Its not Goal its GOLD !!! . Review on The Goal - Eliyahu M Goldratt

You are a Plant manager in a manufacturing company , and six months into the job , your plant is in a mess and totally in the red , orders are not being shipped regularly , snarls and shouts are common among the customers and the bosses. Reaching home past Ten every day at home doesn’t do any good either , your wife is alone the entire day and is quite upset and so are the Kids.

One fine day your boss steps in and finding the plant in a mess retorts “ 90 days is all you have my friend, to make this plant a profit centre or else it shall be closed.” A tired and weary man … you are confronted at home with your wife , who will take no more of this “ Love for the company ” and is going over to her mother’s .

SO MY FRIEND IN THIS SITUATION WHAT SHALL YOU DO?

Author’s Profile

A startling fact I noted was that this book, which is a management student’s Bible has not yet been reviewed in Mouthshut. Eliyahu Goldratt is the author of this book and hails from the land of Milk and honey – Israel. He has been the myth shatterer in case of management and manufacturing related concepts. He calls Cost accounting as the Enemy number one of Productivity …Can I see those ICWA’s raising their eyebrows !!! He has revolutionized Production management and has got in concepts like Just in time to actual practice pooh poohing EOQ and other concepts on the way.

The Goal is the first book he wrote and it rocked the world , managers used to depend on his book heavily at one point of time. Now though the background of a factory has changed and is more modern. However his other books like Its not luck, Critical chain, Necessary but not sufficient are quite up to date and equally successful.

The book

Alex Rogo is the protagonist in this story and he’s perplexed on what to do about his company. Suddenly his remembers a colleague from Student days , an Israeli called Jonah ( this character very skillfully tries to depict Eli Goldratt himself ). Jonah is a successful consultant and is different in his approach of knowledge sharing , he gives a hint and leaves the thinking to you , which leaves Alex thinking about saving himself from the Damocles’ Sword.

The questions that Jonah asks are primarily What is the Goal of your Company, Why are your inventories piling up through the roof and still you are not able to ship in orders on time ?, What are bottlenecks in the assembly line, How do you identify , leave alone solve the problem ?.

Data flows through the computer, sheets and sheets of it , how do you actually sift information from the same. (Discussed in detail in The Haystack Syndrome)

This story deals with Alex setting the plant right, the plant which doesn’t know which order must be shipped first , when to effectively order raw materials, how to manage the pile of inventory and how to ship in time. Unless you ship in time, how can you ensure the next order ?.

Along with machinery, stock, profits and the like are some roses , some love , some endearing moments in which Alex tries to win back his love from his wife. Startling discoveries which he makes from simple ordinary situations are later used in the assembly line processes.

The verdict

I am personally upset with this review , I just can keep writing but I shall give away the urge to read the book and the very essence of the book. This has been one of the marvelous books that I have read so far. I have read it once and realized that once is just not enough … and I now have a copy at home.

The art of explaining complex production management in the form of a fiction like story is simple unparrarel to any other knowledge based books I have read earlier.

Except The Goal no other books are easily available in India. This book is available with the paper vendors of Churchgate station. But the other books have to be imported and cost at least Rs 1000 and more . My organization has been grateful enough to get the entire series in for us “Book starved ”employees.

Well if all my Gushing about the book and the author has not worked, I reiterate, are you a manager or a management student or just a person thirsty for knowledge , pick this up and you wont regret … my assurance