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Solving Staff Scheduling Problem using

Linear Programming
January 27, 2022 Avinash Navlani

Learn how to use Linear Programming to solve Staff Scheduling problems.


As Senior operation manager, your job is to optimize scarce resources, improve productivity,
reduce cost and maximize profit. For example, scheduling workers’ shifts for the most effective
utilization of manpower. We need to consider the various restrictions of the total working hours of
each employee, the number of shifts, shift hours, and other constraints. Such a problem can be
considered an optimization problem.

Staff or workforce scheduling is used in numerous use-cases like nurse staff scheduling in a
hospital, air flight scheduling, staff scheduling in the hotel, and scheduling of drivers. Such
schedules can be created based on various time periods like hours, days, weeks, and months.
Various organizations use spreadsheets and software. Poorly managed schedule causes
overlapping of employee allocation, no breaks between shifts. Ultimately it will cause poor
employee performance. For effective workforce scheduling, we need to consider the number of
constraints and formulate them in the right manner. Workforce scheduling will help in effective
human resource utilization, balanced timing, balanced workload, reduce employee fatigue and give
importance to individual preferences (link).

Linear programming is a mathematical model for optimizing the linear function. We can achieve the
best results using linear programming for a given specific set of constraints. Linear programming is
widely used in management and economic science problems such as production planning, network
routing, resource scheduling, and resource allocation. Linear programming can also be helpful in
scheduling human resources. Such type of problem is known as Staff Scheduling or Workforce
Scheduling problems.

In this tutorial, we are going to cover the following topics:


 Contents [ hide ]

1 Staff Scheduling Problem

2 Modeling Linear Programming Using Python PuLP
3 Understand the problem
4 Initialize LP Model
5 Define Decision Variable
6 Define Objective Function
7 Define the Constraints
8 Solve Model
9 Summary

Staff Scheduling Problem

In this problem, a saloon owner wants to determine the schedule for staff members. The staff
consists of the full-time shift of 9 hours and part-time shift of 3 hours. The saloon’s opening hours
are divided into 4 shifts of 3 hours each. In each shift, different levels of demands are there that
need the different number of staff members in each shift.

The required number of nurses for each shift is mentioned in the below table:

Shift Time Period Number of Employees

Morning 09 AM-12 PM 6

Afternoon 12-03 PM 11

Evening 03-06 PM 8

Night 06-09 PM 6

There is at least 1 full-time employee we need in each shift. The full-time employee will get $150 for
9 hours shift and the part-time employee will get $45 per shift.

Modeling Linear Programming Using

Python PuLP

PuLP is an open-source library in Python for solving linear programming problems. In order to
solve linear programming problems using PuLP, we need to formulate the objective function. PuLP
will optimize to maximize or minimize the objective function. PuLP modeling process has the
following steps for solving LP problems:

Initialize Model
Define Decision Variable
Define Objective Function
Define the Constraints
Solve Model

Understand the problem

Decision Variables

xi = Number of full-time employees scheduled in shift i.

yi = number of part-time employees scheduled in shift i.

Objective Function:

minimize Z= 150( x0 + x1 + x2 + x3 ) + 45( y0 + y1 + y2 + y3 )

Constraints 1:

Employee starting shift constraints

x0 + y 0 ≥ 6

x0 + x 1 + y 1 ≥ 8

x1 + x2 + y2 ≥ 11

x2 + x 3 + y 3 ≥ 6

Constraints 2:

Minimum full-time employees during any shift/period

x0 ≥ 1

x1 ≥ 1

x2 ≥ 1

Initialize LP Model
In this step, we will import all the classes and functions of pulp module and create a Minimization
LP problem using LpProblem class.

Python

1 # Import all classes of PuLP module

2 from pulp import *
3
4 # Initialize Class
5 model = LpProblem("StaffSchedulingProblem", LpMinimize)
6
7 # Create Shifts
8 shifts = list(range(4))

Define Decision Variable

In this step, we will define the decision variables. In our problem, we have three variables wood
tables, chairs, and bookcases. Let’s create them using LpVariable.dicts() class.
LpVariable.dicts() used with Python’s list comprehension. LpVariable.dicts() will take
the following four values:

First, prefix name of what this variable represents.

Second is the list of all the variables.
Third is the lower bound on this variable.
Fourth variable is the upper bound.
Fourth is essentially the type of data (discrete or continuous). The options for the
fourth parameter are LpContinuous or LpInteger.

Python

1 # Define Decision Variables

2 x = LpVariable.dicts('fulltimeshift_', shifts, lowBound=0, cat='Integer')
3 y = LpVariable.dicts('parttimeshift_', shifts, lowBound=0, cat='Integer')

Define Objective Function


In this step, we will define the minimum objective function by adding it to the LpProblem object.
lpSum(vector) is used here to define multiple linear expressions. It also used list comprehension
to add multiple variables.

Python
1 # Define Objective
2 model += 150 * lpSum([x[i] for i in shifts]) + 45 * lpSum([y[i] for i in shifts])

In this code, we have summed up the two variables(full-time and part-time) list values in an additive
fashion.

Define the Constraints

Here, we are adding two types of constraints: employee starting shift constraints and minimum full-
time employees during any period. We have added the 4 constraints defined in the problem by
adding them to the LpProblem object.

Python

1 # Define Constraints: For Employee starting the shift

2 model += x[0]+y[0]>=6
3 model += x[0]+x[1]+y[1]>=8
4 model += x[1]+x[2]+y[2]>=11
5 model += x[2]+x[3]+y[3]>=6
6
7 # Define Constraints: At least full-time employee during any shift
8 model += x[0]>=1
9 model += x[1]>=1
10 model += x[2]>=1

Solve Model
In this step, we will solve the LP problem by calling solve() method. We can print the final value by
using the following for loop.

Python

1 # The problem is solved using PuLP's choice of Solver

2 model.solve()
3
4 # Print the variables optimized value
5
6
for v in model.variables():
print(v.name, "=", v.varValue)

7
 7
8
# The optimised objective function value is printed to the screen
9
print("Total Cost of Staff = ", value(model.objective))

Output:
fulltimeshift__0 = 1.0
fulltimeshift__1 = 1.0
fulltimeshift__2 = 1.0
fulltimeshift__3 = 0.0
parttimeshift__0 = 5.0
parttimeshift__1 = 6.0
parttimeshift__2 = 9.0
parttimeshift__3 = 5.0

Total Cost of Staff = 1575.0

Summary
In this article, we have learned about Staff Scheduling problems, Problem Formulation, and
implementation in the python PuLp library. We have solved the staff scheduling problem using a
Linear programming problem in Python. Of course, this is just a simple case study, we can add
more constraints to it and make it more complicated. In upcoming articles, we will write more on
different optimization problems and its solution using Python. You can revise the basics of
mathematical concepts in this article and learn about Linear Programming in this article.

Solving Linear Programming using Python PuLP

Solving Cargo Loading Problem using Integer Programming in Python

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