LRN Corporation
LRN
FormerlyLegal Research Network Inc[1]
TypeCorporation
IndustryEthics and legal compliance education
FoundedOctober 1994 (1994-10)[1]
FounderDov Seidman[2]
Headquarters41 Madison Avenue,
New York City
,
United States
Number of locations
New York City, London, Dublin, India
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
Dov Seidman (Chairman),[3] Kevin Michielsen (CEO)[4]
Number of employees
522[5]
Websitelrn.com

LRN, founded in 1994, is an American company which provides advising and educating on ethics, regulatory compliance, and corporate culture to other organizations.[6][7] When founded, the company focused on the legal industry and was named Legal Research Network,[1] before expanding into other fields.[8]

History

Founding

Dov Seidman founded Legal Research Network (later changed to "LRN") two years out of Harvard Law School.[1] Seidman's business plan was to offer legal knowledge and analysis services through an expert network of academics and lawyers.[9][10] This research could then be repurposed in a database licensed to companies. He was able to pre-sell a $500,000 contract to MCI based on the idea.[1] He raised $2 million from 42 investors to launch the company.[11]

In its first year, LRN had a network of 1,100 legal experts in over 2,500 subjects reported by The Washington Post as being "mostly law professors, solo practitioners and lawyers on leave from their regular jobs".[1]

Expansion into Training

The company added ethics and compliance training in the late 1990s, in order to provide legal and ethical awareness throughout organizations, not just to their internal counsel.[12] Online classes, starting in the 2000s,[13] facilitated mass training of thousands of employees at large multi-nationals like Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer.[14] Pfizer trained 150,000 of its employees with LRN courses.[14] Subjects included compliance with sexual harassment laws, trade secrets and anti-trust.[12][15]

As of 2000, 200 of the Fortune 500 companies were clients of LRN.[14][15] Starting in the early 2000s, the company offered "common standards" for ethics and corporate compliance education. Competitors like Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer shared as much of 90% of the course materials, helping to standardize best practices for business ethics in corporate America.[14]

Seidman testified in 2004 before the U.S. Sentencing Commission, regarding the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, about the need for companies to develop ethical cultures instead of "check-the-box", compliance-only approaches.[16]

Operations

Services

LRN's services include analyzing corporate cultures, rewriting their codes of conduct, and providing ethical-compliance education and training to their employees.[14] LRN emphasizes principles and values rather than "blindly" following rules.[17]

In its annual Ethics & Compliance Program Effectiveness Report, which is based on surveys of ethics, compliance, and legal executives from various industries around the world, LRN has found that companies with ethical workplace culture. in contrast to those that focused on rules and procedures, were less likely to experience misconduct among employees, and that 97% of values-based companies outperformed their competition.[18][19] In both the 2021 and 2022 reports, the majority of people surveyed said their companies’ ethical cultures had been strengthened by their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.[20] [21]

Its online education platform offers about 500 courses in 50 languages, on topics including international corruption law, intellectual property, data protection, and environmental sustainability.[14] LRN ethics training materials include videos, blogs, quizzes, social media and video games.[22] Dell told The Wall Street Journal in 2014 that LRN developed an ethics game for it entitled the "Honesty Project."[22]

In 2021, LRN published a “Benchmark of Ethical Culture” report, based on surveys of approximately 8,000 employees of companies worldwide representing 17 industries.[23] According to the report, companies with strong ethical cultures outperform other companies by 40 percent across several metrics including customer satisfaction, employee loyalty, and innovation. [24]

Organization

LRN was originally headquartered in California, then moved its headquarters to New York City in 2012.[25] It also has offices in London and India.[26]

Job titles were largely eliminated from the company, according to a 2014 Wall Street Journal article.[27] But, as of 2021, the company was using job titles such as “Chief Human Resources Officer“,[28] "Chief Marketing Officer” and “Chief Financial Officer” again.[5]

In 2007, Seidman published the book How, which discussed the business philosophy on which LRN is based. In it, he argues that companies that behave more ethically than their competitors will also outperform the competition financially.[29]

Since 2008, LRN has been the corporate partner of The Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity’s Prize in Ethics Essay Contest, an annual competition for students to analyze ethical issues.[16]

Finances

LRN received a $30 million investment from Softbank in 2000.[13]

In 2018, Leeds Equity Partners made a “substantial” investment in LRN.[2] The investment enabled LRN in 2020 to acquire Interactive Services, a Dublin-based e-learning company which offers workplace policy compliance training. The combined companies had about 40% of the Fortune 500 as clients, as of 2020.[2][30]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Mintz, John (11 December 1995). "Getting an Expert Opinion at a Bargain Price". The Washington Post. No. Final Edition. United States. The Washington Post. p. F07. Retrieved 6 February 2017.
  2. 1 2 3 Sorkin, Andrew Ross; Hirsch, Lauren; de la Merced, Michael J.; Karaian, Jason (9 September 2020). "What If There Isn't a Vaccine for Years?". The New York Times. Retrieved 20 June 2022.
  3. ↑ "Dov Seidman, LRN Corp: Profile and Biography". Bloomberg Markets. Retrieved 20 June 2022.
  4. ↑ "Kevin Michielsen, LRN Corp: Profile and Biography". Bloomberg Markets. Retrieved 20 June 2022.
  5. 1 2 "LRN Company Profile". Pitchbook.com. Pitchbook. Retrieved 19 September 2022.
  6. ↑ Kleiner, Art (29 May 2012). "The Thought Leader Interview: Dov Seidman". United States: strategy+business. PwC network. Retrieved 27 May 2015.
  7. ↑ Mahler, Jonathan (5 October 2014). "If the Word 'How' Is Trademarked, Does This Headline Need a ™?". The New York Times. New York, N.Y., United States. The New York Times Company. p. A1. Retrieved 18 July 2015.
  8. ↑ Murphy, Richard (2 February 2010). "Why Doing Good Is Good for Business". United States: Fortune. Time Inc. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  9. ↑ Heisel, William (5 July 2009). "His Keen Sense of Ethics Has Paid Off Handsomely". Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles, United States. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 6 February 2017.
  10. ↑ Osborne, D.M. American Lawyer, "Should You Be Afraid of this Man?" June, 1995 (profile of Legal Research Network)
  11. ↑ Haaretz.com "Dov Seidman's secret: You don't have to be a sucker to succeed", July 1, 2012
  12. 1 2 Kleiner, Art (22 November 1999). "Learning the Law with a Mouse". National Law Journal.
  13. 1 2 Vrana, Debora (24 January 2000). "Southland's Attraction Grows for Large Internet Venture Firms". Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles, United States. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  14. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Kirkpatrick, David (October 2002). "Serving Up Scruples". Fortune Magazine.
  15. 1 2 Holding, Reynolds (3 February 2000). "Baby Lawyers Too Costly to Waste". San Francisco Gate. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  16. 1 2 Clancy, Heather (26 October 2013). "Disruptor - Dov Seidman". ZDNET. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  17. ↑ Bogoslaw, David (2 December 2013). "Wayne Brody: Making the business case for E&C". United States: Corporate Secretary. IR Media Group Ltd. Retrieved 10 June 2015.
  18. ↑ DiPietro, Ben (8 March 2017). "The Morning Risk Report: Values-Based Culture Pays Off for Companies". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  19. ↑ Jaeger, Jaclyn (11 August 2021). "LRN survey: E&C programs thrive when boards are engaged". Compliance Week. Retrieved 25 May 2022.
  20. ↑ Tornone, Kate (28 April 2021). "Coronavirus proved an ethics stress test, but employers say they emerged stronger". HRDive. Retrieved 25 May 2022.
  21. ↑ Jaeger, Jaclyn (15 June 2020). "LRN survey: Values, not policies, drive ethical behavior". Compliance Week. Retrieved 25 May 2022.
  22. 1 2 DiPietro, Ben (26 September 2014). "Turning Employees Into Ethics Believers". United States: The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company Inc. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  23. ↑ Miner, Emily (7 January 2022). "How creating an ethical workplace can boost your bottom line—and attract top talent". FastCompany.com. Retrieved 19 September 2022.
  24. ↑ Selko, Adrienne (30 November 2021). "Can a Strong Ethical Culture Affect Workplace Performance?". IndustryWeek. Retrieved 25 May 2022.
  25. ↑ Baker, Mila (5 September 2014). "21st Century Organization Design: Integrating Work Environment, Work Experience, and Leadership". United States: Work Design Magazine. Workspace Design Magazine, LLC. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  26. ↑ Chaturvedi, Anumeha (20 July 2012). "LRN to Start Offering Its Services in India This Year". India: The Economic Times Of India. Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. Retrieved 9 June 2015.
  27. ↑ Weber, Lauren (9 April 2014). "Companies Say No to Having an HR Department". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 8 June 2015.
  28. ↑ "Margaret Sweeney, LRN Corp: Profile and Biography". Bloomberg Markets. Retrieved 23 June 2022.
  29. ↑ Murphy, Richard McGill (2 February 2010). "Why doing good is good for business". Fortune magazine. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
  30. ↑ Carey, Brian (13 September 2020). "E-learning provider Interactive Services sold to US rival, LRN Corporation". The Times. Retrieved 24 May 2022.
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