Operational Research Practitioners Research Articles

The Analytics Movement: Implications for Operations Research

The movement toward the increased use of analytics in organizations has generated much discussion by academics and professionals about the impacts and opportunities that analytics offers. Although operations research (OR) has been a driving force in applying quantitative and analytical models for organizational decision making, it is less clear how we as OR practitioners can take advantage of the surging interest in analytics to promote the OR profession and expand its reach. In this paper, we discuss the drivers of the analytics movement, an example of an analytics project, and the opportunities and implications for OR, i.e., the problem scope, models and methods, implementation issues, organizational role, professional skills, and education.

Mathematical programming modelling tools for resource-poor countries and organisations

In recent years, powerful mathematical modelling languages have enabled Operational Research practitioners to rapidly develop prototype tools capable of modelling complex managerial decisions such as staff shift scheduling, or production and supply chain planning. However, such tools have often required expensive commercial optimisation solvers that are sometimes beyond the financial reach of small companies and organisations, particularly in the low-income and emerging economies. Fortunately, the worldwide scope of the internet has put powerful free optimisation tools within the reach of anyone with a modest PC and even a slow internet connection. This article will present examples showing just how beneficial such an approach can be for resource-poor organisations.

The role of statistics in operations research: Some personal reflections

Statistics has a very important role to play in Operations Research (OR), yet many standard texts relegate it to a subordinate position behind, for example, deterministic optimisation techniques. I argue in this paper that statistics, and statistical thinking, are essential for the OR practitioner operating in the real, uncertain world. Using many examples from my own experience, I demonstrate that statistics is very useful, and indeed essential, when tackling real-world OR problems. Many of these examples have not been published before and will therefore hopefully be of interest in themselves, as well as illustrations of the points I wish to make.

Bitz & Pizzas: Optimal stopping strategy for a slot machine bonus game

Slot machine games used to be very simple, often limited to just one spin of the reels, but have evolved to accommodate a variety of features that provide added excitement and the potential for greater wins. They also engage the players more by, quite often, requiring them to make choices. This paper presents one of these games, Bitz & Pizzas. This case study introduces a novel application of Operational Research (OR) and serves as evidence that as slot games, and their corresponding models, are becoming more sophisticated, the role of a well-trained OR professional is becoming more important and necessary in this industry. It also shows that OR practitioners are in touch with the needs of the gambling industry and understand current practices and legislation.

The practice of operations research in Jordanian industry: a field study

This study is concerned with the evaluation of the status of operations research (OR) practice, training and its diffusion into Jordanian industrial shareholding companies. The purpose of such an evaluation is to explore the level of OR awareness. To discover the extent of acceptance and implementation of OR and the adequacy of computing and training facilities in OR. It also attempts to identify the obstacles to the wider adoption of OR. The methodology for the study is essentially based upon a questionnaire that was directed to the practitioners of OR in all Jordanian industrial shareholding companies (86 companies) during summer 2003. The study concludes that the level of OR awareness, and usage in the companies is low. Also, there is a lack of specialised personnel, computer usage and OR departments. Moreover, the study concludes that many barriers are hindering the wider adoption of OR in the companies investigated.

Constructive complexity: a metric for operations research spreadsheet model design

This article makes a modest step toward a quantitative measure of the work required to solve a specific kind of problem: a given spreadsheet design. The method relies on a measure that we define called constructive complexity, which is the number of keystrokes required to write a spreadsheet for a given computational task, as a function of the input data. The notion of constructive complexity is simple but general. The measure is simple enough to be described briefly in the classroom and the textbook. As an example, we use the shortest path problem. The objective is to educate operations research students and practitioners to write better spreadsheets, and to evaluate the quality of different spreadsheet designs. Constructive complexity could be used as a tool to achieve these objectives. We do not claim that it resolves all problems of spreadsheet design, but it is one step forward in quantifying spreadsheet design, and is intended to generate additional debate.

State-of-the-art exact and heuristic solution procedures for simple assembly line balancing

The assembly line balancing problem arises and has to be solved when an assembly line has to be configured or redesigned. It consists of distributing the total workload for manufacturing any unit of the product to be assembled among the work stations along the line. The so-called simple assembly line balancing problem (SALBP), a basic version of the general problem, has attracted attention of researchers and practitioners of operations research for almost half a century. In this paper, we give an up-to-date and comprehensive survey of SALBP research with a special emphasis on recent outstanding and guiding contributions to the field.

ASP, The Art and Science of Practice: Elements of a Theory of the Practice of Operations Research: Practice as a Business

In the previous two articles in this series (Murphy 2005a, b), I looked at practice from the perspective of doing operations research (OR). Because OR practitioners have careers and often found businesses, we need to understand practice as a business. Operations research/management science (OR/MS) businesses face many of the same issues as other technology and consulting businesses. However, the product is intangible, creating marketing problems. The businesses operate in a complex ecology with different levels of competition and cooperation among OR and software firms, depending on their different areas of expertise. Social networks play an important role in the way individuals and companies market and develop new strands of practice.

Systems/operational research and sustainable development: towards a new agenda

AbstractAt the 2002 International Sustainable Development Research Conference in Manchester, a great number of the 53 papers presented addressed exciting methodological developments associated with action research. Many of these initiatives can be linked with the rich tradition of operational research (OR). OR and environmental planning for sustainable development share three traditions: first, both have wide boundaries in terms of clientele, range of methodological approaches used and attention to multiple (and often conflicting) values; second, both traditions have an interest in fostering interdisciplinarity; third, both OR and environmental planning are concerned with the implementation, as well as the design, of planning strategies. Given these shared traditions, we recently engaged in a systemic intervention project to explore the possibilities of improved collaboration between OR practitioners and environmental planners. In a literature review and interviews with stakeholders, three generic issues were found to recur: complexity and uncertainty (regarding the unpredictability of natural and social phenomena); multiple and often conflicting values (of those involved in environmental planning) and political effects (on those not involved in planning processes, including non‐human nature). This paper reveals a pattern of how these generic issues are perceived in the public, business and voluntary sectors, and explains how, through a series of workshops and a mini‐conference, three interrelated agendas for future action took shape. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Operations management and operations research: a historical and relational perspective

The focus of this research paper is to briefly trace the historical development of Operations Management (OM) and Operations Research (OR). The problems and challenges resulting from the convergence between the two fields in recent years are evaluated and some recommendations are offered to both OM and OR academicians and practitioners.

On teaching the analytic hierarchy process

We discuss aspects of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) that we feel are important to the successful presentation of the AHP to graduate business students. We have also created a working paper that presents some of the examples and class projects that we found to be of pedagogical value. This working paper can be obtained by email from the first author ( lbodin@rhsmith.umd.edu). Scope and purpose Since its inception nearly 25 years ago, the AHP has been widely used to solve a broad range of multi-criteria decision problems. Successful applications can be found in business, industry, government, and the military. The community of operations research (OR) practitioners has incorporated the AHP in its methodological tool-bag while a number of university programs include AHP in courses covering decision-making techniques or in general OR courses. Instructors new to the topic need to be concerned with how the fundamental concepts of the AHP are first presented to students. Based on our teaching experiences, we discuss our view of how key elements of the AHP should be presented in the classroom in the hope it will aid instructors to understand better the important decision-aiding framework of the AHP.

Developments in linear and integer programming

In this review we describe recent developments in linear and integer (linear) programming. For over 50 years Operational Research practitioners have made use of linear optimisation models to aid decision making and over this period the size of problems that can be solved has increased dramatically, the time required to solve problems has decreased substantially and the flexibility of modelling and solving systems has increased steadily. Large models are no longer confined to large computers, and the flexibility of optimisation systems embedded in other decision support tools has made on-line decision making using linear programming a reality (and using integer programming a possibility). The review focuses on recent developments in algorithms, software and applications and investigates some connections between linear optimisation and other technologies.

Using Experimental Design to Find Effective Parameter Settings for Heuristics

In this paper, we propose a procedure, based on statistical design of experiments and gradient descent, that finds effective settings for parameters found in heuristics. We develop our procedure using four experiments. We use our procedure and a small subset of problems to find parameter settings for two new vehicle routing heuristics. We then set the parameters of each heuristic and solve 19 capacity-constrained and 15 capacity-constrained and route-length-constrained vehicle routing problems ranging in size from 50 to 483 customers. We conclude that our procedure is an effective method that deserves serious consideration by both researchers and operations research practitioners.

Simulated annealing algorithm : technical improvements

We present an overview of the main problem-independent sequential and parallel amelioration techniques of the Simulated Annealing algorithm. We begin by briefly exposing the theoretical framework encompassing the standard markovian model, the notion of cycle and the optimal temperature schedules. Theory of cycles yields explicit relationships between the geometry of the energy landscape and the expected behavior of the algorithm. It leads to the design of efficient temperature schedules, as well as to improvements of the algorithm behavior by distorting the cost function. Next, we present a survey of parallelization techniques, focussing on problem-independent synchronous strategies. They provide flexible and general tools, allowing operational research practitioners to take advantage of the computational power of parallel architectures. We conclude with an application. It concerns the search for Hamiltonian paths in cubic graphs. It brings to the fore the efficiency of the cost function distortions technique, when used in combination with Parallel Simulated Annealing.

A Contextual Approach for Designing and Using OR Quantitative Models

Practitioners of Operations Research (OR) traditionally concentrate on mathematical and computational aspects of quantitative models, sometimes resulting in risky implementation or early model obsolescence. We propose an approach, inspired by system concepts and technology management, which includes softer influences, such as decision frequency, model life cycle and technological stage of management, to help modeling and model management decisions. Some graphic indicators are developed to help diagnosis and conception.

A Misattribution: The Use of Operational Research Tools: A Survey of Operational Research Practitioners in the UK

A Misattribution: The Use of Operational Research Tools: A Survey of Operational Research Practitioners in the UK

The Use of Operational Research Tools: A Survey of Operational Research Practitioners in the UK

The Use of Operational Research Tools: A Survey of Operational Research Practitioners in the UK

The Use of Operational Research Tools: A Survey of Operational Research Practitioners in the UK

Given the importance of understanding decision making processes within organizations, studies of the attitudes of Operational Research practitioners towards specific aspects of their work is a neglected area of research. This paper furnishes an account of a questionnaire-based survey of industrially based OR practitioners selected from the membership of the Operational Research Society. The objective of the study is to assess the views of OR practitioners regarding the modelling and problem solving tools that are available to them. In particular, the issues of technique selection, the treatment of uncertainty, and the perceived contribution of Operational Research to decision issues are investigated. Results from the survey contribute towards both a greater understanding of OR practitioners' perspectives on the decision support process and the development of a profile of the membership of the OR Society.

The Use of Operational Research Tools: A Survey of Operational Research Practitioners in the UK

Given the importance of understanding decision making processes within organizations, studies of the attitudes of Operational Research practitioners towards specific aspects of their work is a neglected area of research. This paper furnishes an account of a questionnaire-based survey of industrially based OR practitioners selected from the membership of the Operational Research Society. The objective of the study is to assess the views of OR practitioners regarding the modelling and problem solving tools that are available to them. In particular, the issues of technique selection, the treatment of uncertainty, and the perceived contribution of Operational Research to decision issues are investigated. Results from the survey contribute towards both a greater understanding of OR practitioners' perspectives on the decision support process and the development of a profile of the membership of the OR Society.

OR Utilization in Nigeria: A Sample Survey

The study presents the results of a mail survey on the utilization of Operational Research (OR) techniques in tackling complex operational problems in the private sector in Nigeria. The survey was mailed to OR practitioners in nearly 1000 companies and was aimed at determining the familiarity with, and usage of, OR techniques, background of OR personnel, degree of computer usage, application areas, implementation and contributions of OR, problems attendant in using OR techniques, and future prospects for OR usage.