Little's Law Utilization Warning
Service Operations
Little's Law Utilization Warning
Operational principle that high utilization in variable systems can create disproportionate increases in queue and lead time.
Examples
- 01The Little's Law utilization warning explains why the claims team's lead time doubled when utilization rose from 80 % to 95 %.
- 02Supervisors use the Little's Law utilization warning when planning staff: running every agent at 100 % creates long queues.
- 03Following the Little's Law utilization warning, the team keeps 10 % spare capacity, and average waiting time falls by half.