Relieving BottlenecksThe key to pre

Relieving BottlenecksThe key to preserving bottleneck capacity is to carefully monitor short-term schedules and keep bottleneck resource as busy as is practical. Managers should minimize idle time at the bottlenecks caused by delays elsewhere in the system and make sure that the bottleneck has all the resources it needs to stay busy. When a changeover or setup is made at a bottleneck, the number of units or customers processed before the next changeover should be large compared to the number processed at less critical operations. Maximizing the number of units processed per setup means fewer setups per year and, thus, less total time lost to setups. The number of setups also depends on the required product variety; more variety necessitates more frequent changeovers.The long-term capacity of bottleneck operations can be expanded in various ways. Investments can be made in new equipment and in brick-and-mortar facility expansions. The bottleneck’s capacity also can be expanded by operating it more hours per week, such as by hiring more employees and going from a one-shift operation to multiple shifts, or by hiring more employees and operating the plant six or seven days per week versus five days per week. Managers also might relieve the bottleneck by redesigning the process, either through process reengineering or process improvement, or by purchasing additional machines that can handle more capacity.