The Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt

Find the bottleneck and subordinate everything else to it.

Three takeaways for AI PMs

• Find the constraint before optimising anything: Walk the flow from idea to a change validated in production and look for where work waits.
• Measure throughput, not local efficiency: Throughput is validated changes reaching users; everything else is activity.
• Protect the bottleneck, and do not feed it junk: Everything that reaches the constraint should deserve its time.

Do this Monday

• In your next standup, ask where work is waiting and count the items in each queue; name the longest one as the constraint for the week.
• Before the next sprint planning, replace one output metric on your dashboard, such as PRs opened or features generated, with a throughput metric: changes validated and live with users.
• This week, write down one thing you will stop sending to the bottleneck, such as unreviewed agent output or speculative PRs, and tell the team why.