Body of Knowledge Governing Board 2023 - 2024
Fazleena Badurdeen
BoK Governing Board Chair, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Director, Online MS in Manufacturing Systems Engineering, University of Kentucky; IISE Vice President, Technical Operations
Fazleena has nearly 20 years of engagement with IISE, serving in various capacities within the divisions, conferences, and other activities, and has been dedicated to identifying the industrial engineering community’s needs and helping develop activities of mutual benefit to both the institute and its members. Her research and teaching focus is on product design as well as
manufacturing systems/supply chains with an emphasis on enhancing sustainability. She is also a core faculty member of the University of Kentucky’s Institute for Sustainable Manufacturing.
Omar Ashour
BoK Governing Board Co-Chair, Associate Professor of Industrial Engineering at The Pennsylvania State University, The Behrend College
Dr. Omar Ashour is an Associate Professor of Industrial Engineering at Pennsylvania State University, The Behrend College. Dr. Ashour received a B.S. degree in Industrial Engineering/Manufacturing Engineering and an M.S. degree in Industrial Engineering from Jordan University of Science and Technology (JUST) in 2005 and 2007, respectively. He received his M.Eng. degree in Industrial Engineering/Human Factors and Ergonomics and a Ph.D. degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from The Pennsylvania State University (PSU) in 2010 and 2012, respectively. Dr. Ashour was the inaugural recipient of William and Wendy Korb Early Career Professorship in Industrial Engineering in 2016. Dr. Ashour’s research areas include data-driven decision-making, modeling and simulation, data analytics, immersive technologies, and process improvement. He contributed to research directed to improve design and engineering education.
Dr. Ashour currently serves as a Technical Vice President (TVP) on the Technical Operations Board (TOB) of the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers (IISE).
Azad Madni
Founder and CEO Intelligent Systems Technology Inc.
Dr. Azad Madni is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the Dean’s Professor in USC’s Astronautical Engineering and Civil and Environmental Engineering Departments, and Executive Director of USC’s Systems Architecting and Engineering Program. He is the founder and CEO of
Intelligent Systems Technology, Inc., a hi-tech company that conducts R&D in complex systems engineering methods and processes. He has received numerous prestigious awards and honors from nine professional societies and is a Life Fellow/Fellow of seven professional societies including IEEE, AAAS, INCOSE and
AIAA. He received his Ph.D., M.S., and B.S. degrees in Engineering from UCLA.
Tiffany A. Sargent
Senior Principal Engineer and Cheif Technologist for Cloud and Enterprise Sales at Intel Corporation
As a recognized leader at Intel for the past 28 years, she has built a career solving engineering problems that drive business value throughout the company. She develops innovative approaches to solve multi-disciplinary engineering challenges that address both ecosystem inflection points and customer business problems. Her solutions cover the full spectrum of Complex Systems across Internet of Things, Machine to Machine (M2M), Cloud, Enterprise, and Distributed Analytics. Tiffany holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from the University of Massachusetts and North Carolina State University.
Tiffany is a passionate community leader and volunteers her expertise across non-profits, academia, and government.
Dave Harry
CEO of Process Whisperer® Consultants LLC, Lean Six Sigma, Team Dynamics and Toyota Kata Consusltant
Dave Harry is CEO of Process Whisperer® Consultants LLC, a boutique process improvement consulting firm serving industry. As an independent Lean Six Sigma, Team Dynamics and Toyota Kata consultant, Dave has taught and lectured process improvement, project management and Toyota Kata classes throughout the US and internationally for over 20 years.
Dave’s leadership and industry teaching experience includes with Rolls-Royce Energy, Northrop Grumman Mission Systems, KMPG Consulting, Training Modernization Group, the University of Tennessee and Simplilearn. He has also had a successful U.S. Navy career as a Naval Aviator, International Defense Cooperation Agreements Negotiator and U.S. Defense Attaché. He has resided overseas in Spain, India, and Sri Lanka. He holds Lean Six Sigma certifications from ASQ, Rolls-Royce plc, SSD Global Solutions, and Northrop Grumman and actively participates on boards and leadership positions with the IISE OpEx Division, ASQ Lean Enterprise Division, IISE Industrial Systems Engineers Body of Knowledge (BoK) Governing Board, Industrial Engineering and Operations Management (IEOM) Society Advisory Board and the Project Management Office Global Institute (PMO-GI). Dave has presented at IISE, ASQ, IEOM, TapRooT and AQI Conferences for more than 15 years. Dave is a PMI certified PMP®, has Lean Bronze Certification (LBC) through the SME/AME/Shingo Institute Alliance and is a Certified Scrum Master (CSM®).
he has been awarded three master’s degrees, including a MSc Degree in Systems Management from the University of Southern California. Dave lives in Greeneville Tennessee, USA
Michael Graul
Sr. Director of Engineering Professional Education, Associate Professor of Engineering Practice, Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station
Michael Graul, PhD PE has spent 33 years as a practitioner in the field of Industrial and Systems Engineering; 31 (1992-present) of those years have been spent with Knowledge Based Systems, Inc. (KBSI) in College Station, Texas.
He served as Principal Investigator (PI), Senior Scientist, and Project Manager (PM) for several systems design, analysis, and engineering efforts at KBSI. His primary industrial focus is that of production system design,
planning, implementation, operation, and sustainment. His applied research focus is on design and development of production system architectures. He continues to serve, part-time, as a Senior Scientist and Engineer supporting
KBSI technology integration and analytics efforts. In 2013, he joined the faculty of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Texas A&M University on a part-time basis. In 2018, he joined the department full-time and was named the
Assistant Department Head for Undergraduate Affairs. He was promoted to Associate Department Head in the spring of 2021. In June 2022, he was named Sr. Director of TEES Professional Education.
He is a licensed Professional Engineer (TX) and served for six-years as the national PE Exam Committee Chair; now as past chair. He currently serves as Director for the IISE Society of Engineering and Management Systems.
Steve Kiester
Sr Integrated Program Scheduling Specialist, Bell - Textron
Steve’s career as an ISE has allowed him to work in diverse roles, primarily through the aviation industry. After graduation from Oklahoma State University (BSIE), he began his career at Texas Instruments in NC machining, facilities planning, and material handling systems design / implementation. He later transitioned to various ISE roles in manufacturing / assembly support at Bell-Textron and General Dynamics (now Lockheed-Martin). Since 1993, he has served in a variety of project / program management support and teaching roles at Bell-Textron for both government and commercial aircraft development initiatives. He holds a Green Belt certification with a focus on Design for Six Sigma (DFSS). A member of IISE since 1991, he was inducted as a Fellow in 2022. In the IISE Dallas-Fort Worth chapter, Steve served as Director of Student Chapter Relations, Director of Programs, President, and Past President. He currently serves on the Industrial Engineering and Management (IEM) Industry Advisory Board and The Cowboy Academy at Oklahoma State University.
As a volunteer in the Civil Air Patrol (United States Air Force Auxiliary), he serves in management roles in Education & Training, Personnel and Administration.