Accomplishments
When I began my assignment as President of LEOS I outlined six major goals that I would try to accomplish.
They included:

• Support VP-Technical Affairs in restructuring and realigning the roles and responsibilities of the Technical Councils.
• Improve awareness and utilization of LEOS services by the LEOS membership.
• Increase membership by 10 percent.
• Complete the process of improving the Newsletter to have the prestige of a Magazine.
• Continue to develop a strategy to increase LEOS’ influence in IEEE.
• Review the Constitution and Bylaws.

The intent of the first goal was to try to get the technical affairs organization more involved in determining the strategic direction of the society. In the past the Technical Councils have had a passive function except for the organization of the technical program of the LEOS Annual Meeting. Under the leadership of both I. C. Khoo and Nan Jokerst, the Vice Presidents of Technical Affairs, there has been tremendous progress in updating the technical committees and setting up processes that will help LEOS better adapt our conferences and publications to our rapidly changing technical world.
The second goal of improving awareness and utilization of LEOS services by the LEOS membership was started by reorganizing and reenergizing the Membership Committee. This committee, which has the responsibility of improving both the quantity and quality of LEOS membership, had been inactive for many years. We changed the structure of the committee to have the President-elect (and the President in the first year of their two-year term) as the chair. This new structure provided the President-elect with the opportunity to understand membership issues before they became President and then as President (in their first year) lead new initiatives to improve membership. Alan Willner, President-elect, has aggressively restarted this committee! Good things will happen as Alan moves LEOS membership issues forward this coming year!
Missing the third goal of increasing LEOS membership was my biggest disappointment. Instead of increased membership under my watch, we actually decreased by approximately 14 percent. The good news is that we seem to be slowly inching out of the telecom bubble burst with a lot of new opportunities for LEOS and LEOS members in the future.
The fourth goal of improving the Newsletter has been realized by the tireless effort of Mary Lanzerotti and her Associate Editors. The new look and feel of the Newsletter is as good, if not better, than many of the other IEEE magazines. In my opinion, Mary and her team have also significantly improved the content of the Newsletter.
The fifth goal of developing a strategy to increase LEOS’ influence in IEEE has started but will need to continue during Alan’s presidency. During the past two years we have been able to see several of our LEOS members nominated and in some cases win key positions on major IEEE committees. It has been very important for LEOS that Gordon Day has been able to serve on the TAB FINCOM during this time of financial concern. It is still critically important that we move forward with this effort since it is necessary that LEOS be able to participate in the future directions of IEEE.
The final goal of reviewing and updating the IEEE-LEOS Constitution and Bylaws was completed by John Marsh and Gordon Day. This was an important but necessary job!
Over the past two years I have tried to highlight the different organizations within LEOS. I have yet to talk about two key individuals that keep the President and board informed and moving forward, Gail Walters and Paul Shumate. Gail is the “organizational glue” keeping the Executive Committee and the members of the Board of Governors on-time and in the right place. She even provides little 4”x 4” schedules that tell us what meetings we need to attend and where the meetings will be held. She coordinates all the Board and committee meetings and makes sure that everything is done right. Most of her “day job” is serving as the main Society-member point of contact. In this role she handles all the awards and awards committee meetings, all membership issues and problems that may arise, all Chapter coordination, and many other things that make our society strong. I think most of the LEOS leadership would all agree that we would be a disorganized mess if it wasn’t for Gail!
Finally, Paul Shumate has been the spark of energy that keeps LEOS moving forward. His passion for the success of LEOS is contagious and his work ethic guarantees that everything is always done right. He understands the politics and vision of IEEE so he keeps us well-connected and always looking good. He understands the technologies of LEOS and keeps pushing us to move with the new changes that are continually transforming both academia and industry. And finally, he understands people and how to be patient and yet push us enough to make us all better. Paul is the heart of the LEOS organization!
It has been both an honor and a pleasure to serve as the IEEE-LEOS, society president for the past two years. If you have any comments or suggestions, please contact me at h.s.hinton@ieee.org.