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16th International Conference of the

TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA
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April 23, 2015 Johannesburg, South Africa

Production vs Projects

Jaco Laubscher, Realization Africa, South-Africa

23rd April, 2015

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Jaco Laubscher
Jaco is a Theory of Constraints1 Solutions Application Expert,
currently involved with various projects in South and Southern Africa.
He has been trained by Realization Inc. as a Critical Chain
Implementation Expert.
Jaco has a B.Eng Mechanical Engineering Degree from the
University of Pretoria. Having spent 9 years in the Food and
Beverage industry, dealing with large and complex multi-discipline
projects, Jaco gained extensive experience in Process Engineering,
Process Automation, Project Management, Contracting and Contract
Management as well as the associated disciplines of System
Engineering, Configuration Management, Quality Management and
Risk Management.
For the past 9 years Jaco has actively implementing Critical Chain
jaco.laubscher@realization.co.za
Project Management Systems across a number of industries,
www.realization.co.za
ranging from IT, Construction, Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul as
+27 83 306 7145
well as new product development environments.

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Legal Disclaimer

Everything I am presenting here today is my personal

opinion, observations and hypothesis.
These opinions, observations and hypothesis are not
those of Realization Inc, nor has any of these been
incorporated in any of the products or services provided
by Realization Inc.
These views have however been shaped during a number
of implementations of Realizations technology.

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A Version of TOC history

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Challenging inconsistencies

Why do I expect to find a pure project environment or a pure

production environment and not a mixture/hybrid of the two?
When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail

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Pure Production Environment

Repetitive (have been done before)

Touch-time is a small percentage of lead-time
Object based
Over-production and under-production is possible
Stock of finished goods is possible
Lead-time can be very short (hours/days)
Stock buffers and time buffers is used

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Pure Project Environment

Non-repetitive (Each project is unique)

Touch-time is a noticeable percentage of lead-time
Could be non-object based (ideas, concepts, designs)
Over-production and under-production is not possible,
when a task is completed, it is completed.
Stock of finished goods is not possible
Lead-time is longer (weeks/months/years)
Time buffers is used

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Reality is different
Have projects with repetitive tasks. (Babcock)
Have projects with tasks, where touch-time is a small
percentage of the lead time. (Centurion Systems DTP)
Have production where touch-time is a large percentage
of total lead-time (SABN)
Have logistical elements that needs to be ready for CCtask as well as non-CC tasks and thus need feeding
buffers for all tasks. (Babcock)

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Is this also reality?

The Goal vs Critical Chain

DBR/sDBR vs CCPM

vs

Critical Chain
Project Buffer

vs
Feeding Buffer

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A unified view?

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Production-Project Mix
Buffer
Buffer
Buffer
Buffer

It is a maintenance project using CCPM principles, but

instead of as-late-as-possible, we manipulate the feeding
buffers so that every chain starts as soon as possible.
Tasks are production task that needs to be completed at a
daily certain rate, so daily targets is used to report progress
and not remaining duration estimates. Buffers are mostly
used for Murphy, rather that task time variability.
Full-kitting is the most important aspect that is required
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Production-Project Mix
Buffer

Buffer

Buffer

Overall the development is driven with CCPM.

Most departments obtain their priorities in this multi-project
environment from the CCPM software.
One department is running a job-shop and the project work is
only 5% to 10% of their workload.
Our solution: When chain get to this department, the task itself
becomes a buffer.

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Logistics Project mix

Buffer

3 weeks
FK

Buffer

3 weeks

Buffer

3 weeks
FK

Buffer

3 weeks

3 weeks

Created tasks with 100% feeding buffer to ensure that the

logistical supply is ready when the critical chain task starts, but
how do you deal with the some requirement on a non-critical
chain task? Implemented full-kit points to solve the problem.
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Summary
Reality is, that there is very few pure project
environments or pure production environments.
As TOC practitioners, we tend to invent and adapt the
principles to find the best solution for the specific
environment.
There is a need to capture these solutions and
adaptations in order to be a learning organisation.
Validation of adaptations should be part of the process of
recording them.
We may actually still be missing some pieces of the
puzzle.

16th International Conference of the TOC Practitioners Alliance - TOCPA