ARTICLE IN PRESS

Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251

www.elsevier.com/locate/ijpe

Task time estimation in a multi-product manually

operated workstation
David S. Kima,, J. David Portera, Jirachai Buddhakulsomsirib
a
School of Mechanical, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97330, USA
b
School of Manufacturing Systems and Mechanical Engineering, Sirindhorn International Institute of Technology,
Thammasat University, Pathumthani 12121, Thailand
Received 19 September 2007; accepted 5 February 2008
Available online 14 February 2008

Abstract

Many manual workstations are designed so that a specic set of tasks to be completed on jobs are performed at the
workstation. The subset of individual tasks executed on each job may vary, and a jobs total processing time at the
workstation is the sum of those individual task times. Since estimates of the mean and variance of the individual task times
are used to make operational and planning decisions, data should be collected on a regular basis to ensure accurate
estimates. In this research, we apply a least-squares method and maximum likelihood estimation to estimate the mean and
variance of individual task times at a manual workstation from total job-processing time data. Both methods assume that
the time to execute individual tasks at a workstation can be treated as independent random variables whose distributions
are the same regardless of what other tasks are executed on a job. The maximum likelihood method also assumes that these
times are normally distributed. Efcient computational formulas developed for the least-squares method are ideal for use
with an automatic data collection system, and both methods provide good estimates of mean task times that are adequate
for planning and operational decisions.
r 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Work measurement; Least squares; Maximum likelihood

1. Introduction

There are many examples of production systems where jobs move through various manually operated
workstations on their routing, and at each workstation specic tasks required by the job are completed.
A classic example is the moving automotive assembly line. In this example, all jobs (i.e., vehicles) visit the
manual assembly workstations in the same order and workers at each workstation perform the required
assembly tasks for that particular job. The required tasks for a job are a subset of the tasks performed at the
workstation. For example, sedans passing through a specic workstation may require additional tasks for rear
doors that are not required on coupes. The same general situation is common in electronics and electrical
appliance assembly (Kutintarat and Kanjanapanyakom, 2001), and may occur in other production systems

Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 541 737 8858.

E-mail address: david.kim@orst.edu (D.S. Kim).

0925-5273/$ - see front matter r 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijpe.2008.02.004
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240 D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251

where a xed set of tasks are performed by workers. The work presented here was motivated by questions on
how to automate task time data collection for a large manufacturer of commercial diesel trucks. In this paper,
we address task time estimation for a single manually operated workstation. Although the focus is on a
single workstation, the methods developed are applicable to multiple workstation systems by applying the
results to each workstation separately. It is in the context of a large production system where planning and
operational decisions become more complex, and regular data collection of individual task times can become a
daunting task.
Accurate estimates for the time to execute individual tasks are important because the estimates are
used in various ways. They are used when assigning the tasks to be performed at a workstation. The
objective is to assign tasks to workstations such that each workstation will execute the same average
amount of work. This is the line balancing problem. Estimates of the individual task times are also
used when scheduling (i.e., sequencing) jobs, in applications such the operation of moving automotive
assembly lines. Here the objective is to sequence jobs such that more complicated jobs are separated
by a minimum number of less complicated jobs to prevent the workers at a workstation from losing pace
with the assembly line. Task time estimates are also used for manpower planning and cost estimation of
new products.
The applications mentioned require that task time estimates are available before the line is operational,
however, with the varied uses of individual task time estimates it is helpful and important to have accurate and
up-to-date estimates. For existing systems, average task times may vary considerably from prior estimates
causing system inefciencies, poor scheduling and poor planning decisions. Accurate and up-to-date estimates
will also be extremely valuable when planning and designing future assembly lines.
The estimation of individual task times falls in the area of work measurement and is one of the traditional
application areas of industrial engineering. Thus, there have been volumes of research published related to
work measurement, as well as commercial tools developed to make work measurement more efcient.
Unfortunately, most existing methods for generating individual task time estimates remain tedious and
time consuming since they focus on individual tasks separately. One approach to estimate individual
task times is to use pre-determined time systems (e.g., methodstime measurement) and break individual
tasks into fundamental elements (Smith, 1978; Mundel and Danner, 1994). Because of the time and
detail required, pre-determined time systems are often not practical for large production systems. Another
approach is to time work, which is being performed. Timing individual tasks requires intimate knowledge
of the tasks since workers transition from task to task without denite starting and stopping points.
Because of this, the only reliable method for collecting individual task time data is manual data collection,
which is time consuming, tedious and difcult to complete for large systems. A more effective approach
would be to utilize automatic data collection technology (Section 2.2), which will provide regular and
consistent collection of data. However, it would be very difcult to utilize automatic data collection
technology for direct collection of individual task times, so it must be combined with simpler data collection
requirements.
The approach we propose is to estimate individual task times from the collection of only the total
job-processing times at a workstation. Two methods are presented that can be used to estimate both the mean
and variance of the individual task times. The rst method presented is the same as the multiple regression
methods found in Smith (1978) and Mundel and Danner (1994). A contribution to this method presented here
is the development of computational formulas that permit efcient updating of individual task time estimates
as additional data are obtained, and an extension of this method to estimate the variance of the individual task
times. The second method presented is a maximum likelihood method that can be used when the distributional
form of the task times is known. Most important in this case are normally distributed task times, where the
maximum likelihood method can be used to estimate the mean and variance of individual task times. This
paper will focus on the estimation of individual task-processing times for a single workstation, which can then
be applied to each workstation in a larger production system.
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, the required data and technologies that
may be used to automate data collection are discussed. We then present the least squares and maximum
likelihood methods in Sections 3 and 4, respectively. Computational results are presented in Section 5, and the
paper closes with conclusions in Section 6.
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D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251 241

2. Notation, assumptions, and data collection

In this section, we present notation, state assumptions, and describe the required data. We then briey
discuss automatic identication and data collection (AIDC) technologies that may be appropriate for different
production systems.

2.1. Notation and assumptions

The notation to be used for job and individual task-processing times is presented next. Let,

 Xt the random variable representing the total processing time of job t at the workstation.
 X it the random variable representing the time of individual task i on job t at the workstation.
 l m0; m1 ; m2 ; . . . ; mN T , where mi EX it .
 at 1; a1t ; a2t ; a3t ; . . . ; aN
t  A row vector of indicator variables that indicates which individual
tasks (out of N possible) are performed on job t (ait 1 if task i is performed on job t; ait 0
otherwise). Task 0 represents non-task specic work that is performed at the workstation on
every job.
 xt total processing time at the workstation for job t, t 1, 2,y,R. The xt are realizations of the task-
processing time random variable Xt.
 xit task i processing time for job t, t 1,2,y,R. The xit are realizations of the task-processing time
random variable X it .

X it and X jt , i6j are assumed to be independent random variables. Additionally, the distribution of task is
processing time stays the same regardless of which other tasks are performed on a job. The appropriateness of
this assumption for various environments should be evaluated.
We are interested in estimates for l and r2 (i.e., estimators for the mean and variance of the individual task
times).

2.2. Required data and automatic data collection

Data for realizations of Xt will be collected and the data for at are known. The latter data are
readily available since it is needed to process the jobs correctly. The total job-processing time data must
be collected, but it is much more straightforward and less time consuming than collecting individual task
time data.
The collection of total job-processing time data can be a labor-intensive procedure if collected manually. In
many systems, however, the necessary data can be collected using automatic identication and data collection
(AIDC) technologies. AIDC technologies that can overcome the disadvantages of manual data collection may
include bar codes, voice recognition, radio frequency data communications (RFDC), and radio frequency
identication (RFID), among others (Palmer, 2001).
In large production systems, it is rare to nd instances where a single AIDC technology is used
for a particular application. Typically, multiple AIDC technologies are brought together to provide a
solution for the problem at hand. Additionally, data collected in the production oor is stored in databases
that are easily accessible by different production planning and scheduling systems (e.g., MRP and ERP
systems).
Bar coding is arguably the most prevalent AIDC technology employed in industry. Bar-code-based systems
have been incorporated into almost all facets of industry including warehouse management, shop oor
control, health care, transportation, and retail (Chausse et al., 2000; Manthou and Vlachopoulou, 2001; Porter
et al., 2004). However, bar-code-based systems may still require the operator to activate a trigger to signal the
start and end of job processing. When it is important to minimize workers participation in data collection,
AIDC technologies such as RFID are more appropriate since the data collection process can be controlled
with position sensors.
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242 D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251

3. Least-squares estimators

Estimates of the expected values of individual task times can be computed by considering the sample
averages that could be computed if data on the individual tasks were available. Let,
i;j P i j j
X R t1 at at xt =Ri;j the sample average of task j times for those jobs where tasks i and j both occur.
j;j
X thePsample average of task j times over all jobs where task j is executed.
i j
Ri;j R t1 at at the number of jobs that require both task i and j. Rj,j the number of jobs where task j is
executed.
P
Ti R i
t1 at xt the sum of job-processing times for all jobs that required task i, i 0,1,2,y,N.
T0 the total processing time of all jobs completed at the workstation.
i;j
The X can be used to dene a set of linear equations that must hold for the collected data. This system of
equations is
0;0 0;1 0;2 0;N
RX R0;1 X R0;2 X  R0;N X T0
1;0 1;1 1;2 1;N
R1;0 X R1;1 X R1;2 X  R1;N X T1
2;0 2;1 2;2 2;N
R2;0 X R2;1 X R2;2 X  R2;N X T2
.. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..
. . . . . . . . .
N1;0 N1;1 N1;2 N1;N
RN1;0 X RN1;1 X RN1;2 X  RN1;N X T N1
N;0 N;1 N;2 N;N
RN;0 X RN;1 X RN;2 X  RN;N X TN
0;j j;j
This system of equations has N+1 equations and N2+N+1 unknown sample averages (X X for j
0; 1; . . . ; N since task 0 occurs on every job) and thus will typically not have a unique solution. Since the
i;j
X ; i 0; 1; 2; . . . ; N, are all sample averages of task j times, they are unbiased estimators of mj. As an
i;j i;j j
approximation of the X , we replace X ; i 0; 1; 2; . . . ; N with a single unknown X^ . The system of linear
equations now becomes,
0 1 2 N
RX^ R0;1 X^ R0;2 X^  R0;N X^ T0
0 1 2 N
R1;0 X^ R1;1 X^ R1;2 X^  R1;N X^ T1
.. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..
. . . . . . . . .
0 1 2 N
RN1;0 X^ RN1;1 X^ RN1;2 X^  RN1;N X^ T N1
0 1 2 N
RN;0 X^ RN;1 X^ RN;2 X^  RN;N X^ TN
0 1 2
^N T
^ X^ ; X^ ; X^ ; . . . ; X  , the above system of equations can
Letting R Ri;j , T T 0 ; T 1 ; T 2 ; . . . ; T N T , X
be expressed as RX^ T, and
^ R1 T:
X (1)
T
Since R Ri;j  is simply job count data, and T T 0 ; T 1 ; T 2 ; . . . ; T N  are totals of job processing times,
updating R and T is straightforward. Also Ri,j Rj,i and R0,j Rj,0 Rj,j.

3.1. Equivalence to least squares

Eq. (1) is equivalent to least-squares calculations if we assume that an appropriate model for the total
processing time of the tth job at the workstation is,
X t b0 a1t b1 a2t b2    aN
t bN  t ; t 1; 2; . . . ; R. (2)
Here at represents the values of the independent variables (where at and ait are dened in Section 2.1), and
the coefcients bi mi. et is a random error term with Et  0. Assuming Et  0 guarantees that the
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D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251 243

estimates will be unbiased. Additional assumptions regarding the variance and correlation of the error terms
will be discussed later and affect the properties of the estimators as well as the statistical inference related to
the estimates. Let
2 3 2 3 2 3
x1 b0 a1
6 x2 7 6 b1 7 6 a2 7
6 7 6 7 6 7
x6 7 6 7 6 7
6 .. 7; b 6 .. 7; and a 6 .. 7.
4 . 5 4 . 5 4 . 5
xR bN aR
x is a R-dimensional column vector (data for R jobs that has been collected), b is a N+1 dimensional column
vector and a is an R  (N+1) matrix.
We would like to compute the estimator b^ of b that minimizes the sum of the squared differences
x  ab^ T x  ab.
^ A standard least-squares result (Neter et al., 1985) is

b^ aT a1 aT x: (3)
The equivalence
P of (1) andP (3) results from the following equalities:
i j
Ri;j R t1 at at , and T i
R i
t1 at xt , which implies that
2 3 2 3
R R0;1 R0;2    R0;N T0
6 R1;0 R1;1 R1;2    R1;N 7 6T 7
6 7 6 17
6 7 6 7
6 R2;0 R2;1 R2;2    R2;N 7 6 7
T
a a6 7; a x 6 T 2 7.
T
6 . 7 6 7
6 .. ..
.
..
.
..
.
.. 7
. 5 6 ... 7
4 4 5
RN;0 RN;2 RN;3    RN;N TN

There were no assumptions made regarding the error distribution in Eq. (2) except that the expected value
equals zero. If we also assume ei and ej are uncorrelated for all i6j, and that Vari  s2 for all i, then the
estimate b^ is also minimum variance among all unbiased linear estimators (Neter et al., 1985). Under these
additional assumptions, the distribution of task is processing time stays the same regardless of which other
tasks are also performed on a job. In reality, this may not always hold since workers develop their unique
methods and sequences for how different subsets of tasks are completed on a job, which may affect the task
time distribution. Workers can also tire which may affect the individual task time distribution for a job
requiring many tasks. Additionally, since the at dictate different sums of individual task times, the constant
error variance term is not applicable (see also Knott and Sury, 1987). Nevertheless, judgments can be made as
to how well or poorly these assumptions are met. If the error term in Eq. (2) is also assumed to be normally
distributed then the elements of b^ are also normally distributed with a mean of b. The covariance matrix can be
estimated from the data and a variety of valid statistical procedures may be conducted.

3.2. Estimating VarX it

The method for estimating the variance of individual task times is similar to the method used to estimate
EX it , but is based on collecting total job-processing time sample variances by job type. A particular job type
is a specic combination of individual tasks performed. Let u be the job type index, and nu the number of
observations collected for job type u. Let r be the number of different job types and let,

 V u the sample variance of the total processing times for jobs of type u, u 1, 2,y, r, estimated from
nu observations (collected data),
 V V 1; V 2; . . . ; V rT ,
 n r-dimensional diagonal matrix with nu as the uth diagonal element,
i
 V^ the sample variance of individual task i times (to be estimated),
i
 s2i VarX it  EV^ ,
i
 a (u) the value of the individual task indicator variable for task i on job type u,
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244 D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251

 0
au aP u; a1 u; . . . ; aN uT ,
 Tvari ru1 nu ai uV u the scaled (by nu) sum of total processing time sample variances for all jobs
where task i is performed.

The Ti (from Section 3) are random variables, and since X it and X jt , i6j are assumed to be independent the
following equations will hold.
Rs20 R0;1 s21 R0;2 s22  R0;N s2N VarT 0
R1;0 s20 R1;1 s21 R1;2 s22  R1;N s2N VarT 1
.. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..
. . . . . . . . .
RN1;0 s0 RN1;1 s21
2
RN1;2 s22  RN1;N s2N VarT 2
RN;0 s20 RN;1 s21 RN;2 s22  RN;N s2N VarT N

Replacing the variances by their estimates gives the following system of equations:
0 1 2 N
RV^ R0;1 V^ R0;2 V^  R0;N V^ Tvar0
0 1 2 N
R1;0 V^ R1;1 V^ R1;2 V^  R1;N V^ Tvar1
.. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. ..
. . . . . . . . .
0 1 2 N
RN1;0 V^ RN1;1 V^ RN1;2 V^  RN1;N V^ TvarN1
0 1 2 N
RN;0 V^ RN;1 V^ RN;2 V^  RN;N V^ TvarN
^ Tvarwhere
or RV
2 3 2 3 2 3
0 Tvar0 a1
V^
6 17 6 Tvar1 7 6 7
6 V^ 7 6 7 6 a2 7
6 7 6 7
V 6 . 7; Tvar 6
^ 7 T
6 .. 7 A nV; and A 6 . 7.
6 .. 7 4 . 5 6 .. 7
4 5 4 5
N
V^ Tvar N ar
^ gives
Solving for V
^ R1  Tvar.
V (4)
For a xed set of job types matrix A does not change. Updating V requires that the sample variances for the
total processing time of each job type be updated.

3.3. Example

We next present an example for a workstation where four individual tasks may be performed. This example
will be based on data for 10 jobs (5 job types with 2 observations each) and is primarily included to
demonstrate the computations. There is no task zero included, which does not change the computations
shown (task zero is one that is present on every job produced). As will be seen in this example, 10 jobs are too
few to give accurate results with the variability present in the data. Results for larger examples will be
presented in Section 5.
Fig. 1 shows the data for the individual task and total job times, the data on what individual tasks are
performed on each job, which must be known to perform each job correctly, and the calculations to estimate
the mean and variance of the individual task times. In the application noted, we would only have information
on the total job times and we would not know the individual task times shown.
The estimates of the mean and variance of the individual task times may be seen as relatively inaccurate
compared with the sample values computed from the individual task times (which are known in the example).
This inaccuracy is basically due to the small numbers of jobs and job types. In high volume production system
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251 245

Task Times Tasks Present

t 1 2 3 4 Total 1 2 3 4
1 4.58 6.12 13.62 9.65 33.98 1 1 1 1
2 6.28 2.17 9.75 11.24 29.43 1 1 1 1
3 4.87 4.08 - - 8.95 1 1 0 0
4 6.12 5.00 - - 11.12 1 1 0 0
5 5.61 - 13.82 - 19.43 1 0 1 0
6 5.39 - 11.56 - 16.95 1 0 1 0
7 4.15 - - 8.34 12.49 1 0 0 1
8 2.91 - - 6.83 9.75 1 0 0 1
9 - 5.59 - 10.11 15.70 0 1 0 1
10 - 8.03 - 9.00 17.02 0 1 0 1
Avg 4.99 5.17 12.19 9.19 174.82
s2 1.59 2.80 7.50 0.89

Calculations to estimate the mean task times.

8 4 4 4 142 . 1 0 . 33 0 . 08 0 . 25 0 . 08 2 . 87
4 6 2 4 116 . 2 0 . 08 0 . 33 0 0 . 17 7 . 17
R = aTa = , T = aTX = , R1 = = R-1T =
, X
4 2 4 2 99 . 8 0 . 25 0 0 . 50 0 14 . 37
4 4 2 6 118 . 4 0 . 08 0 . 17 2 0 . 33 8 . 25

Calculations to estimate task time variance.

1 1 1 1 10 . 34 2 0 0 0 0
39 . 05
1 1 0 0 2 . 36 0 2 0 0 0
27 . 15
A= 0 1 0 1 , V = 3 . 08 , n= 0 0 2 0 0 , Tvar = ATnV = ,
26 . 83
1 0 1 0 3 . 75 0 0 0 2 0
29 . 94
1 0 0 1 0 . 88 0 0 0 0 2

1 . 55

0 . 81
V = R-1Tvar =
3 . 65

2 . 20

Fig. 1. Example calculations for a 10-job example.

applications where large amounts of data are accumulated quickly, the accuracy of the estimates will improve
as the number of jobs and job types increase.
Like the estimation of individual task time means, the variance estimation method presented has a similar
equivalence to least-squares estimation.
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246 D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251

3.4. Limitations of the least-squares method

In order for the least-squares method to be viable, the R matrix must be of full rank, which will require an
unknown amount of data depending on the mix of jobs produced at the workstation. Part of this requirement
is that there is variability of job types. If the jobs produced are too homogeneous, R will not be full rank.
However, if the jobs produced are all the same there is probably no need to collect data on individual tasks.
A more serious concern is that negative variance estimates are sometimes produced. Negative estimates are
common in other applications involving variance component estimation (see Montgomery (2005) and Kuehl
(2000) for estimating variance components in random effects models, and Searle (1971) for a general
discussion of several variance estimation methods). The main causes cited are not enough data, or an incorrect
statistical model. There are, however, different approaches suggested for dealing with negative variance
estimates.
The rst approach assumes that a negative variance estimate indicates very small variance, which is then set
to zero. However, the estimate is no longer unbiased with this approach. A second approach is to use a
method or model that assures non-negative variance estimates. In our application, variance estimation was
modeled as a non-linear program that minimized the sum of squared variance estimation errors, subject to a
set of non-negativity constraints on the variance estimates. This non-linear program was solved with a
multiplier-based barrier method (Nash and Sofer, 1996). The results show that all negative variance estimates
(with no constraints) are set to zero in the non-linear program. A third approach is to collect more data and
conduct analyses separately and in conjunction with the existing data to see whether more accurate (positive)
variance estimates are obtained.
We next present an alternative method to separate the individual task times when there is good reason to
believe that the individual task times follow known theoretical distributions.

4. Maximum likelihood estimation

In this section, we show how the available data can be used to construct a likelihood function assuming that
the individual task times are observations from a known theoretical distribution. The parameters for each
individual task time distribution may differ and the parameters that maximize this likelihood function can
then be solved for. As maximum likelihood estimators, the estimates will have several desirable statistical
properties (see Law and Kelton, 2000, p. 345).
The method presented can be viewed as a signal source separation method that shows similarity to
methods used for blind source separation. Blind source separation is the standard application of inde-
pendent component analysis (ICA) (Roberts and Everson, 2001) and addresses the separation of
source signals when only a mapping of the sources is observable. There is a hierarchy and taxonomy
of various ICA models, but the basic blind source separation problem assumes that the mapping of
sources is linear and stationary, noiseless, and that the number of observable outputs equals the number
of sources.
In the problem we present, the unknown sources are the individual task time distributions; the mapping is
the sum of the individual task times, which is linear and non-stationary (and known); and the observable
outputs are the workstation total processing times. Here, there is only one observation per mapping of
multiple sources. The use of a likelihood function as a contrast function is common in blind source
separation methods, and in the basic blind source separation problem the maximization of the likelihood
function is equivalent to minimizing mutual information found in the sources (characterized by entropies),
which maximizes their independence (Roberts and Everson, 2001).
This method is practical only for individual task time distributions where the convolutions of the indivi-
dual task time distributions have the same distributional form as the individual task times. For our
application, we focus on the normal distribution. Like the independence assumptions for the least-squares
method, which are applicable here, the appropriateness of this assumption for a particular environment
should be evaluated.
If the individual task times Xi are normally distributed, that is, X i Nmi ; s2i and the task times are
assumed to be independent, then the likelihood function is, ll; r2 f a1 x1  f a2 x2      f aR xR ,
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D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251 247

where f at xi Normal density function for the sum of normally distributed random variables as indi-
cated by at.
  !  
2 1 1 x1  a1  l2
ll; r p p exp 
2p a1  r 2 2a1  r2
  !  
1 1 xR  aR  l2
   p
p
exp 
2p aR  r2 2aR  r2
 R !  
1 1 x1  a1  l2
p  p exp 
2p a1  r2 2a1  r2
!  
1 xR  aR  l2
     p exp 
aR  r2 2aR  r2

The log-likelihood function is

  !
2 2 1 1
f l; r lnll; r R ln p ln p
2p a1  r 2
!  
1 x1  a1  l2
   ln p 
aR  r2 2a1  r2
 
xR  aR  l2
  
2aR  r2
 
1 1X R
R ln p  lnat  r2
2p 2 t1
XR  
xt  at  l2

t1
2at  r2

We need to numerically nd estimates l; ^ r^ 2 that maximize f l;

^ r^ 2 . In the case of normally distributed task
times, we did not establish that the log-likelihood function is concave and, as such, it will not be possible to
guarantee that the parameter estimates calculated using standard solvers (such as found in spreadsheets) are
global maximizers of the likelihood function. However, computational results indicate that the estimates l; ^ r^ 2
are good regardless of the initial estimate values used.

5. Computational results

In this section, we present results from applying both the least squares and maximum likelihood methods to
estimate the mean and variance of individual task times from randomly generated total job-processing times.
We did not include a task 0 in the experiments so that the data utilized would represent specic tasks that may
or may not occur on jobs. A task zero, if included, would show as a column of all ones in matrix a.
The least-squares method was tested with realizations of individual task times from normal and lognormal
distributions with means randomly selected between 5 and 15, and coefcients of variation (CV) randomly
selected between 0.25 and 0.75. The maximum likelihood method is tested only with data from normal
distributions. The range of means utilized is arbitrary, but the CV range was selected to represent typical
variability present in manual operations (Hopp and Spearman, 2001).
In many applications, it is normally the case that only a subset of the possible individual task combinations
will be produced. Tasks will sometimes be mutually exclusive as may occur in vehicle assembly where some
individual tasks are specic to coupes, and others specic to sedans. It is also often the case that a few job
types may make up a large proportion of the total number of jobs produced. In the testing of the estimation
methods, three scenarios were created reecting the fact that not all possible jobs types are produced at a
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248 D.S. Kim et al. / Int. J. Production Economics 114 (2008) 239251

Table 1
Job-type scenarios tested

Scenario Minimum no. of tasks Job composition

per job

1 2 All job types with at least two tasks are possible. Twenty percent of these job types
make up 80% of the jobs.
2 2 Twenty-ve percent of the job types with two or more tasks are selected. Random
numbers of each of these job types are used as data.
3 2 Ten percent of the job types with two or more tasks are selected. Random numbers of
each of these job types are used as data.

Table 2
Number of jobs used to generate estimates

Estimate no. Number of tasks

4 6 8

1 100 300 500

2 250 750 1250
3 500 1500 2500
4 750 2250 3750
5 1000 3000 5000

workstation. We also excluded job types that contained just a single task, since segregating this data to
estimate the individual task time properties is more effective. Table 1 describes these scenarios.
Within each scenario, jobs with 4, 6, and 8 tasks were tested. In the experiments, a problem instance for a
specic number of tasks per job (4, 6, or 8) is dened by the random selection of individual task time means
and CVs. The job types that were used in each scenario for a specic number of tasks per job were randomly
selected from the list of all possible job types containing at least two tasks. Once the job types were selected,
they remained the same for all problem instances. If a specied percentage of job types (for a given number of
individual tasks) did not result in enough variation in job types, the scenario was not tested. For example, with
four tasks there are 11 possible job types that require at least two tasks. Ten percent rounds down to one job
type, which is not enough variation in job type for the estimation method to work.
Estimates for the individual task time means and variances for a single problem instance were generated
from a different total number of jobs, as shown in Table 2.
Table 3 shows the performance of the least-squares method for task times that follow a normal distribution,
whereas Table 4 shows the performance for task times that follow a lognormal distribution. The performance
measures shown for the accuracy of the individual task time means and variances reect the average values
over 1000 problem instance replications. For a single problem instance, the absolute percent differences
between the estimated and true values for each task were calculated and then averaged over the tasks. The
maximum absolute percent difference for all tasks was also recorded. Then these absolute percent differences
for a single problem instance were averaged over 1000 replications. The percent negative variance estimate
measure is the total number of negative variance estimates obtained as a percentage of the total number of
variance estimates generated (e.g., for four tasks and 1000 replications, 4000 individual task time variance
estimates were calculated).
In general, the estimates of the mean values were better for lognormal task times, and the estimates of the
variances were better for normal task times. There is a higher range of absolute percent differences for the
variance estimates of lognormal task times as indicated by the higher average maximum percent difference. As
expected, the estimates improve as the number of jobs used to compute the estimates increases. It does not
appear that the number of tasks per job has a large impact on the performance of the estimators, or is there a
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Table 3
Results for the least-squares method applied to task times that follow a normal distribution (averages are for 1000 replications)

No. of jobs Estimating mean Estimating variance

Avg. difference (%) Avg. max diff. (%) Avg. difference (%) Avg. max diff. (%) % Neg. est.

Scenario 1 4 tasks
100 16.06 29.60 97.17 238.10 19.00
250 8.78 17.36 44.04 98.30 6.55
500 7.01 13.47 35.25 77.35 4.18
750 7.45 14.22 39.36 86.83 5.25
1000 6.95 13.24 37.30 82.90 4.52

Scenario 1 6 tasks
300 9.79 21.70 66.92 195.05 13.15
750 7.65 16.86 52.15 153.00 8.28
1500 6.23 13.68 36.13 94.78 4.25
2250 5.60 12.42 30.79 77.62 2.68
3000 5.36 11.8 26.61 63.43 1.88
Scenario 1 8 tasks
500 9.24 21.95 70.72 245.39 14.95
1250 6.66 15.84 47.66 145.21 7.56
2500 5.69 13.62 35.23 101.81 3.74
3750 5.32 12.55 30.68 87.30 3.21
5000 5.08 12.18 27.28 75.82 1.98
Scenario 2 6 tasks
300 9.69 21.45 56.98 165.57 9.68
750 7.44 16.33 46.42 130.70 6.87
1500 6.21 13.66 33.83 86.42 3.47
2250 5.70 12.61 31.18 79.66 2.93
3000 5.49 11.95 27.75 67.57 2.42
Scenario 2 8 tasks
500 9.16 22.04 68.56 241.97 13.34
1250 6.71 15.90 45.44 147.04 6.58
2500 5.70 13.55 34.36 99.02 3.89
3750 5.35 12.78 29.63 84.25 2.79
5000 5.11 12.22 27.98 79.21 2.09
Scenario 3 8 tasks
500 9.95 23.78 73.72 266.34 13.64
1250 7.73 18.39 53.33 180.65 9.21
2500 6.08 14.50 37.63 114.59 4.94
3750 5.51 13.13 32.44 95.26 3.33
5000 5.20 12.27 26.07 69.76 2.01

large difference in the scenarios across jobs with eight tasks. The accuracy of the estimates for mean individual
task times is sufcient for most planning and operational decision-making requirements.
The maximum likelihood method was tested with four and eight tasks, and only in scenario 1. Results
were based on ve replications. One big disadvantage of this method is that it is more computationally
expensive in terms of both computation time and data storage. Finding mean and variance estimates requires
a non-linear optimization (performed using Microsoft Excel), and also requires that all data for each job is
stored. The results are shown in Table 5. As can be seen, the results are comparable to the least-squares
method for four task jobs, but are worse for eight task jobs. The non-linear optimization included non-
negativity constraints to prevent negative arguments within the logarithm function. It is possible that the
performance of this method could improve with an optimization method explicitly developed for this
application.
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Table 4
Results for the least-squares method applied to task times that follow a lognormal distribution (averages are for 1000 replications)

No. of jobs Estimating mean Estimating variance

Avg. difference (%) Avg. max diff. (%) Avg. difference (%) Avg. max diff. (%) % Neg. est.

Scenario 1 4 tasks
100 16.11 29.48 163.41 414.99 22.15
250 9.73 18.33 104.35 261.28 15.83
500 7.39 13.50 85.24 218.39 11.78
750 5.75 10.53 61.78 152.90 9.35
1000 5.30 9.80 60.30 149.21 8.68

Scenario 1 6 tasks
300 9.74 21.59 26.61 63.43 18.78
750 6.36 14.05 84.49 272.94 13.67
1500 4.39 9.91 57.60 180.06 9.02
2250 3.47 7.70 47.09 140.30 7.27
3000 2.98 6.60 40.76 122.69 5.23
Scenario 1 8 tasks
500 8.18 20.11 111.44 433.51 19.53
1250 5.33 13.04 72.87 264.25 12.75
2500 3.65 8.80 52.61 185.47 8.41
3750 2.93 7.27 44.04 151.17 6.81
5000 2.53 6.16 37.88 131.27 5.28
Scenario 2 6 tasks
300 9.43 20.83 124.82 406.68 17.65
750 6.75 14.90 89.04 286.71 13.95
1500 5.25 11.48 70.54 219.40 11.58
2250 3.87 8.57 51.61 156.19 7.78
3000 3.12 6.90 42.29 126.89 5.83
Scenario 2 8 tasks
500 8.12 19.91 108.30 404.84 17.48
1250 5.33 13.19 74.56 279.80 12.25
2500 3.60 8.85 48.57 167.40 7.44
3750 3.01 7.35 43.66 154.22 6.46
5000 2.71 6.73 38.61 134.53 5.55
Scenario 3 8 tasks
500 9.89 23.88 129.93 497.17 19.51
1250 6.29 15.60 85.34 316.63 14.16
2500 4.56 11.12 64.41 231.86 10.10
3750 3.33 8.20 49.94 180.70 7.08
5000 3.31 7.91 46.82 162.16 7.21

For the least-squares method, it is a simple matter to update the estimates as more data are obtained. Since
no distributional assumptions were made, we would expect that the method will also work when there is a mix
of task time distributions at a workstation.

6. Conclusions

We have presented two methods (least squares and maximum likelihood) for estimating the mean and
variance of individual task times at a workstation. The methods assume that the distributions of time to
execute individual tasks on a job are independent, and that these distributions are the same regardless of what
other tasks are executed on a job. The only data needed to compute these estimates are the total job-processing
times at the workstation and data indicating which tasks were required on each job. The latter data are always
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Table 5
Results for the maximum likelihood method applied to task times that follow a normal distribution (averages are for 5 replications)

No. of jobs Estimating mean Estimating variance

Avg. difference (%) Avg. max diff. (%) Avg. difference (%) Avg. max diff. (%)

Scenario 1 4 tasks
100 20.73 36.71 92.57 173.77
250 15.81 31.05 62.88 149.97
500 8.77 19.23 46.07 133.80
750 6.53 12.94 33.38 105.11
1000 5.32 11.08 38.44 118.56

Scenario 1 8 tasks
500 15.77 35.10 76.46 271.46
1000 13.77 34.88 66.42 231.55

available since it is required to properly complete jobs. The total processing times of jobs at a workstation can
be collected using automatic identication and data collection technology (the ideal case), or may be collected
manually. The manual collection of individual task time, which requires constant attention and intimate
knowledge of the individual tasks, can be avoided.
Of the two methods presented, the least-squares method is easier to implement, makes no assumptions
regarding the distribution of the individual task times, and performs better than the maximum likelihood
method. It also lends itself to simple and efcient updating of the estimates as additional data are collected. It
is our choice of the two methods presented.

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