Resource management method and apparatus
First Claim
1. A method of planning resource utilisation in respect of job requirements, the job requirements comprising a plurality of jobs to be carried out over a plurality of days, the method comprising the steps of:
- receiving a plurality of resource records, each record being associated with a resource and comprising data identifying attributes thereof;
receiving job data identifying attributes of the plurality of jobs;
evaluating, on the basis of both types of attribute data, a match between resource availability and job requirements;
modifying attributes of at least some of the resource records, and repeating the evaluation step in respect of the modified resource records; and
selecting resource records, for use in scheduling of jobs to resources, that best match resource availability to job requirements.
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
The invention relates to resource management, and describes a method and apparatus to be used in planning of resource deployment. In an embodiment of the invention, the number and characteristics of forecasted and/or unprocessed jobs falling within a time period such as a week, or a month, are compared to resource availability and status for that time period, in terms of attributes such as location, skills and time. A cost—in terms of jobs that cannot be carried out, given current resource availability and status—is evaluated. Preferably the attributes are stored as resource records, so that there is one resource record per resource, and the attributes of at least some of the resource records are modified using a heuristic search means or similar. The resource records are modified until a minimum cost is identified, and these resource records can then be used to formulate successive capacity plans, which can be input to a scheduling system.
111 Citations
14 Claims
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1. A method of planning resource utilisation in respect of job requirements, the job requirements comprising a plurality of jobs to be carried out over a plurality of days, the method comprising the steps of:
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receiving a plurality of resource records, each record being associated with a resource and comprising data identifying attributes thereof;
receiving job data identifying attributes of the plurality of jobs;
evaluating, on the basis of both types of attribute data, a match between resource availability and job requirements;
modifying attributes of at least some of the resource records, and repeating the evaluation step in respect of the modified resource records; and
selecting resource records, for use in scheduling of jobs to resources, that best match resource availability to job requirements. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
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14. Apparatus for planning resource utilisation in respect of job requirements, the job requirements comprising a plurality of jobs to be carried out over a plurality of days, the apparatus comprising:
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storage arranged to store a plurality of resource records, each record being associated with a resource and comprising data identifying attributes thereof, and data identifying attributes of the plurality of jobs;
receiving means arranged to receive the resource record data and job data;
evaluating means arranged to evaluate, on the basis of both types of attribute data, a match between resource availability and job requirements;
means arranged to modify at least some of the resource records, so as to modify attributes thereof, and selecting means arranged to select resource records that best match resource availability to job requirements.
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Specification