to fix the bottleneck

3.9

Make a slow part of a process faster to stop delays

phrasal verb

: solucionar el cuello de botella

Once we fix the bottleneck in the approval process, everything should run smoothly.

Examples

Management is under pressure to fix the bottleneck that's delaying product shipments.
The engineers worked overnight to fix the bottleneck in the network system.
We need to fix the bottleneck in our production line!
Can we fix the bottleneck before the deadline?
To improve traffic flow, the city plans to fix the bottleneck at the main intersection.
The team will fix the bottleneck in the software development process to ensure faster delivery.
By investing in new technology, we hope to fix the bottleneck that is slowing down our customer service.

Surface Forms

fix the bottleneck infinitive

fixed the bottleneck past

fixed the bottleneck past participle

fixing the bottleneck present participle

fixes the bottleneck third person singular

Morphology

fix + the + bottleneck

The verb 'fix' (to repair or resolve) combined with 'bottleneck' (a chokepoint) yields a directly compositional meaning: remove or repair the chokepoint to eliminate delays. This is a common technical/metaphorical extension that is cross‑linguistically accessible, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents would readily infer the MWE meaning.

Etymology

Fix the bottleneck comes from the picture of pouring liquid through a bottle: the narrow neck is where the flow slows and sometimes gets stuck. So to fix the bottleneck means to remove that tight spot in a process so work can move freely and the 'delay' ends.