Russ brings his high-energy, high-performance experience to a wide range of client projects, with most focusing on organization development (OD), change management, strategy development, team building, workplace learning, project management, program evaluation, and performance management. In addition his work for numerous government and non-profit clients, he has also improved results for Fortune 500, education, service, manufacturing, retail, professional, and health care organizations.

His previous work experience includes serving as Director of the OD Management Center in BGSU’s College of Business, where he directed over 600 organization development projects, strategic planning, performance consulting, and management training programs for clients throughout the U.S. He has also been Director of Organization Development and Training for a 900-employee human services organization and Dean of Professional Education for a four-year university.

Among his projects, Russ has designed, developed and implemented

• Organization development and change management – performance review systems, planned change projects, culture change initiatives, role clarification, organization restructuring, teambuilding and collaborative partnership programs, and organizational needs assessment
• Strategy development – board of directors development, strategic thinking and strategy mapping; five-year strategic roadmaps (for a statewide computer-based training agency)
• Workplace learning – executive level applied leadership programs; hundreds of competency-based training programs covering diverse topics for all levels of employees; training needs analyses; trained more than 50,000 participants
• Technical assistance – grant writing (proposals awarded over $13 million to fund research and development of innovative projects); customer service program (for Fortune Top 10 company); career planning content for an innovative online delivery service for statewide workforce agency; employee orientation, onboarding and succession planning process; Peer-to-Peer Coaching guide and program for One-Stops; assist in writing the State Annual Plan for Workforce Development
• Performance management – Process improvement model (reduced a workforce agency’s paperwork by 50 percent); competency models and capability maturity models for talent management initiatives; competency-based job descriptions and behaviorally anchored rating scales; job and task analyses
• Evaluation – Employee attitude/satisfaction survey (for 4,000 U.S. employees of multinational corporation); plan random assignment control experiment (N=2,400) to determine effectiveness of service delivery; evaluate statewide agency on best practices involving focus groups, online surveys, phone interviews of customers/users; validation of IT training program effectiveness

Russ has had national leadership roles in both the Association for Talent Development (ATD, formerly ASTD) and the National Association for Workforce Development Professionals (NAWDP). For ATD, he served as a member of National Advisors for Chapters, Leadership Development Team, CPLP Certification Test Review Team, Excellence In Practice Evaluation Team, and as coordinator of the national OD Forum. For NAWDP, Russ served on the Research Publications Committee. At the local level, he was elected President (two terms) of the 500+ member Central Ohio Chapter of ATD, and as coordinator of the OD Forum.
In addition to his service to the profession, Russ has presented a variety of workshop sessions at the International ATD Conference and Exposition, ATD Tech Knowledge Conference, ATD National Leadership Conference, and the Annual NAWDP conference.

Russ has held credentials of CPLP as well as Certified Workforce Development Professional (NAWDP).

He has authored “Increasing Learner Involvement and Participation” (chapter in The AMA Handbook of E-Learning; 2003, AMACOM) and “How to Handle E-Learning Peer Evaluation” (chapter in Getting the Most From Online Learning (2003, Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer).

Russ is a former coach, marathon runner (2:54 best) and practiced martial arts (aikido and taekwondo) for over 15 years.