Dallas A. Grundy is a leader and a teacher of individuals, and teams. A champion for personal leadership, Dallas has helped individuals, teams and organizations to ultimately solve problems, change circumstances and improve results through individual development and goal setting. His professional and civic service are born out of support, nurture and development from his extended family, dynamic friends and distinguished teachers and mentors. Born in Philadelphia and raised in the historic town of Lawnside, New Jersey, the cycle of gaining a valuable education, growing personally and serving the community was instilled in Dallas at an early age.
After earning his BS in civil engineering from Rutgers’ School of Engineering and his MBA in management information systems and marketing from Rutgers’ School of Business, Dallas embarked on the creative journey of entrepreneurship, where business endeavors often overlapped civic responsibility. As the Chief Operating Officer of BCT Partners – which he co-founded with Rutgers’ College of Engineering classmates – Dallas led the operations of this multi-million dollar consulting firm that underwent meteoric growth. Another venture, Access One, provided digital solutions for low-income housing, and a third, MBS Enterprises, provided educational services and training. Dallas’ entrepreneurial experiences have exposed him to key leadership roles while serving the needs of many fortune 500 corporations, Foundations, Non-Profit organizations, and Educational, Municipal, and Federal Government institutions. Dallas also has extensive and diverse experience in strategic management and organizational development as Staff Operations Manager at Lucent Technologies, where he managed the strategic staffing programs and initiatives for Lucent’s Optical Networking Market Development Group. In his 14 year entrepreneurial career, Dallas has demonstrated his ability to envision and implement change, solve problems and achieve goals while managing risk. Dallas is listed in Who’s Who in Science and Engineering and Who’s Who Among African-Americans Entrepreneurs.
As a community and civic leader, Dallas, has served as a tutor for public-school children, a mentor for young entrepreneurs, a director of youth programs at his church, and an advocate for the young people of his hometown, the historic African-American community of Lawnside, New Jersey. He also lends his business acumen to the boards of several nonprofit organizations; among them, Renaissance Economic Development Corporation, which spurs economic development through real-estate and property management in the Central New Jersey area. He has served as the chairperson for the First Baptist Church Technology Advisory Board – a body that sets and reviews the technology policy for four social service organizations, a church staff, and more than 6,000 members affiliated with First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens in Somerset, New Jersey. A dynamic communicator, Dallas has addressed diverse audiences of students, emerging professionals, and seasoned executives at various venues. He has mentored and coached aspiring entrepreneurs while assisting in the development of their respective businesses. He was instrumental in implementing New Jersey’s first statewide entrepreneurial development conference – geared toward exposing and seeding entrepreneurial career tracks for New Jersey High School Students. Dallas is on the advisory board for the New Jersey Charter School Resource Center. He is a member of the steering committee that started the Lawnside Education Foundation and currently serves as a member of the board of directors. As a testament and recognition of his many contributions, Dallas was selected by the Partnership for New Jersey as a 2005 Fellow of the Leadership New Jersey Program. Most recently, Dallas was selected by and featured in the Network Journal Magazine (a New York City publication) as one of the “40 under Forty” dynamic achievers.
Dallas, currently serves as Associate Dean of Rutgers’ Graduate School of Education where he leads strategic planning and manages tactical operations in support of the Dean’s goals and programs. As the school’s chief nonacademic officer, Dallas provides counsel and executive support to Dean and leads a business administration and information technology team that serves over 100 faculty and staff and more than 1400 students. Dallas is the steward of an $8M operating budget and over $8M budget for research and sponsored programs. He resides in Somerset, New Jersey, where he attends First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens. Dallas believes that the difference in his life has been his support foundation, which consists of what he calls the 4 – F’s: faith, family, friends, and focus.