The First 50 Years of the Department of Industrial and Operations Engineering at the University of Michigan

Why does someone commit to writing a history about anything? Hopefully, by doing so both the writer and readers will realize that good things don’t simply happen; they result from the creative and hard work of many different people who shared a common vision and goals, often for many years. The Industrial and Operations Engineering Department has been a highly ranked leader in several different aspects of the field over its lifetime. Part of its success may lie in the fact that its faculty members have come from diverse fields, including mathematics, computer science, statistics, physiology, psychology, organizational psychology, mechanical engineering, and economics. In addition, many faculty members worked in or with a variety of industries before joining the department. These people appear to have used their diverse backgrounds in the belief that they could accomplish a larger impact by actively collaborating with others to solve a variety of major societal problems.