4 Steps to assess your team’s capacity
No one is exempt from housework in our family. The chores need to be done and everyone pitches in. As my kid gets older, she takes on more chores and house tasks. With each year, her required tasks expand. First it was picking up toys, then putting away her clean clothes, then changing bed sheets.
The challenge of growing capacity is aligning my expectations with the reality of my child’s true capacity. Whether I am taking into consideration her skills and abilities, or the time she has available for chores, I need to be realistic about what she can take on. Otherwise, I will face more attitude, reduced efficiency in completing the chores, and have less fun together.
Organizations that assign team members to projects or clients as a means of generating revenue are challenged with the same capacity constraints. The capacity of team members is largely driven by time. (Let’s work off the assumption that you have hired highly capable team members that are doing work that aligns with their strengths.)
The capacity of your team limits the amount of revenue your business can generate. Ignoring capacity constraints can lead to greater challenges internally, including potentially losing team members and revenue. Having a strong understanding of the true capacity of your team to deliver revenue producing services is key to knowing you can meet your income goals.
Not sure what your team member’s capacity is (or could be)? Here are four steps to help you assess.
Total time available - How much time does your team member work for you? Is it 40 hours, or are they part time? Is it more than 40 hours per week? Would your team member confirm they willingly devote this amount of time to the business?
Non-billable time - How much time does your team member spend on activities that are not billable to a client? Are they managing people, attending team meetings or training, completing administrative tasks? Does the team member work on internal functions or projects? Does the team member have business development or sales expectations?
Delivery capacity - Subtract non-billable time (#2) from total hours (#1) to know the capacity your team member has for billable work.
Reality check - Review the amount of billable time for your team member over the past two to four weeks. Does the reality of capacity align with what you have plotted based on non-billable expectations?
Every business has a different capacity level for team members. There is no hard and fast rule when it comes to determining capacity in your business. This exercise is a step in evaluating if what you are asking of your team member is appropriate for the role and needs and structure of your business.
Much like my parental ambitions include growing my child’s capacity to include washing dishes, business owners have ambitions that require additional capacity. Start assessing your team’s capacity now to be better equipped to know which team member has space to take on more, which is overburdened, and when you need to hire someone new.