Progress in the Management Sciences

Recent meetings of The Institute of Management Sciences bring home the growth and maturing of the management sciences. For example, the theme of the XIX International Meeting in Houston, Texas, April 4–8, was “Management Science, Ecology, and the Quality of Life”; this was closely followed by the meeting of the United Kingdom Section in Oxford, April 17–19, concerned with economic growth and employment policy. The discussions at these meetings indicated how the management sciences can contribute to the understanding of human institutions in relation to their purposes and environment and to the more effective organization and management of these institutions. As a participant in each, I was compelled to reflect on the progress made in the management sciences in the twenty years, roughly, since the founding of TIMS. The founding members of TIMS, and for that matter those of our sister societies such as ORSA, ORS and other members of IFORS, might have privately dreamed of contributions to issues with such scope, sweep or significance as those discussed at our recent meetings, issues as broad and ill-defined as “the quality of life.” I doubt if they would have dared publicly to claim the potential for significant contributions (A revised version of the Presidential Address presented to the TIMS XIX International Meeting in Houston, Texas, April 1972).