Lawrence M Miller

Career

He began his work in youth prisons after recognizing that the learning system in the organization had exactly the opposite of its intended effect – increasing, rather than decreasing, dysfunctional behavior. For four years he worked to redesign the prison system by establishing the first free economy behind prison walls, where each inmate had to pay rent, maintain a checking account, and pay for everything he desired. This was one of the first applications of behavior analysis in the correctional setting.

He has been consulting, writing and speaking about business organization and culture since 1973. He began his business consulting after being recruited to join Fran Tarkenton's company, Behavioral Systems, Inc., then headed by psychologist Aubrey Daniels. When Daniels parted ways with Tarkenton, Miller was named President of Behavioral Systems, Inc. In 1983 with the publication of American Spirit, he formed his own firm, the Miller Howard Consulting Group in 1983. In 1998 he sold his firm to Towers Perrin, an international human resource consulting firm and became a Principal of that firm. In 1999 he left that firm to focus on his interest in serving non-profit organizations and solo consulting projects.

He and his firm were one of the early proponents of team-based management and worked with many clients to implement Team Management from the senior executive team to include every level and every employee in the organization. The Team Management process created a company of business managers, with every employee focused on continuous improvement of business performance. Miller merged this methodology with his knowledge of Lean management (Toyota Production System) to provide his clients with an integrated approach to creating lean culture. In addition to directing the overall change process, Miller personally coached the senior management team of many of his clients.

The implementation of Team Management led to the realization that the whole system of the organization needed to be redesigned to create alignment so all systems, structure, skills, style and symbols support the same goals and culture. From this realization he developed the process of Whole System Architecture that is a high involvement method of rethinking all of the systems, structures and culture of the organization. Among his consulting clients have been 3M, Corning, Shell Oil Company, Amoco and Texaco, Shell Chemicals, Air Canada and Varig Airlines, Eastman Chemicals, Xerox, Harris Corporation, McDonald's and Chick-Fil-A, Merck and Upjohn Pharmaceuticals, United Technologies, Metropolitan Life and Landmark Communications.

Publications

American Spirit: Visions of A New Corporate Culture, which was the text for Honda of America's course on their values and culture; Barbarians to Bureaucrats: Corporate Life Cycle Strategies, which draws on the history of the rise and fall of civilizations to illustrate the patterns of leadership and evolution in corporate cultures. He has also authored Change Management, a guidebook for redesigning organizations, and Lean Team Management, a workbook for team leaders and members. He has recently completed Sustainable Wealth in which he redefines the nature of capitalism and wealth. He has appeared on the Today Show, CNN, made numerous appearances on CNBC, has written for The New York Times and been the subject of a feature story in Industry Week magazine.

Positions

Academic positions and lectures

Courses Presented at the University Level:

Speaking engagements:

Miller has been keynote speaker at more than five hundred association and corporate meetings. His speaking clients have included American Society for Training and Development, American Society for Quality, American Productivity & Quality Center, dozens of other associations and hundreds of corporations.

Publications

Books: