Our History

Goldratt Research Labs (GRL) was founded in 2007 by Dr. Alan Barnard, on request of Dr. Eli Goldratt, the creator of Theory of Constraints (TOC), to create a research organization that would be a spearhead for new Theory of Constraints based research and development to help accelerate and test the ever growing TOC body of knowledge.

GRL is part of the Goldratt Group, founded in 2001, which also includes Goldratt Consulting, Goldratt Marketing and Goldratt Schools.

Our Focus

GRL focuses on developing research partnerships with especially the more complex private and public sector organizations to find innovative and sustainable ways to achieve more of their goal units, in less time with the same or less resources.

We employ a robust research methodology that starts with:

Quantifying the extent and system wide consequences of problems,
Identifying and validating root cause hypotheses,
Developing viable win:win:win solutions in collaboration with key stakeholders to identify all the necessary and sufficient changes to achieve the desired level of performance as well as the best sequence of implementation in the form of a Strategy and Tactic tree
Testing and continuous improvement of these solutions through "proof-of-concept" pilots.

To ensure sustainability of changes and continuous improvement GRL provides experienced TOC experts - all certified by TOCICO to:

Audit the implementation of recommended changes to pro-actively identify and overcome unexpected implementation obstacles; and
Assist organizations and their IT partners in implementing these TOC best practices within their IT systems.

Our Vision

Since the start of the development of Theory of Constraints over 30 years ago, there have been thousands of successful TOC implementations in almost every industry and application imaginable. The “Theory of Constraints Handbook”, published by McGraw Hill in 2010, provides an overview of the incredible scope of TOC applications today. These do not only include manufacturing, distribution and project based organizations, but also service-based organizations, city councils, schools, hospitals and even prisons.

We believe that despite the great successes already achieved, we are only now ready to discover the full implication and application of managing and improving systems holistically by managing system constraint(s), and the importance of understanding the human aspect of such a change. Considering the continued exponential growth in population and complexity of the world we live in, we believe that the most significant contribution of TOC over the next 30 years will be its application to help us to better exploit (and not waste) our scarcest resources - our finite natural resources and on a personal level, our limited time, attention and motivation - wasted by doing the many things we should not do and not doing the few things we should.

As a research organization, we want to contribute to advancing the application of existing TOC knowledge to more fields and to develop new TOC knowledge to help individuals, organizations and governments better manage these scarce and finite resources for the benefit of all.

Who We Are

Dr. Alan Barnard, CEO Goldratt Research Labs
South Africa

Dr. Alan Barnard is recognized as one of the leading TOC Experts in the world. For the last 15 years, he has worked with Dr. Eli Goldratt on developing new TOC knowledge and leading TOC analysis and implementations for typically large and complex organizations from both the private sector and the public sector. He has applied TOC to achieve his personal goal of helping organizations and individuals identify and unlock their inherent potential.

Dr. Barnard is CEO of Goldratt Research Labs, Director of Goldratt Group Africa, Chairman of Realization Africa, Chairman of African Phosphates and Chairman of The Odyssey Institute.

He was a founding board member and chairman of TOCICO (Theory of Constraints Certification Organization) from 2003-2005, currently serves as chair for the TOCICO Business Strategy Certification committee and received the TOCICO Lifetime Membership award in 2006.

Dan Klarman, TOC Expert
Israel

Dan acquired a Master’s degree in Physics from Tel-Aviv University and held several managerial positions in various fields (including the military, education, R&D and security) before plunging into the world of TOC to become a consultant.

In 2010 Dan started freelance work for Goldratt Research Labs and joined officially in 2012. In this role he has facilitated training and improvement initiatives with organizations that include the State of Utah, Random House Publishing, SAP, Tata Steel and others, and have assisted in numerous TOC Odyssey programs around the globe. Dan collaborates on development and implementation for Harmony Software.

He has accumulated experience in teaching and implementing TOC processes and enjoys seeing people make major breakthroughs for themselves and realize the vision they have for their organizations. His focus strengths include special implementations of DBM and S-DBR, as well as using TOC for value add in ERP implementations.

Paula Weyler, TOC Expert
California, United States

Paula began her journey into Theory of Constraints in 2007 as a TOC implementation manager for a medium-sized custom manufacturing firm in the US. Working with Goldratt Consulting, she led a team to implement S-DBR in an environment that required the testing and development of new TOC knowledge. After securing dramatic improvements in operational performance, which yielded both on time delivery and quality over 95%, she was promoted to VP of Sales and Marketing for the firm. In this role, she used TOC sales processes to double sales in 3 years.

During this time, she also participated in the annual TOC Odyssey program to apply the Thinking Processes to the personal lives of participants.

Paula is passionate about using TOC to dramatically improve both her clients’ lives and the performance of their organizations.

In 2012 Paula joined Goldratt Research Labs, one of the leading organizations in developing and testing new TOC knowledge. In this role she has facilitated training and improvement initiatives with organizations that include the State of Utah, Random House Publishing, and SAP. Her training workshops help clients realize their visions for significant growth and improvement, while creating harmony in the organization. She also facilitates new development, marketing, training and implementation of Harmony Software.

Dr. Barry Morgenstern, TOC Expert
Connecticut, United States

Barry holds a PhD in Special Education and Applied Behavior Analysis. He is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst who trains teachers, parents, and therapists to work with children with autism and other developmental disorders. He has 20 years experience in a wide variety of settings and is currently the CT Director of Research for The Institute of Professional Practice.

His current research interest focuses on testing the extent that the Theory of Constraints can improve services for children with autism.

He has worked with TOC at the International Odyssey Program, as well as applications for the State of Utah.

Dr. Filippo Pescara, TOC Expert
Italy

Filippo Pescara is a doctor in electronic engineering (from University of Ancona) and he holds an MBA in managerial engineering from Polytechnic of Milan. His interest in TOC started in 1993 when he read the goal for the first time. He’s a TOC practitioner since 1995.

Filipo engages in both consultancy and educational projects. He works on holistic projects in medium sized companies in Italy and cooperates with industrial associations and universities holding conferences, educational projects and seminars.

In 1999 he was the Italian facilitator of the GSP in a class composed by different companies in Bologna. He taught TOC operations and logistics for two years as an adjunct professor at the University of Ancona (Italy) in the academic years 2003-2004 and 2004-2005. He is a consulting partner of Inherent Simplicity since January 2008.

In 2011 Dr. Alan Barnard asked him, on the advice of Eli Goldratt who knew about his research and developments in the field of Strategy & Tactics Trees and the Thinking Processes (he presented some of his findings and results to Eli on May 2010), to be part of the Goldratt Research Labs.

Do you manage a COMPLEX environment and are you under pressure to DO MORE in LESS TIME with LESS RESOURCES?

Are you interested in discovering whether there could be a simple, robust solution for achieving and sustaining a step-change improvement in such an environment?

IF you answered YES and YES... you are welcome to contact Dr. Alan Barnard at alan@goldrattresearchlabs.com to discuss a possible research partnership with Goldratt Research Labs