Haystack Syndrome: Sifting Information Out of the Data Ocean

This is one of the best books on business administration I've ever read. OK, reading the final chapters related to information systems might be somewhat boring, but Part I alone is worth the highest praise. Why? Because it tears apart the obsolet Cost Accounting paradigms and other Jurassic sacred cows of the traditional administration that still nowadays, in the vast majority of the companies, lead business leaders to wrong decisions, with severe damage to the financial performance of companies and even countries! For example, if you read this book with an open mind you will learn that product cost is nothing more than an "accounting phantom" that haunts our daily routine and prevents us from seeing the whole picture and reaching to the best decisions for the company's objective. Moreover, Goldratt's system of Throughput Accounting is so much simpler that you'll be amazed about why we needed a physicist from Israel to teach us the obvious, common-sense thinking. The answer here is that common-sense is the least common of all resources, and learning to see the obvious simplicity in the middle of so much complexity created by ourselves is not obvious at all. Read, or better, study the book, and be prepared for mental challenges!

I think Goldratt is an excellent business consultant with excellent ideas to make your business a lot more profitable.

This book gives you the best guidelines to the planning and scheduling world. It is easy readable, but be careful. The theory looks easy, but it isn't. Read again and again, and the value of the book increases.Specially the last section is dynamite.

Goldratt plunges directly to the heart of the matter. Decision makers need information that will help them understand the likely results following from their choices. Most managerial accounting systems offer (at best) a glance at where an organization has been. Beginning with understanding the questions decision makers must answer to make effective decisions, Goldratt moves to how one might go about building an INFORMATION (NOT data) system which can offer up the answers to those questions.Unfortunately, the valuable result will be heavy going for many readers. Particularly, the more narrowly one has specialized, the less likely it is that one will have the breadth of understanding needed to grasp the whole without help from one's associates. Team reading with an IT person, an accounting person, a manufacturing person, and an executive in the team should add value for all readers and their organization.

This book separates those readers who get TOC at a deep level from those who don't. It's not easy reading because it makes you think -- hard at times. But if you stick with it and really comprehend it, the last section is just as valuable as the first two.