“The Goal” and its implications for creative production

I’ve talked previously on The Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt.

The book was aimed at manufacturing but it has larger implications.

To recap what “The Goal” is:

The Goal = to make money

How?

“To reduce operational expense and reduce inventory while simultaneously increasing throughput.”

Operational Expense = What it costs (e.g. labour) to make a product

Inventory = Work in progress (WIP)

Throughput = Sales

Let’s look at this at something I’m trying to do – write music.

The Goal = to write great songs

(full disclaimer – i’ve just embarked on this journey and haven’t yet done this or even got close)

Operational Expense = My time and effort

Inventory = Song ideas (riffs, lyrics, melodies, etc.)

Throughput = Published Songs

So to maximise creativity, I need to optimise the above three things. Anchoring it to the original sentence in the book:

“To reduce operational expense and reduce inventory while simultaneously increasing throughput.”

What does this mean for my song writing?

Inventory – Don’t spend too long trying to perfect a song or section. WIP must be shipped out quickly!

Operational Expense – With every iteration of making a song, I get faster, Creativity is a process as much as it is a conjuring of ideas.

Throughput – This will increase as I manage Inventory and Operational Expense (Song pipelines)

Then next time and next time I’ll be able to do it faster and faster and then I can spend more time optimising inventory and writing better songs more quickly.

I’ll write more as I see how I go.