The Pipeline

"The Pipeline: A Picture of Homebuilding Production" is the story of how RB Builders' cross-functional production team painstakingly learned the principles of homebuilding production in the turbulent years following the end of the period known as the "Age of Homebuilder Entitlement". It is a story told in the exchanges of dialog between team members, senior management, and RB Builders' trusted, results-based advisor/partner. The result is a deep understanding of a production system with an enduring visual image, the elements of which are crafted to the specific conditions, requirements, and parameters of the homebuilding industry, and a realization that improving performance on the velocity side of the ROA equation is the best path a homebuilder has to achieving sustainable competitive separation. "The Pipeline" is about the specific application of underlying principles and disciplines of production that are otherwise universal - physics rooted in the laws that govern all production systems. The book is about using the tools that work for homebuilding production, without regard to the consulting religion from which they come. "The Pipeline" makes the inherent, inviolable, real, and measurable connection between operating performance and business outcomes. It makes clear the requirement that production must be managed as a system.