Optimization of Partly Conflicting Goals in Complex Resource Planning

Many optimization models are limited with respect to the management of inconsistency between the optimization goals. As consequence, these models in many cases achieve results that are optimal for the model but not for the problem. In real world problems the optimization goals are usually partly conflicting. Independence of goals as precondition usually does not hold and utility functions based on weighted sums only do not really help. In this paper we describe an application of an optimization model based on interactions between goals to workforce management. Workforce management is a relevant representative multi-goal real world resource planning optimization problem.