Planning Annualized Hours with Flexible Contracts

This study proposes and evaluates in a novel way a strategy for personnel planning, which combines the particular flexibility strategies i) Annualized hours and ii) flexible contracts. The problem is to plan a flexible workforce that minimizes the problems of overstaffing and understaffing in a retail store, during a time horizon of one year. The problem solution, involved resolving strategic and tactical decisions, its mean an a Tour Scheduling Problem, thus allowing to see the potential benefits of the proposed flexibility strategy. The results obtained show the important benefits, as well as their close link with workforce planning, in relation to operating costs, and robustness facing demand variability scenarios.