Retired Faculty & Staff

Cameron Lawrence

Professor Emeritus

Personal Summary

Retired Chair of the Management Information Systems Department
Retired Professor of Management Information Systems

    After a twenty-three year academic career Dr. Lawrence retired from the University of Montana. Following his retirement, the Montana Board of Regents recognized his contributions to the university system by honoring him with emeritus status. In addition to being a Full Professor, he also served as Department Chair for the Management Information Systems Department, which is the largest academic unit within the College of Business. He holds a Ph.D. from the London School of Economics and completed a program at the Harvard Business School that is designed to improve the effectiveness of corporate boards.

     Dr. Lawrence's research interests are focused on technological mediated organizational transformation, the application of neo-institutional theory into information systems research as well as the organization and management of the IT function within large organizations. His teaching interests are in the areas of management information systems, technology and organizational strategy, quantitative methods and corporate governance.

     While teaching at the London School of Economics he was awarded the highest teaching award that can be bestowed upon Ph.D. candidates for demonstrated excellence in the classroom. Dr. Lawrence's undergraduate and graduate teaching evaluations were consistently among the highest in the College of Business at the University of Montana. He was awarded the outstanding professor award an unprecedented ten times. In addition to the aforementioned awards, he was honored by the University of Montana's Division of Student Affairs for the support and encouragement he provided to UM's students through the years. Dr. Lawrence academic service included membership on the Admissions and Curriculum Committees for the MBA and Master's of Accountancy programs. He was also selected by his colleagues to serve multiple terms on the Faculty Senate at the University of Montana..

     Dr. Lawrence's academic work was published in some of the leading international journals in the field of Management Information Systems including the European Journal of Information Systems, Journal of Information Systems Education, Communications of the Association for Information Systems, Information Systems Education Journal and the Journal of Information Technology Theory and Application. During his career he was an active reviewer for numberous academic journals and conferences. He also served as co-editor for teaching cases for ISEDJ.

     His business background spans technology startups, consulting and real estate including a 60,000 square foot self-storage facility that employs a sophisticated portfolio of technologies to manage security and site access. Throughout his career he has also served on corporate and non profit boards including the Clarkfork Coalition, which does incredible work in the state of Montana and beyond.

     Prior to entering the hallowed halls of academe, Dr. Lawrence spent six years assigned to the U.S. Forest Service and BLM Smokejumper programs where he made approximately 145 parachute jumps using the Ram-Air, FS-12 and FS-14 canopy systems. If you would like to learn more about the smokejumper program click (here) or (here). He is also a former member of the Pro Ski Patrol at Big Sky Resort and currently teaches skiing at Big Sky. When Dr. Lawrence has a break from teaching and writing, he can usually be found skiing, messing about on rivers or on the golf course with his wife who is a much better golfer.

Education

PhD: The London School of Economics

Dissertation: The Transformation of IT Governance: A Neo-Institutional Interpretation

Primary Advisor: Professor Chrisanthi Avgerou

Secondary Advisor: Professor Robert Galliers