Developing institutional decision support systems: A system study, simulation analysis, and DSS design for taxicab dispatching

The nature of decision support systems (DSS) when applied to complex operational control problems was examined, with particular attention given to the case of taxicab dispatching. The traditional perspective has been that DSS are primarily relevant to strategic planning problems, thus much research concerning the design of DSS has focussed on the problems and decision making needs of upper-level managers. The major premise of this research was that DSS concepts are not restricted to the domain of strategic planning problems (ad hoc DSS), but have significant implications for operational control problems also (institutional DSS). The case of taxicab dispatching is representative of these types of problems.;The objectives/achievements of this research were fourfold. First, a DSS design was proposed to serve as an effective and practical approach to improving the decision effectiveness of taxicab dispatchers. Two research topics emanating from this design were pursued and constitute the other three objectives of this study.;The first research topic can be viewed as a "sub"-problem emanating from the DSS design and comprised the second and third objectives of the study. First, the taxi dispatching system was modeled using black box and causal loop diagramming techniques to identify and isolate the crucial variable relationships in the system. This was converted into a parametric, experimental computer simulation model using the simulation language SLAMII (second objective), which provided a tool to experiment with a variety of dispatching policies and fleet sizes to assess their impact on the two primary objectives of the system: profit and service quality (third objective).;The second research topic stemming from the DSS design, and fourth objective of the research, was a "super"-problem requiring the development of a general DSS design framework to aid in the development of institutional DSS. Extrapolating from the taxicab dispatching DSS design and other case examples, and drawing from the theoretical literature, a framework was developed which identified the major design characteristics of institutional DSS.