Sam's career has been mostly centered in Reliability and Product Assurance.
LYONS, CO, October 29, 2018 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Marquis Who's Who, the world's premier publisher of biographical profiles, is proud to present Samuel James Keene Jr., Ph.D., with the Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award. An accomplished listee, Dr. Keene celebrates many years' experience in his professional network, and has been noted for achievements, leadership qualities, and the credentials and successes he has accrued in his field. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected based on current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
He began his career as a reliability engineer at Bendix in Towson, MD, in 1962, where he remained for two years before becoming a research scientist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD. Then, in 1967, he hired on as a staff engineer with IBM in Boulder, CO, where he worked for 26 years. After his IBM career, he mainly took on consulting and contract jobs with companies including Storage Technology, Hughes Aircraft Company, Raytheon, Rome Air Development Labs, Martin Marietta, Loral, and Seagate Technology.
Dr. Keene earned a Bachelor of Science in physics from the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1962. He then received a Master of Science in physics from Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA, in 1966, and later went on to obtain a Doctor of Philosophy in management science and operations research from the University of Colorado Boulder in 1986. He became certified as a Six Sigma Master Black Belt by the Seagate Corporation in 2000. He has always had a teaching component at the companies and universities with which he associated; for example, IBM had Dr Keene teach Self Development and Management classes. His departments all showed high morale on the annual surveys, so IBM would transfer employees with problems into his department on short notice. He had one employee come up to him, at his 25-year reception and inform him that he, Sam, had saved his life by bringing him into his department. Sam told him that he had IBM to thank for his transfer into his department.
Sam also taught one academic year, 1973-1974, on the IBM faculty loan program, at Prairie View A&M University, Prairie View, Texas.
Sam's career has been mostly centered in Reliability and Product Assurance. He was President of the IEEE Reliability Society (1991-1993) and was recognized as an IEEE Fellow in 1996. He received the IEEE Reliability Society Education Award and the American Society of Quality Alan Chop Education Award. Sam is a Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE Reliability Society and served on the Board of the IEEE Technology Management Council. He received the IBM Outstanding Contribution Award and was recognized as the IBM Manager of the Year for IBM Boulder.
Dr. Keene's professional focus has been to remedy field failure problems, fix the underling development or manufacturing process that allowed the operational problem, and then teach best practices to preclude the problem from surfacing again.
Sam is a member of both the IEEE Reliability and the IEEE Computer Societies. He was always active in the Reliability Society Advisory Committee and in alternate times in the Reliability Society Executive Committee. Under the ExCom, he has served as Vice President of Membership or Vice President Technical Operations. He is also the Distinguished Lecturer Chair. Sam regularly documented his projects and lessons learned in over 150 papers, (refereed as well as tech notes), book chapters, and technical presentations.
Dr. Keene reached out to the International Symposium on Software Reliability (IISSRE) enabling the IEEE Reliability Society to become a co-sponsor of their conference, broadening its outreach to Software Reliability. Sam was eventually named Chair for the ISSRE Advisory Council, identifying future venues for ISSRE, for new topical areas, for bringing in key experts, and promoting innovations for software reliability educational deployment. Dr. Keene also enlisted several key reliability professionals to join the Reliability Society. This outreach included inviting 3 world experts in Software Reliability to join the Reliability Society. They are: Dr. Jeffrey Voas, Professor Eric Wong and Professor Shiuhpyng Winston Shieh. Professor Wong has developed 5 new Reliability Chapters in China and two more in progress. Professor Shieh has developed the Taiwan Chapter which was rated the number 1 IEEE Reliability Chapter worldwide for three consecutive years beginning in 2010. Dr. Jeffrey Voas has served as the longest IEEE Reliability President as he has repeatedly opened new system reliability vistas for the Reliability Society.
Awards, Recognitions, Significant Achievements and Milestones:
• Member IEEE Reliability Society Advisory Committee – 2012-2014
• Invited presentation: "The Keene Software Reliability Model" at EEE-RS Software Reliability Seminar held at ALSTOM Headquarters, Paris France – 5 September 2013
• Dr. Keene was an invited speaker at the Boeing Company, IEEE New Technologies Conference, Seal Beach, CA 2011. Two notable occurrences there for him. First a gentleman came up after the technical presentation and said that he had attended a software reliability class that he taught when they were both working at Hughes Corp. He liked a tool that he learned in that class, "Rate Monotonic Analysis" and that changed his career path. Secondly, a more personal note. His wife has a son who works in the Boeing Salt Lake City. This son went to get permission to attend an IEEE conference, but he was told that there were no funds available. Then during their conversation, his step son mentioned his name and his manager was present for Boeing Seal Beach meeting. The manager then reversed himself and said he would find the resource to cover his travel and participation in the IEEE meeting. - 2011
• Appointed Chair of the ISSRE Symposium Advisory Council –2010
• IEEE Educational Activities Board Society/Council Award, citing, "for leadership in developing IEEE educational products, student and chapter outreach training programs and student scholarship programs" to the Reliability Society and to Dr. Sam Keene – 2 July 2010
• Dr. Keene was video interviewed for NASA's Process Based Mission Assurance (PBMA) Knowledge Management System (KMS). They added, "Video archiving your nuggets of wisdom acquired from years of experience… to communicate safety, risk management, and mission assurance to the worldwide NASA/aerospace community" –9 April 2002
• Inclusion in Who's Who in America – 2001
• ASQ invited member to participate in the Six Sigma Test Specification Testing Workshop, Milwaukee, Wi (Designing ASQ Six Sigma Black Belt body of knowledge testing and certification) – 19-20 February 2001
• "The IEEE third Millennium Medal" in recognition and appreciation of valued services and outstanding contributions – 2000
• Award - Certified Six Sigma Master Black Belt, Seagate Corporation. Dr Keene says "This was the most satisfying job of my career." Six Sigma quantifies measurement technology and product and process goals, providing automated statistical analysis tools to systematically optimize products and their underlying processes. -2000
• Certificate of Technical Paper Award for publication of an article of significant importance, "Progressive Software Reliability Forecasting", Raytheon Corporation 28 January – 2000
• Award - Certified Six Sigma Black Award Seagate Corporation – 1999
• Personal important note. He was on temporary duty assignment for 3 years working in Brea, CA for Raytheon. He courted an eligible widow, and mother of 8 children, who lives in Lyons, CO on a small ranch. He asked for her hand in marriage and she accepted on Valentine's Day 1999. They planned for a wedding on July 3. A gloom came over Sally as she realized that he would be home less than two days, allowing for travel. In March 1999, he received a phone call from Ron Watts, a co-founder of the new Denver IEEE Reliability Society Chapter. He offered him a Six Sigma Master Black Belt position. Providence had struck. It was the most challenging and rewarding and timely position of his life. It was the hand of providence for him. – March 1999
• Recipient of the American Society for Quality Allen Chop Technical Achievement (education) Award – 1999
• Dr. Keene helped pioneer the IEEE Educational Activities launch educational live and recorded educational products. The producer, Elizabeth Santos, of these educational products wrote, "In 1995 I had the pleasure of working with Dr. Samuel Keene on an educational product titled, "Developing Reliable Software in the Shortest Cycle Time". As lead presenter, Dr. Keene brought together some of the most renown names in the industry. His ability to bring forth ideas and discuss lively issues are what makes him one of the most outstanding video presenters I have worked with at the IEEE… Dr. Keene's ability as a team leader combined with his overwhelming popularity helped me immensely throughout the development of "Developing Reliable Software in the Shortest Cycle Time" In 2010 the IEEE recognized the IEEE Reliability Society "for leadership in developing educational products, student and chapter outreach training programs and annual student scholarship programs". This is greater than just Dr. Keene's pioneering video tutorials, but he was a major factor for the IEEE to focus on the IEEE Reliability Society for its educational initiatives. - 14 February 1996
• Dispatched by Raytheon to work on the much overdue CDRL Reliability Analysis for the British government for the new Hong Kong Airport. Most fortunately Dr. Keene teamed up with an available system engineer, Mr. Conway McGee, from Belgium. The novelty of their association was that they developed the HK reliability model and analysis working on the same computer during the day. Then Dr. Keene would return to his hotel room and work each evening. This working together was energizing. They could teach each other from their respective disciplines and solve problems real time. Some management might think this to be a waste of time: but it is energizing and most effective. This technique is called, "Pair Programming". They completed all the analysis and got the report approved in 4 months without revisions. - 1996
• Phase 1 review of "New Systems Reliability Assessment Methods" RAC is pleased with your performance in Phase 1…The insight and knowledge that you provided…were extremely helpful in meeting Phase 1 Objectives". - 13 February 1996 (performed under the auspices of Keene's consulting company, Performance Technology")
• Recipient of The IEEE Reliability Society Education Award – 1997
• Certificate of Technical Paper Award in recognition for the publication or presentation of an article of significant technical importance entitled," Progressive Software Reliability Forecasting" Raytheon Corporation - 28 January 2000
• Named IEEE Reliability Engineer of the Year – 1995
• Elected IEEE Fellow "for the Advancement of Reliability Technology in Components and Systems" – 1994
• IEEE Video Conference Program, "Delivering Software Products to the Global Marketplace", David Stone, Samuel Keene and David Heron – 2nd year of IEEE video conference initiative – 1993
• Founding member of the Front Range Council on Concurrent Engineering – 1991
• Member Technical Advisory Board, IBM Federal Sector Division, Boulder CO – 1990-1991
• Member Advisory Board for Colorado State University 's Center for Quality and Productivity – 1990
• Designation as IBM's Corporate representative to the IEEE Reliability Society - 1984
• IBM Boulder CO, Manager of the Year – 1983 (3,500 employees and over 200 managers – estimated)
• The IEEE Reliability Society Chapter of the Year – in recognition of the chapter exhibiting the best overall technical, professional and social program – 1983. The Denver Chapter states, 'Sam Keene is very responsible for the success and growth of the Denver Chapter of the IEEE Reliability Society. He deserves recognition for this fine accomplishment". – 1983
• Outstanding Opinion Survey "you had the two highest morale indexes on site. You were also one of the five managers on site who had all reported indices over 90% favorable" from IBM's annual questionnaire to employees. Estimated 3,500 employees on the Boulder site with 250 managers. – 28 September 1981
• Dr. Keene developed and founded the Denver/ Pikes Peak Section of the IEEE Reliability Society in 1979-1980 under the support of the Reliability Society President, Dr. Thaddeus Regulinski. Sam served as the Denver Chapter Chair for 8 years. The Denver Chapter activities repeatedly ranked the Denver Chapter among the top 5 chapters in the world each year. – 1980 - Present
• Listed in Who's Who in the West -1978
• A member of the IBM Development Team that released the first commercial quality laser printer using a design hardened, test-demonstrated long life HeNe laser with stable characteristics. This laser development was achieved using Design of Experiments (DOE) simultaneously evaluating 13 laser variables and their interactions simultaneously. DOE takes more resources and planning to test but it can catch and preclude factory and field problems. DOE is a most exciting and high payoff development approach, one that is tragically underused. It is the most scientific and strong test tool in my estimation. - 1974-1975
• Adjoint Professor Electrical Engineering, on loan for one year from IBM, to Prairie View A&M University, Prairie View, TX - 1973-1974
• IEEE elected Sam Keene to the grade of Senior Member - 1973
• IBM Outstanding Contribution Award for "Improved ETN Component Replacement Procedure" (multimillion-dollar instant savings plus significant reliability improvement). Dr. Keene found solid tantalum capacitors being needlessly replaced to improve reliability. Sam had tested and qualified solid tantalum capacitors for space application when worked for NASA prior to his joining IBM. He knew that solid tantalum capacitor's dialectics heal and improve over machine's operating life. Also, the de soldering and re-soldering can degrade the component reliability. 13 outside vendors were helping do the same capacitor replacement operation. - 1969
He has also played a significant role in his local community as a scoutmaster with the Boy Scouts of America, a Sunday school teacher with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and a baseball coach for Little League teams. He is the father of 4 sons.
In recognition of outstanding contributions to his profession and the Marquis Who's Who community, Dr. Keene has been featured on the Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement website. Please visit www.ltachievers.com for more information about this honor.
Photo captions:
Left: Dr. Sam Keene awarded his Six Sigma Master Black Belt Certification, Seagate Technology 2000
Right Dr. Sam Keene invited speaker at the IEEE New Technologies Conference, Boeing Seal Beach, CA 2011
Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who's Who in America®, Marquis Who's Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field of endeavor, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Today, Who's Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms around the world. Marquis® now publishes many Who's Who titles, including Who's Who in America®, Who's Who in the World®, Who's Who in American Law®, Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare®, Who's Who in Science and Engineering®, and Who's Who in Asia®. Marquis® publications may be visited at the official Marquis Who's Who® website at www.marquiswhoswho.com.
# # #