Alumni Profile: Timothy Laseter, Professor of Business

Today: After five years on the faculty of the Darden Graduate Business School, Tim is spending the current academic year as a visiting professor at four other leading business schools: IESE in Barcelona, the London Business School, the Stern School at NYU, and Emory's Goizueta School in Atlanta. He will be teaching Operations Strategy, Supply Chain Management, and Product Development to full-time and Executive MBAs. His 1998 book, Balanced Sourcing: Cooperation and Competition in Supplier Relationships (Jossey-Bass), is a critically acclaimed primer to ensure competitive pricing from suppliers while simultaneously nurturing cooperative relationships. In December 2006, Tim co-authored a new book entitled Strategic Product Creation. This book delivers cutting-edge tools for helping managers get new products organized, positioned and marketed faster than before. A contributing editor for strategy+business, he also writes for academic journals, and continues to do some limited consulting to stay current.

Tim Laseter

At Booz Allen & Before: Tim was a Vice President in the firm's operations practice with concentrations in operations strategy, supply chain management, and sourcing for a wide variety of global businesses. During his 15 years with the firm (1988-2002), Tim was fortunate to be based out of a variety of offices, including Cleveland, London, New York, and McLean. As the firm's early thought leader in strategic sourcing, Tim presented to executive audiences in Europe, South America, and Asia, as well as throughout the U.S. Prior to joining Booz Allen, Tim worked in manufacturing operations at a joint venture between Siemens and Corning. He earned a B.S. from Georgia Institute of Technology and an M.B.A. and a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia.

Do you feel that Booz Allen was a foundation to your current position? I now teach first year operations and a second year elective in Operations Strategy at the Darden School at the University of Virginia, one of the top MBA programs in the country. Although I came to Booz Allen with several years of industry experience and have since completed a doctorate in Operations Management, I acquired much of my knowledge of operations during my time at Booz Allen.

I was fortunate enough to work first hand with Booz Allen Senior Vice President Keith Oliver, who coined the term "Supply Chain Management" in the 1980s, and to work with a variety of people in developing the concept of "Strategic Sourcing" during the 1990s.

Would you recommend working at Booz Allen? If so, why? Absolutely. Booz Allen offers the opportunity to work on leading-edge problems with top companies around the world. My experiences spanned the globe and a host of industries: from a spirits company in the UK to a book publisher in New York, a telecommunications company in Brazil, an Internet retailer on the U.S. west coast, an oil producer in Alaska, and a car manufacturer in Tokyo. Each engagement offered an opportunity for me to help a client while simultaneously extending my own knowledge base.

What does the successful consultant do well here? Serve the client through quality work delivered on time. Also, make sure you have fun or otherwise you won't last over the long run.

Do you have any favorite moments or experiences at Booz Allen? No one favorite moment that comes to mind from my 15 years with Booz Allen, but on reflection, I am reminded of a variety of experiences that I was able to share with my family. The global travel of the consulting lifestyle can be demanding, but the upside was the chance to travel with my family to many parts of the world.

We all moved to England for a year and traveled throughout Europe during my time at Booz Allen. My wife and two children joined me for two weeks during an engagement in Alaska. My son attended a worldwide VP meeting with me in Hong Kong when he was 10 years old and my daughter traveled to Tokyo with me three years later when she was 10. My entire family traveled with me throughout South America for more than two weeks while I conducted a series of CEO breakfast meetings introducing my book, Balanced Sourcing.

The opportunity to see so much of the world with my family was a special treat that we would not have experienced without Booz Allen.

Any advice for the new staffer here? Seek a balance in your life. The intellectual challenges of consulting at Booz Allen offer great psychic rewards, while the travel and work pace can be draining. So be careful to maintain a balance between the two or you will not survive.

profile updated September 13, 2007