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Neil Clark Warren

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Neil Clark Warren
Born (1934-09-18) September 18, 1934 (age 89)
Des Moines, Iowa, USA
Occupation(s)Clinical psychologist, inspirational speaker, Christian theologian, founder of eHarmony relationship site
Years active1956-present
SpouseMarylyn Warren
Children3

Neil Clark Warren (born September 18, 1934) is a clinical psychologist, Christian theologian, seminary professor, chairman and co-founder of the online relationship sites eHarmony and Compatible Partners.

Warren was born and raised on a farm outside Des Moines, Iowa. He is a former dean and psychologist at the Graduate School of Psychology at Fuller Theological Seminary. Warren holds a bachelor’s degree from Pepperdine University, where he was the student body president and met his wife of 54 years, Marylyn Warren. He holds a Master of Divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary, and a Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Chicago in 1967. Neil and Marylyn have three daughters and nine grandchildren.

Warren is the author of ten books including Date… or Soul Mate?, How to Know If Someone Is Worth Pursuing in Two Dates or Less, and bestseller Finding the Love of Your Life. In 1995, Warren and son-in-law Greg Forgatch created Neil Clark Warren & Associates, a company which offered seminars and teaching tools based on the wisdom from Warren’s books.

In early 2000, they saw the need to redesign the company and created an online match-making site called eHarmony, the first and only compatibility matching service. Warren’s initial goal was for the site to assist singles in finding a lasting marriage. His further goal was to lower the divorce rate to single digits. Harris Interactive conducted an online study for eHarmony in July and August 2009 among adults aged 20–54. The study found that 44 million users are on the site and an average of 542 of those are married every day in the United States. Dr. Warren’s articles have appeared in numerous journals and magazines, and he has been interviewed on more than seven thousand radio and television programs.[1]

In July 2012, Warren came out of retirement to become the chief executive of eHarmony. He replaced many of the business-focused executives with social scientists. One of Warren’s biggest changes to the company was to expand the brand into a broader “relationship site” to help people create highly compatible relationships throughout their lives. Under this new vision, Warren used his research to help users make close friends, become better parents, connect compatible employers and job seekers, cope with aging and solve interpersonal problems.

"I think we could have had a very good business forever matching people for marriage,” Warren said in 2012 in an interview with the Los Angeles Times. “But our sense was, we could do a lot more than that."[2]

Early life

Born and raised just outside Des Moines, Iowa, Warren developed an interest in compatibility when he was very young. Although his parents’ marriage lasted seventy years, Warren was frustrated by their inability to communicate with each other due to the differences in their intelligence and interests.

“They had a nice marriage, but they were not a very well-matched couple… My dad was just so stinking bright, and my mom was so sweet, but she was two standard deviations below him in intelligence,” Warren said. When his father ran for office in Polk County, Warren’s grandmother refused to vote because she didn’t think you should meddle in politics. Soon after, the family relocated in Long Beach, California.[3]

Education

Warren received his undergraduate degree at Pepperdine University. He got his master’s in divinity at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1959. Warren obtained his Ph.D in psychology from the University of Chicago in 1967.[4]

Career

Following his time at Princeton, Warren moved to Chicago to continue his career in clinical psychology. He attended the University of Chicago. He served as a professor and then dean of Fuller Theological Seminary’s Graduate School of Psychology, the largest and one of the most influential seminaries in the world. During these years, he worked in private practice as a clinical psychologist. In his 35 years of therapy he focused on marriage compatibility and performed countless “divorce autopsies.” After counseling thousands of couples, Warren developed a passion for helping singles find lasting relationships.[5]

Dr. Warren has researched and written extensively about the complex challenge of finding, attracting, and selecting the right marriage partner. He published his first pamphlet in 1975 entitled “Selecting a Marriage Partner,” and went on to write ten books, including Learning to Live with the Love of Your Life, Loving the Life you Live: 3 Secrets to Feeling Good- Deep Down in Your Soul, and Date…or Soul Mate? How to Know If Someone Is Worth Pursuing in Two Dates or Less.

In 1995, Warren and his son-in-law Greg Forgatch started Neil Clark Warren & Associates, a company that offered seminars and teaching tools based on Warren’s book Finding the Love of Your Life (published in 1993). In early 2000, they decided to shift the direction of the company, redesigning it as a match-making service called eHarmony.

“We came to the conclusion that single people in America do not want more education about relationships,” Warren said. “They’re sick of that. They want somebody.” His vision went beyond the dating scene; from the start, his goal was to lower divorce rates and create lasting marriages. “That’s Neil’s vision,” said co-founder Greg Forgatch about Warren, “literally to change the world.”

Throughout his counseling, research, and book writing career, Warren has been consistently driven by this vision. “Putting people together for a lifetime loving relationship is the most underestimated challenge of the human race,” he stated in an interview.[6]

In his book Finding the Love of Your Life, Warren writes, “What we desperately need in America is a revolution- a total change in our mate-selection process…I strongly believe that we can significantly improve this vital area of our corporate life. Men and women throughout our land can be helped to find a person to love with whom they can experience a lifetime of meaning. It takes hard work and patience. It requires training and guidance. But after all, it is for a lifetime. It is worth every ounce of time and effort you give it. So let the revolution begin with you. No more second-rate marriages- that must be our goal.”[7]

Warren was Chairman of the Board of Directors at eHarmony from its beginning. In 2007, he went into retirement to live in Kennebunkport, Maine with his wife Marylyn. Warren then returned to eHarmony as CEO in 2012 due to conflicting visions concerning the future of eHarmony. He currently has no plans to retire again soon. He says eHarmony is expanding and will apply its matchmaking skills to several areas including the job market—pairing employers with job seekers. “I love business. I love being involved with the eHarmony business again. It’s the most exciting thing I’ve seen for a long time.”[8]

Religious Views

Warren says he's not lukewarm about his own faith.

"I am a passionate believer," he says. His religious beliefs are grounded in the earlier theology he received at Princeton and are influenced by humanism and psychology. He often intertwines the two.

"I think there is something very incredible about Jesus. I don't back away from that. At the same time ... the public we want to serve is the world… You can say that that is just a good business idea, because it increases the size of your market. But it's also for me a philosophical point: I think our world will be a lot better world if we can help people of all types get married well." [9]

Research literature

Building upon his research and writing on the subject of building strong marriages (including his book, Finding the Love of Your Life), Warren and Forgatch started eHarmony in 2000 as a web-based method of matching singles with compatible mates for marriage.[10] Their "29 dimensions of compatibility" can be divided into four categories:[11]

  • Character and constitution
  • Personality
  • Emotional makeup and skills
  • Family and values

Focus on the Family and eHarmony

Warren attributes much of eHarmony's initial success to its promotion on the daily radio broadcast of Focus on the Family. As the company expanded and sought broader market share, Warren parted ways with Focus on the Family and its founder, James Dobson. In 2005, Warren discontinued his appearances on Dobson’s radio show and bought back rights to three of his books—Finding the Love of Your Life, Make Anger Your Ally, and Learning to Live with the Love of Your Life—originally published by Focus on the Family. As Warren explained, "We're trying to reach the whole world — people of all spiritual orientations, all political philosophies, all racial backgrounds." [12]

Publications

  • God Said It, Don’t Sweat It ISBN 0-7852-8064-4
  • Finding Contentment ISBN 0-7852-7234-2
  • Finding the Love of Your Life ISBN 0-671-89201-2
  • Catching the Rhythm of Love ISBN 0-7852-7344-8
  • Make Anger Your Ally ISBN 1-56179-707-3
  • Falling in Love for All the Right Reasons
  • How to Know if Someone is Worth Pursuing in Two Dates or Less
  • Love the Life you Live

In promoting his books he has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, including Focus on the Family, The 700 Club, Geraldo, The Oprah Winfrey Show, CNN, CNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox News, PBS, and CBC (Canada).

See also

References

  1. ^ Slater, D. (2013). Love in the Time of Algorithms. London: Penguin Group.
  2. ^ Chang, A. (2012, December 13). EHarmony founder has his heart set on reviving the dating site. Los Angeles Times.
  3. ^ Slater, D. (2013). Love in the Time of Algorithms. London: Penguin Group.
  4. ^ Slater, D. (2013). Love in the Time of Algorithms. London: Penguin Group.
  5. ^ Slater, D. (2013). Love in the Time of Algorithms. London: Penguin Group.
  6. ^ Slater, D. (2013). Love in the Time of Algorithms. London: Penguin Group.
  7. ^ Warren, N. (1992). Finding the Love of Your Life. New York: Pocket Books.
  8. ^ Chang, A. (2012, December 13). EHarmony founder has his heart set on reviving the dating site. Los Angeles Times.
  9. ^ Love in the Time of Algorithms. Dan Slater
  10. ^ http://www.eharmony.com/core/eharmony;jsessionid=i7Pn20gw3_L8?cmd=about-ncw
  11. ^ 29 Dimensions
  12. ^ Kornblum, Janet (2005-05-18). "eHarmony: Heart and soul". USA Today. Retrieved 2010-05-20.

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