Gerard McLean, Résumé

Contact Info:
Social: @gerardmclean everywhere
About.me | LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | Medium
Phone: +(937) 239–75XX (M), +(937) 836–6255 (O)
Locations: Dayton, OH; Kingston, NY; NYC; Viborg, Denmark

I’m remote, re-locatable and mobile, but love to hang around in the Eastern Time Zone of the United States, mostly.

Short Rundown

Employment History:
• 11/95–Present Rivershark Inc. Englewood OH, President/CEO
• 7/98–3/02 Dayton Daily News, NIE, Dayton, OH NIE/Marketing
• 2/96–7/98 Electrologic of America, Inc, Dayton, OH, Sales/Marketing
• 7/94–11/95 Spar Marketing, Minneapolis, MN, Vice-President HR
• 5/87–7/94 Huffy Service First, Dayton, OH, Manager, Training and Development
• 2/82–5/87 Target Stores, St. Paul, MN, Team Specialist

Education:
BA, English, University of Minnesota

Industries I’ve transformed
•Defined how soccer tournaments are managed/marketed on the internet (TourneyCentral, 2000)
• Created on-line retail service labor sourcing (NARMS, 1996)
• Re-define and position the merchandising industry (SPAR, 1994)
• Created training for a decentralized workforce (Huffy, 1986)

Deep Dive

Major Accomplishments:

• Wrote a short book that captures this boring, dry CV into a narrative story, A Face for Radio and a Voice for Twitter
• Wrote and published a personal history of The ACA (Obamacare) as a series of letters, a publication and a book. Dear Hillary; One Hundred Letters about Health Care to Hillary Clinton
• Wrote and published the definitive guide (c. 2017) for incorporating social media into youth sporting events; The Game Through Glass.
• Published a book, Monkey with a loaded typewriter, Mostly true essays An essay from the book was featured on the Medium home page under the Potterhead tab on Oct 28, 2016.
• Created, grew and maintained reader-engaging character-based social media accounts (@dogwalkblog as an example. Many of these are anonymous, but details can be released to legitimate parties.)
• Created an integrated Web-based work-flow system for event management including marketing, registration, sponsor ad sales and tracking, application management, hotel booking, travel and entertainment management and branded product sales. Currently being implemented in youth soccer tournaments, Special Olympics Games in softball and basketball.
• Successful implementation of a materials design and production workflow for a Newspapers In Education department.
• Designed and delivered two workshops (2002, 2003) for the US Youth Soccer Association on Integrating Tournament Operations and the Internet.
• Designed and developed the Theraquine brand and product for ELA
• Designed and executed the marketing position and brand identity for the StimMaster for ELA. Secured the endorsement by Christopher Reeve for the StimMaster.
• Created and implemented a comprehensive HR program for Spar Marketing.
• Developed and implemented an IVR solution for collecting daily data from 5,000+ field reps for Spar Marketing
• Created and implemented an inter/intranet solution for NARMS to include a revenue-generating job board and search.
• Created and implemented a comprehensive, university-type training program for Huffy Service First.
• Designed and implemented a week-long leadership seminar for all internal managers at Huffy Service First.
• Established and currently operating Rivershark, Inc.
• Established as an expert and speaker within the retail merchandising industry. Designed and deliver two seminars per year at the semi-annual educational conferences hosted by NARMS.
• I made Lizz Winstead LOL on Twitter once. (25 Nov 2012)
• I’ve been captured by the Google car for street view.

General Skills:

• Digital native, fluent in all major social platforms. (Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, etc)
• The ability to communicate clearly, organization, capacity for teamwork, punctuality, critical thinking, social savviness, creativity and adaptability.
• Copywriting.
• Project management with multi-priority projects; Agile.
• Reader engagement and conversation-based traffic building using social media channels.
• Identify viral and potentially viral memes quickly from media streams and sources.
• General business management, including P/L responsibility, all aspects of staffing including employee selection, training, career development and corrective action, setting and executing corporate objectives from a mission statement to strategic implementation, staff leadership and task management.
• Brand development and promotion
• Product/service design and development
• Marketing research and strategic entry
• Multimedia project development
• Website design, implementation and maintenance
• Proposal preparation and delivery to internal and external clients
• Public speaking, i.e., seminar and speech delivery to large and small groups

Technical Skills:

• Video/audio creation and editing.
• Website design and development.
• Graphic design from creative concept to file construction
• Newspaper page design, instructional design, multimedia production Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere Pro, Audition, QuarkXPress.
• Perl and PHP
• Database design (MySQL)
• HTML/CSS
• UNIX/LINUX sysadmin

Speaking History (highlights)
2015 SXSW Inanimate Character Redefine Authenticity
2012 NARMS Social Media in Retail Services
2011 NARMS Member Services Online
2002/04 US Youth Soccer Websites for soccer tournaments
2000 Newspapers in Education for Teachers
1996 NARMS Why websites are necessary in retail services

Podcasts (partial)

Dad Was Right (2020 –current)
A dad gets a book “Dad Was Right” as a gift and tortures his two adult kids years later with stories — in their own voices — about why he was right.

Old Man Stink (2013-current)
A tongue-in-cheek play on ageism, short conversations with older people about how they embrace and use technology in their lives, either at home or on the job.

Tournament Review (2007–2010)
A companion podcast to the blog at TourneyCentral.com that gives voice to the experts in the soccer tournament industry or ancillary industries that contribute to the success of soccer tournaments.

Web Site Portfolio (partial):
Rivershark Inc
TourneyCentral.com
Soccer Tournament Sites
dogwalkblog.com
NARMS International (defunct, but check out the Wayback Machine)

tl;dr
My skills and attributes can be summed up into one experience: I used to sell exercise bikes to people with paralysis. I was very good at it. That is a true story.

References:
Just Google me; the internet thinks I’m wonderful.