Modeling a flexible staff scheduling problem in the Era of Covid-19

In this paper, we propose optimization models to address flexible staff scheduling problems and some main issues arising from efficient workforce management during the Covid-19 pandemic. The adoption of precautionary measures to prevent the pandemic from spreading has raised the need to rethink quickly and effectively the way in which the workforce is scheduled, to ensure that all the activities are conducted in a safe and responsible manner. The emphasis is on novel optimization models that take into account demand requirements, employees’ personal and family responsibilities, and anti-Covid-19 measures at the same time. It is precisely considering the anti-Covid-19 measures that the models allow to define the working mode to be assigned to the employees: working remotely or on-site. The last optimization model, which can be viewed as the most general and the most flexible formulation, has been developed to capture the specificity of a real case study of an Italian University. In order to improve employees’ satisfaction and ensure the best work/life balance possible, an alternative partition of a workday into shifts to the usual two shifts, morning and afternoon, is proposed. The model has been tested on real data provided by the Department of Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering, University of Calabria, Italy. The computational experiments show good performance and underline the potentiality of the model to handle worker safety requirements and practicalities and to ensure work activities continuity. In addition, the non-cyclic workforce policy, based on the proposed workday organization, is preferred by employees, since it allows them to better meet their needs.