IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ejores/v272y2019i2p636-641.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Prescriptive analytics for human resource planning in the professional services industry

Author

Listed:
  • Berk, Lauren
  • Bertsimas, Dimitris
  • Weinstein, Alexander M.
  • Yan, Julia

Abstract

In this paper, we examine human resource planning decisions made at firms that sell contract-based consulting projects. High levels of uncertainty in deals and revenue forecasts make it challenging for consulting firms to hire the right people to staff their projects. We present a human resource planning model using concepts from robust optimization to allow companies to dynamically make hiring decisions that maximize profit while remaining as flexible as possible, and demonstrate potential profit improvements through simulation on real data.

Suggested Citation

  • Berk, Lauren & Bertsimas, Dimitris & Weinstein, Alexander M. & Yan, Julia, 2019. "Prescriptive analytics for human resource planning in the professional services industry," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 272(2), pages 636-641.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ejores:v:272:y:2019:i:2:p:636-641
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ejor.2018.06.035
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377221718305708
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ejor.2018.06.035?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cipriano Santos & Tere Gonzalez & Haitao Li & Kay-Yut Chen & Dirk Beyer & Sundaresh Biligi & Qi Feng & Ravindra Kumar & Shelen Jain & Ranga Ramanujam & Alex Zhang, 2013. "HP Enterprise Services Uses Optimization for Resource Planning," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 43(2), pages 152-169, April.
    2. Ben-Tal, Aharon & Chung, Byung Do & Mandala, Supreet Reddy & Yao, Tao, 2011. "Robust optimization for emergency logistics planning: Risk mitigation in humanitarian relief supply chains," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 45(8), pages 1177-1189, September.
    3. Bernard Gendron, 2005. "Scheduling Employees in Quebec’s Liquor Stores with Integer Programming," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 35(5), pages 402-410, October.
    4. Dimitris Bertsimas & Dan A. Iancu & Pablo A. Parrilo, 2010. "Optimality of Affine Policies in Multistage Robust Optimization," Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 35(2), pages 363-394, May.
    5. Aharon Ben-Tal & Boaz Golany & Arkadi Nemirovski & Jean-Philippe Vial, 2005. "Retailer-Supplier Flexible Commitments Contracts: A Robust Optimization Approach," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 7(3), pages 248-271, February.
    6. Andris A. Zoltners & Prabhakant Sinha, 1980. "Integer Programming Models for Sales Resource Allocation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 26(3), pages 242-260, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hokyeom Kim & Injun Choi & Jitaek Lim & Sanghyun Sung, 2022. "Business Process-Organizational Structure (BP-OS) Performance Measurement Model and Problem-Solving Guidelines for Efficient Organizational Management in an Ontact Work Environment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(21), pages 1-22, November.
    2. Zhang, Yucheng & Xu, Shan & Zhang, Long & Yang, Mengxi, 2021. "Big data and human resource management research: An integrative review and new directions for future research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 34-50.
    3. Luis Arismendy & Carlos Cárdenas & Diego Gómez & Aymer Maturana & Ricardo Mejía & Christian G. Quintero M., 2021. "A Prescriptive Intelligent System for an Industrial Wastewater Treatment Process: Analyzing pH as a First Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-14, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Viktoryia Buhayenko & Dick den Hertog, 2017. "Adjustable Robust Optimisation approach to optimise discounts for multi-period supply chain coordination under demand uncertainty," International Journal of Production Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 55(22), pages 6801-6823, November.
    2. Dimitris Bertsimas & Frans J. C. T. de Ruiter, 2016. "Duality in Two-Stage Adaptive Linear Optimization: Faster Computation and Stronger Bounds," INFORMS Journal on Computing, INFORMS, vol. 28(3), pages 500-511, August.
    3. Ning Zhang & Chang Fang, 2020. "Saddle point approximation approaches for two-stage robust optimization problems," Journal of Global Optimization, Springer, vol. 78(4), pages 651-670, December.
    4. Bakker, Hannah & Dunke, Fabian & Nickel, Stefan, 2020. "A structuring review on multi-stage optimization under uncertainty: Aligning concepts from theory and practice," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    5. Yanıkoğlu, İhsan & Gorissen, Bram L. & den Hertog, Dick, 2019. "A survey of adjustable robust optimization," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 277(3), pages 799-813.
    6. Hamed Mamani & Shima Nassiri & Michael R. Wagner, 2017. "Closed-Form Solutions for Robust Inventory Management," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(5), pages 1625-1643, May.
    7. Dan A. Iancu & Nikolaos Trichakis, 2014. "Pareto Efficiency in Robust Optimization," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 60(1), pages 130-147, January.
    8. Haolin Ruan & Zhi Chen & Chin Pang Ho, 2023. "Adjustable Distributionally Robust Optimization with Infinitely Constrained Ambiguity Sets," INFORMS Journal on Computing, INFORMS, vol. 35(5), pages 1002-1023, September.
    9. Jianzhe Zhen & Ahmadreza Marandi & Danique de Moor & Dick den Hertog & Lieven Vandenberghe, 2022. "Disjoint Bilinear Optimization: A Two-Stage Robust Optimization Perspective," INFORMS Journal on Computing, INFORMS, vol. 34(5), pages 2410-2427, September.
    10. Gabrel, Virginie & Murat, Cécile & Thiele, Aurélie, 2014. "Recent advances in robust optimization: An overview," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 235(3), pages 471-483.
    11. Xin, Linwei & Goldberg, David A., 2021. "Time (in)consistency of multistage distributionally robust inventory models with moment constraints," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 289(3), pages 1127-1141.
    12. Gorissen, B.L. & den Hertog, D., 2011. "Robust Counterparts of Inequalities Containing Sums of Maxima of Linear Functions," Other publications TiSEM 8c6aa0e2-c4c6-4693-ab9a-f, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    13. Gorissen, B.L. & den Hertog, D., 2011. "Robust Counterparts of Inequalities Containing Sums of Maxima of Linear Functions," Discussion Paper 2011-115, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    14. Gorissen, Bram L. & Yanıkoğlu, İhsan & den Hertog, Dick, 2015. "A practical guide to robust optimization," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 124-137.
    15. Christoph Buchheim & Jannis Kurtz, 2018. "Robust combinatorial optimization under convex and discrete cost uncertainty," EURO Journal on Computational Optimization, Springer;EURO - The Association of European Operational Research Societies, vol. 6(3), pages 211-238, September.
    16. Marcus Ang & Yun Fong Lim & Melvyn Sim, 2012. "Robust Storage Assignment in Unit-Load Warehouses," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(11), pages 2114-2130, November.
    17. Jiankun Sun & Jan A. Van Mieghem, 2019. "Robust Dual Sourcing Inventory Management: Optimality of Capped Dual Index Policies and Smoothing," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 21(4), pages 912-931, October.
    18. Rahal, Said & Papageorgiou, Dimitri J. & Li, Zukui, 2021. "Hybrid strategies using linear and piecewise-linear decision rules for multistage adaptive linear optimization," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 290(3), pages 1014-1030.
    19. Amir Ardestani-Jaafari & Erick Delage, 2016. "Robust Optimization of Sums of Piecewise Linear Functions with Application to Inventory Problems," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 64(2), pages 474-494, April.
    20. Chaithanya Bandi & Eojin Han & Omid Nohadani, 2019. "Sustainable Inventory with Robust Periodic-Affine Policies and Application to Medical Supply Chains," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 65(10), pages 4636-4655, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ejores:v:272:y:2019:i:2:p:636-641. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eor .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.