Analysing the Operational Research/Management Science System: Insights from Small Academic Communities in the United Kingdom

Abstract

The OR/MS system has multiple actors located in diverse communities: industry (end users), consulting and academia (education research). The main flows between communities in the system are based on the exchange of problems for solutions using diverse knowledge stocks (e.g. mathematics, statistics, systems thinking) as well as the movement of graduates. However, there are disagreements on the views about the OR/MS system as well as issues that have affected the OR/MS field in recent years reducing its relative stance within the rest of disciplines, students and managers. This paper proposes a framework based on a set of activities within OR/MS communities and offer a set of multidimensional measures that can be employed to evaluate the communities over time providing additional evidence for the discussion about the development of OR/MS. Five OR communities located in five universities in the United Kingdom are employed to explore the state of the OR communities using the framework. The results confirm the existence of a broad spectrum and applicability of research in diverse fields but the broad spectrum is somehow diluted among subject areas and not captured by traditional OR perspectives. The findings show a declining position in business schools, dispersion of practitioners and OR graduates, who are not linked to OR communities. Professional societies may need to find synergies with other societies in close subject areas. OR communities attempt to be relevant to economic and social processes through their outputs but their actions are scattered.