Dr. Ian McCarthy, Canada Research Chair of Technology and Operations Management from the Beedie School of Business, Simon Fraser University, British Columbia.

The "velocity" of industries has emerged as a critical issue for management - industries such as healthcare, computers, fashion, and biotechnology seem to demand specific capabilities in order to keep up with the pace of change. In this presentation I explore the "multidimensionality" of industry velocity, focusing on the interplay of the rate and direction of change among multiple environmental dimensions such as demand, products, and technology. I present a framework that examines potential relationships among velocity dimensions by introducing three concepts: "velocity homology" which is the degree to which velocity dimensions have similar rates and directions of change at a point in time; "velocity coupling" which is the degree to which the velocities of different dimensions affect one another over time; and "velocity regimes" which represent patterns of velocity homology and velocity coupling. As well as introducing the core ideas and implications of this framework, I will also discuss the collaborative and creative process that gave rise to this paper.

Ian McCarthy is a Professor and the Canada Research Chair of Technology and Operations Management at the Beedie School of Business, Simon Fraser University. Prior to joining Simon Fraser University he was a faculty member at the Universities of Warwick and Sheffield, and he also worked at Philips Electronics and Alcan. His research and teaching focus on process design and control, innovation management, and change management, he works with professionals and their organizations to understand, re-design, and change their operations. In 2009 Ian was appointed to be a Fulbright New Century Scholar (NCS) to examine the role of the university as an innovation driver and knowledge centre. He also tweets (@Toffeemen68) and blogs (http://itdepends4.blogspot.com/) about operations, innovation, change, social media, and management education.