People

April 23, 2010
Omni Cable Corp. (West Chester, Pa.): John Russ has been promoted to Western Region V.P. and Dan Trotta has been appointed Southeast Region V.P. Russ

Omni Cable Corp. (West Chester, Pa.): John Russ has been promoted to Western Region V.P. and Dan Trotta has been appointed Southeast Region V.P.

Russ will manage the Los Angeles, San Francisco and Denver facilities. He has been with Omni for over 10 years, serving as regional manager in San Francisco.

Trotta has worked for more than 25 years in the wire and cable industry, including posts at Belden, Commscope and Berktek. He will have responsibility for the Atlanta, Tampa and Houston facilities. Trotta has a B.A. in psychology from Hunter College.

In other news at Omni Cable, Travis Williams has been appointed regional manager at the Los Angeles facility. Williams most recently served as a branch manager for W.W. Grainger, where he managed three locations. He has a B.S. in economics from the United States Naval Academy and a M.A. in global leadership from the University of San Diego.

IDEA (Arlington, Va.): Del Nickel, former president of Pentair's Technical Products global business unit in Anoka, Minn., will serve as the IDEA chairman of the board for 2010-2011. He previously served on the board as the vice chair from 2009-2010 and secretary from 2008-2009. Nickel brings over 40 years of experience in the electrical industry, including an 18-year career at Pentair. He retired from Pentair in March 2010. Outgoing IDEA chairman, Ronald Schlader, vice president of operations and quality, Crescent Electric Supply Co., served in the position from 2009-2010 and will continue to serve on the 2010-2011 Board as a voting director.

National Association of Wholesale-Distributors (NAW) (Washington, D.C.): Guy Blissett, a wholesale-distribution industry expert at IBM's Institute for Business Value (IBV), has been named a fellow of the NAW Institute for Distribution Excellence, NAW's long-range research arm. The NAW Institute established the Fellows program in 1999 to acknowledge individuals who have made and will continue to make significant intellectual contributions to the field of wholesale distribution.

Other Institute fellows are Adam Fein, president of Pembroke Consulting; Brent Grover, president of Evergreen Consulting, LLC; Barry Lawrence, director of the Industrial Distribution Program and the Supply Chain Systems Lab at Texas A&M University; and Michael Marks, managing partner at Indian River Consulting Group.

General Cable (Highland Heights, Ky.): The Wire & Cable Manufacturers' Alliance (WCMA) has named Mike Murphy, V.P. of sales, Gepco Brand Products, as a recipient of one of its 2010 Distinguished Career Awards. WCMA's 26th Annual Awards Dinner and Investiture Ceremony honoring Mike will take place on April 24 in Hartford, Conn. He has held a variety of executive posts at General Cable since coming to the company in 2002. Murphy attended Indiana University and the Columbia Management Institute MBA program, where he specialized in sales and marketing management. He also attended the Earlham Institute for Executive Growth and is a veteran of the United States Air Force.

Cobra Wire & Cable Inc. (Hatboro, Pa.): Jenna Spear has been named regional sales manager and will be responsible for maintaining and growing the company's customer base in the mid-western region of the United States. She is a graduate of Gwynedd Mercy College.