Fred Lybrand

[The fastest way to read The Goal, and the absolute fastest way to learn The Theory of Constraints.][Watch a video summary.]

Jonah is retrieved from the airport and supports the team at the plant.

Highlight

“What you’re saying is that making an employee work and profiting from that work are two different things.”

Ineffective employee time has a second trap – it creates future work that continues to be off target. Stopping bad direction work is a huge relief on an organization.

Page by Page

P203 – “Before we jump to conclusions, let’s invest half an hour to go into the plant so we can find out what’s happening,” Jonah says.

P204 – “You know, I would guess, just from looking at it, that you have at least a month or more of work lined-up here for this machine.

P205 – “But let’s say you need only 450 hours a month, or 75 percent, of Y to keep the flow equal to demand. What happens when Y has worked its 450 hours? Do you let it sit idle?”

P206 – “Excess inventory,” says Stacey.

P207 – Bob shrugs and says, “We build the orders and ship them.” “How can you?” asks Jonah.

Money cannot be made without the part as the constraint.

P208 – As he says this, I’m thinking to myself about the finished goods we’ve got crammed into warehouses.

Warehouses full of inventory are an operations and financial red flag.

P209 – “A major constraint here in your system is this machine,” says Jonah.

“When you make a non-bottleneck do more work than this machine, you are not increasing productivity. On the contrary, you are doing exactly the opposite. You are creating excess inventory, which is against the goal.”

“But what are we supposed to do?” asks Bob. “If we don’t keep our people working, we’ll have idle time, and idle time will lower our efficiencies.”

“So what?” asks Jonah.

Jonah is calling out the importance of cadence. It doesn’t make sense for the plant to outwork the constraint.

P210 – Then Ralph suggests, “What you’re saying is that making an employee work and profiting from that work are two different things.”

P211 – “We’re releasing material faster than the bottlenecks can process it.”

Creating inventory that cannot be advanced has no purpose. It is makework. Many companies make this mistake with projects – kicking off projects that cannot be completed.

[The fastest way to read The Goal, and the absolute fastest way to learn The Theory of Constraints.][Watch a video summary of Chapter 24.]

Rogo’s team achieves several major milestones and celebrates in response. Julie shows up, jumps to conclusions, and runs away from her problems as usual. Jonah returns to provide more guidance at the plant.

Highlights

“The bottlenecks have spread.”

In this re-reading, I found this line confusing. Cells at Rogo’s plant are producing out of cadence with the constraint, creating interim bottlenecks. This is a somewhat absurd situation – why would anyone do that? Perhaps it is an indication of how much wisdom has been spread since The Goal was first published.

Page by Page

P195 – “Here’s to a new plant record in shipments of product,” he says.

“Not only did we ship more product,” says Stacey, “but, having just calculated our inventory levels, I am pleased to report that between last month and now, we’ve had a twelve percent net decline in work-in-process inventory.”

P196 – “The reason I called is I know how I’m always on your case when things go wrong, Al, so I just wanted to tell you thanks from me and Jons for doing something right,” says Peach.

P197 – “You bastard!”

P198 – “Look, why don’t I talk to her.”

Often times the messenger is as important as the message.

P199 – “The bottlenecks have spread.”

P200 – If the demand on another work center has gone above one hundred percent, then we’ve created a new bottleneck.

Last week, for the first time since I’ve been at this plant, you could actually walk over to the assembly line without having to turn sideways to squeeze between the stacks and bins of inventory.

P201 – Jonah says, “Maybe I’d better come have another look.”

[Learn the goal fast, with the best chapter-by-chapter summary.] [Watch a video summary of Chapter 21.]

Alex asks Julie on a date – it is touching. The plant is learning how to focus on constraints.

Highlight

When you’ve finished the bottleneck parts, you can go back to what you were doing before.

The right to work on something outside of the constraint is earned.

Page by Page

P170 – All she can do is say no, right?

P171 – “And about ninety percent of the current overdues have parts that flow through one or both of the bottleneck operations.

P172 – “I don’t want to see either of you working on something not on that list.

P173 – “Why the hell isn’t that machine working?” I ask him.

P174 – It turns out, as Bob explains to me, that the parts they were waiting for at the NCX-10 have been sitting there for about a week.

P175 – So by continuing to run the non-bottleneck parts, this guy was actually interfering with our ability to get an order out the door and make money.”

P176 – We’re holding fifteen-minute meetings with everyone working in the plant, both foremen and hourly people.

P177 – When you’ve finished the bottleneck parts, you can go back to what you were doing before.

[What every MBA should know about The Goal.] [Link to video summary.]

Rogo begins the chapter at home and picks Jonah up from the airport.

Highlight

“Alex, there are two ways that the ideas I’m giving you won’t work. One is if there isn’t any demand for the products your plant makes.”

“I also can’t help you if you’re determined not to change.”

These situations are difficult to fix:

• No product demand,
• Culture prevents change.
• Avoid them.

Page by Page

P149 – “We found out we’ve got some problems at the plant which we might not be able to solve.”

Double constraints.

P150 – “But you have to learn how to run your plant by its constraints.”

“Alex, there are two ways that the ideas I’m giving you won’t work. One is if there isn’t any demand for the products your plant makes.”

“I also can’t help you if you’re determined not to change.”

P151 – “Most manufacturing plants do not have bottlenecks. They have enormous excess capacity.” Spoken by Jonah to Alex at airport.

“To increase the capacity of the plant is to increase the capacity of only the bottlenecks.”

P152 – “And I suggest that first of all we go into your plant and see for ourselves exactly how you are managing your two bottlenecks.”

Spoken by Jonah to team – a manufacturer’s products come from the plant floor. Solve problems where they live.

“The six of us put on the safety glasses and hats and go into the plant.”

Safety first!

“I notice Jonah’s eyes measuring the stacks of inventory piled everywhere.”

Inventory status and hand kept statistical process control graphs are great ways to understand a plant.

P153 – Jonah says, “So talk to them. They have a stake in this plant. They’re not stupid. But you have to make them understand.”

NCX-10 is a constraint, but it is being left idle during union lunch breaks.

P154 – “There are,” says Stacey, “but going outside would increase our cost-per-part.”

The expression on Jonah’s face says he’s getting a little bored with this stonewalling.

Jonah asks about external sourcing for heat treat.

Goldratt’s 9 Layers of Resistance is a great way to tackle objections like Stacey raises around heat treat.

P155 – “I’ll put my question differently: how many products are you unable to ship because you are missing the parts in that pile?”

Rogo is asking, “what specific parts constrain revenue?”

P156 – “One million dollars,” I say with awe. “On one condition!” says Jonah. “That you get these parts in and out of heat-treat and shipped as a finished product before your customers get tired of waiting and go elsewhere!”

P157 – I ask, “You mean we should put Q.C. in front of the bottlenecks?”

“Every time a bottleneck finishes a part, you are making it possible to ship a finished product.”

Thinking through quality control is a common way to free up capacity at a constraint.

P158 – “The true cost is the cost of an hour of the entire system.”

P159 – “First, make sure the bottlenecks’ time is not wasted,” he says.

P160 – I say, “Well, actually, you and the kids were on the right track at dinner.” “We were?” asks Dave. “We need to make the Herbies go faster,” I say.

Julie is off – listening to violin music in the background like Scoobie Doo.

[I need to read The Goal fast, and the Theory of Constraints.][Video summary of Chapter 16.]

The most important part of this chapter is that we learn Rogo’s daughter’s name – Sharon. Julie is not a likable character, but as someone who has experienced similar relationship issues it might be that these scenes hit too close to home.

This is a bridge chapter like 7 and 12.

Page by Page

P120 – Al, I can’t handle always being last in line for you.

[Should he prioritize her as he had the efficiency of the NCX-10 before Jonah’s teachings? /sarcasm]

P121 – “Is Mommy still mad at me?”

P122 – “What did you do to her?” yells her mother.

P123 – “I’m very worried about her.”

It is reasonable to worry about any adult that flees from a problem and sheds their obligations as a parent. This is why Julie is so unlikable.