Richard Scott Webster, 88, of Columbus, passed away on January 16, 2023. He was born on June 5, 1934.
Richard Webster, son of the late Alice and Robert Webster of Ithaca, NY, was a principal of Abintra Performance Learning, President of PRM Institute, and retired from administration and teaching in the Fisher College of Business at The Ohio State University. He joined the Fisher College in 1981 as Director of Executive Education, and taught accounting in the College from 1986 until retirement in 1994.
He is survived by his wife Barbara Barnhart Webster; sons, Matthew (Jane) Webster of Leawood, KS and Timothy (Katherine) Webster of Vienna, VA; sister, Susan (John) Talbott of Baltimore, MD; grandchildren, Elizabeth, Caroline, Augustine, Beatrice, Theodoric, and Annabella; and many Nieces and Nephews.
Work at Ohio State concluded 42 years in higher education: at Antioch College (BA, 1960), The University of Michigan (Ph.D., 1975), Grand Valley State University, the State Board of Education and the Governor’s Budget Office in Lansing, MI, followed by teaching and administrative work at Florida International University in Miami, the Higher Education Management Institute and the American Council on Education in Washington, DC- before coming to Ohio State.
After retirement from Ohio State he undertook R&D work on the paradigm shift to learning from teaching and training. This transition is a cornerstone of the global information society and changing economic conditions. This work resulted in co-founding Abintra Performance Learning in 2002-the first company to pursue the vision of every enterprise using ideas processes to work toward continual improvement of performance, satisfaction, quality, and results-and of work forces and the local economy and community.
Community improvement was also served by participation in Worthington’s Partners for Citizenship and Character, and several human resource professional associations.
All of these efforts intended to forward learning as a natural and joyful experience-seeking opportunities for all educators, leaders, managers (and parents) to reconnect with a basic purpose of their work: helping others learn and use their learning for leading joyful and productive lives.
