Mike’s professional and academic background includes two advanced degrees and more than 25 years of human resources and organizational development experience during which time he has held positions as an HR Manager, Director and Vice-President.

In 1989, Mike co-founded and oversaw the daily operations of a consulting firm based in Omaha, NE that grew from one office servicing two states, to five offices servicing ten states, and from four employees to more than 50 within five years.

After selling the consulting firm to a national competitor in 1994, Mike relocated to Seattle and worked as an Independent HR Consultant. In that role, he was frequently hired as a Sub-Contractor by other HR Consulting firms that specialized in the design and implementation of HR systems and programs for start-up companies during the peak of the high tech boom in the Pacific Northwest from the mid to late 1990’s.

The mid-to-late 1990’s, which is often referred to as the high-tech boom, was a time in our history when most employers, particularly those within the IT sector, were stymied by their inability to recruit, hire and train enough workers adequately to keep up with the demands of their business.

Accordingly, as companies were forced to find new and creative methods for sourcing, recruiting, hiring, training, compensating, recognizing, rewarding and, most importantly, retaining their employee’s, they relied on HR Consultants to help in their efforts to find and keep their most valued asset, their talent.

Throughout this period of time, Mike’s creative “hands-on” approach – that includes both tactical and strategic methodologies for growing a business - proved to be instrumental to the success of a variety of organizations operating in the Puget Sound region; this time of “transition” within the work environment was often characterized by changes in the workplace such as free meals, flex-time, paid childcare, new and open methods for communicating with workers, autonomy, the fostering of entrepreneurial cultures and the advent of businesses for social responsibility.

By 1999, Mike was working almost exclusively within the wireless industry where the majority of employee populations worked in call centers. While working with the B2B team at AT&T Wireless, Mike routinely consulted in the daily operations, expansions, mergers, consolidations and closures of call centers from Paramus, NJ to Seattle, WA.

After the “high-tech bubble” burst in 2001, Mike was hired as the HR Lead for the Hartford Insurance’s Southern California Operations as the company sought to de-centralize many of their operations (including the administration of their call centers) from the East to West Coasts. It was during his tenure with Hartford Insurance that Mike became an expert on California employment law.

In 2003, Hartford Insurance changed their business model and again centralized most of their operational entities – along with their senior staff – back to Hartford, CT. With the elimination of his position, Mike returned to consulting and formed Organizational Development Solutions LLP. As the sole-proprietor of ODS, Mike worked with a variety of small to medium size companies in both California and Arizona.

While many of these clients were start-ups, many others were in transition and/or simply wanted someone with Mike’s skills and competencies to assist in the design and implementation of performance development systems that define roles and foster high performance cultures.

Since relocating to his hometown of Chicago in 2010, Mike has continued to serve in the role of outsourced HR Expert to a few clients in California and Arizona and, in 2011, he was recruiting to work on behalf of the Taproot Foundation in providing consulting services to a specific client market.

Taproot is a non-profit organization that makes executive talent available to non-profits that are working to improve society and foster social responsibility:

As a Facilitator and Coach, Mike's consulting work has included facilitating team-building exercises, training leaders and coaching executives.

As a Speaker, Guest Lecturer and Adjunct Faculty Members at numerous colleges and universities, Mike has taught both graduate and under-graduate courses in the field of human resources management dating back to the early 1980’s. He’s also designed leadership development curriculums for both profit and non-profit organizations.

As an expert in the field of organizational development and human resources management during the past two and a half decades, Mike has acquired a unique - and highly sought after - set of skills that continue to produce results for the shareholders of high growth organizations.

Mike's educational accomplishments include:

M.S. Human Resources Management, Drake University
M.A. Organizational Behavior, Marquette University
B.A. Business Administration and Communications, Cardinal Stritch University
* Post- graduate certification in Diversity, Anderson School of Management, UCLA