The hidden evils of high WIP

I’m flat out stealing from this post because it makes the value of low WIP so obvious:

And it’s not just context switching. Even if we pretend the context switching cost is ZERO (which it never is), look at how much earlier “A” would still finish in the one-at-a-time scenario. Behold, the power of single piece flow.

But here’s the rub: everyone looks at this and agrees at an individual level. But then they turn around and assign each person on a team their own separate workstream. That’s the same problem, just magnified. It’ll still take a lot longer to deliver the first unit of value (along with all of the other problems that come with high team WIP).

Limiting team WIP is just as important as limiting individual WIP.