European Practices in Transportation Workforce Development

FHWA INTERNATIONAL TECHNOLOGY EXCHANGE PROGRAMS

June 2003

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Biographic Sketches
Contact Information

APPENDIX A

TEAM MEMBERS

BIOGRAPHIC SKETCHES

Pete K. Rahn, panel co-chairman, is the secretary of the New Mexico State Highway and Transportation Department in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Rahn leads a 2,700-employee organization responsible for all modes of transportation in New Mexico. His areas of emphasis include improving the organization's customer service, applying the Malcomb Baldrige quality principles, and developing a flexible and responsive workforce. Before joining the department, he was corporate vice president of Kysar Insurance in Farmington, New Mexico, and an elected county oficial. Rahn has a bachelor's degree in city and regional planning from New Mexico State University. He chairs the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials' Standing Committee on Quality and is a member of the Transportation Research Board Task Force on Accelerating Innovation in the Highway Industry. He is immediate past president of the Western Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials.

Joseph S. Toole, panel co-chairman, is director of professional development for the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) in Washington, D.C. Toole administers a national program of training, education, and workforce development, which includes international outreach. This program encompasses technical and management training for Federal, State, and local agencies and other countries and awards educational grants for current and prospective transportation staff. He is co-chair of FHWA's Workforce Planning and Professional Development Task Force. Toole partners with State departments of transportation and transportation associations on studies to determine future workforce needs and to identify best practices in managing human resources. He has served FHWA in a variety of field and headquarters positions over the past 25 years, including serving as special assistant to the FHWA administrator and as director of FHWA's Office of Technology Applications. He has chaired or served on a number of agency task forces, including the FHWA 2000 Work Group, which established the agency's original strategic planning process. Toole graduated from California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo with a degree in transportation engineering, and he has a master's of business administration in finance from George Washington University. He is a licensed professional engineer.

Randy Bergquist is program manager for learning and development for the U.S. Department of Transportation's Departmental Office of Human Resource Management in Washington, D.C. He is responsible for developing, recommending, and overseeing a variety of learning and development policies, programs, initiatives, and special high-level workforce planning projects. He has 21 years of Federal service, working for the U.S. Department of Commerce and the U.S. Department of Transportation in the areas of employee relations and employee development. Bergquist received a bachelor's degree in music education from Shenandoah College and Conservatory of Music and a master's degree in counseling from the University of Wisconsin. He is a member of the Human Resource Development Council Executive Committee, chairs its professionalism subcommittee, and serves on the policy and legislation subcommittee.

Ronald W. Carmichael is division engineer for the Federal Highway Administration's (FHWA) Western Federal Lands Highway Division in Vancouver, Washington. The division is one of three field offices responsible for the Federal Lands Highway Program and serves Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, and part of Wyoming. As division engineer, Carmichael is responsible for administering highway programs in cooperation with the Federal lands management agencies (Department of Defense, U.S. Forest Service, National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Bureau of Land Management) and State and local transportation agencies. The Western Federal Lands Highway Division provides transportation engineering services for planning, design, construction, and rehabilitation of roadways and bridges on, or providing access to, federally owned lands. Carmichael joined FHWA in 1975. Previous assignments included positions in North Carolina, Maryland, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, and the headquarters office in Washington, D.C. Before joining FHWA, he worked for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Carmichael has a bachelor's degree in civil engineering from North Carolina State University. He is a registered professional engineer.

David S. Ferguson has served as chief of personnel resources for the Florida Department of Transportation since January 1973. His responsibilities include compensation, classification, benefits, discipline, union contract negotiations, selection, training and development, and policy development. He is also responsible for developing and directing all personnel and training programs for about 10,000 employees statewide. In 1994, he developed and implemented a new personnel system for the department, which included a major consolidation of job classes; pay broadbanding; a knowledge, skills, and abilities selection system (eliminating minimum qualifications); a computerized system to rank employees for superior proficiency pay increases; and a bonus payment program. Before joining the department, he held several personnel positions in both the public and private sectors. He has served on numerous State committees covering compensation, productivity, benefits, career service reform, and training.

Gary Gilmore is chief engineer for the Montana Department of Transportation in Helena, Montana. As chief engineer, he is responsible for overseeing the department's $300 million pre-construction and construction programs. Gilmore is respected across the State for his technical expertise, commonsense approach to issues, and experience. He is known as a "spark plug" for getting things done. He began working for the department as an engineerin-training in 1971 and served as division traffic engineer and field project manager. He worked as the district construction engineer for eight years before being appointed operations engineer. He has been the department's chief engineer since 1996. Gilmore has a bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Montana State University and is a licensed professional engineer. He attended the Northwestern Traffic Institute and the Highway and Transportation Management Institute at the University of Mississippi.

Gene C. Griffin is director of the Upper Great Plains Transportation Institute at North Dakota State University. The institute is a freestanding department within the university and serves as the university's focal point for transportation research and education. Griffin has more than 26 years of experience as a transportation and logistics researcher and research administrator. He has conducted scholarly work in economics, management, business logistics, and public policy related to rail and motor transport, low-volume roads, economic development, and agricultural transportation. Grifin has served as director of the institute since 1980, during which time its annual budget has increased from $175,000 to more than $3 million and its staff has grown from two to more than 20. He is responsible for the institute's five programs: 1) research and service program; 2) Mountain-Plains Consortium, a regional university transportation center; 3) TEL8, a regional telecommunications system dedicated to transportation training and education; 4) Advanced Traffic Analysis Center, a program for integrating ITS solutions for trafic management in second-tier cities; and 5) graduate and undergraduate programs. During his tenure as director, the institute has gained national stature in the area of rural and small urban transportation and logistics. Griffin has a bachelor's degree in mathematics and a master's degree in economics from North Dakota State University, maintains an active involvement in research, and has published numerous reports and journal articles.

Kathryn Harrington-Hughes, the panel's report writer, is director of operations for the Eno Transportation Foundation in Washington, D.C. Her responsibilities include planning and managing leadership development and training programs, including the American Associationof State Highway and Transportation Officials' National Transportation Management Conference and the Transit Cooperative Research Program's International Transit Studies Program. Before joining the Eno staff, Harrington-Hughes was president and principal writer for HarringtonHughes & Associates Inc. (now Woodward Communications Inc.), where she produced numerous publications aimed at improving the skills and knowledge of transportation engineers and managers; director of communications for the Strategic Highway Research Program; and director of communications and marketing for the Institute of Transportation Engineers. She holds a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Maryland and serves as the secretary of the Transportation Research Board's Committee on Technology Transfer (A5012).

Jerry A. Hawkins is director of human resources for the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) in Washington, D.C. Hawkins directs a comprehensive personnel and training program for FHWA employees located in the Washington, D.C., headquarters, State divisions, and four technical resource centers. Before becoming human resources director, Hawkins served as chief of personnel policy staf; chief of the Training and Executive Development Division, where he directed the Highway Engineer Training Program; and chief of the Personnel Operations Division, with responsibility for compensation, recruitment, merit promotion, staffing, planning and analysis, employee benefits, and management of automated training and personnel systems. During his Federal career, Hawkins gained expertise working in human resource and training functions in four other Federal agencies. He has a bachelor's degree in history from Norfolk State University and a master's degree in administration from George Washington University. He serves as FHWA's representative on the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials' Administrative Subcommittee on Personnel and Human Resources. He is also a member of the International Personnel Management Association.

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