In a system such as a state bureaucracy, operations research can map out the ways a state system does business, prosecutes crimes or collects taxes. It can lay out objectives and means of measuring performance and serve as a means of even more detailed analysis of specific tasks within the institution, such as law enforcement against tax evaders. When the system is analyzed at each minute level of its operation, communication among the different functions of the system can be improved as goals are laid out in more detail. Personnel in each part of the system see their purposes and roles more clearly when the operations of the group are analyzed in such detail.
Building a detailed, operations-level model is essential for seeing where inefficiencies arise. The entire purpose of operations research is to look at the facts as they operate in the day-to-day work of the group. Operations research acts as a concept map that lays out how the system functions at all levels. Such mapping permits researchers to see how to correct kinks in crucial factors like the chain of command, the spending of money or the processes of hiring. Once the map of how the organization works is laid out, it is much easier to see where gridlock or backlogs occur and then take corrective measures.
Operations research applied to a state bureaucracy, as an example, seeks to eliminate all forms of waste and increase the effective use of tools like computers, state automobiles or even deadly force. A detailed operations approach to law enforcement may show that using two police officers per patrol car is better than one, since situations can be more easily diffused and police become better protected. The idea that it is more expensive to have two in a car rather than one can be counterbalanced in detailed operations research when the specific actions of two police officers per car are compared to those cars using only one police officer per car. If two police officers per car make life easier for law enforcement, reduce stress and protect lives with less possibility of confrontation, then the two-officer car idea should be used more often. This type of detailed analysis of specific systems of operation can show substantial evidence of effectiveness that could not be known with certainty otherwise.