On the importance of sequencing decisions in production planning and scheduling

Abstract

We discuss the traditional hierarchical approach to production planning and scheduling, emphasizing the fact that scheduling constraints are often either ignored or considered in a very crude way. In particular, we point out that how scheduling is carried out is part of the capacity constraints on the lotsizes. Usual methods to handle capacity in theory or in practice are reviewed. Finally, we present an approach that tries to overcome these drawbacks by capturing the shop-floor capacity through scheduling considerations.