Abstract

Hi-tech manufacturing uses sophisticated and capital intensive processes that require a highly skilled workforce. Fluctuating demand leads to either a shortage of skilled workers that causes unmet demand or an excess of skilled labor that causes worker idleness. This mismatch in the available and required skillsets is a source of potential loss for the organization. This thesis formulates an industry-motivated workforce planning and facility utilization problem as a two-stage stochastic recourse program that considers fluctuating demand over a long planning horizon and includes business and labor rules, e.g., hiring, firing, overtime, cross-training, and shift swapping, that govern the structure of the workforce. Solutions to this problem are computed using a scenario-based approach and indicate that the cost of workforce formation can be significantly reduced by using the recourse problem.

Library of Congress Subject Headings

Manpower planning--Mathematical models; Strategic planning--Mathematical models; Mathematical optimization; Stochastic processes--Mathematical models

Publication Date

8-1-2013

Document Type

Thesis

Department, Program, or Center

Industrial and Systems Engineering (KGCOE)

Advisor

Grasman, Scott

Comments

Note: imported from RIT’s Digital Media Library running on DSpace to RIT Scholar Works in December 2013. Physical copy available from RIT's Wallace Library at HF5549.5.M3 K85 2013

Campus

RIT – Main Campus

Plan Codes

ISEE-MS

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