It becomes obvious, then, that it is critical to build a connection between these three measures and what goes on in the plant…down to every employee on the factory floor. The management team agrees on three metrics to determine if the plant is making money: net profit, return on investment (ROI), and cash flow. And an action that takes away from making money is non-productive. He finally decides that making money is the appropriate goal and so, based on the guru’s definition of productivity, an action that moves the plant toward making money is productive. The plant manager wonders if the goal is cost-effective purchasing, employing good people, high technology, producing quality products, capturing market share, customer satisfaction, etc. Every action that does not bring a company closer to its goal is not productive.' This demands the question: What is the goal? 'Every action that brings a company closer to its goal is productive. First, he takes what can be a complicated subject, productivity, and defines it simply as the act of bringing a company closer to its goal. Given three months to turn the plant around, the plant manager turns to a manufacturing guru who has a unique and potentially risky approach to addressing the problems. Collectively they wonder why they can’t consistently get a quality product out the door on time at the cost that can beat competition. Shipments are constantly late and there exists months of production backlog, yet inventories of finished and in-process goods are soaring. In the story, the manufacturing operation’s management team is struggling to return what was once a successful plant to profitability so it won’t get closed down by ownership.

As the characters 'think logically and consistently about their problems they are able to determine 'cause and effect' relationships between their actions and the results.' Written as a novel, it is about a process of continual improvement based on a company’s manufacturing operations but relevant to all organizations because it’s about people trying to understand what makes their world tick so that they can make it better. Subtitled 'A Process of Ongoing Improvement,' the first edition of The Goal was printed in 1984. Bezos said he used these books as frameworks for sketching out the future of the company, and one of the books they read and discussed was The Goal. My curiosity was piqued when I saw the article entitled ' Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Had His Top Execs Read These Three Books.' Bezos is an avid reader and this past summer he hosted all-day (yes, all day!) book clubs with Amazon’s top executives.

The goal eliyahu goldratt summary