Philip Kotler

Philip Kotler (born 27 May 1931 in Chicago) is the S.C. Johnson & Son Distinguished Professor of International Marketing at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. He received his Masters degree at the University of Chicago and his Ph.D. at MIT, both in economics. He did postdoctoral work in mathematics at Harvard University and in behavioural science at the University of Chicago.

Philip Kotler is widely acknowledged as the father of modern marketing and the world’s foremost expert on strategic marketing. He was voted the first Leader in Marketing Thought by the American Marketing Association and named The Founder of Modern Marketing Management in the Handbook of Management Thinking. Professor Kotler holds major awards including the American Marketing Association’s (AMA) Distinguished Marketing Educator Award and Distinguished Educator Award from The Academy of Marketing Science. The Sales and Marketing Executives International (SMEI) named him Marketer of the Year and the American Marketing Association described him as “the most influential marketer of all time.” (Extracted from 2008 Leaders in London Conference brochure).

Professor Kotler has authored over 50 books on all aspects of marketing, including the most widely used marketing textbook in graduate business schools worldwide, Marketing Management, now in its 14th edition. He has published more than 150 articles in leading journals, including the Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review, Journal of Marketing, Management Science and the Journal of Business Strategy.

He has consulted for IBM, General Electric, AT&T, Honeywell, Bank of America, Merck and others in the areas of marketing strategy and planning, marketing organisation and international marketing. He has also advised governments on how to develop and position the skills and resources of their companies for global competition.

Professor Kotler was ranked the fourth most Influential Business Writers/Management Gurus, following Peter Drucker, Bill Gates, and Jack Welch, in a survey of 1,000 executives from 25 countries (Financial Times November 18, 2005).  He was ranked the sixth most influential business thinker following Gary Hamel, Thomas L. Friedman, Bill Gates, Malcolm Gladwell, and Howard Gardner by the Wall Street Journal (May 5, 2008).

Professor Kotler was honored on his 75th birthday with a commemorative postage stamp from Indonesia.