CHAP - 1

OPERATION RESEARCH
 OPERATIONS RESEARCH
• INTRODUCTION & HISTORY OF O.R.
• DEFINITIONS OF O.R.
• CHARACTERISTIC OF O.R.
• PHASES OF SCIENTIFIC METHOD IN
O.R. APPROACH.
 INTRODUCTION & HISTORY
OF
O.R.
• It is generally agreed that O.R. came into the
existence as a discipline during the world war-2.
• The term of O.R. was coined as a result of
research on military operations during this war.
• Since the war involved strategic and tactical
problems which were so complicated.
• That to expecting adequate solution from
individual or specialists in a single discipline was
unrealistic. to be con…
 INTRODUCTION & HISTORY
OF
O.R.
• Therefore, the group of individual who
collectively were considered specialists in
mathematics, economics, statistics and
probability theory, engineering, behavioral
and physical science were formed as a
special units within the armed forces to
deal with strategic and tactical problems of
various military operation.
To be con….
 INTRODUCTION & HISTORY
OF
O.R.
• A key person in post-war development of O.R.
was George B.Dantzig.
• In India , Operations Research came into
existence in 1949 when An O.R. unit was
established at Regional Research Laboratory ,
Hyderabad. At the same time Prof. R. S.Verma,
also set up an O.R. team at Defense Science
Laboratory to solve problems of store, purchase
and planning. To be con…
 INTRODUTION & HISTORY
OF
O.R.
• In 1953, P. C. Mahalanobis established
an O.R. team in the Indian Statistical
Institute, Calcutta to solve problems of
related to national planning and survey.
 Definitions Of O.R.
• Because of the wide scope of the
applications of operations research,
giving a precise definition is difficult.
However, a few definitions of O.R. are as
under:
 Definitions Of O.R.
• O.R. is concerned with scientifically deciding
how to best design and operate man-machine
system usually requiring the allocation of scarce
resource.
• (operation research society, America.
• O.R. is the systematic application of quantitative
methods, techniques and tools to the analysis of
problems involving the operation of system .
• (Daellenbach and George, 1978)
 Definitions Of O.R.
• O.R. is the art of giving bad answers to problems
to which otherwise worse answers are given.
• T.L.Saaty,1958
• O.R. may be described as a scientific approach
to decision making that involves the operation of
organizational system.
• (F.S.Hiller and G.J.Lieberman ,1980)
 Definitions Of O.R.
• Operations Research is a scientific
approach to problems solving for
executive management.
H. M.Wanger.
 CHARACTERISTICS OF O.R.
• O.R. uses mixed team approach to find
out optimum solution.
• O.R. uses scientific method to arrive at the
optimum solution.
• O.R. is the inter disciplinary team
approach to find out the optimum return.
• O.R. emphasis on the overall approach to
the system. i.e. All the aspects of the
problem under consideration.
 CHARACTERISTICS OF O.R.
• O.R. tries to optimize the total output by
maximizing the profit and minimizing the
loss or cost.
• O.R. gives bad answer to the problems
where worse could be given. i.e. it cannot
give perfect answers to the problem thus
or improves only the quality of the solution.
 CHARACTERISTICS OF O.R.
• The task of operation researcher may be said to
consist of studying an operation selecting
variables to described the operation ;
investigating the mathematical relationships of
the variables.
• Operation Researcher actually determines what
factor influence the state of affairs and tries to
measure them. All these measurements are then
incorporated in to a generalized system. The
O.R. deals more in experiments and induction
rather than in analysis and deduction.
 PHASES OF SCIENTIFIC
METHOD IN O.R. APPROACH
• JUDGEMENT PHASE
• RESEARCH PHASE
• ACTION PHASE
 JUDGEMENT PHASE
• This phase includes
• Identification of the real-life problem ,
• Selection of an appropriate objective and
the values of various variables related to
this objective,
• Application of the appropriate scale of
measurement , i.e. deciding the measures
of effectiveness, and
 JUDGEMENT PHASE
• Formulation of an appropriate model of the
problem, abstracting the essential
information so that a solution at the
decision-maker’s goals can be sought.
 RESEARCH PHASE
• This phase is the largest and longest among
other two phases. However, the remaining two
are also equally important as they provide the
basis for a scientific method. This phase utilizes:
• Observations and data collection for a better
understanding of the problem,
• Formulation of hypothesis and models,
• Observation and experimentation to the test
hypothesis on the basis of the additional data,
 RESEARCH PHASE
• Analysis of the available information and
verification of the hypothesis using
pre-established measures desirability,
• Predictions of various results from the
hypothesis, and
• Generalization of the result and
consideration of alternative methods.
 ACTION PHASE

• This phase consists of making