Dr. Gregory Kuhn
Dr. Gregory Kuhn, Ph.D., is a Research Associate with the Center for Governmental Studies at Northern Illinois University. The Center for Governmental Studies is a public service, applied research, and public policy development organization. Its mission is to be a leader in providing services that contribute to the economic well-being of the State of Illinois and in advancing the capabilities of government at all levels, to develop policies and to manage and evaluate their program services. Dr. Kuhn has over twenty years of combined experience in local government administration, consulting, and academics. His executive recruitment work has included services to local government jurisdictions serving populations of less than 5,000 to major U.S. cities with populations over 1,000,000. His management consulting assignments have also served a wide variety of cities, counties and not-for-profit agencies across the country and have included strategic planning, organization and personnel studies, team-building, focus group exercises, and management training seminars, in addition to scores of executive recruitment assignments. He is also qualified to administer and apply the Myers-Briggs (MBTI) testing instrument and offers assistance to organizations in its application and use.
Dr. Kuhn's local government experience has included service as a City Manager and Assistant Manager in suburban metropolitan Chicago municipalities. His municipal activities and achievements as an administrator included establishment of strategic planning approaches to fiscal, policy, and operational matters, reorganization of departments and city-wide organizations, creation of in-house engineering and building and zoning capabilities, and implementation of early automated utility reading and billing system. He has helped his organizations earn multiple certificates of achievement from the Government Finance Officers Association, including the GFOA Cost-Cutter/Innovation Award, among other awards and honors. Recent recognitions of Dr. Kuhn’s work included a Distinguished Service Award from the Illinois City Management Association in 2002 for his research on city manager performance appraisal methods and the 2000 Finklestein Teaching Excellence Award for Graduate Students at Northern Illinois University.
Dr. Kuhn is a graduate of Marquette University, majoring in Political Science, and holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration, and a Ph.D. in Public Administration, Public Policy and Organizational Theory, both from Northern Illinois University. His dissertation research was focused on Council/Manager relations with particular emphasis on governing body assessment of the City Manager's performance.
Dr. Kuhn serves as an adjunct faculty member Northern Illinois University’s Department of Public Administration and Public Policy. Dr. Kuhn also serves as Vice-Chairman of his community’s Plan Commission & Zoning Board of Appeals. Dr. Kuhn’s current professional affiliations include the International City/County Management Association (ICMA), the Illinois City Management Association, the American Society of Training and Development (ASTD), and the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA).