HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT (2024)

The subject Operations management has its own connection with the age old Industrial Revolution, which has started during the late 17th century in England and later spread to the rest of Europe and to the United States during the 19th century.

Historical Evolution ofOperations Management

The subject Operations managementhas its own connection with the age old Industrial Revolution, which hasstarted during the late 17th century in England and later spread to the rest ofEurope and to the United States during the 19th century. Prior to that time,goods were manufactured in small quantities in smaller shops / factories by thelocal craftsmen and their apprentices, who were mostly their family members.Under that system, it was common for one person to be responsible for making aproduct, such as a horse-drawn wagon or a piece of furniture, from start tofinish. Only simple tools were available; the machines that we use today hadnot been invented.

Later, in the 18th century, manyscientific inventions came into existence and changed the face of production /operations by substituting huge machines, which are operated by steam power andelectric power. Perhaps the most significant of these inventions, was the steamengine; it had the ability to provide power to operate huge machineries in thefactories. For example, the spinning jenny and the power looms revolutionizedthe textile industry. Ample supplies of coal and iron ore provided materialsfor generating power and making machinery. The new machines, made of iron, weremuch stronger and more durable than the simple wooden machines they replaced.

From the late 17th century (1770)to the early years of the 18th century, series of events took place in Englandwhich together is called the Industrial Revolution.

Industrial Revolution resulted intwo major developments: widespread substitution of machine power for humanpower and establishment of the organized production system known as factorysystem.

The events that took place from1770 to the 1800s are characterized by great inventions. The great inventionswere eight in number ,with six of them having been conceived in England, one inFrance and one in the United States .The eight inventions are—HargreavesSpinning Jenny, Arkwright’s Water Frame, Crompton’s Mule, Cartwright’s PowerLoom, Watt’s steam engine, Berthollet’s Chlorine Bleaching Discovery,Mandslay’s Screw-Cutting Lathe and Eli Whitney’sInterchangeable Manufacture.

As observed from eightinventions, most of them have to do with the spinning of yarn and weaving ofcloth. This is logical from the point of view that cloth was the principalexport commodity of England at that time and was in short supply owing to theconsiderable expansion of England’s colonial empire and its commercial trade.

The availability of machine powergreatly facilitated the gathering of workers in factories that housed themachines. The large number of workers congregated in the factories, created theneed for organizing them in logical ways to produce goods.

The publication of Adam Smith’sThe Wealth of Nations in 1776 advocated the benefits of the division of laboror specialization of labor, which broke production of goods into smallspecialized tasks that were assigned to workers on production lines. Thus, thefactories of late 1700s not only had developed production machinery, but alsoways of planning and controlling the output of workers.

The impact of the IndustrialRevolution was first felt in England. From here, it spread to other Europeancountries and to the United States. The Industrial Revolution advanced furtherwith the development of the gasoline engine and electricity in the 1800s. Otherindustries emerged and along with them new factories came into being. By themiddle of 18th century, the old cottage system of production had been replacedby the large scale factory system. As days went by, production capacitiesexpanded, demand for capital grew and labor became highly dependent on jobs andurbanized. At the commencement of the 20th century, the one element that wasmissing was a management –the ability to develop and use the existingfacilities to produce on a large scale to meet massive markets of today.

Later, the Scientific ManagementEra has brought widespread changes to the practices and management offactories. The movement was spearheaded by the efficiency engineer and inventorFrederickWinslow Taylor, who is often referred to as the Father of Scientific Management.Taylor believed in a “science of management” based on observation,measurement, analysis and improvement of workmethods, and economic incentives. He studied work methods in great detail toidentify the best method for doing each job. Taylor also believed thatmanagement should be responsible for planning, carefully selecting and trainingworkers, finding the best way to perform each job, achieving cooperationbetween management and workers, and separating management activities from workactivities.