Learn why one stage in a workflow usually governs a whole team's delivery speed, and how to find it. You will read cumulative flow diagrams for the widening bands that betray a growing bottleneck, diagnose a slowed IT workflow, and build a reusable reading guide your team can trust.
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Why local efficiency doesn't speed up delivery — free to watch, no account needed.
What you'll learn
- Explain the Theory of Constraints and why one bottleneck governs a system's throughput
- Define the core flow metrics — WIP, cycle time, lead time and throughput — and how they relate through Little's Law
- Read a cumulative flow diagram to locate a growing bottleneck from its widening bands
- Diagnose the real constraint in a slowed IT workflow and choose how to relieve it
- Produce a one-page Cumulative Flow Diagram Reading Guide for your team
Syllabus
Why Delivery Slows — the Constraint Problem
Why local efficiency doesn't speed up deliveryFree preview
The Theory of Constraints for knowledge work
Reading Flow — Metrics and the Cumulative Flow Diagram
Flow metrics — WIP, cycle time, lead time and throughput
The cumulative flow diagram and its widening bands
Applying It to Real IT Work
Case study — the team that couldn't say why it slowed
Relieving the constraint once you've found it
Making It Stick
Building your Cumulative Flow Diagram Reading Guide
Common traps in bottleneck hunting