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Identify and eliminate constraints in your personal systems.
The slowest part of any system determines the speed of the whole system.
Improving anything other than the bottleneck does not improve the system.
Identify exploit and elevate your personal bottlenecks systematically.
Decision-making information processing energy management and context switching.
You cannot address a bottleneck you cannot measure — quantify the constraint.
Before adding capacity make sure the bottleneck is fully utilized.
Adjust other parts of your system to support the bottleneck rather than running at their own pace.
Once exploited invest in increasing the capacity of the bottleneck.
The constraint shifts — return to step one and find the new bottleneck.
Sometimes fixing one bottleneck reveals that a downstream constraint was hidden.
In collaborative work specific people are often the constraint.
Sometimes a tool is the constraint and upgrading or replacing it unblocks the whole system.
Inefficient processes create artificial constraints that can be designed away.
When you cannot get the information you need to proceed the information flow is the constraint.
When decisions are delayed everything downstream waits.
Sometimes your energy level is the binding constraint and no process improvement helps.
Make your current bottleneck visible so you can focus on it.
Design systems with extra capacity at known bottleneck points.
Track your bottlenecks over time to see whether they are shifting or chronic.
Finding and resolving constraints is the practical application of systems thinking to your life.