Capacity planning answers whether the plan can physically be executed with the people, machines and hours available.
Rough-cut before detailed
Rough-cut capacity planning checks the master schedule against a handful of critical resources. It is fast, it uses data most plants already have, and it catches the majority of overload situations before they reach the floor.
What you need to measure
- Available hours by work center, net of maintenance and absence.
- Setup and run standards that reflect current methods.
- Actual efficiency and utilization, tracked over time.
- Where queues form — usually the constraint.
Using capacity in promises
The point of capacity data is not a chart. It is the ability to tell a customer a date you will hit, and to say no — or quote a longer lead time — when the load genuinely does not fit.