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The 5-Step FOCUS – Find The Constraint
Constraints aren’t your enemy—they’re your friend. If you want the most bang-for-buck for your effort, despite the connotation of the word constraint, it’s precisely at that place you’ll find the leverage you’re looking for.(more…)
The 5-Step FOCUS – Setting the Goal
In a recent workshop, I asked the team to state their goal. The number they gave me—expressed as a volume of safe, reliable tonnes—was a good deal less than the design capacity of the plant. A little surprised, I asked them what was going on.(more…)
The 5 Step FOCUS – Identifying the System
In one of Eli Goldratt’s last essays, his introduction to the TOC Handbook, he wrote: ‘Can we condense all of TOC into one sentence? I think it is possible to condense it into a single word: focus.’ (more…)
Six Technology Questions: Part II
In Part I, we started using Goldratt’s six questions to judge how technology might help us better control contracted resources at a mine site. Our ambitious agenda required the solution to include group functions and vendors along with the teams directly involved. (more…)
Six Questions to Judge Technology
How do we decide whether we should adopt a new technology? It needn’t be new to the world, but new to our organisation. After all, Peter Drucker noted that selling Eskimos a fridge to keep meat from freezing was a creative new use of current technology. (more…)
Act by Priority
Of all life’s gifts, time is the most precious. None of us escapes its clutches. As every minute ticks by, our quota is relentlessly reduced by that minute, then the next and the next. Prioritising how we spend our allotted time is one of our most consequential challenges. (more…)
