Abstract
Purpose This study aims to compare linear programming and stable marriage approaches to the personnel assignment problem under conditions of uncertainty. Robust solutions should exhibit reduced variability of solutions in the presence of one or more additional constraints or problem perturbations added to some baseline problems. Design/methodology/approach Several variations of each approach are compared with respect to solution speed, solution quality as measured by officer-to-assignment preferences and solution robustness as measured by the number of assignment changes required after inducing a set of representative perturbations or constraints to an assignment instance. These side constraints represent the realistic assignment categorical priorities and limitations encountered by army assignment managers who solve this problem semiannually, and thus the synthetic instances considered herein emulate typical problem instances. Findings The results provide insight regarding the trade-offs between traditional optimization and heuristic-based solution approaches. Originality/value The results indicate the viability of using the stable marriage algorithm for talent management via the talent marketplace currently used by both the U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force for personnel assignments.
Highlights
At least twice each year, a group of assignment managers from the U.S Army’s Human Resources Command solve an army personnel-to-assignment matching problem (APAMP), a problem wherein each assignment manager aligned with a career specialty must pair officers with personnel assignments
In the presence of uncertainty regarding the problem structure, the addition and/or removal of elements from either input set will require resolving the assignment problem. Such disruptions occur frequently within APAMP instantiations, as officers may be removed from consideration – or newly considered – for an assignment because of personnel actions or unit needs; assignments may become vacant on short notice; or a specific officer-toassignment matching may be directed to meet the needs of a specific unit or senior decisionmaker
The Air Force is currently using stable marriage algorithm (SMA) to support their assignment process and is investigating issues related to preference matrix sparsity, something we look to examine in a sequel to this work; this study focuses on the robustness of assignment solutions using SMA for APAMP
Summary
At least twice each year, a group of assignment managers (i.e. human resource specialists) from the U.S Army’s Human Resources Command solve an army personnel-to-assignment matching problem (APAMP), a problem wherein each assignment manager aligned with a career specialty must pair officers with personnel assignments. Each assignment manager may consider the suitability of an officer to fill an assignment, an officer’s preference for a. © In accordance with section 105 of the US Copyright Act, this work has been produced by a US government employee and shall be considered a public domain work, as copyright protection is not available. The authors thank the editor and two anonymous referees for their insightful comments and suggestions that improved this manuscript
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