Evolved Technologist ® -

What follows is a review of the Perfect Plant book by Adolf Allesch, Global SAP NetWeaver Lead Partner, IBM Global Business Services:

In my practice I have invested in numerous books and articles searching for a comprehensive piece of work that ties the challenges of manufacturing with useable, actionable enterprise software implementation. In Search of the Perfect Plant sets new ground in understanding a realistic approach to true actionable improvements for plant operations.

Most books take a very academic approach to these daunting problems. In search of the Perfect Plant is written in dialog format which makes it applicable for theorists as well as practitioners. Every chapter does an artful job of presenting today's manufacturing challenges and makes the connection to the applicable application, improvement process, and technology needed to overcome it.

I found that most practitioners and clients have varied perspectives on this topic based upon who they are (functional experience) and the MFG theory (Lean, TQM, Six Sigma, JIT, ect.)they align with. The book demystifies the this problem, which aided me in my practice.

I found the categorization of plant operations especially useful in applying the text as part of transformational efforts. The first being "the essence of production" including the production process of strategy and coordination, planning and execution. The second category called "taking care of the plant from the inside" includes optimizing performance by focusing on asset management, energy management, and quality management. The third category of "broad and looking at the big picture" concentrates on visibility, flexibility, and change. The chapters dealing with this third category takes all the pressing issues related to visibility, compliance, risk, architecture, standards, interoperability, and change management and puts them into context for a larger organizational perspective.

Whenever I want to get everyone on the same page in how we think about and connect manufacturing issues to larger organizational transformation, this book is at the top of the reading list for everyone.