Free The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement by Eliyahu Goldratt

be working, but are they productive?
    For a moment, I consider going back and telling the supervisor to make those guys actually produce. But, well . . . maybe there really isn’t anything for them to work on right now. And even though I could perhaps have those guys shifted to someplace where they could produce, how would I know if that work is helping us make money?
    That’s a weird thought.

Can I assume that making people work and making money are the same thing? We’ve tended to do that in the past. The basic rule has been just keep everybody and everything out here working all the time; keep pushing that product out the door. And when there isn’t any work to do, make some. And when we can’t make work, shift people around. And when you still can’t make them work, lay them off.

I look around and most people are working. Idle people in here are the exception. Just about everybody is working nearly all the time. And we’re not making money.

Some stairs zig-zag up one of the walls, access to one of the overhead cranes. I climb them until I am halfway to the roof and can look out over the plant from one of the landings.

Every moment, lots and lots of things are happening down there. Practically everything I’m seeing is a variable. The complexity in this plant—in any manufacturing plant—is mind-boggling if you contemplate it. Situations on the floor are always changing. How can I possibly control what goes on? How the hell am I supposed to know if any action in the plant is productive or non-productive toward making money?

The answer is supposed to be in my briefcase, which is heavy in my hand. It’s filled with all those reports and printouts and stuff that Lou gave me for the meeting.

We do have lots of measurements that are supposed to tell us if we’re productive. But what they really tell us are things like whether somebody down there "worked’’ for all the hours we paid him or her to work. They tell us whether the output per hour met our standard for the job. They tell us the "cost of products,’’ they tell us "direct labor variances,’’ all that stuff. But how do I really know if what happens here is making money for us, or whether we’re just playing accounting games? There must be a connection, but how do I define it?

I shuffle back down the stairs.

Maybe I should just dash off a blistering memo on the evil of reading newspapers on the job. Think that’ll put us back in the black?
    By the time I finally set foot inside my office, it is past five o’clock and most of the people who might have been waiting for me are gone. Fran was probably one of the first ones out the door. But she has left me all their messages. I can barely see the phone under them. Half of the messages seem to be from Bill Peach. I guess he caught my disappearing act.
    With reluctance, I pick up the phone and dial his number. But God is merciful. It rings for a straight two minutes; no answer. I breathe quietly and hang up.
    Sitting back in my chair, looking out at the reddish-gold of late afternoon, I keep thinking about measurements, about all the ways we use to evaluate performance: meeting schedules and due dates, inventory turns, total sales, total expenses. Is there a simplified way to know if we’re making money?
    There is a soft knock at the door.

I turn. It’s Lou.

As I mentioned earlier, Lou is the plant controller. He’s a
    paunchy, older man who is about two years away from retirement. In the best accountants’ tradition, he wears horn-rimmed bifocal glasses. Even though he dresses in expensive suits, somehow he always seems to look a little frumpled. He came here from corporate about twenty years ago. His hair is snow white. I think his reason for living is to go to the CPA conventions and bust loose. Most of the time, he’s very mild-mannered—until you try to put something over on him. Then he turns into Godzilla.
    "Hi,’’ he says from the door.

I roll my hand, motioning him to come