Just finished listening to "The Goal" by Eliyahu Goldratt. It was required "reading" for my Supply Chain Management class. It is a teaching tool about managing operations cleverly disguised as a novel. The story is about a plant manager named Alex Rogo who is faced with a problem of his plant being closed in three months if he doesn't improve performance. The reader is taken through Alex's journey of discovering that previous measurements of performance were not sufficient to accomplish their goals. In fact, they determined the goal was not to push products out of their warehouse, but to make money. In this case that was done through increasing net profit, ROI, and cash flow. At the plant level that goal translated into increasing throughput, while reducing inventory and operating expense.
The details are not as important as the fact this manager questioned some fundamental assumptions of how to deal with their objectives and what they should be.
Also, interlaced in this management story is a bunch of family drama! Rogo and his wife get into a rough part of their relationship as a result of his intense work schedule. It definitely keeps the story interesting! Don't worry, it all works out in the end, in case you were wondering.
If you ever want a good book on learning about business and operations (and maybe relationships, lol), this is certainly an entertaining way to do it!
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