Workplace Productivity & Efficiency Modell

Agent Model

Links

Problem One: Two Workers and No Walls

In this model, there are two workers, they both have to pick up their two brown boxes and drop them off at the red x, one is positioned closer to a box that's further away from their drop off. The other is positioned closer to a box that’s closer to their drop off. They're both the same distance away from their closest box. Who do you think will get their boxes dropped off first, Worker 1 or Worker 2?
You may predict that both of them get all of their boxes returned at the same time, but after running the model you should realize that Worker 1 gets all of their boxes dropped off first. This is probably because Worker 1 only has to walk half of the distance of the box furthest from the drop-off bin while Worker 2 has to walk 2 times that distance (forward and back) this means Worker 2 only has to walk half of the distance of the box closest to the drop-off bin and Worker 1 has to walk two times that distance, but again the distance between the further away box and the drop off bin is greater than the distance between the distance between the closer box and the drop-off bin allowing Worker 1 to drop of all their boxes first. This shows why workspace setup matters. In this case, if a business was faced with these two options for workplace setups, they may want to go with the one on the left to save time and save money.

Problem Two: Two Workers and Walls

This model is very similar to the previos one, only there is a wall intercepting the middle of both of the workers' spaces with an opening on the right. Who do you predict will get all their boxes in first now? At first, I thought Worker 1 would still have all their boxes dropped off first. I believed that even though Worker 2 had a major advantage with his box being close to the opening of the wall, Worker 1 would still have the advantage being started near the further away box.
After the model is run, you should find that Worker 2 gets in all their boxes first. I came to realize that this is so because not only is the furthest away box on the same side as the wall opening, but the drop-off bin itself is on the same side of the wall opening! So in this case, a business that happens to have a dividing wall similar to the one above might want to go with the second setup if posed between deciding between the first and the second setup.

AgentCubes Model with 1 Worker

This model is a regular setup with just one worker and three boxes. While there is no comparing different setups in this model efficiency can still be made just in which boxes are picked up first. If the box towards the top of this model is box 1, the box to the left of top one is the second box and the box to the right of box 1 is box 3, which box do you think should be picked up first in order for all the boxes to be picked up in the least amount of time?
If you think about it, Box 1 would need to be picked up first in order to create the speediest time. In order to figure this out, you need to look at which boxes the worker is closer to than the drop-off bin is. You can see that the worker is further away from Box 2 and Box 3 than the drop-off bin is. The worker is closer to Box 1 than the drop-off bin is to Box 1 therefore creating less distance that needs to be traveled back and forth to retrieve and drop off Box 1. Since you can't really make tell the worker to pick up a certain box first in AgentCubes, I did a bit of measuring myself by using sticky notes. Take a look:

Worker picks up Box 1 first:

Worker picks up Box 2 first:

Worker picks up Box 3 first:

Results: Picking up Box 1 resorts in the shortest distance traveled

It can be seen that when all of the distances from each Box were put together, the total distance from Box 1 was less than the total distance from Box 2 and from Box 3. This means that all of the boxes were therefore picked up in less time which means it would cost slightly less to pick up Box 1 first than to pick up any of the other boxes first. This shows that even the order in which boxes are picked up first matters.

Versions

Version 7
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408859
There is a world with agents. Some agents have shapes. The box agent gives off an invisible scent that draws the worker to it. Once the worker gets to the box the worker picks up the box and walks to the drop-off bin to drop the box off. The worker does this with all the boxes until there are no more left. This happens alongside another worker doing the same thing.
- Add another worker and another side that does the same thing

Version 6
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408594
There is a world with agents. Some agents have shapes. The box agent gives off an invisible scent which draws the worker to it. Once the worker gets to the box the worker picks up the box and walks to the drop-off bin to drop the box off. The worker does this with all the boxes until there are no more left.
- Loop the box grabbing and drop-off process until there are no more boxes left

Version 5
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408593
There is a world with agents. Some agents have shapes. The box agent gives off an invisible scent which draws the worker to it. Once the worker gets to the box the worker picks up the box and walks to the drop-off bin to drop the box off.
- Add actions to make the worker walk over to the drop-off bin after picking up a box (broadcast?)

Version 4
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408571
There is a world with agents. Some agents have shapes. The box agent gives off an invisible scent which draws the worker to it. Once the worker gets to the box the worker picks up the box.
- Add actions to put the box next to or on top of the worker’s head to indicate that it is being carried

Version 3
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408568
There is a world with agents. Some agents have shapes. The box agent gives off an invisible scent which draws the worker to it.
- Add actions to draw the worker towards the box

Version 2
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408565
There is a world with agents. Some agents have shapes. The box agent gives off an invisible scent.
- Add a 'scent' to the box
- Add a 'scent' to the floor

Version 1
https://agentsheets.com/project/1407246
There is a world with stationary agents. Some agents have shapes.
-Add all agents:
• Worker
• Box
• Counter
• Drop-Off Bin
-Style agents to liking
-Add all shapes:
• Drop-Off Bin Empty
• Drop-Off Bin Occupied
• Drop-Off Bin Full
• Box Disappear
• Style shapes to liking

Version 0
https://agentsheets.com/project/1408560
There is a world.
- Create a world
- Use naming scheme: V#_Productivity&Efficiency
- Add a description

Try it Yourself!

In any of the 3 models, you can add boxes and walls to experiments with how each setup takes shorter or longer than another setup. You can even add more workers and drop-off bins, but there is a chance that the model may mess up. In this case, refresh and try again. Do it as many times as you'd like, none of the changes from an audience member will be saved to the actual model.