What is CAPACITY?

by | January 18, 2011

Our guest blog post comes from Bert Holeton, Founder and President of The Mastermind Group, a network of master consultants with expertise and proven results in all areas of business.  Bert will lead our January 26 Equinox Focus program on “Evaluating Capacity in Your Organization.”

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Ask a businessperson about capacity, and you’re likely to get an answer related to the maximum output or producing ability of a specific section of their organization. 

*  If there’s a machine involved: How many units can the machine produce per hour?

*  If it’s a production line: How many cars can be produced in a day? How many airplanes in a month? How many ships in a year?

*  If it’s a railcar: How much coal, or corn, or corn syrup can it haul?

*  If it’s a venue – a restaurant, movie theatre, or stadium: What is the maximum occupancy for a single event? The maximum number of patrons served over the course of an evening?

*  If it’s a storage device: How many megabytes, or gigabytes, or terabytes does it hold?

When it comes to machines, production processes, or containers, it can be pretty straightforward to define, and measure, CAPACITY.

But what if you are curious about the capacity of your sales group; or your Information Technology group?

When we incorporate PEOPLE into the question of capacity, suddenly our answers become a “range” – or we have to say, “It depends.”

So how can you answer the ultimate question of CAPACITY when people are central to the answer?

What is your company’s capacity to satisfy the marketplace while maintaining appropriate profits?