{"id":113,"date":"2021-12-22T09:01:33","date_gmt":"2021-12-22T09:01:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/?p=113"},"modified":"2021-12-27T21:41:38","modified_gmt":"2021-12-27T21:41:38","slug":"why-the-bottleneck-is-everything","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/why-the-bottleneck-is-everything\/","title":{"rendered":"Why The Bottleneck Is Everything"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-post\" data-elementor-id=\"113\" class=\"elementor elementor-113\" data-elementor-settings=\"[]\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-section-wrap\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<section class=\"elementor-section elementor-top-section elementor-element elementor-element-2e606a33 elementor-section-boxed elementor-section-height-default elementor-section-height-default\" data-id=\"2e606a33\" data-element_type=\"section\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-container elementor-column-gap-default\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-column elementor-col-100 elementor-top-column elementor-element elementor-element-78943bae\" data-id=\"78943bae\" data-element_type=\"column\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-wrap elementor-element-populated\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-1ab0dfe elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"1ab0dfe\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t<style>\/*! elementor - v3.5.0 - 12-12-2021 *\/\n.elementor-heading-title{padding:0;margin:0;line-height:1}.elementor-widget-heading .elementor-heading-title[class*=elementor-size-]>a{color:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit}.elementor-widget-heading .elementor-heading-title.elementor-size-small{font-size:15px}.elementor-widget-heading .elementor-heading-title.elementor-size-medium{font-size:19px}.elementor-widget-heading .elementor-heading-title.elementor-size-large{font-size:29px}.elementor-widget-heading .elementor-heading-title.elementor-size-xl{font-size:39px}.elementor-widget-heading .elementor-heading-title.elementor-size-xxl{font-size:59px}<\/style><h1 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Why The Bottleneck Is Everything<\/h1>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-3cc407ea elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"3cc407ea\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t<style>\/*! elementor - v3.5.0 - 12-12-2021 *\/\n.elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-stacked .elementor-drop-cap{background-color:#818a91;color:#fff}.elementor-widget-text-editor.elementor-drop-cap-view-framed .elementor-drop-cap{color:#818a91;border:3px solid;background-color:transparent}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap{margin-top:8px}.elementor-widget-text-editor:not(.elementor-drop-cap-view-default) .elementor-drop-cap-letter{width:1em;height:1em}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap{float:left;text-align:center;line-height:1;font-size:50px}.elementor-widget-text-editor .elementor-drop-cap-letter{display:inline-block}<\/style>\t\t\t\t<!-- wp:image {\"id\":114,\"sizeSlug\":\"full\",\"linkDestination\":\"none\"} -->\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"895\" height=\"377\" src=\"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Bottlenecks-in-a-process.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-114\" srcset=\"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Bottlenecks-in-a-process.jpg 895w, http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Bottlenecks-in-a-process-300x126.jpg 300w, http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/12\/Bottlenecks-in-a-process-768x324.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 895px) 100vw, 895px\" \/><\/figure>\n<!-- \/wp:image -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p>This is probably the least intuitive idea that I\u2019ve come across in my working career, but when explained and demonstrated, possibly one of the most important.<br>Here it is: it is inefficient to have everyone working at 100% effort, 100% of the time.<br>This seems wrong \u2013 we\u2019re paying for these people, they should be putting all their time and effort towards our product features! Get back to working on them! However, due to a concept called the \u201ctheory of constraints\u201d (see \u201cThe Goal\u201d by E.M. Goldratt) this is actually a terribly inefficient way of getting value through your business.<\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p><\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p>I\u2019m going to approach this slightly differently to Goldratt, so let\u2019s start with these premises<br><strong>1) Development of a product\/service goes through several sequential steps<\/strong><br>Yes, even if we\u2019re super agile we do still find ourselves going through sequential steps, e.g. defining what we want, identifying what it depends on, actually doing it, getting reviews &amp; presumably smashing a big green release button.<br><strong>2) Work in progress costs effort<\/strong><br>Someone has to estimate, design, do something with it, otherwise it\u2019s not really in progress<br><strong>3) Unfinished work goes stale over time and costs effort to un-stale-ify<\/strong><br>Un-stale-ify \u2026. you\u2019re welcome! Pretty much any work that isn\u2019t completely implemented and on test will get out of date enough to be not worth having.<\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p><\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p>Based on these, I think we can build the case the case for the importance of bottlenecks.<br>Starting with 1, lets assume that we have an overly simplistic sequence A-B-C.<br>A is super efficient and puts 10 units through per day<br>B is not too bad with 9 units per day<br>C is our bottleneck with just 4 units per day<\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p><\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p>It seems fairly obvious that if we get A and B to work at full capacity then we still don\u2019t make any more than 4 units per day that we can sell. A and B are consuming cost and produce surplus that starts to pile up, rust, and everyone is blaming poor C.<br>So, ok, that was obvious and we decide to recruit a second C, now we\u2019re a bit closer and managing 8 units per day\u2026 we still have that surplus though and that hurts (see premise 2 and 3).<br>A is still making 10 units per day<br>B is still making 9 units per day<br>C is now 8 units per day<\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p>Getting A and B to work at full capacity doesn\u2019t help. Throughput will never be higher than 8 &amp; we\u2019ll end up with a big rusting backlogs behind B and C. This \u2018rusting\u2019 occurs over time, the longer the thing sits around, the more effort it costs.<br>Ultimately there is no benefit to optimising locally at A and B, if C isn\u2019t going any faster, then the system isn\u2019t going any faster.<br>Bottlenecks are everything because any optimisation anywhere apart from the bottleneck is only going to cost you more and gain you nothing \u2013 even slow you down!<br>What if we took a different approach? A \u2018Pull\u2019 rather than \u2018Push\u2019 approach. Let\u2019s give each step a fixed backlog of up to C\u2019s maximum capacity and no more. The previous step only feeds in enough to fill the backlog if there\u2019s space. This means that A and B start realising that they sometimes don\u2019t need to work at full capacity and the same end product quantities get generated regardless, while also not causing overflowing backlogs.<br>Applying this idea to knowledge work like software development, there\u2019s even more benefit \u2013 as this \u2018spare\u2019 time can be used for learning, personal development, to look at what *should* be done as well as what *must* be done, maybe help the bottleneck out or (and this is really important) investigate new and creative ideas to give your business an edge.<br>Suffering with bottlenecks? Yes you are. =)<br>Here are the 4 steps to dealing with them, plus a link that explains each step in more detail<br>1) Identify<br>2) Exploit<br>3) Subordinate<br>4) Elevate<br><a href=\"https:\/\/masteringbusinessanalysis.com\/mba082-addressing-bottlenecks-theory-constraints\/\">https:\/\/masteringbusinessanalysis.com\/mba082-addressing-bottlenecks-theory-constraints\/<\/a><\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\n\n<!-- wp:paragraph -->\n<p>Thanks for reading!<\/p>\n<!-- \/wp:paragraph -->\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why The Bottleneck Is Everything This is probably the least intuitive idea that I\u2019ve come across in my working career, but when explained and demonstrated, possibly one of the most important.Here it is: it is inefficient to have everyone working at 100% effort, 100% of the time.This seems wrong \u2013 we\u2019re paying for these people, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":114,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":185,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113\/revisions\/185"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}