Oral-History:Susan (Kathy) Land
About Susan (Kathy) Land
Born in Memphis, Tennessee in 1963, and raised in Georgia, IEEE Fellow (2018) and IEEE-HKN member (2015), Susan K. (Kathy) Land, served as the 2021 IEEE President and the 2009 President of the IEEE Computer Society. She holds a B.S. from University of Georgia, 1984 and an M.S. from Florida Institute of Technology, 2012. Land is author and co-author of publications regarding software engineering principles and the practical application of software process methodologies as well as guidebooks for IEEE Software Engineering Standards.
Land has spent more than thirty years in the defense industry in the application of software engineering methodologies, the management of information systems, and leadership of software development teams. Currently, she is the Director of Acquisition at THAAD Missiles (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense at the U.S. Missile Defense Agency. Previous employment includes Principal Software Engineer at MITRE as week as Program Manager, Technical Director Huntsville Operations, Technical Fellow (2000–2007) at Northrop Gruman.
Land became involved in IEEE through her work in standards and activities with the IEEE Standards Association. She has been an active member of the IEEE Standards Association for more than twenty-five years, served as the IEEE Computer Society vice president for Standards in 2004, and received the 2007 IEEE Standards Medallion. She served as the 2018 Vice President, IEEE Technical Activities as well as two additional terms on the IEEE Board of Directors as Division VIII Director/Delegate in 2011 and 2012 and as Division V Director/Delegate in 2014 and 2015. She was also a member of the IEEE-USA Board of Directors (2013, 2016) and a member of Region 3 Executive Committee (2016, 2017).
Land has been an active volunteer devoting her time to crucial initiatives at IEEE, including financial transparency, increased efficiencies in conference management and publications; and increased Standards activities across IEEE In addition, in 2018, she helped draft a statement reaffirming the IEEE Code of Conduct, Code of Ethics, and Nondiscrimination Policy, thus solidifying TAB’s dedication to ethical and fair treatment of all IEEE members.
About the Interview
SUSAN (KATHY) LAND: An Interview Conducted by Mary Ann Hellrigel, IEEE History Center, August 2, 2024.
Interview #919 for the IEEE History Center, The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
Copyright Statement
This manuscript is being made available for research purposes only. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to the IEEE History Center. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of IEEE History Center.
Request for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the IEEE History Center Oral History Program, IEEE History Center, 445 Hoes Lane, Piscataway, NJ 08854 USA or ieee-history@ieee.org. It should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user.
It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows:
Susan (Kathy) Land, an oral history conducted in 2024 by Mary Ann Hellrigel, IEEE History Center, Piscataway, NJ, USA.
Interview
INTERVIEWEE: Susan (Kathy) Land
INTERVIEWER: Mary Ann Hellrigel
DATE: 2 August 2024
PLACE: Virtual
Early life and education
Hellrigel:
[0:00:00] Today is August 2nd, 2024. This is Mary Ann Hellrigel. I am at the IEEE History Center, and I am the Institutional Historian, Archivist, [0:00:20] and Oral History Program Manager. Today, I am with Susan Kathy Land. We’re recording her oral history virtually. She is the 2021 IEEE President, 2009 IEEE Computer Society President, [0:00:40] a 2018 IEEE Fellow, and a member of Eta Kappa Nu [IEEE-HKN]. Currently, she’s the Director of Acquisition at THAAD Missiles [Terminal High Altitude Area Defense]. [US Missile Defense Agency.]
Thank you very much for agreeing to record your oral history. [0:01:00] You recorded an oral history as a past president of the IEEE Computer Society, so we won’t exactly repeat that. I’d like to start by you telling us the date and place of your birth, the year is fine, and your full name. Then we’ll start [0:01:20] with a little bit about your parents and siblings as well as a little bit about your growing up. In the other oral history [the IEEE Computer Society], you talked about your grandfather being very influential.
Land:
Yes, I don’t even remember doing that. I have this pathological [habit of] looking forward. [0:01:40] I don’t look backwards.
Hellrigel:
I think that [your maternal grandfather] was the University of Georgia link.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
Your name and maybe the place and year [0:02:00] of your birth if you wouldn’t mind?
Land:
Susan Kathleen Land, and I go by Kathy. It’s a Southern thing. You get a nickname. I was born in Memphis, Tennessee at Baptist Memorial Hospital, [0:02:20] which is no longer there. What else did you want to know? I grew up living in Memphis for maybe three years and then I lived the rest of my [early] life in Athens, Georgia.
Hellrigel:
You were born in the early 1960s, mid-1960s.
Land:
1963. Yes, I’m sixty. [0:02:40]
Hellrigel:
The tail end of the baby boom. You grew up in Athens, Georgia. Could you tell me your mother and father’s names?
Land:
Susan Thompson and [0:03:00] Benjamin Pike. My maiden name was Pike.
Hellrigel:
What was your mother’s level of education? What did she do for a living?
Land:
She was a librarian, and she had a master’s degree in library science. [0:03:20] She and my two aunts went to college. In the South, they were some of the first. Women usually got degrees in education, library science, art. You really didn’t go for any of the hard sciences. It’s very different. Up North, I have friends that are my peers and [0:03:40] their mothers or aunts got engineering degrees. That was unheard of.
Hellrigel:
Right. Swarthmore is known for women in engineering. Some of the Seven Sister colleges offered science degrees. Your mother was a librarian, and she went to the University of… [0:04:00]
Land:
Georgia. They all went to Georgia.
Hellrigel:
The last question related to the other oral history [IEEE Computer Society Presidents oral history collection]; your grandfather was a big influence on you.
Land:
My grandfather and my grandmother. They lived in Athens. My grandmother pretty much raised me, and she was a great influence.
Hellrigel:
[0:05:20] Growing up then, did you have siblings?
Land:
I have a sister, and I have a half-brother. I have a sister who’s a teacher.
Hellrigel:
Both of you grew up with your grandparents and…
Land:
No, we grew up with my mother.
Hellrigel:
Okay. Okay. Sorry, sorry. [0:05:40]
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
So, you’re living in--
Land:
Feral, feral childhood, put it that way. No adult supervision. I think that’s why I’m so independent.
Hellrigel:
Your sister is younger or older?
Land:
She’s thirteen months younger than I am.
Hellrigel:
You were [0:06:00] very close chronologically.
Land:
Right.
Hellrigel:
You’re growing up in Athens, Georgia. During your childhood, in school, were there any classes you liked or disliked?
Your grandfather’s name?
Land:
Jack C. Thompson.
Hellrigel:
This is your mother’s father?
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
His name?
Land:
Jay Land. He’s a Ph.D. You know how you meet somebody and you’re so good for each other? Well, I met him and his grades, he was really, like a geek, but [0:32:40] he hunted. He was in the woods all the time. He was like a real diamond in the rough. He had kind of bad skin, and he had a unibrow. He was so shy. Oh, my gosh, but he let me work on him. I taught him. There was something about him. [0:33:00] I looked inside and saw who was in there, and I shaped him up a little bit. Also, I told him he needed to work on his grades, so he started focusing on his grades, and he didn’t ever stop. He got two master’s degrees and a Ph.D. He’s brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. [0:33:20]
Hellrigel:
What is his field?
Land:
His field is optics and lasers. He’s working on the next-generation weapon systems.
Hellrigel:
You had that in common; your career in the defense industry.
Point Mugu
Land:
Yes, we’ve always had that in common. We worked at [Naval Air Station] Point Mugu, [in California] together. [0:33:40] He worked in the AMRAAM missile lab [Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile], and I worked in the standard missile lab. He got the job out there. When we went out there, we just got married. He got job offers all over. He got a job offer to do the robotics when they were modernizing all the auto plants. He got a job offer [0:34:00] with Disney to go down and do whatever they do down there engineering-wise. He had a couple of others. Then he took the government job because it, the missiles, was more interesting. Then I got a job on base because they were looking for computer people.
I ran some computer systems when I was waiting on Jay to get out of college. [0:34:20] He finished a master’s degree at Georgia, the first one, and I got a job in the genetics department, and I ran their IBM mainframe system. You remember this was 1983, so nobody knew how to work computers, and they weren’t teaching it in school. They were teaching [0:34:40] punch card and computers were evolving so quickly. Some of the first programmable computers is what I worked on. I got a job; they were looking for computer people. They were wheeling out the vacuum-tube system, literally, and wheeling in the new computers, the HP systems [0:35:00] and back systems. They hired me, but I had to get a job as a clerk. Hence, this is where the touch-typing came in because I had to pass a typing test. You used to have to do that. I got a job as a clerk for, I think, thirty or sixty days. You had to stay in the job a certain number of days.
I wrote my own job description at Pacific Missile [0:35:20] Test Center for a computer systems programmer. It was the first series in the Navy anywhere, as far as I knew, because I wrote it. Then I wrote my second one, which was computer systems specialist, and that was a GS-11 track.
Hellrigel:
This is at Point Mugu?
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
This is [0:35:40] in California?
Land:
Yes, it’s between Malibu and Port Hueneme.
Hellrigel:
You’re going to graduate, you’re going to stay in Athens, Georgia, and your husband get his master’s [degree]. Then he matches and takes the job at Point Mugu. Then you [0:36:00] start as clerical and you work your way up.
Land:
Well, they hired me. I didn’t work my way up. They hired me as a computer person. But they had no positions.
Hellrigel:
Right, yes, the label.
Land:
They said, if you want to go ahead and come in, you can come in this way. We’ll get you in the system and then you have to wait thirty days to change positions. [0:36:20] I’m like, sure, I’ll make money while I’m waiting. I don’t care. That was when I was the clerk. But going back to the guy and his copies, I would have made his copies.
Hellrigel:
Yes. Then you help write the job description. It’s also quite common for many people early [0:36:40] in the career as computers are developing because there are no jobs with that title or description.
Land:
Right. One of the interesting statistics is that in 1985, it saw the peak of women in computing. It’s because employers needed anybody that could code; anybody that could do [0:37:00] this, so they were really open to hiring women with less experience. Now, that stopped. But you look at it, those people did their jobs. Those people learned on the job. So, what are we doing? We funneled so much into formal academia.
Hellrigel:
Right. What’s your degree in? [0:37:20]
Land:
We limit opportunity for people. So. that’s one thing I’ve tried to do as a manager. When I was a manager at Northrop Grumman, one of my managers did not have a college degree, but they were totally competent, totally, but just didn’t have a college degree. So not everybody has that opportunity. [0:37:40] Especially now it’s pretty unaffordable.
Hellrigel:
Yes, it has gotten quite expensive. So, you’re going to start at Point Mugu in 1983 or 1984?
Land:
I think, yes, 1984. [0:38:00]
Hellrigel:
How did you like living in California?
Land:
It was interesting. When we moved there, we had like a studio apartment. I didn’t even know what a studio was, where everything’s all in one room. Then we bought a house, but the market out there was so expensive, [0:38:20] so we weren’t in a great area. I learned a lot about how important it is to pick where you’re going to move. Our whole marriage, we’ve kind of bought houses, done the work ourselves, and then resold the house. That was our first kind of resale. [0:38:40] We were fortunate because we resold it right before the first housing market crash in California. We’ve had pretty good timing on that kind of thing. It was interesting. I liked it. Everybody is outside all the time because of the weather. We hiked in the Sierras a lot. [0:39:00] We went snow skiing a lot. We had some great friends because [President Ronald] Reagan was hiring all those young civil servants. There was no contractor. The only contractor at Point Mugu was the guy that came to fix the Xerox copier. We were all civil servants. Now that’s completely changed today where you see, [0:39:20] half of my staff are contractors. Half are civilians and half are contractors.
Hellrigel:
This is part of the Reagan era with the influx of funding into defense-related work.
Land:
Right. Yes. I was working on the Standard Missile II which was a really, really, early, [0:39:40] early test version. My husband was working on the AMRAAM concept. We tested the guidance portions. They did the hardware in the loop at Point Mugu.
Hellrigel:
You start with computer work and you’re [0:40:00] at Point Mugu for designing then the code and the computers that are going to control the missile systems?
Land:
Yes, doing the hardware and the loop testing.
Hellrigel:
Did you find this fun or a challenge?
Land:
Well, so [0:40:20] what happened there is that we started hearing about Macintosh computers, and somehow I got a hold of one Mac. Remember the old square Mac? I figured out a way around procurement because I thought this, the designing, how you could use this, they were [0:40:40] the only computers you could really design on. They had software for, so--
Hellrigel:
Graphics.
Land:
Exactly. And programs for engineering design and that kind of thing, and also software development, that kind of thing. I figured out a way around the procurement system and ordered a bunch of Macs. I got permission and [0:41:00] ordered Macs for all the engineers. They were really glitchy. I don’t know if you remember, but everybody jokes about Windows crashing. Macintosh used to be the glitchiest thing in the world. You had to have a million and one workaround for the software. There might be a problem or a bug in the software. I started, [0:41:20] I don’t know, I have this intuitive thing with computers. I figured out how to fix a lot of the bugs, how to work around a lot of the bugs, tips and guidance for working with different pieces of software, so I started writing about it and I set up a users’ group. There was a newsletter called the Mac Core Update. [0:41:40] That was my newsletter. It was for DoD. We had the intranet, but it was before the internet. I used to send all my letters through the orange envelopes. I put the newsletter in it and send it to the Pentagon, so that’s how I [0:42:00] routed all my newsletters. The users group grew to I don’t know, I think I had like 700 people on it, which was pretty big back then thinking I had to do everything by hand.
Hellrigel:
By fixing the bugs, you’re also learning the coding? [0:42:20]
Land:
Yes. I looked back at one of my early performance appraisals and I’m like, what kind of code. I have them in my books in my office. I have these books for my career where I have stuff in them. But I was looking back and it’s like, what code is this? It talked about how I was writing in [0:42:40] this really obscure language. I don’t even know what language it is today. I’d have to go back and look because I can’t remember what it was. Like I said, I don’t remember a lot of stuff. I have a pathological looking forward. But yes, I was writing in code, and I don’t know what it was.
Hellrigel:
Who helped you or did you just decide [0:43:00] that you’re a good puzzler and you are going to figure it out?
Land:
I really love computers; I loved it. When I went to Georgia, they did not have a computer science department. They had got a computer science program in 1984.
Hellrigel:
Oh.
Land:
The year I graduated is the year they set up. There was no way [0:43:20] I was doing computer engineering because that was just a nightmare. It’s not the same thing. So, that’s where I fell into computers. Then I started, and I just leveraged that experience into more and more software development. [0:43:40] I did all the languages like C++ and Java, and then I went into Oracle. I really liked the database side of things. This was when databases were exploding. I forget the years. I think it was in the 1990s. [0:44:00] It was great. I loved doing that job.
Hellrigel:
How long are you at Point Mugu?
Land:
Oh, God. I don’t know; we were in California, I think, eight years. I was at Mugu for three years because I had kids. I had my first child and then they wanted me to work at home, [0:44:20] but there was no work-at-home program. So, this mentor of mine set up a work-at-home program and me and two other people at Point Mugu were in it. It was again, another first of its kind. I worked at home with my first child, but my children are seventeen months apart. So, I was like, I can’t work at home with two babies.
Hellrigel:
[0:44:40] They’re going to create this work at home for you and two other people. Recently, I recorded Mary Lynn Nielsen’s oral history as she was retiring from the IEEE Standards Association. When she was having her kids, she and a couple of the women became the test [0:45:00] case for work at home. They were too valuable and they were able to say this is the project that I’m going to do. Someone from Standards came and set up a tower computer and she worked on a project at home and had the flexibility. Now there are policies, but back [0:45:20] then there were no policies. Did you have maternity leave?
Land:
No.
Hellrigel:
No? When you’re working at home, what are you working on? Is it different than when you’re working in the office?
Land:
Oh, so there was a woman, her name was Doris Malesko, and she worked in another [0:45:40] part of the base. I think she found out about me through my newsletters. I was doing that Mac users group thing. She found out I was like leaving, and she said, no, let’s do this work-at-home thing. You can evaluate software and write articles for me. So, that’s [0:46:00] what I did. I had to turn in like one article a week, which was fine. She really believed in me, and she did not want me to leave. She said, you can’t just sit at home, you have to do something. She believed in my skill set. [0:46:20]
Hellrigel:
Did she have kids?
Land:
I don’t know. She retired like ten or fifteen years ago and I called her. It was when I was president of the Computer Society, and on the Board and stuff, and I published my books already. I told her that she was [0:46:40] instrumental in my career and that I would never forget what she did for me and how she believed in me. It was the belief that was the most important thing. And she just was astounded. She had no idea.
Hellrigel:
If you made a list, what do you think are some of your most important or cool firsts?
Land:
Well, [0:53:20] working with Oracle before they were structured for massive data sets. That’s what I ran into with this bus data thing. You’re talking terabytes of data, but at the time, there was no way, and we had to physically with code partition [0:53:40] across servers. Now, they do that for you. Doing all that kind of stuff where you’re trying to figure it out. Working it with America’s Army and the game developers were amazing. We had two different pods of game developers, one in [0:54:00] Oakland and one in Research Triangle. These are the guys that when they weren’t developing for me, they would go and do the software for Pirates of the Caribbean, and then they’d come back. So, really super-talented, but different type of people to work with. [They were] really different; they preferred to work [0:54:20] starting at 8:00 at night and work all night. Fine, just get it done.
That’s where I sort of started as a manager being more task-oriented. I don’t care and it was perfect for COVID. I don’t care when you work, just get your tasks done. As a manager, you have to be more task-oriented, and that takes [0:54:40] some discipline.
Trying to model some of those first models, for example, a soldier climbing up a rope or there were some basic training in the beginning of this game that you had to go through, or the ballistics of the guns. We put real ballistic models in [0:55:00] America’s Army and there were a number of patents that we got for some of the things, some of the modeling. It was pushing boundaries. I tried to work with IEEE to get some gaming standards developed and I think there’s some work going on in that area. At the time, there was a real need [0:55:20] for standards. How many polygons can you put to hit a certain threshold or what’s optimal. Different kinds of things that you hit limits in gaming, which I don’t know if they’re still there, but they were at the beginning.
Hellrigel:
Do you play video games?
Land:
I used to. [0:55:40] I do the hidden object adventure games. If I’m ever on a trip, I’ll download one of those. It’s like where you walk in the room, and you have to find the scepter and then you go into another room. So, those I play, but that’s really the only thing I play. [0:56:00]
Hellrigel:
You’re working at Point Mugu, you’re at Eglin, so are you pending most of your career on these bases? [0:56:20]
Land:
Oh, yes, definitely. Now we’re at Redstone. So, I’ve spent my whole life supporting in some manner of speaking, including America’s Army because it was a recruiting tool for the Army, supporting DOD (Department of Defense).
Hellrigel:
This is mostly Air Force? [0:56:40]
Land:
Oh, no. It was Navy at Point Mugu. It was Air Force at Eglin. Then, I don’t know, it’s Tri-Service [the Army, Navy, and Air Force] at MDA (Missile Defense Agency). If anything, it’s more Army.
Hellrigel:
How do you then make this segue into management. If I were to look at your career, you transition to management.
Land:
Yes, [0:57:00] so just managing. I made a conscious decision at a certain point to get out of software and more into program management because you can’t control your destiny, and that’s why I write my books. It’s like if you don’t understand engineering process, if you look at engineering process, [0:57:20] electrical engineering, software engineering, civil engineering; it’s requirements definition, it’s design, it’s implementation, it’s test. So, the overall process is the same. But at the time it’s not taught in school and people didn’t know that you had to define requirements before [0:57:40] you went out and made a bid on the business side. They didn’t involve the technical people in any of the business development, so there were huge disconnects. I was on team, after team, after team where we’d be working until 1:00 and 2:00 in the morning and all-day Saturday, because some business geek somewhere had decided that this is what they could sell this development effort for. [0:58:00] I got sick of it. So, that’s how I got into process improvement. And also, teams that didn’t have configuration management or didn’t know how to develop requirements or whatever. So, that’s how I found IEEE. They [IEEE] had standards that talked about software requirements development, and software design. Now, they’ve redone [0:58:20] it. At the time, they were individual standards, which I thought were better. But what do I know? I’m just an implementer. Now, they have the 12207, which I think is a little obtuse and hard for people to really understand.
When they did away with those individual guides and standards, that’s when I wrote my books. I’m like, here’s how you apply it. [0:58:40] I’ll explain 12207. Here’s how you apply the software standards. Here’s what it means to do requirements development. Here’s in a real sense, and I give real examples.
Land:
No, I don’t know. All I know is I still get checks. It’s interesting, my residual checks [1:00:00] have remained constant. How can a book that old still be [earning residuals]? I must have hit a nerve because I’m still getting the same amount of residual check that I got sort of when I started, which is interesting.
Hellrigel:
You wrote these books and published in 2005, [1:00:20] 2006.
Land:
Right.
Hellrigel:
Where do you find the time to write?
Land:
So, that’s crazy. because that’s when I was doing America’s Army and I was literally from 7:00 to midnight working that program. I was also doing volunteer work at IEEE. I also had kids and I also was writing these books. So, you tell me; I [1:00:40] don’t know. I don’t know where I got the time, but I did.
Hellrigel:
I guess you sleep in catnaps.
MITRE
Land:
I didn’t sleep. That was the time, and that was one of the reasons I left. America’s Army delivered. We got it delivered. It was successful. It was competing in the top ten. I worked for Northrop Grumman, and at the [1:01:00] time I was a section manager and tech director for the Huntsville area. I asked them to pull me back and not have me on that program anymore, but they wouldn’t do it. They said, you’re too valuable. Well, that’s the best way to lose people. So, I left, and I went to MITRE.
Hellrigel:
You have worked for many of the [1:01:20] top defense-related companies. Do you like any of them better than the others? Looking at your career, you jumped because...
Land:
Yes. I really like Northrop, but it was Northrop Grumman Task. I was in the IT sector and [1:01:40] I really liked it. But there was some local management that was dysfunctional. It’s always your immediate manager. The reason people quit is their immediate manager. My director, I was a manager, the director was a great guy, but there were issues. We just didn’t agree on my path forward. [1:02:00] Then, MITRE I loved. I always leave because I purposefully want to make a career change. They were inside. I worked at MITRE, and I was supporting missile defense. They were redesigning the C2BMC, [1:02:20] which is the command control battle management communications, which is the backbone of missile defense. It’s all the algorithms; it’s the networks. It’s what connects the sensors to the shooters. They brought me in with another guy because they had this idea about concurrency. They wanted to be able to use software to be one of the levels of safety. At DOD, [1:02:40] the military in the past, what they would do is they would pull the plug, so it had to be a physical connection to be in fire-control systems. We’re talking fire control where you’re going to push a button. The warfighter’s going to push a button and launch a missile. They wanted to be able to have a physical connection for the messaging.
Hellrigel:
What would you label yourself? For some people when we’re the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the word engineers rubs them the wrong way. Then who wants to be called a scientist? [1:04:40] Who wants to be called an engineer? Who wants to be called a technologist.
Land:
No, I don’t care. You can call me Mary. I don’t care. All I know is that I get the job and I get the job done.
Hellrigel:
While this is going on, you’re also going to get your master’s [degree] to advance your career.
Land:
Yes, I got my master’s [degree] in program management, IT program management. [1:05:00] I never needed a master’s degree. I never needed it until I got to a certain level and I thought it would help me compete, so that’s the only reason it got it. I got my master’s. FIT [Florida Institute of Technology] has a [1:05:20] larger master’s campus here in Huntsville, [Alabama] than it does in Melbourne, [Florida]. It is an in-person master’s campus, so that’s where I went.
I went into management on purpose. Then in a kind of a natural [1:05:40] progression, I went into acquisition oversight. Because again, getting to that, making sure that the technical people have a voice, right. I’ve been a program manager. I’ve been a developer. I’ve been all these things. I’ve been involved in contracts and acquisition because that’s what MDA does. We work with contractors. [1:06:00] My position now is to really make sure that the technical people are heard and also that the contractor’s voice is heard because remember I was a contractor for a year. Many times, there’s this adversarial [1:06:20] attitude between the government and contractors. Some of that’s just the natural trying to capture the work or trying to, I don’t know, everybody tries to maximize their dollar. But you need to keep it where everybody, all the voices, can be heard.
Hellrigel:
Acquisition oversight means that you look at all the contracts [1:06:40] coming in from contractors and the workflow?
Land:
Let’s say that THAAD Missiles wants to get some new seekers. That has to go on contract, so the engineers have to define the requirements, and I manage [1:07:00] the team that facilitates all of that process. My folks that work for me work with the engineers, help get the statement of work defined, work to get the RFP developed, and work with contracts, so all of that. [1:07:20] So, that whole process until it gets on contract and then after facilitating some of the feedback.
Hellrigel:
Is there anything else you’d like to say on your career before we jump to IEEE proper.
Land:
No. I’ve [1:13:00] just been really fortunate and I tell everybody that. I’ve got someone that works for me now that I’m really encouraging to get a degree because now it’s such a requirement. People will waive the requirement for her to come work for me because she’s so good. But if something happens to this current job [1:13:20] setup where the company doesn’t get the contract again, she’s a contractor, or I leave or whatever, she’s in a world of hurt trying to find another job.
Hellrigel:
Right, because they’re going to say, oh, you don’t have the degree, or you don’t have a degree in X. And it seems almost, even when you look [1:13:40] at IEEE, the world’s become so overly specialized, that this label to that label to that label.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
We’ll be coming back and forth to your career.
How do you find IEEE or how does IEEE find you? [1:14:00] How do you get involved with IEEE?
Land:
I was leading software teams at a company called BTG [Delta Research Division] which is I think no longer in existence. The head of the company was really a process-improvement leader for CMM. [1:14:20] If you remember CMM, capability maturity model, before the CMMI, the capability maturity model integration. So anyway, I got tapped. I was using the standards for my teams to train them. I was a lead, you know how to do requirements and how to talk to customers [1:14:40] because customers wanted things right away, that kind of thing. And using IEEE standards as the go-to authority, right. They did away with the guides, so there was a fellow that worked for BTG, Tom Hannon. I went to Tom Hannon, and I said, why [1:15:00] are they doing this? Why are they doing this! This is craziness. These are the most valuable things that IEEE has to offer. He said, if you don’t agree, you can submit a paper to a conference and tell them what you think. It was the International Software Engineering Symposium or something like that. [1:15:20] I’m like, they’re not going to listen to me, and he said, oh yes, they will. So, I submitted a paper, it got accepted, and then I went to this conference. I met all the movers and shakers in software engineering, [including] Jim Moore, he’s my friend to this day. Just many, many folks from all over the world. [1:15:40] They listened to me, and they said, well, we would like for you to do a survey of software engineering standards users. The internet was very, very new still, and I did one of the first internet-based surveys, had coded that. [1:16:00] I did two of those surveys: what are your standards users doing, what do they think is important. We got them that feedback right away and they still did away with those guides. I wrote my books.
Hellrigel:
Right. So, you’re going to get involved then with IEEE in the late or [1:16:20] mid-1990s and you come through the standards door.
Land:
Yes. I tell people this, we need more hooks in IEEE because I was a volunteer for standards for three years before I was ever a member. The reason I became a member [1:16:40] is I was working on a standard and I wanted to be part of the ballot pool. You can be on a standards Working Group and be a volunteer all day long, and not be an IEEE member. But when you want to ballot on the standard, you have to join, so that’s how they hooked me. And I’m like, why are we not paying [1:17:00] attention to more hooks?
Hellrigel:
That’s what Mary Lynne Nielsen, [retired staff from IEEE Standards] Association, said in her oral history. She explained the working group, and said that as staff, she could be in the working group, but she couldn’t be in the ballot group.
Land:
Right. And well, she could if she joined IEEE.
Hellrigel:
Right, right. But then maybe there would be a conflict of interest if you work for IEEE [1:17:20] Standards Association? I don’t know. So, your entre is the IEEE Standards Association or standards work.
Land:
Yes, so I was the chair of PMBOK adoption twice, the Project Management Body of Knowledge. [1:17:40] Then I was chair of the [IEEE] Computer Society, so I was chair of Software Engineering Standards Committee. Then I was VP of Standards for the [IEEE] Computer Society. So, I was VP of Standards before I was [1:18:00] anything else. I think I was second VP of the Computer Society at the time.
IEEE Computer Society
Hellrigel:
When do you become involved with the IEEE Computer Society?
Land:
That’s it, I was on this. The Computer Society at the time was the largest developer of [1:18:20] standards in IEEE, at the time, they had over 100,000 members, 150,000 members at the time. So, being Chair in Software Engineering Standards where that was what everybody was talking about, right. So, [IEEE] Capability Maturity Model (CMM), Lean Six Sigma, all this stuff; process improvement [1:18:40] in IEEE Standards. It was a big deal; to be the Vice President of SC-SC [IEEE-SA Sensors Council Standards Committee] was a big deal.
Then also there were some broken relationships. I found out about IEEE proper because when you’re in one of these Societies or a Working Group, you don’t even realize that there’s this whole other IEEE organization [1:19:00] out there. You don’t. I realized it because I had to repair some relationships between the [IEEE] Computer Society and the [IEEE] Standards Association. There was a lot of dysfunction there. So anyway, I was a VP of Standards first, and that’s how I got involved with the Computer Society.
Hellrigel:
[1:19:20] Then working with standards got you to the IEEE Computer Society, which then got you to the IEEE Standards Association, which got you to IEEE.
Land:
Well, sort of.
Hellrigel:
Sort of?
Land:
The Standards Association, I started to realize it. Then the Computer Society was very myopic. They were very insular. They had had some presidents and executive [1:19:40] directors that did not want to participate [with IEEE]. It was a very adversarial relationship with IEEE, and that’s not healthy and it’s not good. What I realized as I was coming up to Computer Society was that, and I don’t know how this was, but that we needed to be players [1:20:00] in the arena. We had no volunteers. Computer Society had no volunteers up at IEEE, so I made a concerted effort to start recruiting people like me to go and be Directors, to be not just a Director in name only, but to get involved in other committees on IEEE. Now you look, it’s [1:20:20] a lot more equitable.
Then there were some things that were [unfair]. There was a publications algorithm that was very unfair to the larger Societies or Societies that publish a lot. And that was because we had enough people up there who were telling that story, that sort of got unwound.
Hellrigel:
By unfair, you mean, the [1:20:40] allocation of funding?
Land:
Unfair, yes, like robbing Peter to pay Paul. Well, if you rob Peter enough, Peter’s going to start to shrink, which is what happened to the Computer Society and start to get into financial trouble, which is what happened at the Computer Society. Now they’re back on the right track. But you’ve got to have the right representation at the higher level, [1:21:00] or in TAB, Technical Activities, or informed Directors who are going to advocate for you, which you can do there at TAB. We didn’t have the right people. We didn’t have the right people plugged in.
Land:
I was a member of a bunch of different Societies. I’ve joined TMC [IEEE Technology Management Council. I’m a member of all the Councils. But I’m not one of these people, I’m not, a lot of people join and because they’re running for [1:23:20] an office or they do whatever. And I don’t do that. I’m not going to join Power and Energy. I’m not an electrical engineer working on power lines, right, or for a power company. Why would I join?
Hellrigel:
Have you worked with IEEE Council on Superconductivity people? [1:23:40]
Land:
Yes, a few.
Hellrigel:
They were one of the first oral history projects I worked on when I was hired. Through your Standards work you’re going to get the attention of the IEEE Computer Society and you’re going to join. Can you be a member of Computer Society and not IEEE? I [1:24:00] forget. Some of the societies allow this.
Land:
Yes, you can be an affiliate, but that came later. I joined the standards association. You can be a member of IEEE-SA and not a member of the Computer Society. Then I joined the Computer Society, and I don’t know, I started becoming active. [1:24:20] You can’t just sit and do standards. So, I did a bunch of different stuff. I was VP of conferences for Computer Society and changed the conference model.
Hellrigel:
Yes, how do you mean change the model?
Land:
I came in and this was before automation, so all of the conference application [1:24:40] forms were called TMRFs. They were digital, but they were individual digital files. We were losing money in conferences and I’m like, how is this happening? You know, the Computer Society may still have the largest number of conferences, but at the time it had the [1:25:00] largest number of conferences. It’s like publications, how can you lose money on publications? If you remember, everything’s reported and was reported in net, so it was very hard to see gross to net. What happens? Where are all the algorithms taking the money? What’s going on? That was one of the TAB initiatives, the FinTrans [financial transparency], that we did [1:25:20] to try to unwind all the spaghetti. Then that led to this whole new financial system with IEEE because it’s important for everybody, all the stakeholders to understand the finances.
Again, going back to what motivates me, and why I gave that talk to the people [the 2021 IEEE President’s Town Hall talk to IEEE staff]. I am so wound up in finances because of my upbringing. [1:25:40] I want to know what the bottom line is and where the money’s coming from. If you don’t understand that, then what are you doing? Why are you losing money the more you publish? Why are you losing money when you have all these conferences?
I looked at the conferences and I had to build this giant spreadsheet. I set thresholds, so the number of people over a [1:26:00] three-year period, the number of attendees. I don’t know, there are lots of sort of metrics. They had a social budget. This was the most important things, they had a social budget and they had a technical budget. Well, some of them had a social budget and you [1:26:20] couldn’t tax, so their social budget was kind of ignored. They would have, let’s say it was $100,000 conference. Well, they might have a social budget that was $60,000. That is not a technical activity.
Hellrigel:
Right, that’s all the drinks and social activities.
Land:
Paying for sleigh rides in Canada [1:26:40] is not a technical activity. I looked at all the metrics across all the conferences and then kind of held things and then came up saying, okay, we’ve got to stop. It was a surplus-driven model, right? So, you’re given a budget, you propose a budget, and you’re supposed to generate a surplus, [1:27:00] but there’s no incentive. People are incentivized. I did a survey of all the conference organizers and leaders, and the number one thing they said was, we want to be able to keep some of our budget for planning for the next year, even if it’s on paper. If we generate a $15,000 surplus, then give us $5,000 of [1:27:20] that virtually so that we can plan. I think some of that happened. But what I had to work on was surplus-driven doesn’t make any sense for anybody. We went to a straight flat fee and combined the social and technical budget. It’s one budget. You spend it however you want, but it’s going to get taxed regardless, [1:27:40] and that really started forcing people to put it in the technical area so that they could raise more revenue because of this fee.
Hellrigel:
And by tax, what would you assess?
Land:
Just like 15 percent, I think is what it was across for Technical Activities.
Hellrigel:
And that goes back to IEEE. That tax means a percentage back to IEEE?
Land:
[1:28:00] It goes to Technical Activities. Instead of a surplus, they had to generate a 15 percent surplus. Well, instead of doing that, you’re just going to get assessed the 15 percent. We’re going to stop playing games because there was no punishment, if they [1:28:20] didn’t generate their surplus, nobody ever cancels anything in IEEE. There were conferences that were going for years and years that were running negative, negative, negative, negative, and there was no consequence. We’ve got to make it and my responsibility at the time as VP of Conferences was to make this go positive. [1:28:40]
Hellrigel:
When you’re VP of Conferences, are there any conferences you sunset?
Land:
That’s not really up to the VP of Conferences. In the Computer Society there were all these different subgroups and that’s up to them. [1:29:00] They would make a recommendation to sunset. My responsibility, I was like the police officer. I’m like, what are you doing? Yes. I shined a light, and it was interesting because I had to, again, nothing was automated and there were no mailing lists. I had to build a mailing list of all the conference leaders, their treasurers, and their whatever, and then send out [1:29:20] emails. One of my first emails to everybody was that we’re losing $10,000 a day in conferences, and we have to make a difference. Yes, it was over a million dollars a year. This wasn’t trivial, right? This was a big problem that nobody had fixed.
I always take each job, and I never think I’m going to [1:29:40] get another job in IEEE because I’m kind of busy changing stuff, or looking into stuff, or pissing people off and I made a lot of people mad, but then when I started explaining it and communicating it and socializing it, they understood.
Hellrigel:
Now, you go in and you just look around and you get this [1:30:00] feel, that oh, this is strange or why is that?
Land:
Yes, I have a real knack for process. I don’t know. I have a knack for finding an issue. I do that at my day job. I’m doing that right now with some standard operating procedures. There’s some stuff that’s [1:30:20] really major confusion, jacked up, so we’re fixing it.
Hellrigel:
If you’re joining IEEE in the early 1990s, and then you are going to be elected president of the Computer Society in 2009, that’s [1:30:40] quick.
Land:
Yes, I thought I would never get elected. I did some stuff in Standards and made some improvements there. I did some stuff in conferences, made some improvements there, and I was working on other committees and stuff across the Computer Society. I don’t know. I got elected but I thought after I did that I wasn’t trying. I’ve never been political, [1:31:00] honestly, and I look back and think it’s kind of amazing that I got elected president after I reformed the conferences.
Hellrigel:
How do you decide to run for office, does someone walk up to you at a conference and say, hey, listen, you should be the next president? How do you get roped into that?
Land:
People will tell, yes, [1:31:20] they are like, you need to run, you need to run, you need to run. And lots of times I’ll wait, like, they asked me to run for TAB VP for years, and I said, no, I don’t have enough experience. I need to understand the finances. I need to understand, so I served on different committees across IEEE and across Technical Activities. I [1:31:40] didn’t understand all the different Societies and Councils, so I served on a committee that reviews them for a couple of years. But there’s a lot when you’re TAB VP. If you know the job you’re getting into, I try to prepare for it. [1:32:00] If you’re going to make a difference, you need to understand it so you can make a difference when you’re there.
Hellrigel:
You’re pretty good at quickly assessing the lay of the land. Like if someone would say to you here IEEE has thirty-nine Societies and eight Technical Councils, then your head already starts going, [1:32:20] that you have to get your head around that.
Land:
Yes, I’m really good at organizational improvement and that kind of thing.
Hellrigel:
And while you’re doing this, you have a job.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
And you have a family.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
I’m going to take a side-step. How do you do all that? [1:32:40]
Land:
Well, I talk to women’s groups when they ask me to, and I tell them, you can’t have it all. You know, for years in the 1980s, we were told we could have it all, right? You can’t. That’s stupid. Anybody that thinks you can have it all without some tremendous support from your spouse or tremendous support from your parents or whatever support system [1:33:00] you have, is crazy. So, my two kids. My husband is always joking, saying he’s had the same job. He’s worked for the government. He just retired this year and became a contractor for the first time in his life, so he’s kind of double-dipping. We’re getting the retirement and [1:33:20] he’s seeing it’s different. It’s different. He likes it.
Hellrigel:
How is it different?
Land:
You’re not the decision authority, for one. In the government, and that’s one of the reasons I insourced again is because I wanted to have the decision [1:33:40] authority. When you’re a contractor, you’re really jumping to the tune of whatever that contract is, whoever that management is, whatever, you got to make money. In the government, we’re really more oversight and it [1:34:00] just depends on what part of the government you work in.
Hellrigel:
So, part of being able to do this is you’ve had a supportive spouse.
Land:
Oh, yes. Yes. It’s not perfect, right. If you’ve got all these high expectations that laundry is going to get done perfectly, and [1:34:20] I’m crazy about keeping my house up, so I would come home from work and be doing laundry or whatever, if it wasn’t done. But there’s the practical aspects of having a household and a family. If you want that, and then working a job that keeps you away until 1:00 a.m., your spouse has [1:34:40] to know that you’re working, that that’s important to you, support that and not have their own agenda. It has to be a joint agenda. We were also remodeling houses during this time. Remember I told you that we’d buy a house and remodel it. When we moved to Florida, we bought a house and remodeled it, a major extensive remodel. The [1:35:00] house I’m in now, we’re always doing something. That’s what we do together, and we are really good working projects together like that.
Land:
Yes, I had to justify it. It’s very hard for people in industry. I was lucky, [1:39:40] my first job, I worked for BTG and they were very into it, so they supported it. But at first, volunteers have to pay for everything. My company paid for me to go to that conference, so I was very lucky, and they paid for my standards work. Then you get to a certain point, like where your VP of Standards [1:40:00] and IEEE starts to pay for your travel. But then you have to negotiate with your company because I’m not taking my leave. I’m just not. This work I think is valuable to the company, but it’s up to me to describe to the company why it’s important and why it should matter. And people, they don’t take control of their careers, I don’t think. [1:40:20] I have briefings that go back all the way to the 1990s, so here’s the value, here’s the benefit. I had to do that at Northrop. I had to do that, and I was a high-level manager, IT fellow, right, and for Northrop. But still, you have to do make the case because [1:40:40] they’re going to use overhead funding to pay for whatever you’re doing. And also, overhead funding, they can’t charge a contract when you’re getting paid to be at an IEEE meeting. They have to find money for your salary. People need to understand that and then just make the case, so here’s the value-add. I did [1:41:00] that at MITRE and I did that at MDA.
Hellrigel:
Are you giving papers at the IEEE conferences?
Land:
Not anymore. I used to. But I did. When you’re [IEEE] President you give talks. I was the COVID president, so I think [1:41:20] I did more presentations. I was trying to find the stats. I think I might’ve sent you a briefing, and I’m looking for that briefing, I can’t find it.
Hellrigel:
I’ll go through my notes.
Land:
Yes, because I gave more talks, I think, than would have been physically possible if I were traveling. I know that [1:41:40] for sure, because I would talk to India in the morning and then like San Juan, Puerto Rico in the evening. I did that pretty much every day while I was President and those were all different things. Then when I was running, you can’t campaign, but you can give technical talks. I gave a lot of technical talks. But a lot of my talks, [1:42:00] what I prefer to do are to young professionals or to students and like here’s how you create a resume. A lot of these students started sending me their resumes and they’re terrible, terrible, terrible. I would never hire them. So, [1:42:20] I’m trying to give them practical advice. Here’s an example of a good resume. Here’s a bad one. Here’s how you keep track of your performance using the STAR technique to sell yourself to your company to get promoted. You know, things like that.
Hellrigel:
What’s the STAR technique?
Land:
Just Google it. It’s really great. I have all my current employees doing it [1:42:40] because everybody nowadays has to do self-appraisals and then that’s what gives your boss the ammo to get you a raise or whatever. But if you don’t give them anything, they can’t do much. Basically, you document what you did, why it mattered, and the impact. [1:43:00]
IEEE Presidency
Hellrigel:
We could jump to your IEEE presidency then. You were the COVID year IEEE President-elect as the shutdown started in 2020.
Land:
I was the COVID couple of years. -
Hellrigel:
Right, you were [1:43:20] President-Elect and Toshi [Toshio Fukuda] was the 2020 IEEE President.
Land:
Right. They shut down all the travel and everything, I think midterm Toshi’s year. It caught me as President-Elect and it caught me as President, but I was fine with it. We focused. [1:43:40] We did a ton of work. I was totally fine with not traveling everywhere. I didn’t travel.
The TAB VP has a travel budget, and I’m like, why is the TAB Vice President [IEEE Technical Activities Board, Vice President] traveling? They have no reason to travel. None. I’m sorry, I’m just an honest person. [1:44:00] Maybe I’m too honest sometimes, but I didn’t feel right about using that to pre-campaign for anything, which is what people do. I’m the TAB VP, so I’m going to the Region 6 meeting, or I’m going to the Region 10 meeting. Why? Why? So, I took that money, and I used it [1:44:20] for STEM grants and I used it for other stuff to fund things in IEEE.
Hellrigel:
Yes, reviewing your career I noticed that you came up to the presidency through both IEEE Standards and TAB.
I’m just going to take one sidestep, between the IEEE Computer Society presidency [1:45:40] and becoming IEEE President-elect, you were elected an IEEE Fellow.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
How did you find out you were elected an IEEE Fellow? I guess you get an email or something in November [or December] of 2017.
Land:
You know people are working on your nomination package because they ask [1:46:00] you for information. It’s not a super-secret thing. Now, sometimes when you get nominated for HKN, that’s a surprise because that’s a much easier process, right. But [nominees for] Fellow, [those] people know.
Hellrigel:
[1:46:20] What does being an IEEE Fellow mean to you?
Land:
It just signifies that my body of work that I’ve done, [indicates] that I do have technical chops.
Hellrigel:
[1:46:40] In regard to IEEE Fellows, there are far fewer women Fellows than men.
Land:
Right. But remember, I was an IT Fellow at Northrop Grumman. The IT sector has 120,000 employees, and at the time, they had like, thirty fellows so [1:47:00] that was pretty significant. It didn’t make a difference at all in my job. Did not affect my career. Didn’t make a difference.
Hellrigel:
Do you think it would have affected your career [1:47:20] if you were in academia?
Land:
Oh, sure, yes. But that’s why a lot of people from industry don’t even care about being a Fellow, because it doesn’t affect your career at all.
Hellrigel:
That’s usually the response I get to that question. Then IEEE-HKN [Eta Kappa Nu], how do you get [1:47:40] elected to that because you have an undergraduate degree in education and then you started a technical career.
Land:
I got inducted as a professional. I do have the IT master’s degree. The thing we’re missing here is that I went back to college [1:48:00] and I took forty, thirty semester hours in computer science. I took all of the undergraduate core classes in computer science at, whoa, what was the university? I can’t remember the name, but anyway, a technical university. But like data structures and, I didn’t just fall [1:48:20] into all the classic knowledge on my own. I did go to college for that for thirty semester hours.
Hellrigel:
Right. I think you were out in California?
Land:
No, that was in Florida.
Hellrigel:
[1:50:00] How do you get tracked to become IEEE President?
Land:
I don’t know. I think it’s like the lightning has to strike. I always think that the hardest part is getting through N&A [IEEE Nominations and Appointments Committee]. It’s so political. The tricky thing about [1:50:20] it is, and why I think I’m like a miracle president is because I never really put that as a goal. I was always focused on, let’s fix this, let’s work this, let’s do this, and kind of ruffling feathers, but not in a bad way, but like FinTrans (financial transparency), let’s dig in. Staff [1:50:40] didn’t like that. The Societies and Councils didn’t necessarily understand what we were doing.
I was on that stupid 2030 Committee, that disaster, where they were trying to change [the Board of Directors]. The previous [IEEE] President Barry Shoup was trying to change the Board to make it a commercial board and [1:51:00] remove the volunteers. I was the TAB representative. I stood up and said, I’ll be the TAB rep and represent TAB here and make sure the communication’s going back and forth. I think because they saw that I was trying to do the communication. I don’t know, but that was a disaster.
Hellrigel:
Is that when they [1:51:20] were trying to shrink the size of the [IEEE] Board of Directors?
Land:
They were trying to shrink. Who knows what they were trying to do? I have no idea to this day. It was a disaster. It was not in the best interest of the organization, and nobody wanted it. So, why were they pushing it? I don’t know. I was on the side.
Hellrigel:
And by making Global Spec.
Land:
Yes, [1:51:40] I was the big mouth early on about what are we doing with Global Spec, when nobody was. I’m like, look at the financials on this.
Land:
They knew I had things I wanted to get done, I think, too. [1:53:20] I was going to work the STEM initiative regardless, and I funded some of that before I became president using some of my other money. As an officer of the organization, you have a budget for travel or other things, so I would use some of that money and do good within IEEE or try to get new initiatives started. I’m not a [1:53:40] saint. I’m just telling you. I just look for resources where I find them.
Hellrigel:
Right. The STEM initiative, what was your goal, was it K through 12?
Land:
Oh, yes, really early. Really [1:54:00] second grade through eighth grade was my target.
Hellrigel:
Do you think that’s been successful?
Land:
Oh, yes, I think so. It seems to be taking off. The portal is getting a lot of engagement. But the model I had from that [1:54:20] was, as I worked with STEM locally. There’s this group called, in Huntsville, it’s called HATS, the Huntsville Association of Technical Societies. They have this thing called STEDTRAIN [Science and Technology Education Training]. Don’t even ask me to get that acronym for you. But basically, they gave $60,000 in grants to teachers [1:54:40] K through 12 every year. They do that, and they’ve given out millions of dollars over the history of this organization. It’s IEEE and then other technical societies that are grouped together to raise money to do that. This is their main philanthropic initiative. Then they also do [1:55:00] some awards to local professionals. I also got the Huntsville Association Professional of the Year and another. They have two major awards. I won both the awards in the same year, which was super-crazy. That was a surprise. I didn’t know anybody was even watching what I was doing because I am [1:55:20] engaged in HATS for the STEDTRAIN stuff or was. I didn’t know that they were aware of what I was doing at IEEE, but, or in my career, because it’s a combined thing. It’s like what you’re doing on your job and your [volunteer work]. It was kind of wild to win both of those.
Hellrigel:
It must be nice to be recognized on the local level, too.
Land:
It’s very hard. In Huntsville it’s very hard. When I was IEEE President, there was like MDA, the general, the director of MDA sent it out. But people don’t really [1:56:00] understand what IEEE is, and it’s a shame because Huntsville has the largest number of Ph.Ds. per capita in the world. So, what are we doing wrong? Huntsville has a very active, big, big Chapter, big Section, but they’re not really reaching. They’ll have meetings. Don’t get me wrong. They’ll have a technical speaker and have 500 people show [1:56:20] up. But they don’t have the engagement and they don’t join IEEE. So, we’re doing good things in Huntsville, but it’s the name. I still go, IEEE, and people go, what? Even though, like MDA has a subscription to the digital library with IEL, [1:56:40] people should know what IEEE is. Some do.
I didn’t do all this for the recognition. That has been non-existent, right. Then there’s a part of me that thinks, well, if I was a man, I bet that it’d make the news. But then I just have to be like, well I’m not and it [1:57:00] didn’t. So that’s not why I do it.
Hellrigel:
But sometimes you would wonder why it doesn’t make the news more because there are a handful of women who’ve been president of IEEE, so it’s the atypical.
Hellrigel:
Your election results are quite outstanding in that you were the victor by nearly 5,000 votes, and many of the elections are very close. An election around your time, there was one that was a [1:59:20] difference of 500 votes.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
The victor of that election is still amazed that they came out on the end they did, because they did because they thought the other person was a stronger candidate. Who approaches you to say we [1:59:40] want to throw your name in?
Land:
I don’t know. I don’t know if I even know who put my name in. You just get an email from N&A and decide, all right, is this the right time? I’ll admit I looked, like, okay, what are my chances? I’ve always been aware politically of [2:00:00] the reality of me, what I’ve done, who I am and the people that are sitting in the places.
Hellrigel:
Pragmatic.
Land:
I looked and I’m like, what are my chances? Who’s on N&A? Who’s going to vote no? I actually listed all the people and said okay, well, I think I have a chance getting through N&A, because that’s the hardest part. [2:00:20] Then I looked who’s on the Board. Who’s going to vote no on the Board, and I realized I had the majority there. You have to be smart about it because if you put your name in and you don’t make it through, then it’s like a curse, right. Or if you put your name in and you don’t make it through the Board, then they don’t want to do it again. You have [2:00:40] to be aware, people you cannot be naive if you’re working in an organization like IEEE, or with a board of people. You have to understand who they are. I don’t care if it’s a vote that’s coming to the Board. You have to do your time. I think that’s one reason I’ve been so successful on some of my initiatives is I read the room. [2:01:00] If we bring this through now, can we get it through, who’s going to vote against it? If you don’t do that kind of thing, or who do I need to convince? If I socialize this, is it going to matter? There’s some really tricky things that we did. I’ll tell you [2:01:20] one thing I was really proud of at IEEE that we did, and you learn a lot about people’s character and who you would never nominate. Like I will never nominate some people because of my dealings with them on certain issues. One example, when I was President-Elect [2:01:40] I think, the VP of Conferences wanted my help because they were trying to change-- No, the VP of Publications, sorry, Larry [Lawrence Hall]. We were trying to change the right to change your name.
Hellrigel:
Oh, yes. [2:02:00]
Land:
Remember that? All the other organizations had already changed and allowed that, but IEEE was the last. In order to change your name on a publication, you have to reach out to every co-author and get written permission. It’s just some bogus stuff and it’s all metadata anyway. Then there was a group of people who were fighting [2:02:20] against it because they were academics. And because if you have a solid publication record and somebody else doesn’t, lots of times it’s women, but it could be somebody else. It could be somebody that’s trans that’s changed their name, but their record is broken, so then you look like you’re a better candidate than this person that has this broken publications record. [2:02:40] It’s incredibly self-serving. It’s incredibly unethical, in my opinion, to try to hold other people down through something like that, and IEEE is above that. We had to fight and fight and fight. Actually, there was some sneaky stuff. Like, what I’m talking about reading the room is that when we [2:03:00] were discussing this, the motion was tabled. These folks brought it up at the end of the meeting. We all had other meetings to go to. We start messaging and it’s about being connected. We all messaged each other, came back in the meeting. It was virtual. Reworked the wording on the fly, but we had already prepared kind of it. [2:03:20] Anyway, bottom line is we got it through and then I did a press announcement immediately so that it could not be changed. Maybe I was president; I don’t know.
Hellrigel:
I was at the Corporate Activity Strategy Forum yesterday and this is one of the issues that was talked about. [02:03:40] They talked about how it’s being implemented. We had somebody from Publications talk; give a presentation.
Land:
And they’re doing it or not? Do I need to get back with you all?
Hellrigel:
They are doing it.
Land:
Okay, good.
Hellrigel:
They are doing it.
Hellrigel:
Regarding the N&A process, you have to [2:06:20] put your portfolio together and go to that committee?
Land:
No, you don’t. I’m on N&A right now, and I have been on N&A for two years. That’s sort of one of the reasons the IEEE Past Presidents disappear because they’re on N&A, then they chair N&A, and then they’re on N&A. You’re [2:06:40] on N&A for three years, and when you’re on N&A, you can’t run for anything, which is fine. I’m not one of these that’s going to recycle anyway.
You get an email that says you’ve been nominated for this position and then you submit a packet. That’s one of the [2:07:00] other things that I’ve done. I try to talk to people about how to do that, because you wouldn’t believe the packets. People would just say, see enclosed when they have tell us about why you want to be on this committee. It’s competitive. There might be fifty or sixty people trying for one spot. People say on their application [2:07:20] package, see resume or because I want to, and you’re like zero. You rank them, so everybody gets ranked. All the committee ranks. Then you discuss maybe the top three, and then you select one and then it selects [2:07:40] one, and then it gets recommended to the Board. Either it’s recommended for confirmation, or it’s recommended by the President for further consideration. Then you have to go to the Board. If the Board says, yes, we want these two people or two out of the five or whatever, you [the person being considered] goes to the Board and they do a pitch, a five-minute pitch.
Hellrigel:
[2:08:00] The pitch would be at the IEEE Board of Directors meeting.
Land:
Right. They listen to all the pitches. First, you do a pitch to N&A. I am wrong, if you’re running for [IEEE] President, you do a pitch, but not any other office.
Hellrigel:
How did your pitch go? [2:08:20] You show up and what happens?
Land:
I was fine at N&A. I was fine. I’m never nervous speaking in public. But there’s two times in my career I’ve been nervous like crazy-nervous. When I was running for TAB VP, I had to speak to TAB. Then another time was when I was running for President. I spoke to the Board, and [2:08:40] I don’t know why, and then I got over it and I wasn’t anymore. But I’ve been a member of the Board. I interact with the Board. I speak to the Board all the time, but when you’re up there, and it’s, I guess because I, when I decide I want something, or I’m going to run, I’m all in. So, I guess because it was important to me, I was nervous. I don’t know.
Hellrigel:
Did you like [2:09:00] your experiences being on the IEEE Board of Directors?
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
Then you’re going to be the candidate and you’re going to run for IEEE President-Elect.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
That’s October of 2019, [2:13:00] and you were running against, I might mispronounce the gentleman’s name, is it Dejan?
Land:
Dejan Milojevic.
Hellrigel:
Dejan.
Land:
Yes, again, another opportunity to reform stuff because the election was a nightmare. [2:13:20] There’s an Election Oversight Committee, which was chaired by an individual who was friends with Dejan.
Hellrigel:
Oh.
Land:
Yes. So, even with them being friends, there were two incidents that were confirmed to be egregious violations of the campaign [2:13:40] rules, but they didn’t do anything. I looked at how do we prevent this from happening to people moving forward. We reformed the presidential election process totally…
Hellrigel:
Other people have talked about it, elections; wondering what if some people with deeper pockets had more [2:14:20] money to run a campaign?
Land:
This company was totally supporting him traveling all over the world, giving technical talks, but he was campaigning. It was stuff like that. So, HP Labs was supporting what he was doing in a big way, and I didn’t have that. [2:14:40] But so we, the thing was just like, I don’t look at it, he did what he did because he’s motivated by what he’s motivated by. I’m motivated differently. I wanted to make it so that nobody had to go through the same thing again. And so we changed, we reformed everything. And now they’re even expanding it to the division director or the director [2:15:00] elections, which I think is fantastic.
Hellrigel:
Right. And this is still working its way through because the elections and the support comes out of Corporate Activities.
Land:
They’re doing a great job, and they’ll make, they’ll change, do make slight changes and stuff, but it [2:15:20] has to be fair and equitable or we don’t get the right person.
Hellrigel:
Right, yes. They’re trying to make it so that if someone goes to a Region 1 meeting, both go to the Region 1 meeting. What are some of the issues that you thought you would tackle before [2:15:40] you become IEEE President-elect?
Land:
Well, I knew ethics. I knew reforming the ethics process. I knew STEM, because I was already working that and providing funding for some of that. I knew, what else, it’s all in that brief I sent you. [2:16:00]
Hellrigel:
Right, right.
Land:
Yes. And I can’t remember, like I said.
Hellrigel:
That’s okay.
Land:
That’s my problem; I look forward. But I had a whole list, right. So I’m like, here is my agenda. And I started working stuff before I even got nominated. I mean, I say that like, [2:16:20] because I wasn’t planning on, I figured there might be a chance I would run. But I was like, if I don’t get elected or I don’t get nominated, I’m still doing this stuff.
Hellrigel:
Right. And is there anything that you wanted to do that you didn’t get to do?
Land:
I don’t think so.
Hellrigel:
When you’re on the Board of Directors, I know even within the History Committee, there have been some disruptions. We had to have someone come [2:21:00] in two years ago, it would be 2022, who was our Robert’s Rules person. This was someone not on the History Committee to just make people follow operational rules. There were people [IEEE Members] not on the History Committee, coming to the committee meetings sort of, [2:21:20] not crashing them, because IEEE members could go to any meetings, but to tell them, okay, you can speak at this time, you can’t just keep jumping in.
Land:
Yes, yes.
Hellrigel:
As president, how do you manage the meeting? Did you find that--
Land:
Well, you better know Robert’s Rules and that helped because [2:21:40] in the Standards world, we all from the time I started with IEEE, Everybody in Standards uses Robert’s Rules and in TAB we use Robert’s Rules. The better you are at being the chair of the meeting, the better the meeting and more effective the meeting is going to go. It starts with planning the [2:22:00] meeting, time allotted for discussion, and being informed, right. [For example], staff may think and item is going to be a ten-minute item, but it’s going to be a thirty-minute item because you are aware of all the back talk and what’s going on, that kind of stuff.
Hellrigel:
When you were IEEE President, who did you work with from IEEE staff? [2:22:20]
Land:
Governance. It’s like there’s three, like there’s somebody that, I wrote, I would say 80 percent of my talks, but there might be a talk like where you’re going to do a dedication for an [IEEE] Milestone. Well, there’s a staff person that writes that for you which makes sense. There’s [2:22:40] a staff writer. There’s a travel person, but I didn’t travel, so it was mainly to help me set up BTCs and keep my schedule because I had a crazy, crazy, crazy schedule. Then you have another person to help with governance stuff.
Hellrigel:
Yes. How did you like going to the [2:23:20] IEEE Milestones?
Land:
I didn’t go.
Hellrigel:
I mean, virtually attending the dedications.
Land:
I liked it. It was fun.
Hellrigel:
Yes, because it seems that you have an interest in history. And one of the projects that’s still ongoing--
Land:
I gave history, some. What did I do; the Life Fellow Oral History.
Hellrigel:
Yes, the Life Fellow Oral History Project.
Land:
I gave money for [2:23:40] that, yes.
Hellrigel:
Right, and that’s--
Land:
See, I forget what I do. I forget.
Hellrigel:
Right. I’ll give you an update on that project because I run the IEEE History Center’s oral history program.
Land:
Awesome.
Hellrigel:
That project was challenging in that I’ve trained now probably 150 people. [2:24:00] How many people out of that do you think have recorded an oral history as an interviewer?
Land:
You have to do it the way we’re doing it if you want to get the oral history.
Hellrigel:
It did raise the profile of the IEEE Oral History Program, it raised awareness, and some people understand the challenges. But due to increased demand, I am getting pulled in [2:27:00] different directions, and sometimes people actually give me grief about why aren’t there more women in the IEEE Life Fellows oral history collection. I try to explain I am a force of one.
Land:
There’s not that many out there to interview.
Hellrigel:
Right. I said, well, we got to go back--
Land:
I’ll never be a Life Member. I joined too [2:27:20] late. I’ll never make it.
Hellrigel:
Let’s look back. They’re not that many who are [IEEE] Fellows.
Land:
Yes.
Hellrigel:
When you got to look at the history of who have become IEEE Fellows. I also did the numbers-crunching about the different Regions [2:27:40] and how many fellows from this Region, that Region, and that Region? Part of it is that we see the change over time as IEEE got more global. As you became a more active IEEE member, say the mid-1990s, that’s when IEEE is really going global. If [2:28:00] you look at the 1980s and 1990s, IEEE is getting more involved China, the Soviet Union, in India, etc.
Have you seen any trends in IEEE?
Land:
That was part of the Fellows reform that we did.
Hellrigel:
Right, right.
Hellrigel:
When you’re IEEE Past President, you get to travel a little bit because that’s not a COVID [2:34:40] year anymore.
Land:
I didn’t travel. I just went to meetings.
Hellrigel:
Virtual or a few in person?
Land:
If there was a Board meeting in person or whatever, I went. But really, I’m a big believer in it’s somebody else’s opportunity. It’s somebody else’s time. [2:35:00] I mean, I’d be interested in doing some oral history recordings for you, things like that, but I’m not interested in any other positions on the board. I’m not interested. People are trying to hook me in. I have a friend that’s running and they’re like, well, if I get elected, I’m hooking you into something. I’m like, okay, well, just let me know what it is, [2:35:20] and I’ll think about it.
Hellrigel:
Like a committee?
Hellrigel:
What do you see some of the challenges for IEEE going forward?
Land:
That’s the [2:40:20] other thing, understanding what IEEE really is, the articles of incorporation, and how those tie to the governance documents. If you’re Chair of the Board, you need to understand, like I understood all the governance, I read all the governance, and I was on the Governance Committee for IEEE before I was President. [2:40:40] You have to understand, because people on the Board, well-meaning, might bring up something saying, oh, we want to change this. But you have to go, as the Chair, with the governance staff backing you, that no you can’t do that. If we do that, it means affecting our 501(c)(3) status. I had several of those types of things come up, where [2:41:00] if you can stop it right at the source, before it’s brought to the Board, while people are talking about it, if you understand what’s going on.
Closing remarks
Hellrigel:
[2:43:40] One last thing, because I know I kept you a long time. Before I hit record, we were talking about the importance of mentoring and helping other women.
Land:
Well, not just women, but other people. I’ve [2:44:00] got numerous friends that I’ve helped run for office, like looking at their materials, men and women. I have a group, I won’t tell you who they are, but I have a group of really close women friends in IEEE who are all leaders, and we get together once a year. [2:44:20] Not IEEE-related, not work-related, but socially. It’s important because I always joke and say, well, I have a Y chromosome because I’ve always, I’m the only woman at a lot of the MDA meetings. [2:44:40] It’s still that way. Even though MDA has a lot of really good diversity metrics in the senior leader positions, they’re not that great. They’re getting better. But you just have to support everybody. [2:45:00] If somebody’s good and ethical and honest, then I’ll support them and help them any way I can and I think we should all do that. But on the converse, if somebody’s unethical and full of shenanigans, I’m going to do everything I can to make sure that they’re not in my orbit.
Hellrigel:
Do you [2:45:20] think you can measure someone up pretty quickly?
Land:
I trust everybody implicitly, it’s a Southern thing; until they destroy that trust. Even then, sometimes I’ll go back for a second helping, but once they’ve lost my good-natured opinion, [2:45:40] whatever, you’re kind of done and I’ll be vocal.
Ray Liu, I don’t know if it’s an Asian thing either, but Ray Liu’s the same way. Ray Liu and I are like great friends. He says I’m his sister that he never knew he had or whatever. We’re the same.
It takes [2:46:00] a lot of guts if you’re in a meeting and people are like, oh, what about this person, blah, blah, blah. And you go, no, here’s a specific example of what they did or here’s this or whatever. This happened in the Board one time. I won’t tell you what it was about or who it was about, but I had to step forward. This is one of the times I wrote something down. I wrote it down, read it out, [2:46:20] and then all of a sudden, all these other women started coming forward. It was like a serious me-too movement at the Board. A moment at the Board. But a lot of those women that are on the Board, were on the Board, they all came forward and said, no, this is what happened to me. No, this is what, but it takes somebody first.
Hellrigel:
[2:46:40] Right, someone to stick their neck out.
Hellrigel:
Do you have any favorite [2:47:40] event or an experience that sticks in your mind with IEEE, a fun thing?
Land:
Well, something that meant a lot to me is I was nominated and received a standards medallion. But I didn’t want it at the standards meeting or whatever. [2:48:00] So we had a dinner, and just my closest friends in software engineering standards, we all went and celebrated and that was special.
Hellrigel:
So you went to somewhere local by you, or were you at a conference?
Land:
No, we just met at a board meeting and had it. I didn’t want a big to-do. But it was special that they all were willing to do that. [2:48:20]
Hellrigel:
Did you find your, well, I guess your whole experience was disrupted by COVID. Even some of your training as [2:50:20] an incoming P, president-elect, things started to slow down during that year. But overall, you think COVID, I know the shift to WebEx went fairly well.
Land:
I think we should do more. I think we should do more virtual and take advantage of it. More hybrid, more [2:50:40] virtual. I think we’d reach out to more people. I mean, I’m telling you that there was no way I could have gone to some of the countries because of my restrictions on travel with my clearance, so I was able to reach out and talk and mentor, whatever to [2:51:00] these folks, and it was great. It didn’t wear me out. I was able to do other things for IEEE. I wasn’t spending all the time out of touch on a plane because some of these things, if you’re making big change, you have to socialize, negotiate, reach out. You have to be actively pursuing the end [2:51:20] goal, you can’t be on a plane for ten hours.
No, I’ve traveled everywhere. Before COVID hit, I was heading to Vietnam. I had just gotten back from Singapore. I’ve been [2:53:20] to Australia many times. It’s not like I haven’t traveled. Believe me, I’m a million-miler on Delta.
Hellrigel:
Wow.
Land:
So, I’ve done the travel. Yes, and that’s all IEEE travel. From my personal experience, if you [2:53:40] have specific things that need to be negotiated in person, fine. But if you can give a talk and have the interaction through WebEx, and sometimes it’s better because it’s more equal. Here’s an example, India, if you go to a meeting in India, people are hesitant to ask you questions because [2:54:00] there’s somebody they’re moderating and there’s a caste system, a social structure or whatever. I get online on WebEx, and everybody’s asking me questions. I can’t answer the questions fast enough.
Hellrigel:
[2:54:20] Are there any topics we didn’t cover?
Land:
I’m sure, but I don’t know what they would be.
