Operations Management Theory: Reconciling Capacity and Demand Essay

Question 3 Draw on appropriate Operations management theory, concepts and frameworks to examine how your organization, or an organization with which you are familiar, reconciles capacity and demand.Information technology services industry is a highly competitive cost based operation sector where availability of resources, tangible and intangible is key to successful projects. This makes a significant challenge to accurately reconcile capacity and demand. OpenText is a leader in providing enterprise content management solutions and we will analyse consulting services provided in the European market along with effect on demand with todays changing economic environment.Slack et al (2009, p.248) defines relationship between capacity and demand asCapacity is the output that an operation (or single process) can relieve in a defined unit of time. Demand is the quantity of products and services that customers request from an operation or process at any point in time.Managing capacity is a n on-going effort in the industry by reducing cost through repeat business from existing customer and by savoury new potential customers This while managing customer expectations and ensuring quality of service. Customer engagement and service delivery are key to OpenTexts economic competiveness in the market. Employee schooling and attracting highly skilled individuals to the organisation are essential in delivering quality service. When considering potential projects, OpenText need to know the resource availability to perform the tasks. This demand for resources is dull against who is available (capacity) to determine if additional resources are required to meet the demand and if required what types of resources are needed... ...ly uncertainty. IIE Transactions 34 717-728.Slack, N., Chambers, S., Johnston, R., Betts, A.,(2009). Operations and process management south edition. Harlow Pearson Education LimitedRoth, A.V. and Velde ,M V D.(1991), Operations As Marketing A Compe titive Service Strategy, Journal of Operations Management ,Vol. 10 ,No. 3,pp 303-328Chiang, W. K. and Feng, Y. (2007). The measure out of information sharing in the presence of supply uncertainty and demand volatility. International Journal of Production Research, 45 (6), 1429-1447.Hum,Sin Hoon (2000), A Hayes-Wheelwright framework approach for strategical management of thrid party logistics services,Integrated Manufacturing Systems,Vol .11/2,pp 132-137Buxey,G.(1993). Production planning and scheduling for seasonal demand. International Journal of Operations and Production Management, 13(7),4-21.