Phillip Mills

Phillip Mills

Phillip MIlls
Nationality New Zealander
Occupation Founder and Chief Executive, Les Mills International

As a founder and Chief Executive of Les Mills International, Phillip Mills is a pioneer and “thought leader”[1] in the global fitness industry and “revolutionized”[2] the modern group-exercise experience. He is also an author and a public advocate for the environment and sustainability in business.

Contents

Sport

Phillip Mills was born into an athletic family in Auckland, New Zealand, in 1955. His father Les, mother Colleen and sister Donna all represented New Zealand at Olympic and/or Commonwealth Games in track and field.[3][4][5]

Phillip Mills competed at the 1974 Commonwealth Games in the 110m hurdles, and four years later in both 110m and 400m hurdles.[6] He attended the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) on a track and field scholarship, and graduated with a degree in philosophy in 1978.[7]

Business

On returning to New Zealand in 1979, Phillip Mills took an increasing role in the Les Mills fitness-club business founded by Les and Colleen in 1968. The Les Mills business floated on the stock market in 1984 and was taken over by an investment company in 1987. After the share market crash that year, Mills bought the business back and continues to operate it.[8]

There are now ten Les Mills clubs in New Zealand with over 50,000 members.[9] The largest club, Les Mills Auckland is well known in the fitness industry for having some of the world’s biggest regular fitness classes.[10]

Inspired by the birth of the aerobics industry he witnessed while studying at UCLA, Phillip Mills developed his own exercise-to-music system that grew to include the nine proprietary group fitness programs – BODYATTACK, BODYBALANCE/BODYFLOW, BODYCOMBAT, BODYJAM, BODYPUMP, BODYSTEP, BODYVIVE, RPM and SH’BAM – that are offered in more than 13,000 fitness clubs in 75 countries through Les Mills International.[11][12][13]

In 2004, Mills was named Ernst & Young’s New Zealand Entrepreneur of the Year.[14] In 2009 he won Kea New Zealand’s World Class New Zealand Award for New Thinking.[15][16]

The environment and sustainability

In 2007 Mills and his wife, Dr Jackie Mills MD, published Fighting Globesity – A Practical Guide To Personal Health and Global Sustainability (Random House).[17][18] Mills is also founder of the 100% Plan, a group of New Zealand business leaders lobbying for green business policy.[19][20] “We are a group of New Zealand business people with a strong commitment to, and concern for, our country’s future,” says the 100% Plan website. “We want to improve the New Zealand economy and our environment, and we believe that the two are not mutually exclusive.”[21]

References

  1. ^ The Future of Fitness White Paper - Les Mills International. “The Future of Fitness”. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  2. ^ Ernst & Young New Zealand. “Phillip Mills – Winner”. 2004.
  3. ^ New Zealand Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association website. Les Mills profile. 2010. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  4. ^ New Zealand Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association website. Colleen Mills profile. 2010. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  5. ^ New Zealand Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association website. Donna Mills profile. 2010. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  6. ^ New Zealand Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association website. Phillip Mills profile. 2010. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  7. ^ Ernst & Young New Zealand. “Phillip Mills – Winner”. 2004.
  8. ^ Ernst & Young New Zealand. “Phillip Mills – Winner”. 2004.
  9. ^ Les Mills New Zealand website. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  10. ^ Les Mills New Zealand website. [1] Les Mills Auckland City Gym homepage].Accessed 28 July 2010.
  11. ^ Williams, Alexandra. “The ‘Perform or Create’ Continuum”. IDEA Fitness Journal. April 2006.
  12. ^ Les Mills International website. Accessed 28 July 2010.
  13. ^ Les Mills International. “Les Mills International announces a milestone achievement, changing lives in over 13,000 clubs worldwide”. September 1, 2009.
  14. ^ Ernst & Young New Zealand. “Phillip Mills – Winner”. 2004.
  15. ^ Kea New Zealand website. “Winners of the 2009 World Class New Zealand Awards”. Accessed 28 July, 2010.
  16. ^ Made from New Zealand website. Video interview: “Phillip Mills - World Class New Zealand - Les Mills”. 2009.
  17. ^ Mills, Phillip and Dr Jackie Mills MD. Fighting Globesity: A Practical Guide to Personal Health and Sustainability. Random House. 2007.
  18. ^ Monroe, Mary. “Fit Body, Fit Planet”. IDEA Fitness Journal. September 2008.
  19. ^ Revington, Mark. “New Zealand's cleantech change agents”. Unlimited. June 21, 2010.
  20. ^ Tobias, Chris. “One hundred percent”. Idealog #27. 2010.
  21. ^ 100% Plan website. Accessed 28 July 2010.

Works and Publications

Mills, Phillip. “Green chances far outweigh costs”. New Zealand Herald. January 2, 2010.

Mills, Phillip. “Imagining 2020: Green opportunities far outweigh the costs”. New Zealand Business council for Sustainable Development. March 11, 2010.

Mills, Phillip. “To do more than catch up, we need to clean up and green up”. Dominion Post. February 25, 2010.

Mills, Phillip and Dr Jackie Mills MD. Fighting Globesity: A Practical Guide to Personal Health and Sustainability. Random House. 2007.

External links

Building Intelligence Group, The. “Fit for the Future”. Think. November 15, 2009. Celsias website. “Geoff Ross leads high-powered green ginger group”. April 28, 2010.

Chauvel, Charles. “Energy and Resources Policy in New Zealand: Where's the Plan?”. Speech to Power and Electricity World New Zealand 2010. February 16, 2010.

Club Industry. “Interview with Geoff Dyer, CEO of Lifestyle Family Fitness Inc., St. Petersburg, FL”. July 1, 2007.

Club Industry website. “Les Mills Examines ‘Future of Fitness’”. January 12, 2010.

Dale, Suzie, Sue Godinet, Natalie Kearse and Dr Adrian Field. The Future of Fitness – A White Paper. Les Mills International. 2010. Easy Green Living website. “Les Mills Gyms Going Green”. October 9, 2009.

Ernst & Young New Zealand website. “Entrepreneurial Hall of Fame”. 2009.

Fallow, Brian. “The upside of climate change”. New Zealand Herald. Jan 21, 2010.

Felstead, Alan and Daniel Bishop, Alison Fuller, Nick Jewson, Tracey Lee & Lorna Unwin. “Moving to the Music: Learning Processes, Training and Productive Systems – The Case of Exercise to Music Instruction”. Learning as Work Research Paper, No. 6. Cardiff School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University. June 2006.

Ferguson, Mary. “Phillip reveals the secrets of his success”. Work Out. July 2009. Pp 1 and 24.

Goa, Karen. “Les Mills: The father of fitness”. Plenty. Autumn 2007.

Hunter, Tim. "Making a very healthy profit”. Sunday Star-Times. October 17, 2004.

McNeil, Ben. “NZ wants to lead the Clean Ind Revolution!”. The Clean Revolution website. March 10, 2010. Accessed 28 July 2010.

National Business Review, The. “The Rich List 2006”. July 21, 2006

Popke, Michael. “Wide World, of Sorts – Review of Fighting Globesity: A Practical Guide to Personal Health and Global Sustainability”. Athletic Business. November 2007.

Williams, Alexandra. “Green Up Your Fitness.” Idea Fitness Journal. July 2009.