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Essay about The Historical Evolution of Operations Management

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Operations have always existed in some form since the olden times. Over the years, operations have dramatically changed at least in the manufacturing industry and it has gone through three main stages which are the craft manufacturing, mass production and the modern era.
Craft manufacturing involved highly skilled workers who produced in small quantities using simple tools with the objective to meet specific individual customer’s needs. In the craft production system, workers usually work in their homes or small workshops and at that time, there was low competition due to low scale production. Although operations have evolved greatly since that period, some industries still have recourse to craftsmanship like in furniture or clock …show more content…

The second industrial revolution brought forward two main innovations; scientific management and the moving assembly line.
In 1911, Frederic Taylor considered as the father of scientific management believed in management based on measurement, analysis and improvement of work methods. His objective was to find the best way in doing any task instead of letting workers determine how to do their jobs. He believed in managers selecting and training workers properly, in cooperation between them and in separating managerial activities from work activities. His objective was to maximize output and by breaking down the activities into logical and repetitive tasks therefore simple for the worker to understand, he was able to have workers performing at a high speed thus reducing costs. The scientific method was not always popular with workers who felt that there was not a fair compensation considering the increase in output. As the public opposed themselves to this management method, bringing Taylor to testify at the Hall of Congress, scientific management became actually more widespread and gained more acceptance. As a matter of fact, many companies still use today scientific management.
During that same period, other pioneers supported and contributed to that movement. Franck Gilbreth created the motion study and together with Taylor, who also developed the stopwatch time

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