A visionary entrepreneur, CEO, author, and teacher, Dov Seidman has devoted his life and career to elevating individual behavior and helping organizations create ethical, winning cultures. Seidman is the founder and chairman of LRN, the leading ethics and compliance company, and The HOW Institute for Society. He is the author of The New York Times bestseller "HOW: Why HOW We Do Anything Means Everything." Seidman’s HOW philosophy underscores the belief that how we conduct ourselves and lead our organizations is paramount to success in contemporary society.
Growing up, Seidman, a dyslexic, struggled in school. His late acceptance into the University of California, Los Angeles led him to enroll in philosophy courses as all other classes were full. This unforeseen avenue shaped his future. Graduating summa cum laude with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in philosophy in 1987, he furthered his education at Oxford University, earning a degree in philosophy, politics, and economics while serving as captain of the Balliol College crew team. Seidman then earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School in1992.
A few months after graduating, Seidman founded LRN with a powerful vision to “democratize legal knowledge.” Seven days after he opened LRN’s doors, The Wall Street Journal wrote a front-page article, “Law Firm Fat Threatened by Lean Network,” describing Seidman’s idea for LRN “as simple as it is revolutionary.” The American Lawyer soon thereafter profiled Seidman in “Should you be afraid of this man?” highlighting the potential of LRN’s model “to revolutionize the legal profession.” Seidman expanded LRN to help companies create legally aware and ethically inspired workforces. LRN became one of the first SaaS (Software as a Service) companies, pioneering the field of online ethics and compliance education. Today, LRN works with thousands of organizations and has educated more than 50 million employees in over 100 countries on how to navigate complex legal and regulatory environments and make ethical decisions.
LRN is widely recognized for having shaped the modern-day ethics and compliance industry. Seidman’s testimony before the U.S. Sentencing Commission urged corporations to transcend a compliance-only mindset, advocating for corporate cultures grounded in ethics. His proposals have become the standards by which companies, cultures, and programs are evaluated.
His dedication to nurturing the next generation of leaders is also evident in his work with The HOW Institute for Society, which he founded in 2019 to instill a culture of moral leadership, values-based behavior, and principled decision-making at every level and sector of society. With its NXT-GEN Fellowship in Moral Leadership, The HOW Institute works with leading institutions to develop managers who lead with moral authority and ensure that these leaders occupy positions of formal authority in their respective organizations.
Many publications have recognized Seidman’s contributions, with The New York Times naming him a “groundbreaker” and Time magazine calling him a “game changer.” As Fortune magazine put it, “his ability to take the challenges that CEOs and other leaders face in their day-to-day roles and place them in a broader context of decision-making” has made him a distinguished voice at various global gatherings including: Vatican City, National Football League, Steve Jobs Theater, and Pauley Pavillion where he gave the 2002 commencement address “Do the Right Thing.”
Seidman serves on the boards of organizations aligned with his mission, including the Ellison Medical Institute, 92NY, Planet Word and The Elie Wiesel Foundation. Seidman has played the leading role in awarding the Elie Wiesel Prize in Ethics to college students. Seidman received the Jurisprudence Award from the Anti-Defamation League.
In 2022, Seidman was appointed a Hauser Leader at the Harvard Kennedy School. The University of Miami School of Law has benefited from Seidman's annual visits to teach in the Entertainment, Arts, and Sports Law Program in which HOW is used as the foundational textbook.
Seidman's impact is profound and far-reaching, offering invaluable lessons to young leaders embarking on their careers. His approach emphasizes that success is an outgrowth of pursuing a journey of significance and that people stand to gain advantage by not just outperforming the competition but by “outbehaving” it.
For inspiring the next generation of leaders in prioritizing ethics in their personal and professional lives, the University of Miami is proud to welcome Dov Seidman as the School of Law's 2025 commencement speaker.
