William Brown

Overview

William M. Brown
Born	c. 1963
Citizenship	United States
Education	B.S. and M.S. in mechanical engineering
Alma mater	Villanova University; Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania
Occupation	Business executive
Employer	3M
Known for	Chief executive of 3M; former chairman and CEO of L3Harris Technologies
Title	Chief executive officer
Term	2024–present
Predecessor	Mike Roman
Board member of	Becton, Dickinson and Company; Celanese Corporation; Florida Institute of Technology; FDNY Foundation
Spouse	Lorena

👤 William M. "Bill" Brown (born c. 1963) is an American business executive who has served as chief executive officer (CEO) of 3M since May 2024. An engineer by training with degrees in mechanical engineering from Villanova University and a Master of Business Administration from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, he previously led Harris Corporation and its successor L3Harris Technologies as chief executive and chairman after senior roles at United Technologies Corporation. Brown is widely associated with efforts to reshape mature industrial and defence businesses through portfolio focus, cost discipline and renewed investment in new products.

🌐 Career overview and reputation. Brown built his reputation by refocusing long-established companies such as Harris Corporation and L3Harris Technologies on higher-margin defence and government technologies before being recruited as only the third external CEO in 3M's history. Analysts have described him as energetic and intensely results-driven, and his record of share-price gains and merger execution has been accompanied by internal controversy, including criticism of job cuts at Harris and a rare shareholder vote against executive pay early in his 3M tenure.

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Early life and education

🎓 Engineering studies and business education. Brown was born in the early 1960s and developed an interest in mechanical engineering at a young age. He studied at Villanova University, earning a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering in 1984 and a Master of Science degree in the same field in 1987, an education he has credited with grounding him in analytical problem-solving and a strong affinity for technology. Brown later augmented his technical training with business education at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, where he completed an MBA that broadened his expertise into corporate strategy and finance.

🛠 Early engineering work and consulting pivot. After completing his graduate engineering studies, Brown began his career as a project engineer at industrial gas producer Air Products and Chemicals, applying his training to plant and equipment projects in the industrial sector. He subsequently moved into management consulting at McKinsey & Company, working on complex assignments for corporate clients; this shift from engineering into advisory work exposed him to a wider range of strategic and organisational issues and set the stage for his later transition into senior industrial leadership roles.

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Career

🏢 Move to United Technologies. In 1997 Brown left consulting to join United Technologies Corporation (UTC), marking a transition from advisory work into operating positions at a large diversified industrial conglomerate. Over the following fourteen years he held roles in several UTC businesses in the United States and abroad, including leadership positions in the Fire & Security division and an appointment as senior vice president for corporate strategy and development, where he focused on streamlining portfolios and strengthening core businesses.

📡 Repositioning Harris Corporation. Brown was recruited in late 2011 to lead Florida-based Harris Corporation, a long-standing but underperforming communications and defence-electronics company, and became its president and CEO that November. At Harris he moved away from prior diversification efforts and concentrated the business on high-technology communications systems, space payloads and government contracts, selling or deemphasising non-core activities in order to direct capital and management attention to areas where the company held technological advantages.

📈 Shareholder gains and technology milestones at Harris. Under Brown's leadership Harris delivered substantial share-price appreciation, with external analyses estimating gains of more than 150% in the five years after he assumed the CEO role, reflecting improved profitability and a clearer strategic focus. The company also undertook new in-house innovation projects, including the development and launch of an all-Harris small satellite based on CubeSat technology, and in 2014 Brown was promoted to chairman in addition to chief executive, consolidating his authority over the group's strategic direction.

🤝 Creation of L3Harris Technologies. Brown's most consequential transaction at Harris was the merger with L3 Technologies, announced in 2018 and completed in 2019, which formed L3Harris Technologies and created one of the largest defence contractors in the United States. He became the first CEO and chairman of the combined group, overseeing integration and cost-synergy programmes, and later moved to the position of executive chairman in 2021 before retiring from L3Harris in 2022, when vice chair Chris Kubasik succeeded him as chief executive.

🏭 Appointment as 3M chief executive. Following a brief period out of the C-suite after his departure from L3Harris, Brown was appointed CEO of 3M in March 2024, with his tenure beginning on 1 May 2024. He succeeded long-time 3M executive Mike Roman and became only the third outsider to lead the Minnesota-based manufacturer, a fact highlighted by analysts who observed that previous external CEOs at 3M had not met with lasting success, thereby raising expectations for Brown's performance.

📊 Strategy and reshaping at 3M. Brown inherited a company facing significant headwinds, including large legal liabilities related to industrial chemicals and military earplugs and the financial impact of spinning off its health-care division, and he signalled that his turnaround plan would rely on continuous, incremental change rather than a single transformative deal. He set out targets to increase the proportion of revenue derived from products launched within the previous five years from about 10% in 2023 to 20% by 2027, backing plans for roughly 1,000 new product introductions and reallocating resources toward research and development to support what he presented as a renewed innovation agenda at 3M.

🪚 Portfolio pruning and market reaction. Alongside the push for new products, Brown initiated a methodical review of 3M's business portfolio, identifying dozens of lines he regarded as commodity-like or lacking a clear competitive advantage and planning their sale or closure so that capital and management could be redeployed to higher-return activities. One early example was the divestiture of a small industrial grinding business with several underutilised factories, and financial analysts described the overall programme as a disciplined "self-help" strategy; by late 2025 they noted a marked improvement in sentiment toward 3M as its shares rose about 29% in 2024 and delivered a total shareholder return of roughly 46% including dividends.

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Leadership style and management philosophy

👣 High-energy, hands-on leadership. Commentators and colleagues have frequently described Brown as a high-energy, visibly engaged leader who prefers to spend time in factories and laboratories rather than primarily in the executive suite. At 3M he has been noted for walking the corridors of the company's Maplewood, Minnesota headquarters, visiting research facilities and holding in-person meetings with scientists, engineers and frontline employees in order to understand operations and reinforce what he characterises as a performance-oriented culture.

🏢 Return-to-office philosophy. In mid-2025 Brown ended 3M's "Work Your Way" flexible work programme and required most salaried employees to work on site at least four days per week, arguing in a company-wide communication that in-person collaboration strengthens engagement, innovation and speed of execution. He has stated that he works from the office whenever he is not travelling and that visible leadership is important for reinforcing priorities and embedding what he describes as "3M excellence" across the organisation.

🧠 Discipline, communication and team orientation. Former colleagues and public biographies have portrayed Brown as a disciplined manager, meticulous about follow-through yet prepared to give teams latitude to innovate within clearly defined objectives, and as a confident communicator able to move easily between discussions with shop-floor employees, investors and policymakers. He has frequently framed business as a team activity, emphasising that large transformations depend on clear strategy, repeated communication and personal example from leaders who are willing to make difficult decisions when they judge that long-term competitiveness requires change.

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Financial profile and wealth

💰 Compensation at 3M. Brown's appointment at 3M was accompanied by a substantial pay package that drew immediate scrutiny from investors and the business press. In 2024, his partial first year as CEO, he received total compensation of about US$7.5 million, including a pro-rated base salary of roughly US$1.2 million, a US$3 million signing bonus, performance-based incentives of about US$2.7 million and other benefits such as relocation-related assistance. In addition, 3M awarded him long-term equity grants valued at approximately US$13.6 million that will vest over several years, bringing his reported 2024 compensation to about US$19.1 million, more than double what outgoing CEO Mike Roman earned in 2023.

📊 Accumulated wealth and share ownership. Before joining 3M, Brown had already accumulated substantial personal wealth through equity participation in the companies he led; regulatory filings in 2021 indicated that he owned nearly 294,000 shares of L3Harris Technologies, contributing to an estimated net worth exceeding US$80 million at that time. At 3M he is subject to share-ownership guidelines intended to align executive and shareholder interests, and he also receives remuneration for his service on external boards in sectors such as medical technology and chemicals.

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Controversies and challenges

⚖️ Shareholder revolt over pay. At Brown's first annual meeting as 3M CEO in 2024, shareholders voted against the company's advisory "say-on-pay" resolution on executive compensation, an outcome that is uncommon among large U.S. public companies. The negative vote followed the announcement of Brown's sizeable sign-on equity awards at a time when 3M was also reducing its long-standing dividend, and local business coverage described the decision as an early setback for the new chief executive; 3M's board subsequently pledged to engage further with investors and adjust pay structures to strengthen the link between executive rewards and long-term performance.

🧪 Legacy legal liabilities and operational risk. Brown also inherited significant legal exposures from earlier periods of 3M's history, notably mass-tort litigation related to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and to military earplugs supplied to the United States armed forces, with potential settlement costs running into the billions of dollars. Analysts have described these matters as a continuing "cloud" over 3M's valuation and have noted that Brown, whose prior experience lies chiefly in operations and portfolio management, has largely kept public commentary on PFAS to a minimum while strengthening the company's legal team and building reserves to manage possible outcomes.

🏠 Workplace culture and flexibility debates. Brown's decision to curtail remote work at 3M has generated mixed reactions, with some employees and commentators arguing that the policy might hinder recruitment and retention in a competitive labour market, while others have welcomed clearer expectations after the pandemic-era shift to hybrid work. Brown has defended the change as necessary to rebuild the firm's collaborative culture, particularly in laboratories and manufacturing environments, and has presented it as part of a broader effort to embed "3M excellence" and a renewed sense of urgency throughout the organisation.

📉 Employee discontent at Harris. Earlier in his career Brown faced criticism over workforce morale during his tenure at Harris Corporation, where employee surveys and external reporting in the mid-2010s indicated that only a minority of staff approved of his leadership. Commentators linked the low scores to job cuts and an emphasis on efficiency that included replacing some experienced, higher-paid engineers with less costly junior staff, even as shareholders benefited from strong share-price performance under his strategy.

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Personal life and philanthropy

❤️ Family life and community service. Brown maintains a relatively low public profile regarding his family, but has been photographed at volunteer events with his wife, Lorena, including service at a children's hospital in Philadelphia where they delivered refreshments to patients' families as part of a corporate community programme. Public profiles occasionally note that he has children, although he rarely discusses them in interviews, and colleagues have described him outside work as approachable and down-to-earth despite the intensity and analytical focus he brings to his corporate roles.

🎓 Support for education and public institutions. Brown has directed a significant portion of his philanthropy toward engineering education and public-service organisations. In 2024 he made a personal gift of US$2.5 million to Villanova University's College of Engineering to endow a chair in mechanical engineering and has previously supported an "Innovate" summer programme there designed to give undergraduates hands-on design and leadership experience. He serves as a trustee of the Florida Institute of Technology and has been a board member of the FDNY Foundation, which supports New York City's fire department, reflecting an interest in institutions connected to technology, safety and community resilience.

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Legacy and outlook

🚀 Legacy as a transformational industrial leader. Brown's trajectory from mechanical engineer to CEO of multiple Fortune 500 industrial and defence companies has led observers to view him as a specialist in reshaping mature businesses through a combination of portfolio rationalisation, disciplined capital allocation and focused new-product investment. At Harris and L3Harris this playbook produced substantial shareholder returns alongside debate over its human cost, and at 3M he has articulated a similar philosophy that emphasises continuous transformation to maintain competitiveness in evolving markets.

🔮 Outlook for 3M under Brown. As of 2025 Brown remains in the early stages of his tenure at 3M, with progress visible in measures such as rising revenue from more recent product launches and an improving share-price trend, but with the ultimate test of his leadership likely to hinge on how effectively he manages the company's legal exposures and balances shareholder expectations with those of employees and wider stakeholders. His status as a rare external CEO at 3M means that his success or failure may shape how the company evaluates outside talent in the future, and in corporate communications he has expressed enthusiasm for leading what he has described as an iconic innovator while seeking to leave it stronger than when he arrived.

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