Problems of Quantitative Models in Large Management Information Systems

Ackoff says that “Managers are not confronted with problems that are independent of each other, but with dynamic situations that consist of complex systems of changing problems that interact with each other …” He calls these “messes” [Ackoff, Russell L. 1979. The future of operational research is past. J. Oper. Res. Soc.30 (2) 93–104.]. We in Operations Research know this. Yet we continue to insert our optimizing and decision-aiding models into large, dynamic, ill-mannered systems, knowing all the while that their effects will be disturbed and perhaps even partially obscured by events in the larger system that are outside the models' scope. Why do we do so? My own experience may serve to illuminate our motivation.