Multi-mode schedule optimisation for incentivised projects

Abstract

This research presents a novel quantitative methodology to optimise the scheduling of subcontracted projects from the perspective of the contractor. Specifically, the scenario where the contractor’s remuneration is performance dependent is investigated. Based on the incentive methodology introduced by Kerkhove and Vanhoucke (2016), a novel mixed integer programming formulation as well as a greedy local search heuristic to solve the contractor’s problem are presented and tested in a computational experiment. For this experiment, a database containing 3,150 contract-project combinations with diverse structures has been created. The results from this experiment demonstrate the efficiency of the MIP formulation even for larger problem instances, as well as the influence of the project and contract structure on the contractor’s earnings.