Time-Cost Trade-off and Constraint Resource Scheduling Considering Overtime for Activity Expedition

Abstract

Project cost, duration and resources are three important parameters of a construction project. There is always a trade-off between project time and cost. While a lot of techniques are available to optimize the project time and cost in normal conditions, less effort is done to optimize them in a resource constraint conditions. This paper is focusing on a nonlinear integer framework for time-cost trade-off (TCT) and constraint resource scheduling (RCS) using overtime working as an activity expedition option, taking help of Microsoft Project Software (MSP) and Microsoft Excel Solver. The framework is inspired by the fact that, in case of resource constraints (limited availability), one of the best option for crashing an activity and reducing project duration is increasing working hours (overtime working), considering that the amount of this overtime work should not violate the Indian labor law, the resulted schedule will be the most practical, efficient and with high probability of completion on time.

Keywords: Time-cost trade-off, constrained resource scheduling, labor law, nonlinear integer programming, project total cost