Off-campus UMass Amherst users: To download campus access dissertations, please use the following link to log into our proxy server with your UMass Amherst user name and password.

Non-UMass Amherst users: Please talk to your librarian about requesting this dissertation through interlibrary loan.

Dissertations that have an embargo placed on them will not be available to anyone until the embargo expires.

Author ORCID Identifier

N/A

AccessType

Open Access Dissertation

Document Type

dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Degree Program

Management

Year Degree Awarded

2014

First Advisor

Senay Solak

Second Advisor

Anna Nagurney

Third Advisor

Robert Nakosteen

Subject Categories

Operations and Supply Chain Management | Other Business

Abstract

We study a class of stochastic resource allocation problems that specifically deals with effective utilization of resources in the interest of social value creation. These problems are treated as a separate class of problems mainly due to the nonprofit nature of the application areas, as well as the abstract structure of social value definition. As part of our analysis of these unique characteristics in societal resource allocation, we consider two major application areas involving such decisions. The first application area deals with resource allocations for foreclosed housing acquisitions as part of the response to the foreclosure crisis in the U.S. Two stochastic dynamic models are developed and analyzed for these types of problems. In the first model, we consider strategic resource allocation decisions by community development corporations (CDCs), which aim to minimize the negative effects of foreclosures by acquiring, redeveloping and selling foreclosed properties in their service areas. We model this strategic decision process through different types of stochastic mixed-integer programming formulations, and present alternative solution approaches. We also apply the models to real-world data obtained through interactions with a CDC, and perform both policy related and computational analyses. Based on these analyses, we present some general policy insights involving tradeoffs between different societal objectives, and also discuss the efficiency of exact and heuristic solution approaches for the models.In the second model, we consider a tactical resource allocation problem, and identify socially optimal policies for CDCs in dynamically selecting foreclosed properties for acquisition as they become available over time. The analytical results based on a dynamic programming model are then implemented in a case study involving a CDC, and social return based measures defining selectivity rates at different budget levels are specified. The second application area involves dynamic portfolio management approaches for optimization of surgical team compositions in robotic surgeries. For this problem, we develop a stochastic dynamic model to identify policies for optimal team configurations, where optimality is defined based on the minimum experience level required to achieve the maximum attainable performance over all ranges of feasible experience measures. We derive individual and dependent performance values of each surgical team member by using data on operating room time and team member experience, and then use them as inputs to a stochastic programming based framework that we develop. Several insights and guidelines for dynamic staff allocation to surgical teams are then proposed based on the analytical and numerical results derived from the model.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.7275/5474833.0

Download

Share

COinS