Denis Maier, Ph.D.

Biography

Professor Maier spent 20 years in international industry and management consulting before returning to academia. He held various positions in operations related functions and worked for over ten years for BMW as a Senior Executive at the headquarters in Germany and in the U.S. at Plant Spartanburg in South Carolina. Throughout his career Professor Maier has led and successfully implemented numerous projects in different roles as an internal and external consultant, as a project leader and as a responsible executive.

Professor Maier has been teaching now for over ten years at the University of Minnesota and since 2014 at Wake Forest University. He has extensive experience with on ground, hybrid and online courses (synchronous & asynchronous) in Undergraduate and Graduate Programs (Master’s of Science in Management; Part-Time MBA for Working Professionals). Besides his main focus on Operations/Supply Chain Management and Project Management, he has also taught Business Ethics and International Business Management. His research interest is sustainable operational excellence in manufacturing and in service industries like Healthcare, Financial Services and Retail. As a Professor of Practice, he is also heavily engaged in industry consulting activities and author of the book Sophisticated Factory – The Vital Mindset Shift for American Manufacturing in the Era of the 4th Industrial Revolution.