This is a fantastic book. I like the approach used to bring the concepts across to the reader. I highly recommend this book.

This book is a novel with the purpose of instructing the reader in the theory of constraints. The book details how one should go about analyzing operations or any system to find, fix and/or optimize the overall structure and the overall process. It is about the analysis of processes and how to structure them and manage them, in view of the constraints contained within them. Anyone interested in accounting, operations management, process management, continuous improvement, etc. should read this book. It is a fast and easy read, but it contains much substantive insight into analyzing and optimizing processes.

I was required to get this book for an operations management course in college. It was definitely an enjoyable read, especially for a business book. The narrative format made for a very easy read. The real world examples offered make the connection between theory and application. We were given this book in place of a textbook, and it was about a million times more entertaining than any textbook.

Stories are one of the best ways to teach. Eliyahu Goldratt is a master at weaving a tale to teach a crucial concept in manufacturing.

The Goal is the story of locating bottlenecks and streamlining a manufacturing line. The story is full of twists and turns, a super consultant named Jonah who speaks in riddles and a cast of believable characters. To make the story even more believable it is spiced with real life problems at home that our hero Alex must solve simultaneously while he is desperately trying to save the plant he is responsible for from closing down.

Goldratt is on a mission to take manufacturing form an art to a science and this is his way of doing just that. The book is well worth the time for anyone interested in using critical thinking and common sense to solve manufacturing problems. Highly recommended!

The Re-Discovery of Common Sense: A Guide to: The Lost Art of Critical Thinking

This book is a very infomative and clear written book. Although it is not a breathe taking novel it is as best written as a text book could be written. Many senerios I found very helpful relating to my own real life experiences in the workplace and the challanges we meet everyday. Definitley well recommended. BUY IT...

I was pretty surprised at how good and informative this book was when I was reading it. It took me almost no effort at all to keep reading. This book gives you a glimpse of the responsibilities a manufacturing management have and the problem that they have to solve. It is an eye opener for anyone in management that is interested in the fundamentals of running a business. The narrator walks you through all the steps and processes on overcoming problems so you'd get a sense of what the logic is behind every solution. One good point that I got out of this book is that don't just follow the common practice, instead use your common sense.

In reading The Goal, I was not completely sure what to expect when I first began to read it. I was told that it was a novel, but at the same time I was being required to read it for an engineering Statistical Quality Control class, so I figured it would be quite interesting to see a novel used to explain something for engineering.

The novel, as soley a a story, was entertaining and brings up many aspects of life that pertain to working and how it relates with having a family. The interesting part about this aspect of the book, is that it utilizes the theory of the book as a whole, which pertains to engineering and manufacturing, showing the theory to be more universal.

The theory that I have spoken of is mainly that of having a goal and making sure that the goal remains the focus. This theory is the basis for all else that is presented in the book, although it is not the only theory presented. The theory of constraints is also spoken of and many other specific thoughts in the area of manufacturing.

Overall, I found this book to be very useful in bringing my view of how to approach problems, and in many ways life, to focus. It was an excellent reminder that we need to remember what we are doing and understand the implications of actions, but most of all, to focus on what we are trying to achieve.

I'll keep this short. Over the years I've read all kinds of books that try to teach you something that more often than not teach you how to sleep while reading. When someone recommended this book to me I thought, here we go again, but I was wrong. This book was fun to read and I had a hard time putting it down. Its goal was to teach you a few things and not one hundred which is how people both learn and retain. I highly recommend this book to everyone and its message goes beyond just manufacturing but can be applied to many different areas both in the work place and out.

If your organization/plant faces the classic problem of Quality, Cost & Delivery: "why can't we consistently get a quality product out the door on time at the cost that can beat the competition?" or if you have a plant manager who is "always promoting some new thing he's doing, and most of the time what he's doing isn't any different from the things everyone else is doing", then you better read this book and make others to read it as well.

This book introduced the Theory of Constraints to the world of business and has made its way to B-Schools as a textbook. Eliyahu Goldratt has done an excellent job in explaining his theory using a novel-style writing. It is a story of a struggling plant manager to improve his plant's performance and save it from closure. The expert in this story provoked the main character to "derive his solutions by supplying the question marks instead of exclamation marks".

Recommended read for every professional in manufacturing.

The concept(s) in this book are a key part of the lean manufacturing grouping of concepts. This is one of the little hinges that swing big doors. It is a high leveragbe activity to identify your constraints and to focus improvements at this constraint.

I found THE GOAL a book written in a direct language. My personal interest toward the topic takes me to look forward to the next book that the author wrote. Perhaps it's not only a question of Economics.

The "Goal" is tied to Fortune Magazine's small business editorial staff taking into consideration the epilogue is dedicated to case interviews by David Whitford, Fortune's "Small Business Editor at Large". To this extent, the book is an editorial for the commercial adventures of the author. On the other hand, unlike other business books, Goldratt manages to keep readers interest between applications by providing the drama of the day-to-day in the life of the principal player in the story, Alex Rogo (Plant Manager) who is positioned in the book to have [only] ninety days to save his plant, job, and marriage. We add to this a general disenchantment by Rogo's managers, the usual skepticism of labor unions, and we have an interesting read.

From a critical review perspective the book misses one important ingredient. There is no index of words or terms. So, the reader becomes displaced in note-taking and highlighting of sentences in the text. Not something all people enjoy when trying to synoptically reference the material; no matter how diligent they might be as scholars. In this regard, the book tries to pass itself off as a novel, when in reality it is a textbook, written in story form.

The story flow is straight forward. The book has a beginning, middle, and an end. Alex Rogo and his working associates deduce along as an academic and consultant named Jonah feeds vignettes of information throughout. Jonah gives Rogo the "Where's Waldo" approach to [a] next-move- dialog: then running to the airport or meeting leaving Rogo to search for answers in the nuanced language of the fog. Rogo then consults his fellow workers, his children, or his, about-to-be, estranged wife for clues to the answer. All while Rogo's boss has Rogo walking a widow's walk with traces of Snidely Whiplash - as Nell [that would be Rogo] remains tied to the railroad tracks. The drama leads to the reader wanting to identify with Rogo and help him prevail in [a] classic fight between good and evil - the company management in this case being uninformed, if not evil.

The book introduces situations known as "constraints" about which Rogo and company are to solve. These constraints revolve around production machines receiving too few, too many, or no production parts at all. Juxtaposed to the shop floor, the on the ground methodology begins with a simple example as Rogo Sheppard's a column of Boy Scouts on their way through the forest and the observation is made that if one of the Scouts does not walk at the same pace as the rest, the column comes apart This writer believes this may be the Goldratt version of Edwards Demining finding an oil spot on shop floor. Anyway, for the reader planning to examine the [whole] book, let me say that there will be times you do associate yourself with certain actors in the story - sometimes in a scary six degrees of separation, both business and personal.

No point in giving away the ending, however, one might imagine that all business books end rather well, and, for the record, please add an index in the next printing.

In the end of this "novel," the protagonist that just managed a massive turnaround of his manufacturing plant is on his way to managerial infamy as the head of the whole division. But first, he has to choose whom from among his through-putting dream team to promote to his former position, Plant Manager. Does he choose the wizened old Controller who is near retirement? Or the engaging, brilliant young number-cruncher? How about the member of his team who has clearly proved herself as the most intelligent, articulate, results-oriented, and focused member of the plant's management (and, incidentally, the only woman who is in a managerial position in the WHOLE BOOK?) Or, could he possibly choose the bear-like neanderthal who disrupts meetings with his foul language and inane suggestions, and whose current job primarily consists of stopping brawls on the plant floor?

Two points for the neanderthal!

In a senseless and ridiculously dated move, the protagonist bypasses the only female in management and, yes, promotes the neanderthal, who seems to lack any of the intellectual capacity and analytical thought of the rest of the management team. But the choice seems to fit, considering that even apes grooming themselves would be able to recognize the idea of a "bottleneck" in the system, and without consulting a Yoda-like physics teacher sage. How "Alex Rogo" managed to get an MBA without ever learning how to manage people--and, for that manner, an Engineering degree without learning how to manage processes--is beyond me.

But I will give Mr. Goldratt one thing--for a sexist, ploddingly simple business man, he writes pretty well. Despite begrudging the underlying assumptions about women in management and nearly pulling my hair out over Alex Rogo's unending questions (we don't even find out until page 40 that the goal of a company is to--gasp!--make money!), I did stay up until past 2 a.m. reading his glittery prose. And that was two days before my assignment on the book was due.

In fact, there's one brilliant scene in particular, with Alex Rogo and said female manager coming home laughingly drunk late one night only to find his estranged wife waiting for them in the dark...it leads me to think that maybe Eliyahu Goldratt should write soap operas.

I have lost count of the number of people to whom I have recommended this book. Whatever area of management you find yourself in, and at every level from business studies student to CEO and CFO, you are bound to pick up something useful from "The Goal."

The story follows the complex life of Alex Rogo as he works at one problem after another. With the help of his old friend, Jonah, he identifies and solves problem after problem, on the road to saving his manufacturing plant, his own job and those of his colleagues, and his marriage. Each problem is broken down into its simplest components so that the real priorities are easily identified and dealt with.

Satisfying the senior management of his company and the accountants that he has turned around the fortunes of his plant proves difficult, but he supports his arguments with solid evidence.

Managers will recognise many of the problems that Alex encounters as, although part of this fiction, they belong to the real world rather than the theoretical text books that they may be used to reading. The story is far from dull and is easy to read and to understand.

What particularly appealed to me, as a practitioner of process modelling and simulation, was the way that these techniques were used to bring about significant business improvements. The power and value of such techniques was ably demonstrated and should encourage many more companies to put them into practice.

Eli Goldratt has succeeded where many have failed, to put these concepts into language that everyone can understand and therefore benefit.

The only negative comment that I have about this book is that I felt that the background story became a little bit tedious towards the end, but the value gained from reading the rest far out-weighed this minor moan.

Buy it. Read it. Improve!

Thare are many other good reviews on this book what else could I add? Well I've read this one just a few days and really liked it but let's face it: it's not a thriller nor is it really a novel. It's just way too linear for that. But don't get me wrong. This is an excellent book but the style fall short of what I would expect from a novel. Nevertheless, it's still a 4 star book because the objective is not so much to be the next "Dan Brown" but to use the narrative as a teaching aid and to this effect it succedes really well.

Perhaps the only thing is that in a real scenario, I suspect that Alex, the main character, would have faced far more resistance especially when you are trying to change an industry norm. This is an endevor equivalent to saying "Everyone else is blind or dumb but listen to me I know what I'm doing". Unless you actually own the business or you can convince the owner, it's probably near impossible to do. Here a "cas de force majeure" gave our hero the necessary leway.

A good and easy read.

I was quite apprehensive before I bought this book because I had heard a few people say that it was a very difficult book to understand and was very hard to read without getting bored. I must say I was pleasantly surprised to find out that once I started reading it I couldn't put it down! It reads like a very interesting fictional novel with the Theory of Constraints as its main focus. I loved the fact that the author included a plot concerning the manager of the plant and his relationship with his wife because that also created another interesting aspect and provided quite a few breaks from the more in-depth, conceptual sections. Overall I give this book 5 stars! Don't be afraid if you have to read this book for a college class or some kind of assignment... you will enjoy it!

A very well written book for anyone involved in the management area of manufacturing. It is uncanny how close the details in this book compare to my day to day experiences. Very entertaining, educational and I highly recommend this reading.

This is a method to improve (production) processes. It also can show you to better manage a department, shop etc. The nice thing however, is that it is not written as a scientific book, but as a novel. The plot is simple. Alex Rogo -plantmanager- has to improve his business in a limited time. If he fails, the plant will shutdown. Together with his staff, he succeeds to turn the downgoing line, and make the plant a good running one!!! I would also recommend, if you missed reading TIN0 GEORGIOU'S masterpiece--THE FATES, go and read it. With fascinating and brilliantly created characters in `THE FATES' coupled with two intertwining plots makes for a completely enjoyable and page-turning read.

Other recommended titles: The Fates: A Novel

I bought this book because it is necessary for my Operation class. But I do not like to read the old story took place over 20 years ago.

Reading a text book has never been so much fun. I read this during my MBA classes. Why won't every author write their book and drive the point home with such fun stories that don't just drive the point home, but also keep it there forever?

"The Goal" is a hilarious novel but with a serious business message particularly with respect to production/operations management. The author expertly wove an intricate story about a plant manager (Alex Rogo) whose factory and marriage are failing into a compelling and convincing explanation about how to deal with constraints and bottlenecks effectively, not only in business but also in everyday life. This is a good captivating read particularly for those who find reading business and management books to be dry and having a soporific effect.

Alex Rogo's life is made very difficult by bottlenecks, constraints, excess inventories and pressure from management that demands efficiency in the factory operations. However, through mastering the theory of constraints (TOC), the appreciation of a business as a system, the effective use of industrial engineering techniques as well as common sense, Alex and his team overcome the problems.

This is an enlightening book that is easy to read and understand for people particularly those who a new to managing an organization. You will learn about the goal of an organization, waste (and how to avoid it), cost structures, team utilization, supply chain bottlenecks, identify improvements, work prioritization and enhance efficiencies.

You will get the most from this book if you also read the Toyota Production System which can fix many of the problems highlighted in this book. Among the highlights of the Toyota Production System are the Just-in-Time inventory system, production leveling, multi-skilling, the pull method of production planning which provides a more comprehensive approach to manufacturing operations. Another useful investment is to get a copy of the classic book "The Fifth Discipline" by Peter Senge (if you have not yet read it). Senge proposes the "systems thinking" method to help companies to become "learning organizations" that integrates all personnel levels and functions (such as production, human resources, finance etc) to increase the ability of the organisation to be more productive and effective.

In summary, this is an outstanding book packed with insightful wisdom that I recommend to employees at all levels in an organization as well as students studying business.

I received this product in good time and condition. Brand New. Saved quite a bit of money over the campus book store price.

The Goal is a well-written book, broadly applicable to anyone in business and to an extent life in general. It is a no-nonsense novel, utilizing and exploring real-life situations and personalities. What I liked most about the book is the integration of "scientific" approach to business, how assumptions are constantly questioned, explored, and reformulated, and how the human element is, albeit slightly, interwoven.

While the most benefit clearly is in manufacturing context, I find the book to be useful and I work in professional services. I akin the Theory of Constraints ("bottleneck management") to Stephen Covey's example of "moving big rocks", hence the applicability to life in general. Said another way, I believe one must focus on the things that are most constraining (the boundaries), and this method of thought is explored in The Goal. The book also interweaves personal experiences into the "core" business theme, which allows for some examination of life outside of work and of course personalizes the story.

Overall, great book and a suggested read for sure.

If you told me that a story about cost accounting in a factory would be interesting I would say you are nutts. However this story is extremely will written & entertaining thru the first 80%. The finish concerning philosophy could be left off.
I would listen to the book until I reached the end of a chapter because it was interesting even when I had arrived at my driving distination.
I do have an accounting background so that may affect my opinion.

The Goal is a fascinating book about the Theory of Constraints which was introduced to the world by Eliyahu Goldratt. I must admit the title didn't appeal much to me, but bought it anyway because it was recommended highly. After reading it, I realized that the title was perfect since it plays well into the questioning that needs to take place in order to identify the constraint or bottleneck in an organization. The book is written as a novel, which makes the book a lot easier to read and also a lot more entertaining
Alex Rogo is a plant manager and at the beginning of the novel is greeted at his plant by the VP who informs him that his production numbers need to improve or they will be shutting down the plant. Of course, during all this mess Rogo is also going through a rocky marriage and throughout the book the reader is taken through the struggle of both issues.
Alex seeks advice from an old Physicist from Israel named Jonah. Jonah takes Alex through the Socratic method of analysis which is the way Alex then communicates with his management team to solve the issues causing the low throughput in the factory. The conversations that take place between Jonah, Alex and the entire management team are extremely interesting and informative. I wonder how often this level of discussion actually takes place, but it sure makes for interesting reading.
A lot of the applications of the theory of constraints, although they take place in the factory, could be easily implemented in all industries.
Mr. Goldratt has written a business book that will remain relevant for many years to come. I highly recommend this incredible business book. Anyone who does business consulting and does not read and use the information on this book is doing his/her clients a great disservice.

This book is not only entertaining and educational, but in actuality represents some of the manufacturing organizations today. It teaches many lessons and fundamentals that one can apply to improve his company. It touches on topics that are highly practiced on the field of industrial and manufacturing companies such as bottleneck operation, process scheduling, theory of constraints, and batch processing. The book transitions from a division plant being in trouble of closing down to its complete turnaround to become not only the most productive division plant, but the plant that saved the company. I thoroughly enjoyed the way Goldratt systematically went through the process of improvement and methods that the plant manager utilized to turn around his division plant. Having studied these topics that the book touched upon prior to reading made it easy for me to see the relevance of what was going on through out the novel. I strongly feel that the insight this novel gave me in regards to the process of ongoing improvement is something that I will be able make good use off in my career.

I expected the Goal to be a typical business book, however was surprised that it was an easy read, most likely because it was in novel form. I was also surprised at the relatable characters and how the plot was developed to include both his professional and personal life. Goldratt did a good job at making the concepts of the story easily understandable, well described, and generally applicable to many different situations. Because of Goldratt's introduction and explanation of the different problem solving methods, the book can be understood by anyone who has a basic knowledge of industry. Overall I thought the book was well written to keep the readers attention and universally relevant and beneficial to anyone in the industry (managers, engineers, operators, etc.). I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in new ideas that can help increase efficiency, understand how to improve systems, and problem solving.

This book is a story about a plant manager which has to turn his plant around before they shut it down. However this book shows and explains many different options available on improving a plant. Like determining the bottleneck in a plant and increasing throughput and decreasing inventory. This book also talks about the theory of constraints (TOC)which is a vital problem in the plant. Also this books shows how stressful it is being in his position and having to deal with his family. Overall this book was really useful and is a really good book. It shows how many plants are across the country. I would recomend this book to all engineering students and anyone else how is in upper management.

The book talked about how to solve problems that I believe many companies face on their production line. I believe this book is very good book for not only people in industries but also for students to learn and see how they can use their knowledge to solve problems that industries faced. This book talks about theory of constraints which is the core problem of many companies along with bottleneck situation. By reading this book I now can see it clearly how all the classes that I took in school are so related in the real life. This book is awesome. Recommended not only for students and industries, but also for those who want to add knowledge to them.

TOC Overview
Defying conventional opinion which says that books on business must be boring, Eli Goldratt introduced to the world his "Theory of Constraints" in this novel published in 1984. Highly readable, the book uses layman's terms to present an unorthodox approach to improving competitive advantage. The novel is written about a manufacturing plant, but its philosophy can be applied to any company that relies on a production process. The book has been called a "Socratic" novel because Goldratt uses a sort of teacher-student discourse method to explain his theories. Today, generally referred to as the TOC (Theory of Constraints) or constraint management, Goldratt's philosophy attempts to re-focus production processes on the single-most important goal common to all free-market business: making money.

The TOC's greatest appeal is its logical simplicity. Like other operation improvement programs, Goldratt is also concerned with reducing waste and generating/sustaining competitive advantage. But Goldratt's perspective is different from other management systems because he approaches the problem with a clean slate. Leaving all traditional operations management jargon behind, Goldratt starts from scratch with both his definitions and his analysis. Nothing in The Goal requires an understanding of abstract business or economic theory. Everything has an immediate application, and Goldratt explains every concept using a real-life analogy. No doubt his background as a physicist contributes to this tendency. By his own admission, he thought of "science as nothing more than an understanding of the way the world is and why it is that way." Likewise, his exploration of an under-performing manufacturing plant in The Goal is a simple yet profound look at how a process works, and why.
The TOC is based on three fundamental principles, and Eli's theory suggests that all companies which keep these premises in mind will make money:
1. The only reason that companies do anything is to make money.
2. Anything that a company does to speed up the processes that generate money is appropriate.
3. Each business operation is one big process with many sub-processes.

The constraint theory is nested with these principles in that all sub-processes of the operation are defined by how much each one limits total production. The most limiting factors are identified hierarchically as constraints. If non-constraint aspects of the process (whether that be a machine or a worker) need to sit idle sometimes in order to match pace with the constraints, that's okay. In fact, it's a necessity or else excess inventory and higher work-in-progress (WIP) levels will result.
Oftentimes, where operations, accounting, and marketing interface within a company presents a conflict of interest, and Goldratt's book contains several examples of this. Performance measurements such as machine productivity stats, for example, are sometimes meaningless indicators because they don't contribute or even correlate to the company's goal. Alex, the plant supervisor, begins to realize this fact when he tries to impress his mentor, Jonah, by telling him how his plant now uses robots at one of the process stations and productivity in that area improved by 36%. Jonah astutely responds by asking if any of the workers were laid off, or if the plant was selling any more products. Alex admits that neither of these had occurred, yet. Jonah then predicted, correctly, that Alex's plant had an excess inventory problem. Adding robots to a non-constraint area didn't increase overall production, it only increased WIP and total production time.

As Goldratt illustrates through Alex's trials and triumphs at the plant, the most fundamental principle of TOC is that all processes must be subordinate to the ultimate goal of making money. The performance measurements of that goal are:
1. Net Profit - an absolute measurement in dollars
2. Return on Investment (ROI) - a relative measure based on investment
3. Cash Flow - a survival measurement

Notice the absence of metrics such as station productivity or worker utilization. Goldratt helps managers mired in traditional thought re-vamp their definitions of performance indicators and the way managers look at making money. Goldratt makes use of three common terms, the correct understanding of which are key to comprehending any business process: throughput, inventory, and operating expenses.

Throughput is the rate at which the system generates money through sales (not the rate of production!). Throughput equals sales revenue minus direct materials cost - it measures the speed at which the company makes money. Inventory is all the money that the system has invested in purchasing things which it intends to sell, or the money currently inside the system. It is the raw materials value tied up in work in progress and unsold finished goods. Large amounts of inventory are undesirable because it means that the company has spent money for product that hasn't generated revenue yet. Put simply, inventory is money. Operational expense is all the money the system spends in order to turn inventory into throughput. This is the money the company must pay out to make throughput happen. All costs of operations other than direct materials costs are operational expenses. The objective is not to reduce operational expense by itself, or improve one measurement in isolation. To achieve the goal, a company must "increase throughput while simultaneously reducing both inventory and operating expense."

Contrary to previous thought on the subject, all production stations achieving max productivity, or all workers working all the time, is a sign that the business as a whole system may be running inefficiently. The sum is greater than its parts. Full utilization of any non-constraint will produce more work in progress than the constraint can handle. This is where TOC differentiates itself from other operations management systems such as TQM and Lean which focus on eliminating waste in every possible corner of the business, speeding up every process increasing "efficiencies". What the TOC does, by contrast, is attempt to increase total system efficiency.

With this in mind, Goldratt details the "how" behind this theory using Five Focusing Steps. These steps should be followed in order by any business considering using the TOC in a way similar to how Alex did in the book. These steps accomplish incremental improvement to the overall operation.
1. Identify the system's constraint(s), and prioritize them according to importance. In this step, the "Herbies" of the plant are identified, so named after an analogy Goldratt uses in the book to explain how the whole operation is only as fast as it's slowest sub-process. The slowest boyscout, Herbie, causes a backlog of hikers on a narrow trail while the faster boys in front of him get further and further ahead. Herbie is a bottleneck.
2. Exploit the system's most critical constraint. In this step, the company looks for ways to get maximum output from the constraint, usually by proper scheduling and control so that the constraint station only works on good inputs. Waste of time and effort occurred in the book when the constraint spent valuable time working on production items that were scrapped by QC later down the line.
3. Subordinate everything else to that constraint. In this step, the whole operations is slowed down to the pace of the constraint. All operation improvement opportunities that would increase productivity of a non-constraint should not be invested in (like the expensive robots which only served to increase WIP inventory).
4. Elevate the system's constraints. Elevating the constraint means to find methods of increasing the capacity of the constraint, such as:
a. Performing regular maintenance on the constraint to prevent breakdowns.
b. Running the constraint for extra shifts.
c. Automating the constraint.
5. Repeat steps 1-4, focusing on a different constraint. However, Goldratt says to be wary of allowing inertia to become the bottleneck itself. Constantly look for the next system constraint, break it, and repeat.
(Goldratt, 1984)

SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats)
Strengths
The most prominent strengths of Goldratt's philosophy, already discussed briefly, are that it's philosophy is simple and its approach to understanding the whole production system is intuitive, logical, and yet profound. However, the theory has been the topic of many optimistic reviews (even after twenty years) because it provides very immediate and positive results to companies. By nature, focusing on the weakest and most critical link in any production chain will generate the greatest amount of improvement in a short amount of time (Spector, 2006).
Weaknesses
One of the weaknesses, or difficulties, inherent to the Theory of Constraints is that multiple bottlenecks can occur within a plant, and sometimes bottlenecks manifest themselves at different workstations at different times, particularly in a balanced plant. Achieving an unbalanced plant is what many manufacturers should, but do not do. Balancing capacity across a sequence of processes; attempting to match capacity with market demand at each work station, is usually detrimental to the system as a whole. Goldratt uses the "match bowl" game to illustrate how floating bottlenecks can occur in a balanced plant. A series of bowls is set on a table (each one representing a station). Matches represent product inventory and one die is used to simulate statistical fluctuations (variation) in performance at each workstation. The bowls are a series of dependent events and each operation has the same capacity (six products per day, or six matches). Each player has a workstation (bowl), and rolls the die to determine how many matches he can take from the previous player's bowl (representing one day's production). On the next turn, each player rolls the die, and again he can only pick up as many matches as are in the previous player's bowl even if he rolled a higher number. The demonstration shows that in a series of dependent events, where each operation has the same amount of capacity (a "balanced" plant), the variation will cause the bottleneck to move from operation to operation (bowl to bowl). Goldratt knew this and combated it by suggesting a version of continuous improvement (see Step Five of the Focusing Steps). It's important to realize that balancing each workstation in isolation against max production will cause excess WIP inventory and bottlenecks. Another weakness/difficulty in implementing TOC is that it is often met with significant emotional resistance, especially by institutionalized business minds. It is difficult to introduce anything knew, especially a philosophy that seems counter-intuitive and unorthodox at the outset. In the book, Alex encounters this defense mechanism amongst his peers and superiors. Goldratt recommends using the Socratic method (the way Jonah does) to elicit the answers from people's own minds, rather than preaching the new methodology. All parts of an organization need to decide together on how best to proceed - if accounting, for example, is kept in the dark, they're likely to be even more hostile towards the new performance metrics.
Opportunities
The opportunities that TOC presents are exciting, especially when applied to old management accounting techniques. There are many accounting "truths" that Goldratt deconstructs quite effectively in his book (Hendricks, 2005). Traditionally, all sub-process improvements were seen as a good thing, but according to Goldratt, "improvement" expenses are wasted if they are spent on non-constraints. Also, another favorite accounting metric, station productivity, can actually lead the plant to make adjustment that detract from the total operating efficiency of the system (or plant).
Threats
The Theory of Constraints, when implemented, is often faced with both internal and external threats. Without everyone "on board," so to speak, it's all to easy to succumb to traditional thought and conventional practices. However, using some uncommon sense and logic in overcoming some of the more prevalent misconceptions is necessary in order to produce results, and ultimately, achieve the goal of making money. It's important to remember that the "TOC is not a panacea for everything. It's not going to solve cultural problems within an organization."

Associated Concepts
Goldratt introduced a new set of jargon to the world of operations management, not afraid to use some rather odd-sounding phrases (e.g., "Jonah," "Evaporating Cloud," or "Reality Tree"). Unfortunately in the early years of development, the Israeli physicist and his unorthodox (but successful) publication of the first business novel ever combined to create an aura of quirkiness amongst the managers who followed his philosophy. In an attempt to "de-cultize" the TOC, it is more commonly referred to as "constraint management." In recent years, constraint management has become a highly applicable business philosophy that can be applied to almost any profit or non-profit organization, and has even been successfully merged into Lean and SixSigma to amplify results.

Potential Areas of Application
The most successful applications of constraint management have occurred in highly competitive industries such as the low-cost airline business and the hardware technology production business. One example of this success is Seagate Technology LLC, a hard disk drive producer with 42,000 employees worldwide. The company experienced unprecedented results after adopting both Six Sigma and later, constraints management. After introducing SixSigma in 1998 and experiencing positive but plateaued results, Seagate's projects lacked the prioritization and the constraint focus that the TOC could, and did, provide. After superimposing the principles of constraint management on top of it's already-established system of SixSigma, the company increased production completion by 80%, and the number of projects completed in three months or less (half the time of the company's previous average of 6 months), was increased by 70% in just 90 days. Constraint management looks at the system as a whole, identifies limiting factors, and works to ensure a harmonious "team" operation of all workstations within the production line. Also called "synchronous manufacturing," (in contrast to the dated notion of a "balanced" plant), Goldratt's approach revolutionized the way operations managers and accountants work in unison to achieve the Goal.

A very interesting book. I am currently studying for my CIMA exams and have found it very useful. An interesting way to learn (reading a novel with accounting principles behind it).

THE GOAL is written as a novel to help the reader understand the significance of the Theory of Constraints (TOC) in an actual business environment. Therefore, the reader needs to keep in mind this book is useful as an instructional tool not as an entertaining work of fiction. The main character, Alex Rogo, is the newly appointed, highly educated manager of a plant that's always behind schedule with really high cost. Alex must balance his efforts to save both the failing plant and his marriage.

Jonah, Alex's mentor, represents Goldratt. He consistently provides guidance to Alex- not by giving him the answer, rather, by providing a simple hint that encourages Alex to think about a viable solution for the plant. Alex finds this Socratic Method to be useful to pinpoint the various problems within the plant and finds it is also useful to determine what the problems are with his failing marriage. Rather than find this insulting, it is a great example of how TOC and the Socratic Method can be used in many areas.

The most favorable element of this book is the ability to follow Alex's thinking process. If Jonah were to spoon-feed Alex the answers, the reader would probably take for granted the difficulty in the bottleneck evaluation process of a business or any process. The pace of the book is great as well. It's slow enough to follow the logic of the entire problem resolution process, but fast enough where the reader is not bored by an over examination of detail. One factor I did find frustrating is the fear of failure Alex possesses. He was promoted because of his abilities and experience. However, he is afraid of making a decision without the guidance of Jonah. This does change midway in the novel when Jonah is unavailable for one of their pow-wow sessions and Alex is forced to play the role of Jonah with his team. It is during this time that he shows his charisma and why he is the team leader.

This book is a nice novel about a factory manager encountering typical problems in his company as: bad delivery performance, low quality and high cost. The story itself builds on the theory of constraints and covers many aspects, addressed by modern manufacturing insights from Quick-Response-Manufcturing (bottle-neck problems and its improvement, wrong understanding of utilisation at workstations, misleading accounting policies, hot-job disturbances, design for manufacturing, purchase and lot size flaws, queueing theory, influence of labour unions, tagging jobs etc.).

Even though the book will not provide the explicit theory behind the scene, it describes very well the problems we often find in companies even this days. The book covers not only softfactors than contains a lot of true findings about accounting and the often misleading interpretation of numbers we still have in the 21st century.

For people interested in operational improvement you should read books as Quick-Response-Manufacturing, Factory Physics or others. I read this book already 4 times and as your knowledge about the "mechanics" of operations grows, the book will be even more interesting, because for most of the problems arising in this novel you will recognize the flaw behind traditional thinking and what could be the solution.

What I liked most in the book is, that you always have to go where the problems are - so this is nothing else than the japanese genchi genbutsu (go see your self). Whether you work in operations ore anywhere, asking always questions about what is really going on and questioning of traditions and old policies often leads to real improvements.

May be one of the niciest business novels ever,
Best Regards,

Oliver

My accounting professor assigned this book, saying it is required reading for Harvard MBA school along with many other schools and new hires in business. However, the further I progressed in the book the more and more I wondered how that is possible. The writing style is for children. Eliyahu Goldratt is very juvenile in the way he handles descriptions, sentence structure, internal monologue, etc. The plot is very cliche and predictable. The main character, who is supposedly highly educated and is a factory manager, thinks and acts as if he never attended a day of class. His wife, the leading woman in the story, is the weakest female character I have ever seen in a book or movie.

In my class, many people postulated that this book was not meant to be a novel, as much as an example for the importance of the theory of constraints. But even if that is true, the probability that the initial circumstances in the book would coexist is of such low possibility, that I would safely say it is outside the relevant range. Therefore, trying to read this book to gain knowledge or insight into optimization or manufacturing is very hampered and wasted time. If you want to learn something about theory of constraints, I recommend reading a math optimization textbook instead.

Although I am not in manufactuing fields, this book still inspires me in many ways. This is a must read for any MBA-bound.

Good book in general, but personally it was a textbook for our class..

I realize it's not just a course requirement and that some business people may actually want to read this book. it does give some interesting perspectives and I would recomment it for someone who's interested in the material. Not real entertaining, but does give you soem unique perspectives on business processes.

I have read a lot of management/process books and I have to say I enjoyed this one. The points are made by telling a story. Great book for people in companies looking at lean manufacturing.

I would recommend this book to most people in business school and to any business owners involved in manufacturing. For the business owners, I think that after reading it, you will strongly recommend that your employees read it.

I read The Goal as a part of the required reading for my Operations Management class at Columbia Business School. I bought the audio version of the book so I could "read" it while commuting to work. I have to say, that I really enjoyed this book; it is not your typical business book, but rather a novel with business concepts.

You follow the story of Alex Rogo, a plant manager facing operation challenges. Alex's plant is neither productive nor profitable and has three months to show an improvement or the plant will be shut down. As you follow Alex through both professional and personal challenges, lessons in operations are sprinkled in between. The examples where very simple yet so clear, e.g., the match stick game he plays at a camping event with his son. And what would an operations book be without discussing bottlenecks. After you read this book, whenever you encounter a bottleneck (or someone really slow on a line), you will call it Herbie. The only negative I have about this book it that it tends to drag toward the end. Overall, "The Goal" is a very enjoyable read with very good operational concepts; it changes the way I look at things.

Below are some of my notes from the earlier chapters in the book.

Goal: To Make Money

Measurements: Net Profit, ROI, Cash Flow

Throughput is the rate at which the system generates money through sales (not production). Throughput is the money coming in.

Inventory is all the money that the system has invested in purchasing things which it intends to sell. Inventory is the money currently inside the system. Inventory is money.

Operational Expense is all the money the system spends in order to turn inventory into throughput. Operational Expense is the money we have to pay out to make throughput happen.

To achieve the goal we need to "increase throughput while simultaneously reducing both inventory and operating expense."

Increased efficiency => increased inventory => increased cost => cost per parts down? No, more inventory is adding to operational expense => Sales Volume matters

All employee time, whether it's direct or indirect, idle time or operating time, or whatever--is operational expense.

If something helps turn inventory into throughput, then it is operational expense. If you intend to sell something, then it is inventory.

The goal is not to reduce operational expense by itself. The goal is not to improve one measurement in isolation. The goal is to reduce operational expense and reduce inventory while simultaneously increase throughput.

This book is easy to read, gives useful advice, and is a must read for individuals in the manufacturing industry.

I remember this was the first full English non-fiction book I read.
I was amazed the way 'The Goal' was written. I suggest every one to read this book irrespective of their official position. The author talks about not the process but stresses on practical and common sensed approach.
In short this book is a good example for how to find solutions from your routine life experience to real life problems.
I wish to give this book to my son.

This book explains the theory of constraints and lets you identify bottlenecks in processes. Also consider "Critical Chain" as a level two book to read after understanding the fundamentals. Apply knowledge to management of projects and people as well, not just production.

Good theories but present in practical version. Easy to understand and not boring to read through.

I have been a devotee of The Goal for many years. Having read that "photocopies of his manuscript became an underground classic among CEOs" really drew me to the first reading. The book reads like a detective novel - can't put it down. Having recommended it highly for many years, I was surprised when my son, a university senior, mentioned that the Theory of Constraints was being discussed in his Business Operations class and he was one of only two students who were familiar with Golldratt and The Goal. He said all those years of listening to me rant paid off! This was a copy for him as a Christmas present. He read it over the break and loved it. I had an opportunity to read some of the case studies in the back of this new edition. I'll be soon ordering more copies, for myself and also for 2 or 3 business owners/executives I know who are in industries discussed in those case studies.
In my opinion, should be required reading in high school or, certainly, university. Any business owner can find great value in this book.

I read this book for an Operations Management class in business school and was fascinated with Goldratt's narative style as well as the sheer range of operational issues he addresses. Set up as a novel, the book demonstrates the importance of defining clear goals at the onset of any enterprise and leveraging the expertise of a team to improve the bottom line. By the the time you finish, you will attain a solid understanding of concepts such as throughput, inventory and capacity.

If you want to be introduced to the theory of constraints in a thorough, easy to read novel format, then this is the book for you. It takes TPS to a level that is easy to teach from and a joy to read. Discover what your Herbie's are.

If you are in any type of managerial position, this book is a must read. Too many points to write here. Just buy the book. You will be glad you did.

Got my attention from the very first page.Anyone involved in manufacturing will identify with the characters and storyline. I was amazed how easily my thinking could change after working more than 20 years in operations. Problems and solutions become more obvious. We are already applying some of Goldratt's logic with fantastic results not just on cost savings but with staff morale as well.
Surprised myself with a whole new way of thinking..contrary to what seemed to be the most efficient way of doing things.

very good book, i really liked reading; it's written in novel style and i believe this is efficient form to explain models and concept even in business!

Too much about this book is already written and I am not going to add anything new. I normally choose light weight (but interesting) books during my flight journey and this one is like a novel than the business book.

Perfect blend of business +Story , and this should be recommended to B-Schools as an ancillary subject.

-Gopal