THE HISTORY OF OPERATIONS RESEARCH
It is generally agreed that operations research came into existence as a discipline during World War II when there was a critical need to manage scarce resources. However, a particular model and technique of OR can be traced back as early as in World War I, when Thomas Edison (1914–15) made an effort to use a tactical game board for finding a solution to minimize shipping losses from enemy submarines, instead of risking ships in actual war conditions. About the same time AK Erlang, a Danish engineer, carried out experiments to study the fluctuations in demand for telephone facilities using automatic dialling equipment. Such experiments were later on used as the basis for the development of the waiting-line theory. Since World War II involved strategic and tactical problems that were highly complicated, to expect adequate solutions from individuals or specialists in a single discipline was unrealistic. Thus, groups ofindividuals who were collectively considered specialists in mathematics, economics, statistics and probability theory, engineering, behavioural, and physical science, were formed as special units within the armed forces, in order to deal with strategic and tactical problems of various military operations.
Such groups were first formed by the British Air Force and later the American armed forces formed similar groups. One of the groups in Britain came to be known as Blackett’s Circus. This group, under the leadership of Prof. P M S Blackett was attached to the Radar Operational Research unit and was assigned the problem of analyzing the coordination of radar equipment at gun sites. Following the success of this group similar mixed-team approach was also adopted in other allied nations
After World War II, scientists who had been active in the military OR groups made efforts to apply the operations research approach to civilian problems related to business, industry, research, etc. The following three factors are behind the appreciation for the use of operations research approach:
i) The economic and industrial boom resulted in mechanization, automation and decentralization of operations and division of management functions. This industrialization resulted in complex managerial problems, and therefore the application of operations research to managerial decisionmaking became popular.
(ii) Continued research after war resulted in advancements in various operations research techniques. In 1947, G B Dantzig, developed the concept of linear programming, the solution of which is found by a method known as simplex method. Besides linear programming, many other techniques of OR, such as statistical quality control, dynamic programming, queuing theory and inventory theory were well-developed before 1950’s.
(iii) The use of high speed computers made it possible to apply OR techniques for solving real-life decision problems.
During the 1950s, there was substantial progress in the application of OR techniques for civilian problems along with the professional development. Many colleges/schools of engineering, public administration, business management, applied mathematics, computer science, etc. Today, however, service organizations such as banks, hospitals, libraries, airlines, railways, etc., all recognize the usefulness of OR in improving efficiency. In 1948, an OR club was formed in England which later changed its name to theOperational Research Society of UK. Its journal, OR Quarterly first appeared in 1950. The Operations Research Society of America (ORSA) was founded in 1952 and its journal, Operations Research was first published in 1953. In the same year, The Institute of Management Sciences (TIMS) was founded as an international society to identify, extend and unify scientific knowledge pertaining to management. Its journal, Management Science, first appeared in 1954.