Settings

Group Size

The Group Size setting is the total number of Jobs Mendel calculates in its calculation. The bigger the group size is, the potential for a better plan but the longer it will take Mendel to produce it. Likewise, the smaller the group size is, the potential for a worst plan but Mendel will produce it quicker. Group Size is performance related and nothing more and is all about how long it takes Mendel to produce a plan. Group size is independent and can be done in isolation from the other settings, when reducing the value it doesn’t affect any of the other settings.

For a testing best practice approach, start this with the biggest number that is acceptable to the customer i.e. the total number of Jobs loaded into the system so Mendel is looking at all of the Jobs at once and will give you the best possible outcome. After that, start reducing group size and look at how the quality of the plan degrades. Reduce it down as far as you can before the customer is unhappy with the loss of quality. Essentially, you’re offsetting how good the plan is to how fast Mendel produces it. For example, there’s no point if it takes 10 hours to produce and produces a brilliant plan, it’s still not fit for purpose. But maybe you’d be happy to drop 10% of the number of Jobs if it ran in 10 minutes.

Nearest Resource

The Nearest Resource setting is the number of Resources nearest to a Job that Mendel considers when it scores Jobs in its calculation. Nearest Resources comes into play after lots of constraints have been entered into Mendel ruling the majority of Resources out (skill is the simplest constraint that will rule out a Resource). For example, Mendel will look at all the different levels of Resources followed by preferred Resources and then mandatory Resources etc. Once it’s finished looking at all the Resources, Mendel will then leave you with a number of Resources for who the Job can be allocated. Out of the Resources that Mendel has left you, it will try and allocate the Job to the nearest Resource first. If the Job can’t be allocated to that Resource, Mendel will then try the next nearest Resource and so on.

There’s a benefit to reducing Nearest Resources beyond performance, which is, it has the effect of keeping people in and around the area in which they live. For example, there’s a Job and there’s 10 people that could possibly do it. Mendel will allocate the Job to the closest Resource. Overall, it’s beneficial for the total miles travelled in the solution.

Scenario

There are 300 Resources, Mendel then rules the majority out and leaves 30 who could potentially do the Job according to the constraints in place. Out of those 30 Resources, if one of them is mandatory then the mandatory Resource will get the Job. If 10 of them are preferred then suddenly, the number of Resources have gone from 300 to 30 and down to 10 and Mendel will allocate the Job to one of those 10 Resources. If none of that set 10 can do it, Mendel will try the next 10, and so on until it’s tried all 30 people who could potentially be allocated the Job.

Urgency Window

The Urgency Window is defined by specifying a number of minutes before the due date end that will treat the Job as urgent. Applying the bonus value makes these Jobs more attractive and increases the likelihood of Mendel scheduling urgent Jobs with or without appointments on time.

Only configure the Urgency settings if scenarios exist where due date Jobs are being pushed outside of their due date window and not completed because of the required distance to travel, when Resources have free time or when Resources have less urgent Jobs allocated to them.