Author: Walter Thrun
Product and process technology has grown at a faster pace than the development of critical financial measures that guide manufacturers in making key decisions. Maximizing Profit addresses this issue in simple, no-nonsense language, with practical techniques that help managers measure the financial effects of typical manufacturing decisions, assess their impact on plant profitability, and understand why current practices are counterproductive. The focus of efforts in recent years has been on execution-based skills. The author contends that if we do not first identify the wrong things being done in the plant, with meaningful financial measures, then we will only be sharpening our execution-based skills to do the wrong things better. Employing a hypothetical case study, based on the author’s actual experiences, Maximizing Profit guides you through a series of common manufacturing decisions such as product mix, process improvement, make-or-buy, and capital investment. You can follow along step-by-step as the team sheds prior assumptions and uses optimization techniques to inform of their decisions. A CD, with an easy-to-use Excel spreadsheet tool and optimization algorithm, is included with the book so that you can try things out for yourself.
