Dexter Adams wowed the roomful of Procter & Gamble Co. executives at a Fairfield reception hall Thursday with his presentation on strategies to improve company results.

There was no time to absorb accolades because Mr. Adams, 41, known as ''D.C.,'' had to catch a 2:30 p.m. flight to Detroit. His colleagues joked as Mr. Adams darted out the door that he'd never make the plane.

He made it.

That matter of haste has irrevocably altered his family's life and jolted pockets of Cincinnati: its tennis community, Procter & Gamble, the faculty at Summit Country Day School and hundreds of neighbors and friends.

''He did an outstanding job,'' said friend and colleague Woodrow Keown, Jr., who watched the presentation. ''I'd say it was a defining moment.''

A Detroit native, Mr. Adams graduated from West Point in 1978. He was described in the yearbook as one of the military academy's most versatile athletes.

The man who friends say could have written a book on time management, play a three-hour tennis match and then smoke a good cigar, served nine years as a combat-ready helicopter pilot in the Army before joining Procter & Gamble's purchasing division in 1987.

''Flying the helicopter, that was dangerous,'' his widow, Angela Adams, said softly Thursday night, shortly after a Comair official called to confirm what she had expected to hear all night.

Mr. Adams chaired a committee for Summit Country Day School to recruit African-American faculty members. He officiated at the ATP Tennis Tournament in Mason and the U.S. Open in New York. He landscaped his neighbor's lawn for free. He took karate lessons with his 8-year-old daughter, Ayrenne.

As a senior purchasing manager at Procter & Gamble, Mr. Adams flew abroad frequently - to Europe, Latin America and Asia. The irony for loved ones was that he died on the way to his hometown on a routine recruiting trip.

''Everybody loves D.C.,'' said Rodney Swope, a senior purchasing manager at Procter & Gamble.