VELOCITY - DEE JACOB [70]
“Come in,” she said.
Murphy took a seat in front of her desk. She noted that his blue eyes were indeed tinged with red, as if he’d had a bad night. She settled herself behind her desk.
“Now, what I want to know most of all is what is going on between you and Wayne Reese?” Amy asked. “Why are you two so angry with each other?”
“I would say that we have a professional difference of opinion,” said Murphy. “Wayne is absolutely committed to Lean Six Sigma. And I abide by what is known as the Theory of Constraints or TOC.”
“Theory of Constraints?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What’s that?”
“To give you the briefest possible explanation, the Theory of Constraints holds that every system – in our case, a business system, or at Oakton, a manufacturing system – is made up of resources that each have varying limits. Performance of the total system is constrained by whatever resource is the most limited. We sometimes refer to that resource, the one with the tightest constraints, as the bottleneck of the system. Therefore, the most efficient way to manage the entire system is to optimize the flow by maximizing processing at the bottleneck and making all other resources subservient to the needs of the bottleneck in terms of their own processing. Do you follow me?”
“No,” said Amy. “I haven’t the foggiest notion of what you just said.”
Murphy sighed. “Well …”
“Just tell me this,” said Amy. “Why are you, with this constraint theory, and Wayne with Lean Six Sigma, why are you at odds with each other?”
“First of all, there is much that we agree upon. Small transfer batches, for instance. And quick changeovers in equipment setups to enable greater flexibility. And, of course, quality and continuous improvement – though I do have to admit that at Oakton, we have become a little complacent about ongoing improvement in recent years,” said Murphy.
“But the differences?”
“Yes, there are several, and they are very important. Wayne believes in a balanced production line. I subscribe to an unbalanced line. Wayne’s objective is to reduce capacity to exactly whatever is customer demand, and then exploit that capacity to one hundred percent. I accept that extra capacity is very necessary for maximum throughput, and that using more than a few resources at a hundred percent is extremely inefficient. Wayne strives endlessly for perfection. I cope with the reality of endless imperfection. Wayne believes that through continuous effort and investment, all meaningful variation can be eliminated. I say, horsefeathers; there will always be some variation, and even if you do succeed in eliminating all variation, by then decades will have passed and you will have exceeded the design life of the technology. But most important, I believe – indeed, I know for a fact – that there must be a primary constraint regulating the entire system. For us, that constraint is Godzilla, the autoclave. And Wayne refuses to acknowledge the supreme importance of keeping Godzilla operating at peak efficiency.”
“Okay, wait! Hold on! Time out!” said Amy. She leaned her elbows on her desk blotter and rubbed her temples. “Wow, this is like the Democrats and the Republicans.”
“Please, ma’am, I don’t think we’re that bad.”
“But clearly you have different philosophies about managing Oakton, as well as the business in general.”
“We each subscribe to a philosophy that has much in common purpose with the other, but a few differences that are irreconcilable.”
“Seriously? You really think these cannot be reconciled?”
“Not without Mr. Reese accepting some realities at Oakton that I came to terms with years ago. There are actually many things I admire about Wayne, but he is a very stubborn man.”
Yeah, well, take a look in the mirror, she thought.
“Let me cut to the chase,” said Murphy. “Amy, I have given the matter a great deal of thought. Please understand that I am at heart a team player. But after a lot of soul-searching, I have come to the conclusion that I cannot remain at Oakton. There is a saying, ‘Lead, follow, or get out of the way.’ No one will let me lead, and I cannot