The historical evolution of operations management began with the industrial revolution in the 1770s and progressed through several phases, including scientific management in the early 1900s, the human relations movement between 1920-1960, and the influence of Japanese manufacturers between 1970-1990. Operations management was transformed by new concepts like interchangeable parts, assembly lines, time and motion studies, and total quality management. The computer and internet revolutions further changed operations with new technologies like enterprise resource planning systems and e-commerce.

2. HistoricalEvolution of
OperationsManagement
BSc.Financial Management (special) Degree
Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka

3. Shashini
Wijekoon
Lochana
Fernando
Nilani
Rathnapriya
Surekha
Dilrukshi
GROUP
MEMBERS

4. Industrial revolution (1770’s)
Post civil war period
Scientific management (1911)
Mass production
Interchangeable parts
Division of labor
Human relations movement (1920-60)
Unemployment insurance
Pension plans
Operations research
Service revolution
Computer revolution
Influence of Japanese manufacturers (1970-
1990)

5. Operations Management

6. A production system takes inputs and
converts them into outputs.
The conversion process is the predominant
activity of a production system.
The primary concern of an operations
manager is the activities of the conversion
process.

8.  Ancient times and before 1700
 The production system was a “ Cottege system”
 In 1700’s the Industrial Revolution begins
 The human power was replaced by the machine power and the
“Factory System” developed
 James Watt (1764) invented steam engine- gathering of the
workers became easy.

9. Industrial Revolution
Steam engine 1769 James Watt
Division of labor 1776 Adam Smith
Interchangeable parts 1790 Eli Whitney
Historical Events in OM
Industrial Revolution

10.  Adam Smith(1776) published “
The Wealth of Nations” touted
the economic benefits of
“Division of Labor”.
 He suggested that the huge
increases in productivity
obtainable from technology or
technological progress are
possible because human and

11.  In 1790, Eli Whitney invented the
concept of “Interchangeable parts”.
 Whitney's defenders have claimed that
he invented the American system of
manufacturing the combination of power
machinery, interchangeable parts, and
division of labor that would underlie the
nation's subsequent industrial revolution.

12.  During the post-Civil War period great expansion of
production capacity occurred.
 By post-Civil War the following developments set
the stage for the great production explosion of the
20th century:
increased capital and production capacity
the expanded urban workforce
new Western US markets
an effective national transportation system

13.  The need to develop the great production machine to
satisfy the massive market of that day gave birth a new
philosophy called “Scientific Management”.
 Frederick Winslow Taylor, known as the “Father of
Scientific Management”
 Invented new scientific procedure to improve the
production efficiency.
 Later he invented the “ Shop System”.
 The implementation of this system increased the
efficiency of the workers.

14. Scientific Management
Principles 1911 Frederick W. Taylor
Time and motion studies 1911 Frank & Lillian Gilbreth
Activity scheduling chart 1912 Henry Gant
Moving assembly line 1913 Henry Ford
Historical Events in OM
Scientific Management

15.  Henry Ford(1863- 1947)
popularized the concept of
“Assembly Lines” by implementing it
in his own company.
 He published the book “ Today and
Tomorrow” in 1926.

16.  Frank B. Gilbreth
 Lilian M. Gilbreth
 Henry L. Gantt
 Carl G. Barth
 Harrington Emerson
 Morris L. Cooke

17.  During 1800 and 1900’s the legacy of rigid control prevailed
over the company.
 Between World War-1 and World War-2 , a philosophy
emerged in United States that the workers also needs to be
treated with dignity.
 The “Human Relation Movement” began by Elton Mayo, F. J.
Roethlisberger, T. N. Whitehead at Hawthorne, Illinois.

18.  The “Hawthorne Studies” show that psychologiacal and sociological
factors affected not only human motivation and attitude but
production as well.
 The work of the behaviouralists ,
 A. Maslow
 Frederick Herzberg
 Douglas McGregor
 Peter Druckker
 Forced the employers of the companies to think about the human
relations in company.

19. Human Relations
Hawthorne studies 1930 Elton Mayo
Motivation theories 1940s Abraham Maslow
1950s Frederick Hertzberg
1960s Douglas McGregor
Historical Events in OM :
Human Relations & behaviorism

20.  European campaign at the time of world war- 2
used enormous quantities of manpower.
 Because of the chaos situation the companies
experienced more complexed situation than the
previous times .
 As a result of the need for the proper
operational strategy the concept of “Operatio
Research” arrive.

21.  The mushroomed growth of the services in the world
economy made the service revolution.
 Different offices mushroomed in world
 More than two third of the world workforce is
employed in services.
 More than two third of the GDP is produced by
services.

22.  Helps in the Enterprise Resource Planning(ERP)
 Softwares like SAP, Peoplesoft, Oracle helps the
managers to get real time news about the different
section of the company.
 The improvement in the communication system- e-mail,
internet technology also influenced the operations
management.

23. Historical Events in OM
Information Age/Internet Revolution
Information Age/
Internet Revolution
Internet, WWW, ERP 1990s ARPANET, Tim
Supply chain Berners-Lee, SAP, i2
management, Technologies, ORACLE,
E-commerce PeopleSoft, Amazon,
Yahoo, eBay,
and others

24. Refined and developed management
practices that increased productivity.
Credited with fueling the quality
revolution
Just-in-time production

25. Quality Revolution
JIT 1970s Taiichi Ohno, Toyota
TQM 1980s W. Edwards Deming,
Joseph Juran, et. al.
Strategy and operations Skinner, Hayes
Reengineering 1990s Hammer, Champy
World Trade Organization 1990s Numerous countries
and companies
Historical Events in OM
Quality Revolution and Globalization

26.  (1776-1900) - Division of labor
 (1900-1920) - Scientific Mgmt. ,Time&Motion
Study
 (1920-1940) - Hawthorn study
 (1940-1960) - Operations research
 (1960-1980) - Just-in-Time
 (1980-2000) - Total Quality Management

27. Industrial revolution (1770’s)
Post civil war period
Scientific management (1911)
Human relations movement (1920-60)
Operations research
Service revolution
Computer revolution
Influence of Japanese manufacturers
(1970-1990)