Leah H. Jamieson

Candidate for 2006 IEEE President-Elect

Purdue University
400 Centennial Mall Drive
West Lafayette, IN 47907 USA

+1 765 494 4966
L.Jamieson@ieee.org

This page is the candidate’s personal web site and does not necessarily
reflect the opinion or position of the IEEE.

Navigating Change: Challenges and Opportunities

Over the next five years, the quality that will have the greatest, longest-lasting impact on the IEEE will be our ability to navigate change: our ability to turn challenges into opportunities. This will determine our responsiveness to the changing needs of our members and to the changing needs of the profession. My vision is to ensure action in five areas:

• Support for engineers throughout their careers: Current estimates put the half-life of engineering knowledge – the time interval in which half of what an engineer knows becomes obsolete – at between 2.5 and 7.5 years. Just as IEEE is the preferred source for highest quality technical information, it should also become the preferred source for highest quality educational material for lifelong learning and professional development.
  
  Opportunities:
  
  • Provide continuity in members’ careers through local and technical communities and internet/web services that support professional development to bridge career transitions.
    
  • Become an international leader in continuing education and lifelong learning.
    

 

• Nimbleness in moving into emerging technology areas: The rate of change of technology, already blindingly fast, is accelerating. We must continue to improve our ability to identify new technologies in the IEEE domain, create agile new technology communities, and establish ourselves as the place to go for novice-to-expert information about new areas. Similarly, we must forge partnerships and collaborations that reflect the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of technology solutions to humanity’s needs.
  
  Opportunities:
  

• Increase our agility in new areas by creating “lightweight” structures that allow the quick formation of interdisciplinary communities in emerging technical areas. Take advantage of the flexibility of the web to quickly make visible our activities in new areas.
  
• Develop new technical content that focuses on newcomers in a technical area; as we enter new areas, focus on both theory and applications from the outset.
  
• Strive to become a trusted resource in new technology areas for a wide audience that includes the media, policy makers, and venture capitalists.
  

 

• Deliberate agility in the continually changing information culture: Publishing is at the heart of both IEEE’s business and its service to the profession. We must be at the forefront in using technology to enhance access and use of our publications. Our content and tools must be relevant to students, researchers, engineers and professionals at all stages of their careers, and, increasingly, to the public. We must also, with due deliberation, plot a course that reflects a deep understanding of the changing economics of publishing.
  
  Opportunities:
  

• Develop our understanding of how people – especially young people – access, use, organize, and share information; use this understanding to develop benefits, products, and services that put IEEE content and services at the center of how people work.
  
• Increase our ability to develop and test a wide range of new products and services through “rapid deployment” experiments, including experiments with new web commerce and communication capabilities. Develop an entrepreneurial culture, including an appropriate financial culture, within IEEE that fosters innovation in our offerings.
  

 

• Global relevance, local needs: IEEE’s structure gives us the opportunity to knit together the global nature of engineering with an understanding of specific local and regional needs. IEEE must use this structure to serve both the global profession and the changing needs of members throughout the world.
  
  Opportunities:
  

• Take advantage of the global nature of the IEEE to enhance members’ ability to be effective in the global engineering profession.
  
• Recognize and work to meet specific local and regional needs in technology development, education, accreditation, professional development, information content and services, and technology policy.
  

 

• A broad view of whom we serve: Engineering touches the lives of everyone in the world. We should consider what role IEEE will play in helping society understand the role of engineering and helping engineers understand society’s perceptions of new technologies.
  
  Opportunities:
  

• Continue to develop IEEE Spectrum as out flagship publication that provides current, authoritative coverage of our technologies and the impact of our technologies.
  
• Expand our outreach to pre-college students and teachers as the most effective long-term means of increasing public understanding of engineering.
  

 

There are guiding principles that I believe are essential to IEEE’s success in meeting these challenges:

• Maintaining a strategic focus;
  
• Valuing teamwork, communication, collaboration, and consensus-building among the many IEEE stakeholders;
  
• Promoting financial models that balance revenue opportunities with member benefits and ensure the long-term financial health of the IEEE;
  
• Paying constant attention to the value of membership, the affordability of membership, and how the foundations of the value of membership are evolving;
  
• Recruiting, retaining, and appreciating volunteers, who are the heart of IEEE;
  
• Providing value to the global profession and to society.
  

The role of the President of IEEE is to combine the strengths of this outstanding organization with a vision for how it can meet the challenges of the future. I will bring to the position of President a record of strong leadership skills and a long history of service to the IEEE. I will be guided by the key principles – strategic focus, teamwork and communication, sound financial models, value of membership, appreciation for volunteers, value to the profession – in helping IEEE meet the challenges and realize the opportunities that the changing world is presenting us.