Paul D. Lapides is Co-founder and Director of the Corporate Governance Center in the Coles College of Business at Kennesaw State University, where he is a professor of management and entrepreneurship. His research and teaching interests include corporate governance, entrepreneurial finance, management, real estate, and venture creation.

Mr. Lapides received the 2000 Kennesaw State University Distinguished Service Award; has been recognized as one of the leading academic authorities on corporate governance by Corporate Board Member; and is the author or coauthor of more than 100 articles and twelve books, including several best sellers. He is a Winner of the International Facility Management Association’s Distinguished Author Award for Facility Management (1995), now in its second edition (2006).

Mr. Lapides served as a member of the National Association of Corporate Director’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Audit Committees that published The Report of the Blue Ribbon Commission on Audit Committees: A Practical Guide (1999, 2004). A frequent speaker at business, professional and academic organizations, his opinions have appeared in more than 500 publications and on national and local television and radio, including, The Wall Street Journal, Business Week, Forbes, USA Today, CNBC’s Morning Call, Bloomberg television and radio, NPR, London's Financial Times, Canada’s National Post, Associated Press, Dow Jones, Bloomberg, Reuters, CBSMarketWatch, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Boston Globe, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Deal, Director's Monthly, Corporate Board Member, Trustee, and Directors & Boards.

Mr. Lapides is a member of the board of directors of Sun Communities, Inc. (NYSE: SUI), a real estate investment trust; Internet Commerce Corporation (NASDAQ: ICCA), a provider of business-to-business e-commerce solutions; and the Board of Directors Network, Inc. (BDN), whose mission is to increase the number of women on corporate boards. He also serves on the advisory boards of the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD); the Newman Real Estate Institute at Baruch College; Grubhub.com LLC, a lead generation company; and W. Ray Wallace & Associates, Inc., an Inc. 500 company providing training cost recovery services. His business and consulting experience includes advising hundreds of start-up, growth and mid-market companies, as well as many of America’s Fortune 500 companies.
A CPA, Mr. Lapides earned a BS with honors in economics from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from New York University. Prior to joining the faculty at Kennesaw State University (1993), he held faculty positions at New York University and Columbia University.

The Corporate Governance Center, founded in 1995, is nationally recognized as a leading provider of corporate governance information to directors, CEOs and other senior executives, researchers, professors, advisors, and other interested parties. Comprised of more than 20 professors from a dozen universities, the Center is international in scope and interdisciplinary in its approach. Collectively, these professors have published more than 1,500 articles and books on a variety of management and boardroom issues. Through research, writing, teaching, and advising the Corporate Governance Center has enjoyed the privilege of working with thousands of directors, CEOs, and other senior executives.