The Goal – Still a Good Read after All These Years

This book came up in a conversation with a friend and got me thinking about just how good of a read this was.

 

One element of this dicussion that is still resonating with me is the observation that individuals in organizations are so focused on their process area that they stop thinking about top and bottom line impact to the business.  I really like the Goal because it helps me think about project and change management in these terms.  One example is a project I had in ’98.  No one else on the project team was excited about it because it was (in their mind) a boring inventory/replenishment project  for a retail chain.  When we talked about the business impact of reducing carry costs for inventory, and how small reductions across hundreds of stores resulted in big improvements in cash flow everyone was a little more interested.  They became downright excited when we started talking about driving sales by improving service levels.  A ½% improvement in ‘in stock’ levels can drive a lot of sales.  This is a long winded way of saying that understanding your processes purpose in supporting top and bottom line results is important.  Goldratt’s books bring that home for me.  I’ve thought about having, “The GOAL is to make MONEY!” tattooed on my chest.  He’s written further on this in terms of supply chain, project management and software development.  All good reads.