System and method for optimizing the selection, verification, and deployment of expert resources in a time of chaos

• US 20080077463A1
• Filed: 09/07/2006
• Published: 03/27/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 09/07/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Hennessy, Richard A., Kraemer, James R., Friedlander, Robert R., Khan, Anwer Mujahid
• Granted Patent: US 9,202,184 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/8
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063112 Skill-based matching of a person or a group to a task

Abstract

A computer implemented method, apparatus, and computer usable program code for finding skills and resources for a chaotic event. Skills data for the chaotic event are organized. A determination is made whether the skills and the resources are available in response to a receiving an identification of the skills and the resources that are required to manage the chaotic event. The skills and the resources are optimized based on requirements and constraints, potential skills, and enabling resources to determine optimized skills and optimized resources. The availability of the optimized skills and the optimized resources are verified. The optimized skills and the optimized resources are reoptimized in response to a determination that the optimized skills and the optimized resources are unavailable.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for finding skills and resources for a chaotic event, the method comprising:

organizing skills data for the chaotic event;

responsive to receiving an identification of the skills and the resources required to manage the chaotic event, determining whether the skills and the resources are available;

optimizing the skills and the resources based on requirements and constraints, potential skills, and enabling resources to form optimized skills and optimized resources;

verifying availability of the optimized skills and the optimized resources; and

responsive to a determination that the optimized skills and the optimized resources are unavailable, reoptimizing the optimized skills and the optimized resources.

2. The computer implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing alternative optimized skills and alternative optimized resources in case the optimized skills and the optimized resources are unavailable; and

recommending the optimized skills and the optimized resources to manage the chaotic event.

3. The computer implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

organizing the skills data in a skills database, wherein the skills data is organized based on an event type of the chaotic event.

4. The computer implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

organizing routes information based on capacity, timing, cost, and availability; and

performing the optimizing step based on the routes information.

5. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the determining step further comprises:

predicting timing and severity of the chaotic event to determine the skills and the resources required and quantities of the skills and the resources.

6. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the determining whether the skills and the resources are available further comprises:

communicating with the skills and the resources for determining availability.

7. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the optimizing step is performed to maximize an objective function in order to compute the optimized skills and the optimized resources subject to a set of constraints.

8. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein the skills may be a cohort of skills, wherein the cohort of skills is treated as a single entity.

9. The computer implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

collecting skills and resources information in a database.

10. The computer implemented method of claim 1, wherein determining whether the skills and the resources are available further comprises:

searching available information to determine the skills that may be available.

11. The computer implemented method of claim 10, wherein the available information may include any of licenses, school records, research papers, immunization records, union records, professional organizations, databases, and Internet data.

12. A data processing system comprising:

a bus system;

a communications system connected to the bus system;

a memory connected to the bus system, wherein the memory includes a set of instructions; and

a processing unit connected to the bus system, wherein the processing unit executes the set of instructions to organize skills data for a chaotic event, determine whether skills and resources are available in response to a determination the skills and the resources are required to manage the chaotic event, optimize the skills and the resources based on requirements and constraints, potential skills, and enabling resources to determine optimized skills and optimized resources, verify availability of the optimized skills and the optimized resources, and reoptimize the optimized skills and the optimized resources in response to a determination that the optimized skills and the optimized resources are unavailable.

13. The system of claim 12, further comprising a plurality of databases operably connected to the data processing system, wherein the set of instructions accesses the plurality of databases to save and retrieve information for managing the skills and the resources for the chaotic event.

14. The system of claim 12, wherein the set of instructions includes a web crawler for finding the skills data.

15. The system of claim 12, wherein the set of instructions organizes routes information and performs optimization based on the routes information.

16. A computer program product comprising a computer usable medium including computer usable program code for finding skills and resources for a chaotic event, the computer program product comprising:

computer usable program code for organizing skills data for the chaotic event;

computer usable program code responsive to determining the skills and the resources required to manage the chaotic event, for determining whether the skills and the resources are available;

computer usable program code for optimizing the skills and the resources based on requirements and constraints, potential skills, and enabling resources to determine optimized skills and optimized resources;

computer usable program code for verifying availability of the optimized skills and the optimized resources; and

computer usable program code responsive to a determination that the optimized skills and the optimized resources are unavailable, for reoptimizing the optimized skills and the optimized resources.

17. The computer program product of claim 16, further comprising computer usable program code for recommending the optimized skills and the optimized resources to manage the chaotic event.

18. The computer program product of claim 16, further comprising:

computer usable program code for organizing the skills data in a skills database;

computer usable program code for organizing routes information in a routes database; and

performing the optimizing step based on the routes information.

19. The computer program product of claim 16, comprising computer usable program code for predicting timing and severity of the chaotic event to determine the skills and the resources required and quantities of the skills and the resources.

20. The computer program product of claim 16, further comprising:

computer usable program code for receiving manual input for finding the skills and the resources for the chaotic event; and

computer usable program code for querying based on discrete data and semantic data for finding the skills and the resources for the chaotic event.