Mary Ward-Callan

Mary Ward-Callan is the Staff Executive at the IEEE responsible for the strategic and operational leadership of the IEEE Technical Communities within the IEEE. The 45 Technical Societies and Councils, and numerous emerging technical communities collectively deliver more than 1300 conferences, 168 periodicals, countless technical training seminars, and three certification programs. Mary has been responsible for the programming and visibility of new technology areas within the IEEE, such as Cloud Computing, Internet of Things, Software Defined Networks, Rebooting Computing. Mary led the Award winning IEEE Humanitarian Technology Challenge; a project that used solid engineering techniques to provide solutions to pressing world problems such as lighting Haiti/Africa/Nicaragua, providing data communications to healthcare facilities in Peru, and providing RFID patient identification in India.

Prior to joining the IEEE, Mary was an Executive Director in the telecommunications industry, employed by Telcordia, Bellcore, and Bell Labs. Mary’s career included significant contributions in local loop design, network simulation, network operations and management, sub-network control, and product testing and product certification. Mary led the network operations activities for several technologies such as SONET, ATM, DLC, VPN and SMDS. She has extensive experience in business management, process re-engineering, requirements management, quality, and project management.

Mary is a Certified Association Executive, holds a Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree in Mathematics from Vassar College (with honors, Phi Beta Kappa), and a Master of Science degree (MSEE) in Electrical Engineering and Computing from Princeton University. She completed the Executive Development Program at Bellcore as well as numerous other key management courses. Mary is a Senior Member of the IEEE and a member of ASAE. She is married with three children and lives in New Jersey, USA.

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