 Born and raised in London, England, Maister became a citizen of the United States in 2006.Maister holds a Bachelor's degree in mathematics, economics and statistics from the University of Birmingham (1968), a Master's degree in operations research from the London School of Economics (1971) and obtained his doctorate in business from the Harvard Business School (1976).During the period when he was obtaining his formal education he worked as a statistician at Bell Canada (Montreal), and as a lecturer in economics and statistics at the Polytechnic of the South Bank (now known as London South Bank University.)