March 15, 2008
About Me
Doug Smith is a consultant, writer, thinker, historian, teacher, lawyer and inventor who has made distinguished contributions in wide-ranging ways:
Management thinking and practice
- Acknowledged as one of the world’s leading management thinkers and consultants
- Inventor and architect of the principles and design for challenge-centric, performance-driven transformation programs that guide leaders to drive innovation, capacity-building, and growth in organizations and companies whose fields are undergoing profound disruption (see examples below)
- Has contributed to innovation, strategy and change in scores of organizations across nearly fifty industries in all three sectors: private, government and non-profit
- Cited in High Impact Consulting for having the number one impact of all consultants mentioned. His philosophy and practices routinely generate better than 50:1 returns
- As a McKinsey & Company Partner and co-leader of the Firm’s worldwide organization practice, launched the “horizontal organization,” a part of the reengineering revolution that Fortune called “the model for the next fifty years”
- Most recently authored On Value and Values -- a sweeping vision to revitalize our values for our world
- Co-authored The Wisdom of Teams and The Discipline of Teams, books used by millions of people in organizations the world over
- Authored Make Success Measurable and Taking Charge of Change -- books praised for using performance to drive real change in a dynamic world
Education and social change
- Author of On Value and Values: Thinking Differently About We In An Age Of Me, a social commentary and moral philosophy that has been compared in breadth and depth to Aristotle’s Politics and DeTocqueville’s Democracy In America.
- Architect of , a challenge-centric, performance-driven transformation program causing profound shifts in scores of affordable housing organizations across the United States while simultaneously setting a remarkably higher standard for results in adult education
- Created the strategy for the award winning Berea Performance Compact being used by The Federation of Appalachian Housing Enterprises to combine the unique skills of some of their members with the local presence of all of their members to produce scalable housing and finance solutions for low-income folks in their region.
- Architect and Executive Director of The Punch Sulzberger Leadership Program, a challenge-centric, performance-driven transformation program for leaders of news organizations seeking to navigate the profound changes affecting their industry.
- Co-authored Sources of The African Past, an innovative, college-level introduction to 19th century African history that puts student and teacher on a level playing field through it’s presentation of original sources
- Taught high school math, physics and chemistry in The Gambia, West Africa and introduced set theory and “new” math to schools nation-wide
- Chairman of the Board of The Rapid Results Institute, that applies results-and-performance driven methods to dramatically increase the size and sustainability of impacts for social and economic development efforts, primarily in Africa
-Board member of SeaChange Capital Partners, an innovative group seeking to mobilize major donors to provide substantial funding for outstanding nonprofits focused on education and youth development
- Member of Executive Committee that rearchitected governance at Yale University
Technology
- Co-invented (patents pending) non-linear arrayed video -- system and methods for creating and viewing fully browseable video – an entirely new form of education and entertainment
- Co-created McKinsey’s Rapid Response Network, one of the world’s earliest and longest lasting innovations in knowledge management
- Former Chairman of E-Lab, company that applied cultural anthropology to invent new methods of behavior-based market research
- Former Chairman of Foothold Technology, a company bringing the benefits of application service technology to the non-profit sector
- Wrote Fumbling the Future: How Xerox Invented, Then Ignored Personal Computing -- widely celebrated as one of the classic books of the Information Age
Industries Served
- Accounting/Auditing
- Agricultural Machinery
- Adult Literacy
- Aviation
- Banking
- Biotechnology
- Cable Television
- Clothing
- Community Development
- Computers
- Consulting
- Corporate Training/Education
- Crafts and Hobbies
- Credit Cards
- Direct Mail
- Disaster Relief
- eCommerce
- Education, K-12 and University
- Energy
- Entertainment
- Fabric Finishing & Dying
- Food and Beverage
- Government
- Health Care
- Information Services
- Insurance
- Journalism
- Kitchen Technology
- Land Use Planning
- Law
- Outsourcing
- Packaging
- Pharmaceuticals
- Professional Sports
- Public Policy
- Publishing
- Retail
- Software
- Telecommunications
- Transportation
- Travel
- Utilities
