A design of personnel scheduling software for manufacturing

This paper describes Decision Support System (DSS) software to model personnel scheduling in a manufacturing environment. The DSS incorporates workload conversion, scheduling and costing functions to generate personnel requirements for a specified planning horizon in a conventional, MRP-driven manufacturing environment. This work was sponsored by the Material Handling Research Center, jointly located at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Arkansas. The DSS consists of four modules. The Data Module accepts information from the master production schedule such as end-item demand and the bill of materials structure for each end item. Labor data such as worker categories, wages and overtime pay are also included here. This data is stored within an internal database. The Workload Conversion Module converts production demands for end items into worker capacity requirements for each work center by manipulating information from the Data Module considering worker categories, worker interchangability and the cost of each personnel schedule evaluated. The Cost Analysis Module assesses the cost of adding or reducing worker capacity and calculates the least cost personnel schedule that will satisfy the master production schedule. The Scheduling Module assigns workers to work centers by both worker category and time period. The scheduling heuristic considers worker interchangability, new hires, extra shifts, layoffs, overtime, weekend work and unexpected absences. Finally, the user is presented with all possible solutions and associated costs. The user may then select the set of solutions that he or she wishes to implement and the overall cost is calculated.