ABSTRACT

The early attempts at efficient management of large-scale operations in support of military power may be traced back to the Venetian Arsenal. Established in the 1100s, this employed a type of assembly line to mass produce galleys (Lane 1973). The industrial revolutions of England in the eighteenth century and the United States in the late nineteenth century engendered tremendous growth in the application of scientific principles to industrial problems and processes. The development of interchangeable parts and the division of labor into specified, discrete tasks facilitated the refinement of production operations at a level of precision that was impossible before.