Patent Publication Number: US-2005137927-A1

Title: System and method for multi-site workforce deployment

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
      Many companies have a number of similar or identical work locations in close proximity. This situation is particularly true in the retail business, where McDonald&#39;s or Starbuck&#39;s, for example, will have a number of outlets in a given geographic area. The workload at such retail locations can be variable, the staff performs the same functions, and demand varies depending on time of day, seasonality and company activity (e.g., sales or promotions). Since labor is the second-ranking controllable expense item, any measures to control labor costs will have an impact.  
      Many companies currently use automated management systems to optimize workforce utilization within a single location, but there would be a considerable benefit to be able to treat all locations within a given area as belonging to a single labor pool, and to optimize utilization accordingly. For example, there are currently situations in which an employee at one location is not being offered as many hours as that person would like to work, while in another location employees are working overtime. Optimization over such an area would produce significant advantages for a company.  
      Unfortunately, no management system currently in use permits such optimization. Legacy systems permit optimization within a single location, and locations can work on a manual ad hoc basis to swap employees, but the existing systems treat individual operating locations as independent operations, having completely separate organizations and data structures. Moreover, such optimization cannot be carried out manually, given the time required to conduct such computations.  
      Accordingly, there is a need in the art for a system and method that provides optimized labor utilization schedules across locations within a given area.  
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
      Embodiments of the present invention provide for multi-site workforce deployment. According to one embodiment, a scheduling module receives identification of an employee who is eligible to work at more than one business location of an organization, receives identification of the more than one business location at which the employee is eligible to work, and generates a labor utilization schedule for one of the more than one business location based at least upon information associated with the employee.  
      A scheduling module of the present invention produces an optimized staffing schedule for a group of interconnected work locations. The module may determine the schedule based on, among other things, business factors with selected weightings assigned to each factor, together with location forecasts, location budgets and employee data (e.g., skill sets, economic factors, and personal preferences). 
    
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       FIG. 1  is a flow chart that depicts a process for multi-site workforce deployment in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 2  is a block diagram that depicts the data flow and structure of multi-site workforce deployment in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 3  is a block diagram that depicts a user computing device in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 4  is a block diagram that depicts a system architecture for multi-site workforce deployment in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 5  is a sequence diagram that depicts a multi-site workforce deployment utilization scenario in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 6  is a screen shot that depicts an employee input screen in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 7  is a screen shot that depicts another employee input screen in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 8  is a screen shot that depicts a volume forecast screen in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 9  is a screen shot that depicts a workload demand forecast screen in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 10  is a screen shot that depicts a daily schedule screen in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 11  is a screen shot that depicts a list replacement functionality in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 12  is a screen shot that depicts a daily coverage report in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  
       FIG. 13  is a screen shot that depicts a schedule statistics report in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. 
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION  
     Scheduler  
       FIG. 1  depicts a process for multi-site workforce deployment in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. A scheduling module receives identification of an employee who is eligible to work at more than one business location of an organization (step  100 ), receives identification of the more than one business location at which the employee is eligible to work (step  110 ), and then generates a labor utilization schedule for one of the more than one business location based at least upon information associated with the employee (step  120 ).  
      As shown in  FIG. 2 , in one embodiment of the present invention scheduler  200  receives through user interface  210  the identification of the employees and the business/work locations with which they are associated, and stores the information in a data store such as database  220 .  
      In this particular example, the data representation shown in database  220  depicts a case in which employee  230  is eligible to work at both location  240  and location  242 , and employee  232  is eligible to work at both location  242  and location  244 ; employee  234  is only eligible to work at location  244 . In accordance with the present invention, when scheduler  200  generates a labor utilization schedule for location  242 , for example, scheduler  200  evaluates information associated with employee  230  and  232 , even though they each are also associated with other work locations (i.e., location  240  and location  244 , respectively).  
      Scheduler  200  may utilize any number of criteria to optimize the generation of the schedule. For example, such criteria may include the store location, work area within that location (i.e., type of job such as sale, stock and cashiering), employee availability, cost (e.g., total cost, incremental cost, overtime cost, etc.), skill level of the employee (e.g., always have highest skilled people at home location, etc.) and “fairness factors” (e.g., hour load, distance from home, distance from primary location, etc.). Other criteria may include payroll (e.g., who pays whom, overtime issues, etc.), work rules (e.g., union, legal, etc.) and employee preferences (e.g., preferred work location).  
     Architecture  
       FIGS. 3 and 4  illustrate the components of a basic computer and network architecture in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.  FIG. 3  depicts user computing device  300 , which may be a personal computer, workstation, handheld personal digital assistant (“PDA”), or any other type of microprocessor-based device. User computing device  300  may include a processor  310 , input device  320 , output device  330 , storage device  340 , client software  350 , and communication device  360 .  
      Input device  320  may include a keyboard, mouse, pen-operated touch screen or monitor, voice-recognition device, or any other device that accepts input. Output device  330  may include a monitor, printer, disk drive, speakers, or any other device that provides output.  
      Storage device  340  may include volatile and nonvolatile data storage, including one or more electrical, magnetic or optical memories such as a RAM, cache, hard drive, CD-ROM drive, tape drive or removable storage disk. Communication device  360  may include a modem, network interface card, or any other device capable of transmitting and receiving signals over a network. The components of user computing device  300  may be connected via an electrical bus or wirelessly.  
      Client software  350  may be stored in storage device  340  and executed by processor  310 , and may include, for example, a web browser for accessing application software such as SAP Retail application StaffWorks that embodies the functionality of the present invention (including, e.g., scheduler  200  and user interface  210 ).  
       FIG. 4  illustrates a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention. According to one particular embodiment, when corporate manager  400  (or location manager  402  or employee  404 ) accesses the SAP Retail application, client software  350  of user computing device  300  communicates with server software  430  (e.g., SAP Retail application StaffWorks) of server  420  via network links  415  and network  410 .  
      Network links  415  may include telephone lines, DSL, cable networks, T1 or T3 lines, wireless network connections, or any other arrangement that implements the transmission and reception of network signals. Network  410  may include any type of interconnected communication system, and may implement any communications protocol, which may secured by any security protocol.  
      Server  420  includes a processor and memory for executing program instructions as well as a network interface, and may include a collection of servers. In one particular embodiment, server  420  may include a combination of enterprise servers such as an application server and a database server. Database  440  (including, e.g., database  220 ) may represent a relational or object database, and may be accessed via a database server.  
      User computing device  300  and server  420  may implement any operating system, such as Windows or UNIX. Client software  350  and server software  430  may be written in any programming language, such as ABAP, C, C++, Java or Visual Basic.  
     EXAMPLE FLOW AND USER INTERFACE  
      In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention,  FIG. 5  depicts a multi-site workforce deployment utilization scenario, with  FIGS. 6-13  illustrating representative screens of user interface  210 .  
       FIGS. 6-7  show exemplary screens for the input of employee information, allowing for multiple employee attributes related to pay rules, labor sharing, proficiency rating and job assignments. This information forms a basis for the optimized scheduling of labor utilization according to the present invention.  
      In  FIG. 6 , one sees from the checked boxes that employee Julie Cook is a shared employee who is eligible to work in multiple locations in the same day. Under the “Local Work Area Assignments” tab, a user can enter a ranking, work area, pay rate, proficiency rating and segment information for Ms. Cook. Rank refers to the ranking of work area assignments (jobs) within that location; for example, employees could be assigned three work areas that they could be scheduled in—sales, stock, and cashiering—and the user could rank these accordingly. The “Mult. Segs Enabled” field allows employees to be scheduled in the same work area more than once in a day; for example, based on the assigned work areas they could be scheduled in sales from 8-12, then stock from 12-3 and then sales again from 3-6. The “Work Area Reluctance Profile” allows the user to choose whether they want the employee weighted more heavily from a scheduling perspective towards their primary job assignment (rank #1) or equal importance—which will look at all jobs the same.  
       FIG. 7  shows the same general screen but with the “Shared Work Area Assignments” tab exposed. This screen allows the user to enter the multiple locations and work areas for which the employee is eligible.  
      Once the employee information is entered, corporate manager  400  may prepare a detailed forecast (step  500 ) and release it to location manager  402  for updating with local information (step  510 ).  FIG. 8  shows a volume forecast screen that allows location manager  402  to make changes or adjustments to the forecasted values along the bottom of the screen as needed.  FIG. 9  shows a workload demand forecast screen that allows location manager  402  to navigate through the organizational hierarchy and see exactly how many employees are needed to accommodate the forecast volume.  
      Then corporate manager  400  assembles the location inputs, conducts an optimization run for all locations and distributes the results (i.e., detailed location forecast and employee schedules) (step  520 ).  FIG. 10  shows a daily schedule view screen that may result from such an optimization run; it allows for the review of the optimized schedule and provides for schedule maintenance such as identifying shared or pooled labor, general shift editing, shift swapping and shift replacement options. With respect to the shift replacement option,  FIG. 11  shows a screen that may appear if the user clicks on the “Replace” button on the bottom of the screen in  FIG. 10 . This option allows the user to find available employees to cover a particular shift; shared employees are evaluated for availability when this option is chosen.  
      Location manager  402  then reviews the distributed results, and distributes the schedules to employee  440  (step  530 ) for review and any requested changes (step  540 ). Location manager  402  approves or disapproves any requested changes (step  550 ), and corporate manager  400  does the same before conducting a final optimization run (step  560 ).  FIGS. 12-13  show a daily coverage report and a schedule statistics report, respectively, that may be generated on demand.  
      Several embodiments of the invention are specifically illustrated and/or described herein. However, it will be appreciated that modifications and variations of the invention are covered by the above teachings and within the purview of the appended claims without departing from the spirit and intended scope of the invention.