Robert Henning

Director with OTF Group, has spent much of the past 14 years advising small businesses in developing countries enhance their competitiveness. Over the past 7 years, he has developed a particular expertise in the application of business strategy and innovation to solve competitiveness challenges in post-conflict economies such as Haiti, Rwanda, Burundi, and Afghanistan. Mr. Henning is currently based in Washington, DC where he continues to advise corporate, government and international donor clients on issues of business strategy, cluster & value chain competitiveness, and private sector development policy.

Until September 2006, he was Chief of Party for the two-year Afghanistan Competitiveness Project, a USAID funded program. The project designed strategies to upgrade the competitiveness of 3 major export clusters in Afghanistan, developed cross cutting solutions to the problems facing the export sectors and established a national competitiveness council. Prior to Afghanistan, Rob was working on the two-year Rwandan National Innovation and Competitiveness project—he managed the financial services sector. Before joining the OTF Group, Mr. Henning worked for the Peace Corps in West Africa; he supervised micro-credit and small enterprise development in Benin and Guinea-Conakry.

Mr. Henning earned a Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) from The McDonough School of Business, at Georgetown University, as a John F. Connelly scholar. He also earned a B.A. from the University of Vermont with a double major in Economics and French. He is a recognized expert in private sector development and is currently authoring several publications for USAID on best practices and techniques for value chain upgrading. He is a contributor to an original book of essays focused on private sector development, called “In the River They Swim”, released by Templeton Press in April 2009.