What is the first step in the Theory of Constraints?

• Subordinate everything else to the constraint

• Elevate the system's bottlenecks

• Identify the system’s constraint

• Exploit the constraint

Throughput is best defined as:

• The money spent on raw materials

• The rate at which the system generates money through sales

• The number of parts a machine can produce

• The amount of time something spends in the system

Which of the following is considered *Inventory* in TOC terms?

• Electricity used by machines

• Wages paid to workers

• Raw materials and work-in-progress

• Customer orders waiting to be shipped

If a process is already optimized and a new constraint appears, what should happen first?

• Ignore the new constraint

• Increase inventory at the constraint

• Return to Step 1 of the 5 Focusing Steps

• Hire more workers

Which of the following is an *Operational Expense*?

• Unused materials in storage

• Machine downtime

• Employee wages and electricity

• Revenue from sales

The five focusing steps of TOC are:

• Identify the constraint (find what is slowing down the system)

• Elevate the constraint (make a bigger change if needed to fix it)

• Subordinate everything else to the constraint (adjust other steps so they don’t outpace the bottleneck)

• Repeat the process again (because the constraint may have moved)

• Exploit the constraint (use it as effectively as possible)

In *The Goal*, what did Jonah describe as the “goal” of any business or production system?

A bottleneck is:

You’re working on a group project with limited access to tools and workspace. You notice one person is waiting a long time to use the saw.

Question:
What TOC step would you start with to solve this problem? Explain what you would do and why it helps the whole group.

A team of students is making wooden phone stands. The painting step is slowing everything down because they only have one station and it takes 10 minutes per stand. What TOC step(s) could help here, and what would you recommend?