Focusing operational improvements, developer resources, or automation efforts specifically on the single slowest step in a business process to increase overall capacity.

Borrowed directly from Eliyahu Goldratt's The Goal and Theory of Constraints manufacturing literature. It bestows industrial factory management prestige on fixing a slow database query or hiring another support rep.

• Theory of Constraints Posture: Draping basic workflow cleanup in heavy manufacturing management theory.
• Consulting Slogan Polish: Dropping the phrase in executive meetings instead of fixing actual code bugs.
• Kitchen Reality Check: Like enjoying a great dinner and asking the line cook, "How did you exploit the bottleneck on prep work?"

The Goal / Manufacturing Drama classic factory scene where the plant manager stands on the assembly floor, staring at a single clogged stamping machine that holds up the entire production line.

Focusing work on fixing the single slowest step in a process to improve overall speed.

“Our optimization strategy exploits the bottleneck in document review to accelerate client onboarding.”

“We focused our efforts on automating contract data entry because that was the slowest step in our client onboarding process.”