<p>Sure. OR itself has many branches. There are lots of things that used to be part of the OR skill-set but have become specialties by themselves (risk analysis, modeling and simulation, network analysis, etc.) An OR degree would qualify you to work in any or all of such fields. </p>
<p>One major line of business for OR majors is the definition of system-wide measures of effectiveness, and the measurement of the system’s performance against those MOEs. OR analysts might also dip into our toolkit to determine how we can improve the system against those measures, or to refine the measures so they better capture the intent of the customer and users. </p>
<p>Another line of business includes system optimization. There are many tools to help optimize some systems;there are almost no tools to help optimize others; and some systems defy optimization because of their chaotic or complex behavior. (That’s when things get REALLY interesting.)</p>
<p>OR is the ‘science of better’, as one of our professional societies says. The world is filled with complex systems that can be analyzed and made better using OR techniques. We almost always ‘earn back’ our pay. </p>
<p>I work in the defense field. Our professional society just met this month. You can check out our website at mors.org. There you will find the titles to the hundreds of papers presented over three days. About half of my division went to the symposium, and a lot of the consultants that support us. </p>
<p>There is substantial unmet demand for these skills, in my field and in many others: airline operations, health care resource management, cost-benefit analysis in industry and government, traffic management, etc. There are many avenues to provide these skills: government consultants, business process reform companies, R&D management firms, and the government itself. </p>
<p>As for the ‘work environment’, I think it takes an independently-minded individual. Just tonight, sharing a drink after work with some former colleagues, they said they enjoyed my participation in meetings because I was always throwing the “BS” flag (when it desperately needed to be thrown). We get to do that. You should know it’s a bit of a high wire act, and not every company or manager will appreciate your value. But, there are plenty of fish in the sea. Most executives prefer having somebody to tell them when they’re not wearing any clothes.</p>
<p>Back in WWII, Winston Churchill set up a ‘central statistics office’ to help deliver the ‘brutal facts’. He knew he was an optimist and that he would always focus on the good news. He defined the perfect role for the OR component, and my job today. </p>
<p>I hope this all helps.</p>