The Goal

145

"No, bottlenecks are not necessarily bad-or good," says Jo- nah, "they are simply a reality. What I am suggesting is that where they exist, you must then use them to control the flow through the system and into the market."

That makes sense to me as I'm listening, because I'm remem- bering how I used Herbie to control the troop during the hike.

"Now I have to run," says Jonah, "because you caught me during a ten-minute break in a presentation."

I jump in. "Jonah, before you go-!"

"Yes?"

"What's our next step?"

He says, "Well, first of all, does your plant have any bottle- necks?"

"We don't know," I tell him.

"Then that's your next step," he says. "You have to find this out, because it makes an enormous difference in how you manage your resources."

"How do we find the bottlenecks?" says Stacey.

"It's very simple, but it would take a few minutes to explain. Look, try to figure that out for yourselves," says Jonah. "It's re- ally easy to do if you think about it first."

I say, "Okay, but..."

"Good- bye for now," he says. "Call me when you know if you have a bottleneck."

The speaker phone issues a click, followed by a fuzzy hum.

"Well... what now?" asks Lou.

"I guess we look at all our resources," I say, "and compare them against market demand. If we find one in which demand is greater than capacity, then we'll know we've got a bottleneck."

"What happens if we find one?" asks Stacey.

"I guess the best thing to do would be what I did to the scout troop," I say. "We adjust capacity so the bottleneck is at the front of production."

"My question," Lou says, "is what happens if our resource with the least capacity in fact has a capacity greater than what market demand calls for?"

"Then I guess we'd have something like a bottle without a neck," I say.

"But there would still be limits," says Stacey. "The bottle would still have walls. But they'd be greater than the market de- mand."