Читать книгу The Missing Links - Caroline Mondon - Страница 17
ОглавлениеCustomers and Suppliers Affect Variability
HÉLOÏSE GRIPS THOMAS'S RIGHT hand as the Finnair jet accelerates down the runway toward its takeoff. The moment she feels the wheels leave the ground, she digs her fingernails into his palm, and he jumps a little even though he is used to this reaction of hers. It isn’t fear that provokes her reflex; it’s the relief she feels at finally being let loose from the daily demands of an earth-bound life.
Héloïse counts the past three weeks among the most trying of her life. As she gazes out the plane window, she recalls what had happened ...
The day after Hubert’s announcement of the staggering number of orders lost, Georgette came to see her. With her head bowed and in a strangled voice, she told Héloïse that the backlog—that is to say, the total number of orders received but not yet shipped1—amounted to no more than one month’s worth of the company’s average turnover. Yet the supply lead time for the wood would not allow production to start on these orders for at least the next two months.
