Zen And The Art Of Throughput: Focus To Improve Flow

Surefire practices to improve service and manufacturing operations by focusing on flow

What you'll learn

Know where to Focus and improve flow

Improve your department or team's productivity

Identify where to spend time and energy in order to increase performance

Learn the right away to approach your work and improve day-to-day operations

Practical approach to apply Theory of Constraints (TOC) to daily operations

Significantly improve Throughput in order to achieve your business results

Learn the approach to Business Transformation and Continuous Improvement

Have a process improvement mindset

Requirements

No prior experience in consulting required. You will learn the foundational approach to improve operations

Basic experience in operations is all you need to understand the concepts!

Description

My mentor once said that the biggest constraint that any organization has is “Management Attention.” He also said that, no matter how difficult or complex the problem may seem, if the leaders of the organization were able to put their heads together and think clearly, they could solve any problem they were facing. I truly believe that.What poisons organizations today is a lack of focus, specifically from the leadership team. Trying to improve everything everywhere is a sure way to fail. Or worse, playing whack-a-mole and only addressing the latest issue that is on everyone’s mind.Leaders need a process to answer the question: “Out of all the things that we could be doing, what should we be doing to improve our company?” - What they need is a systematic, scientific approach to help leaders focus on the most important area of their business. Applying the concepts of the Theory of Constraints (TOC) has been the most effective way I have seen for leaders to do such thing.In this course, you will learn how identify what needs to be changed in your organization in order to increase throughput, and also learn what should you do instead. This course helps you answer the three most important questions any manager faces:- What to change?- What to change to?- How to cause the change?What is the aim of this course?My goal with this course is to help you look at your organization through a different lens. If every decision you make is through the eyes of the “Throughput World,” as I call it, then you are better positioned to challenge the areas of the organization that matter, leave the ones that don’t alone, and create a process of ongoing improvement so that you are always one step ahead.By focusing on how things flow in your organization you can find the key leverage points that will really make a difference, instead of trying to improve a little bit everywhere, hoping that at the end it will make things better.How is the course organized?The course is divided into the find the following sections:· Introduction. We begin with a little intro to the course· The right Mindset First things first. I discuss the mindset that you need to have if you want to quickly improve your operations. It is easy to become overwhelmed and believe that complex environments need complex solutions. If you can swift through the noise, you can identify what needs to change in order to quickly improve the organization· Why focus on Flow I discuss here the business case as to why it is better to focus on flow than anything else. The giants of industry have been focusing on flow and seeing results that others want to copy, so why not do the same for your organization. You will learn from Henry Ford, Taiichi Ohno and the Toyota Production System, or lean.· Barriers to Flow I will share the typical barriers to flow, how to recognize them, understand how much they affect the way things run in the operation.· Improving Flow Once I share the principles of flow, there are many ways to practically implement it. In this section I share some ideas and concepts you can use to improve your operation.· Wrapping it all up In this section I go over a couple of examples on how to apply the principles of flow, and leave you with some final thoughts for you to take it with you as you begin your journey to transforming your operations.At the end of this course, you will be able to…· Know where to focus in your organization· Understand where should your effort and resources be spent for the best outcome· Have the right mindset and lens to which approach your operationWho should take this course?· Professionals interested in making better decisions· Management Consultants· Business Analysts· Small and medium business owners· Startups founders· Operational Leaders

Overview

Section 1: Introduction

Lecture 1 Introduction

Section 2: The Right Mindset: First things First

Lecture 2 Theory of Constraints (TOC) to improve Operations

Section 3: Why Focus on Flow

Lecture 3 Controlling Costs vs Protecting Throughput

Lecture 4 The 5 Focusing Steps and Principles of Flow

Lecture 5 What is Flow?

Lecture 6 Understanding Little's Law

Lecture 7 Standing on the Shoulders of Giants

Section 4: Identify barriers to Flow

Lecture 8 High WIP

Lecture 9 Further Effects of High WIP

Lecture 10 DeSynchronization

Lecture 11 Multi-tasking

Section 5: Improving Flow

Lecture 12 WIP Control & Global Priorities

Lecture 13 Resource Sharing, Pooling & Full-Kitting

Section 6: Wrapping it all up

Lecture 14 Examples of improving Flow

Lecture 15 Final Thoughts

Supervisors wanting to improve their team's performance,Managers and Directors looking to increase their Operation's throughput,Leaders and Executives with the goal to provide clarity and a focusing mechanism to their Organization