Prerequisites for Applying Artificial Intelligence for Scheduling in Small- and Medium-sized Enterprises

Abstract

With the increasing spread of Artificial Intelligence (AI), the prerequisites for a successful implementation in practice are becoming more relevant for large enterprises as well as for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The latter are usually characterized by flat hierarchies, high flexibility, but also by a lack of AI experts and data organisation. One field of AI application for SMEs is scheduling as part of production planning. Scheduling belongs to the most relevant digital solution areas for SMEs. In this article, we examine the prerequisites for the application of AI methods in scheduling in SMEs. For identifying relevant prerequisites, we conduct a literature review and combine it with the results of three AI adoption and readiness models. Afterwards, we describe the results of an interview study on our research question. The main findings include a list of prerequisites. We connect our list with already existing approaches for AI adoption and AI readiness with a strong focus on SMEs and scheduling. Furthermore, we conclude that the prerequisites are dependent on the application context. However, the effect of the size of a company on the prerequisites remains unclear.