Samir Desai

Samir Desai once served as the Executive Director of Learning and Organization Development for Northwestern University. This means he was responsible for developing the skills and capabilities of Northwestern staff and faculty through high impact learning programs, performance management, organizational development, and leadership development as all levels. Samir Desai joined Northwestern University in 2015 after 25 years working in industry. His career spanned systems consulting, project management, learning design and development, technology-enabled learning, learning and leadership development, and talent management. Before joining Northwestern, he was the Managing Director for Talent Development at Accenture, responsible for the onboarding, learning, performance management, and career development of over 300K employees worldwide. He is also the co-author of Return on Learning, Accenture’s re-invention of learning aligned with their business strategy.Samir has a Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He has a Master’s Degree in Computer Science from Northwestern University, which was a cross-discipline program with cognitive science and education, working at the forefront of using artificial intelligence for adult learning. Samir is a Wildcat through and through, and his favorite color, by chance or fate, is purple.

Samir Desai left Northwestern in early 2020. Samir is currently the Vice President of Talent Management and Organization Development at North Shore University Health System.

Education

• Northwestern University - Master of Science, Computer Science; cross-discipline in Education and Cognitive Science 1993 - 1995
• University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign - Bachelor of Science, Electrical Engineering 1986 - 1991