Faculty & Staff

Sandra Gill, Ph.D. Co-Founder; Dean, College of Business, Benedictine University

Sandra L. Gill, Ph.D. is Dean, College of Business, and Associate Professor of Business, at Benedictine University. Dr. Gill joined Benedictine in 2001 as Department Chair and Associate Professor of Business, MBA Programs, and was appointed Dean in 2004. She is a Fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives and Fellow of the American Association of Healthcare Consultants. She is a Certified Clinical Sociologist with the Sociological Practice Association and was 2009 Chair of the Lisle Chamber of Commerce.

For 40 years, Dr. Gill has worked in education and health care as a licensed teacher, program director, consultant and academic faculty member. From 1980-2000, she completed over 1,500 health care external consulting engagements throughout the United States and other countries. For five years, she served on the strategic planning council of the Fielding Graduate University, where she completed her M.A. (1995) and Ph.D (1998) in human and organizational systems. She completed her B.A. (1966) and M.A. (1974) with honors, at Michigan State University. She has published over 40 applied articles related to health care leadership and governance.

James D. Ludema, Ph.D. Co-founder and Director; Professor, Leadership & Change

James D. Ludema, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Ph.D. Program in Organization Development and Director of the Center for Values-Driven Leadership at Benedictine University. He is a member of the Executive Committee of the Academy of Management’s Organization Development and Change Division and is the author of two books and dozens of articles on leadership, strategy and organizational change. His book The Appreciative Inquiry Summit: A Practitioner’s Guide for Leading Large-Scale Change is widely considered a classic in the field.

Dr. Ludema has lived and worked in Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and North America and has served as a consultant to a variety of organizations including GlaxoSmithKline, Merck, BP, McDonald's, John Deere, USG, U.S. Cellular, the US Navy, World Vision, the City of Minneapolis and many local and international NGOs.

Michael Manning, Ph.D. Professor of Leadership, Strategy & Change

Dr. Michael Manning joined the Center’s faculty in 2013 as Professor of Leadership, Strategy & Change. Mike earned a Ph.D. from Purdue University and has held faculty appointments at New Mexico State University, Case Western Reserve University, Fielding Graduate University, and SUNY-Binghamton. He currently serves as an associate editor of the Journal of Applied Behavioral Science and is active in the Academy of Management, where he is a former Chair of the Organization Development and Change Division.

Mike has dedicated his professional career to educating and developing executives and university students, designing effective organizations, and creating applied action research processes and intervention techniques. His current research focuses on the role of emotions in organization development and change. He teaches and consults throughout the U.S. and internationally in Mexico, Europe and the Baltic States, the Middle East, and the Far East.

Ram Tenkasi, Ph.D. Director of Research; Professor, Organization Change

Ramkrishnan (Ram) V. Tenkasi, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Ph.D. Program in Organization Development and Director of Research in the Center for Values-Driven Leadership at Benedictine University. Formerly, he was Assistant Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California. He earned his Ph.D. in Organizational Behavior from the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University.

Dr. Tenkasi’s research on large-scale organizational change, knowledge, learning, information technology and innovation have been funded by multiple federal agencies such as the National Science Foundation and the Fulbright Foundation. His more than 70 articles and chapters have appeared in leading business journals such as Journal of Applied Behavioral Sciences and Journal of Organizational Change Management. He has served as funding program panel member for the National Science Foundation, American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Department of Defense, and the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) and is a core innovation team member for a 3-country project initiated by the National Institutes of Health/National Cancer Institute. He is listed in Who's Who in America, Who's Who in American Education, Who's Who in Science and Engineering, Who's Who in Finance in Business and Who's Who in the World.

Marie Di Virgilio, Ph.D. Administrative Director

Marie Di Virgilio, Ph.D. has over 30 years of business experience holding key leadership positions in sales, human resources, accounting, corporate education and information technology. Much of her experience was with Allstate Insurance Company. She holds a Ph.D. in Organizational Development from Benedictine University, a BA and an MA from Wayne State University and an MBA from Lake Forest Graduate School of Management. She consults and speaks extensively on the topic of change management helping companies take full advantage of their change efforts, thereby improving their organizational effectiveness.

Dr. DiVirgilio is an adjunct professor at the Lake Forest Graduate School of Management, Dominican University and Benedictine University. She teaches and has helped design masters-level courses including Organizational Analysis & Design, Change Leadership, Developing Sustainable Leaders, Effective Leadership and Work Team Dynamics. In 2008 and 2009, she was the Leadership Training Director for the US Department of State’s Middle East Partnership Initiative teaching leadership, communication and conflict resolution skills to students from North Africa and the Middle East. She teaches leadership and organizational behavior classes in Poland and in the Czech Republic.

Kevin Lynch, Ph.D. Leadership Executive-in-Residence

Dr. Kevin Lynch is the Executive-in-Residence at the Center. He joined the Center in 2012, after serving for eleven years as Chief Financial Officer for Pritzker Realty Group, a privately held company in Chicago Illinois. In this role, Kevin managed the administrative, human resources, information technology and risk management responsibilities of rapidly growing organization in the commercial real estate field with assets in excess of $6 billion.

As a practitioner, academic and consultant, Kevin specializes in assisting organizations that are experiencing rapid change, particularly with regard to strategic growth decisions, and the implementation of appropriate organizational infrastructure. Dr. Lynch holds a Ph.D. in Organizational Development from Benedictine University.

Jim (Gus) Gustafson, Ph.D. Director of Executive Education
Leadership Scholar-In-Residence

James “Gus” Gustafson, Ph.D. is Leadership Scholar-in-Residence and Director of Executive Education in the Center for Values-Driven Leadership at Benedictine University. He is Chair-Elect of the Business Leadership Division of the International Leadership Association, former Editor-in-Chief of the Organization Development Journal, and 2010 recipient of the prestigious Global Strategic Leader Award given by the World HRD Congress. Prior to coming to Benedictine, he was Director of Strategic Leadership Research and Development and Organizational Transformation at U.S. Cellular, where he received many awards for his pioneering work in leadership development and organizational change.

Dr. Gustafson has over twenty years of successful organization development, sales, marketing, operations, leadership development, channel management and general management experience in public, private and non-profit organizations. He consults and speaks on a variety of topics, including Values-Driven Leadership, Appreciative Inquiry, Corporate Social Responsibility, Organizational & Team Effectiveness and Servant-Leadership Development.

Deb Hellmuth Associate Director

As Associate Director, Deb Hellmuth manages the Ph.D./D.B.A. program’s day to day operations and is often the first person you’ll talk to at the Center for Values-Driven Leadership. Deb is responsible for the application process, program management and program arrangements. With strong organizational and planning skills, she brings a diverse background in volunteering and freelance work predominantly in project management, volunteer management, event planning and editing. Her passion for community service has led her to serve on various boards and chair myriad committees in the community. Deb’s career experience includes project management for Ryan Diagnostics, Inc., catalog management for GBC, and indexing for Office Max’s business supplies catalog. Deb holds a B.B.A. from the University of Iowa and joined the Center in early 2011.

Amber Johnson Corporate Relations Advisor

Amber Johnson is Corporate Relations Advisor in the Center for Values-Driven Leadership at Benedictine University. She brings more than a decade of experience in communications, marketing, and non-profit fundraising and administration. Before coming to the Center, Amber spent seven years in various leadership positions with World Vision, a Christian humanitarian organization. In her capacity as Regional Senior Director for Marketing and Services, Amber helped launch a social-network fundraising program that grew from single-digit participation in its first year to a national multi-million dollar program in its fifth year. She also served as Senior Advocate for Church Engagement and co-led a national research project to identify best practices in high capacity volunteer engagement.

Prior to her work with World Vision, Amber spent two years in Tonga as a Peace Corps Volunteer and served as the University Editor at Taylor University in Upland, Indiana. She served as adjunct faculty in marketing and public speaking at Taylor and at Ball State University. She holds a M.A. in communication studies, with an emphasis in rhetorical theory, from Ball State University and an undergraduate degree, also in communication studies, from Malone University in Canton, Ohio.