Telecommunication network technician scheduling via multi-agent randomized greedy search

A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions which, when executed by a processing system including at least one processor, cause the processing system to perform operations, the operations comprising:

• obtaining a loan graph among work centers of a telecommunication network, wherein the loan graph includes a cost of travel of network technicians between work centers that are adjacent, wherein each of the network technicians is assigned to one of the work centers;
• obtaining a quantity of work in demand for each of the work centers for a day, wherein at least a first work center of the work centers has an excess of work in demand for the network technicians assigned to the first work center for the day;
• selecting, in accordance with an objective function, a first plurality of moves by at least a first subset of the network technicians, wherein the first plurality of moves comprises moves to adjacent work centers from work centers to which network technicians of the first subset of network technicians are assigned;
• selecting, in accordance with the objective function, a second plurality of moves by at least a second subset of the network technicians, wherein the second plurality of moves comprises moves to adjacent work centers from work centers to which network technicians of the second subset of network technicians are assigned, wherein the first plurality of moves and the second plurality of moves are selected from among possible moves between adjacent work centers in accordance with the loan graph, wherein the objective function identifies a reward for balancing a quantity of work among the network technicians for the day or identifies a reward for reducing an overtime of the network technicians of the first and second subsets of network technicians assigned to a plurality of work centers in excess of a designated quantity of work for the day, wherein the selecting the first plurality of moves comprises minimizing the objective function in accordance with the first plurality of moves, and wherein the selecting the second plurality of moves comprises minimizing the objective function in accordance with the second plurality of moves;
• and
• generating a work plan for the day for the network technicians in accordance with the first plurality of moves and the second plurality of moves.

A device comprising:

• a processor system including at least one processor;
• and
• a computer-readable medium storing instructions which, when executed by the processing system, cause the processing system to perform operations, the operations comprising:
• obtaining a loan graph among work centers of a telecommunication network, wherein the loan graph includes a cost of travel of network technicians between work centers that are adjacent, wherein each of the network technicians is assigned to one of the work centers;
• obtaining a quantity of work in demand for each of the work centers for a day, wherein at least a first work center of the work centers has an excess of work in demand for the network technicians assigned to the first work center for the day;
• selecting, in accordance with an objective function, a first plurality of moves by at least a first subset of the network technicians, wherein the first plurality of moves comprises moves to adjacent work centers from work centers to which network technicians of the first subset of network technicians are assigned;
• selecting, in accordance with the objective function, a second plurality of moves by at least a second subset of the network technicians, wherein the second plurality of moves comprises moves to adjacent work centers from work centers to which network technicians of the second subset of network technicians are assigned, wherein the first plurality of moves and the second plurality of moves are selected from among possible moves between adjacent work centers in accordance with the loan graph, wherein the objective function identifies a reward for balancing a quantity of work among the network technicians for the day or identifies a reward for reducing an overtime of the network technicians of the first and second subsets of network technicians assigned to a plurality of work centers in excess of a designated quantity of work for the day, wherein the selecting the first plurality of moves comprises minimizing the objective function in accordance with the first plurality of moves, and wherein the selecting the second plurality of moves comprises minimizing the objective function in accordance with the second plurality of moves;
• and
• generating a work plan for the day for the network technicians in accordance with the first plurality of moves and the second plurality of moves.