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Fascinating. Can you give some examples of the priorities you incorporated that would be hard for off-the-shelf software to digest?

• duxup 7y ago
  The biggest challenge is just addressing the constantly shifting math on what is 'good'. So late night shifts are generally undesirable, but required to be covered and so you really want to spread them out. Having said that for some folks they'd rather do a bunch in a row, others spread them out. Some folks mind them less than others. Just making the math decide that an even number across the whole team is 'fair' always leads to some weirdness no matter how it works out. So a weekend night shift might be 3 days of work then 4 off. That's awesome for a guy whose vacation starts the following week because he gets more time off. He might actually WANT that. So in that case a night shift is desirable and makes the guy happier. Another person might not want that or not have a vacation... so his point of view might differ. But maybe next weekend he feels differently. And that's just one given weekend shift with somewhat unpredictable results. The real key though is not just noting how the variables change wildly it is that keeping those guys happy, being flexible for them... makes them MORE willing to take a rough shift now and then. That's even HARDER to quantify, but EXTREMELY valuable. And of course my ability to walk up to a dude, explain the situation, he trusts me because I've done this before / him favors is just something a computer that fires off an email just can't do.
  • freepor 7y ago
    Thanks.