This book is nowhere near it's predecessor 'The Goal', but it's still a very good book. If you've read the previous book this will add to the experience and will give you insight in some new sectors the theory of constraints can be applied to.

It is not hard to read any of the books by Goldratt, as they read like a business novel. However, it will make you think about certain processes like it's the one million dollar one. That's what makes this series good; motivational writing and plain problem solving. Hey, who didn't like puzzles when they were kids?

Liked the first one? Then get this one, as it is the second best of the series.

This book truly is a sequal to the goal. In the goal we were introduced the important topic of throughput, inventory and operational expenses. On throuput we learnt how "work" flows through a process, how to manage buffers and when to introduce work into the system. We see how inventory is just held-up cash and why we should try to minimize it within the limits of our constraints. Finally, on operational expenses, we see how cost accounting can really distort the reality and that having excess capacity can actually be a good thing.

In this book the author doesn't just repeat the process at a higher level. Instead we are introduced to new material: the Thinking Process. This is a toolkit for problem solving tools, which make us question our assumptions. These tools are named "Current & Future Reality Trees", "Pre-requisite Tree", "Transition-Tree" and "Negative Branch Reservations". As the story unfolds, our hero is busy applying the Thinking Process in sales in order to generate a leap in profits.

At times, I found the book to be a bit "verbose" in the sense that reading a series of almost repeating if-then statements can be somewhat tedious. But there are some small diagrams that help you follow. All in all, I liked the book but it's an introduction not a manual. Neither this book nor the previous is much more than an introduction to the topic.

For a more in-depth look at the Theory of Constraints and to gain sufficient knowledge to apply it to a business, you would definitely need another book.

Goldratt takes us through he paces again, but this time not quite as ground breaking and informative as the Goal. Of course the Goal remains standard reading for all young managers in any sort of manufacturing environment, and the TOC is a baseline concept that they should wrap their mind around. This book is good and adds a little refinement on top of the previous books, but should definitely be down in the pile. Start with the Goal, and keep this book on the low priority / rainy day list.

Another Goldratt teaching novel that teaches his thinking processes in story format. Fun reading. Inspires trying to solve work process problems that are hard because the current reality has contradictions in it. Setting is far from most workplaces, but then so are spy novels. Read the story for fun, and then read Scheinkopf's Thinking for a Change: Putting the TOC Thinking Processes to Use to learn the methods.

Great book! My first intention was not to buy this book. It was suggested to me. It ended up being very good. I'm glad that Amazon suggested it to me.
Thank you