Distributed hierarchical team resource allocation

Abstract

This paper considers distributed hierarchical team resource allocation in a dynamic environment. A hierarchical team of one leader and three subordinates is to process multiple types of randomly arriving tasks. Sharing a limited amount of renewable resources with other subordinates, each subordinate is responsible for processing a subset of tasks that arrive in his/her subsystem. The leader does not process tasks, but is responsible for coordinating subordinates' task processing through announcing the resource transfer plan and carrying out resource transfers among the subordinates. The objective of the team is to maximize the expected team reward through task processing.

By treating the leader and subordinates as individual decisionmaking entities, a decentralized approach is adopted to model team decisionmaking and coordination processes. Having global information, the leader is assumed to develop an internal model so as to determine the team resource transfer plan. Each subordinate, on the other hand, has local information only. He/She is to obtain resource transfer plans either through the leader's announcement or by using off-line rules, and uses a local task processing model to determine task processing. By incorporating team's computation and communication limitations, separate models and solution methodologies are developed for the leader and subordinates. Comparison between model predictions and human experimental results indicates that the model has a capability to predict human team decisionmaking and coordination processes.