AWAS Automated Work Assignment System A Real World NP-Complete Problem Huy Truong – COT 6410 November 4, 2008

What is AWAS? AWAS is a workforce-management system developed by GTE Service Corporation (now Verizon) in the early 1990s. AWAS assigns jobs to field service technicians, allows technicians to report job status, completes work orders that flow directly into the billing system. AWAS is being used by two of the largest telecommunication corporations in North America: Verizon and Telus (Canada) I was a software developer on the AWAS program in 1998 at GTE Data Services in Tampa, FL

AWAS – High Level Architecture Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Automated Work Assignment System ( AWAS) Add Job Provide ETA Call Input Data Compute an Optimized Job Assignment People Management Software Available Technician, Skill Level Assign Jobs Provide Status Billing System Provide Billing Data Technician Performance Feedback Bill Customer

AWAS – An Optimization Problem Given:  Set of jobs with estimated labor hours, required skills, and location (customer location)  Number of available technicians with skills  Cost to travel between all customer locations Question:  What is the most cost effective way to assign jobs to technicians?

AWAS – Converted to a Decision Problem Given:  Set of jobs with estimated labor hours, required skills, and location (customer location)  Number of available technicians with skills  Cost to travel between all customer locations  Number of hours, k, that jobs must be completed Question:  Can we schedule jobs to technicians so that all jobs will be complete in k hours?

AWAS – Create A Math Model Given:  Set of pre-defined skills S = {s 1, s 2, s 3, … s n }  Set of locations L = {l 1, l 2, … l m }  Set of jobs J = {(s j, l j, hrs), (s k, l k, hrs)… (s v, l v, hrs)}  Set of technicians T = {(s i, s j, s m ), (s v, s k ), (s i )}  Set of travel cost C = {(l 1, l 2, cost), (l 1, l 3, cost)… (l m-1, l m, cost)}  A positive number k Question:  Can we schedule jobs, J, to technicians, T, so that all jobs will be complete in k hours?

AWAS – is a NP Problem 1.The AWAS problem is a decision problem 2.There is a yes instance verifier in polynomial time once the oracle provides the job assignments Therefore, AWAS decision problem is belong NP

AWAS – is a NP-Complete Problem Let’s consider the Multiprocessor Problem Given:  Set of tasks T = {t 1, t 2, … t n }  Set of processors P = {p 1, p 2, … p m }  And an positive integer t Question:  Can we schedule T so that all processors P will stop by some time t?

AWAS – is a NP-Complete Problem Let’s Create an instance of AWAS decision problem Given:  Set of pre-defined skills S = {s 1 } – one skill  Set of locations L = {l 1 } – one location  Set of jobs J = {(s 1, l 1, t1), (s 1, l 1, t 2 )… (s 1, l 1, t n )}  Set of technicians T = {(s 1 ), (s 1 ),… (s 1 )} – All technician has the same skill. Number of technician is equal to number of Processors  Set of travel cost C = {(l 1, l 1, 0)} – a single zero cost to travel from location 1 to location 1  A positive number k  t Question:  Can we schedule jobs, J, to technicians, T, so that all jobs will be complete in k hours?

AWAS - is a NP-Complete Problem Multiprocessor Scheduling is a restricted version of AWAS decision problem. Therefore, prove by restriction that:  All yes instances of AWAS decision problem would be yes instances of Multiprocessor Scheduling problem and vice versa Therefore, AWAS decision problem is a NP-Complete problem

AWAS - Interesting Facts AWAS also considers to assign the similar jobs to the same technician. This improves productivity since the technician works on the same problem all day AWAS handles jobs that need more than one technician AWAS reassigns jobs through out the day to react to cancellation & new jobs The original AWAS was written in C Verizon IT Solution promotes and sells AWAS to telecommunication companies around the Globe software-applications/workforce-management/awas- index.html

AWAS - Interesting Facts There are hate websites for AWAS since it “controls”, tracks, and maximizes field technicians productivities.  “Can you sit around and let this system control your lives, or are you going to stand up and fight against the new world order? Fear not, for we are here to protect you.” guide.html

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