A New Network Data Envelopment Analysis Model for Efficacy Evaluation of Decision-Making Units

Assessing the performance of organizations has become a complex matter within the realm of management, considering the current global setting and its ever-changing nature. Although Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) has been used as a powerful tool for the evaluation of decision-making units, in the traditional DEA models, these units are viewed as a black box, and therefore their internal relationships are generally ignored, assuming that the performance of DMUs is a function of selective inputs and outputs. Recently, there has been a great deal of research on multi-stage units, especially series and parallel units. However, research with a mixed structure is very limited with many studies unable to introduce the efficient unit. However, since in most real cases, the researcher deals with a series and parallel structure simultaneously, it is vital to develop a model of efficiency evaluation with efficient units. Thus, in the current paper, we attempted to solve the mentioned problems. At first, a mixed structure was introduced and then we developed a new model for a mixed structure. Also, the proposed model has the capability of introducing a relative-efficient unit. This is followed by an explanation of the methodology and development of a new network model to measure efficiency in the Iranian Airline Industry.