Engineering Advisory Council

Currently as Vice President of Engineering and Technology for a Builder, Colorado-based aerospace start-up Radia, Inc.. Anderson leads the team developing an aircraft for Radia serving the energy and environment industries.

In 2017, Lindsay retired from The Boeing Company after 32 years of service as Vice President Quality in the Commercial Airplanes Division.  In this role he led the world-wide quality organization providing line leadership for over 5,000 employees at over 20 locations and thousands of suppliers.  He was a member of the BCA Executive Leadership Team reporting to the BCA CEO. 

Previously, Anderson served as vice president of the Field Operations and Delivery for the 737 Program, managing director of Hawker de Havilland (HdH) and numerous other positions within Boeing Commercial Airplanes.  Anderson's career at Boeing began as an engineer at the Renton Division.

Anderson is a member of the Montana State University Engineering Industrial Advisory Committee, serves on the Board of Directors for Seattle Theater Group, and was the past president of the Boeing Management Association.

He is a graduate of the Leaders for Manufacturing Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he earned Master of Science degrees in Management and Materials Sciences and Engineering. In addition, Anderson received a Master of Business Administration from Vanderbilt University in 1985 and a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Montana State University in 1983.

Karen Arnold co-founded Nanocopoeia after serving as founder and CEO of Education Platform Group (SchoolExtra). With an extensive track record of growing technology businesses and moving products and technologies into commercial scale operations, Ms. Arnold is an expert in turn-around consulting, business development, corporate partnering, technology commercialization, corporate finance, strategy planning and implementation, operations development and start-up, research and engineering. Ms. Arnold has worked with technology businesses in industries as diverse as medical devices, biotechnology, information technology and industrial manufacturing. She holds a B.S. in electrical engineering from MSU and master's degrees in business administration and manufacturing operations from University of St. Thomas.

Born and reared in Winifred, Mont., Norman (Norm) Asbjornson became an entrepreneur at the age of 10 as a garbage hauler for residents of his small town. Asbjornson enrolled at MSU in 1953, but a year later his education was delayed by a tour of duty with the U.S. Army in Korea. He returned to MSU and earned a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering in 1960. He began his career with American Standard Industrial Division, a manufacturer of heating and air conditioning products. He spent more than two decades in the heating and air conditioning business before founding his own company, AAON, Inc., in 1988. The publicly-traded company is a leading manufacturer of cutting-edge heating and air conditioning products and is on the 2009 “Fortune 40: Best stocks to retire on.” MSU awarded Asbjornson an honorary doctorate in 2004 for his notable career and community service. Norm resides in Tulsa.

Tony assumed the role of support & services leader in January 2018.  Tony is responsible for shaping the future production system to enable production system, airplane, and support & services value for our customers.

Tony was previously CEO of Boeing Asia Pacific Aviation Services. The Singapore-based team was responsible for execution of all facets of Boeing Global Fleet Care while providing world class support to our airline customers in the region.

Tony previously held numerous engineering positions on the 787, 747 and in customer support.  Prior to joining these programs, Tony held several assignments in field service and service engineering in the Americas, Asia and Europe.

Tony earned a bachelor of science in mechanical engineering technology from Montana State University in 1989 and a master of business administration from John Cass Business School (London, UK) in 2001. He and his wife, Molly, have two children.

Robert (Jesse) Jesperson grew up in the Ekalaka area of eastern Montana. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil Engineering from Montana State University in 1971. He moved to Colorado upon graduation and began a career in the foundation drilling business, working all of the Western U.S. and based out of Denver. He partnered with a utility company in 1984 and engaged in the construction of high voltage transmission lines. After three years in this field and a stint in Israel as a foundation consultant to the Israeli government on the Maor David Generating Station, he founded Evergreen Caissons. Evergreen is primarily engaged in the construction of foundations for high voltage transmission lines and substations. The firm designs and fabricates many of their own tools and has performed extensive modifications to standard equipment to adapt to construction in rugged terrain.

His wife, Sylvia, and daughters are also actively involved in the company. Jesse and Sylvia have their principal residence in Denver, but spend much of their summer at their property north of Whitefish, Mont.

Wesley (Wes) Kremer is Vice President, Air & Missile Defense Systems Product Line at Raytheon Missile Systems in Tucson, Ariz. In this role he has profit / loss responsibility for the Standard Missile programs including SM-3 and SM-6. His portfolio also includes the Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle and the Israeli Cooperative programs.

Prior to his current role, Wes was the Director of the Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Program. In this role he was responsible for the development, testing and production of all variants of the SM-3 missile portfolio. Wes was also the Director of the Systems Design and Performance Engineering Directorate for Missile Systems. Wes led an organization of over 1,700 engineers responsible for the systems engineering (SE), modeling, simulation, and analysis (MS&A), guidance, navigation and control (GNC), and signal processing (SP) design for all Missile Systems programs.

Before joining Raytheon Missile Systems, Wes was the General Manager of Raytheon’s Advanced Products Center (APC) in Dallas, Tex. He was responsible for the execution of internal Raytheon business including the design and production of innovative RF technology solutions, AESA sensors, antennas, composite radomes, and high-temperature composite structures.

Wes joined Raytheon in 2003. He was a recipient of the SAS President’s Award in 2008 and a Raytheon Program Leadership Award in 2006. Wes served 11 years in the US Air Force as a Weapon Systems Officer (WSO) flying the F-111 and F-15E. Wes was ranked #1 of 411 graduates and named as the Air Training Command Navigator of the Year for 1989. Wes has over 1,500 hours of flight time in fighter aircraft including over 90 combat sorties in Iraq and Bosnia.

Wes left the Air Force in 1999 and became the Vice President and General Manager of a software company providing electronic data capture in support of clinical drug trials. He was named to Who’s Who Among Young Executives in 2001.

Wes received a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Montana State University and an MBA in Engineering Technology Management from City University. Wes earned numerous Air Force medals and was a Distinguished Graduate of Air Force ROTC, Specialized Undergraduate Navigator Training, and Squadron Officer School.

Mack Long received his first degree from MSU in business management and earned a second bachelor’s in construction engineering technology in 1992. He holds an MBA from the University of Montana.

After graduating from MSU, Mack went to work for Kiewitt Construction, then returned to Montana to work for the family business, JTL Group. Although JTL was sold to Knife River Construction, a subsidiary of MDU Resources Group, Inc., Mack attained the position of President of JTL after the sale. He recently bought Dale Weaver, Inc., a construction company that provides services to the oil industry.
Mack and his wife, Karen, are active in the Billings community. Mack served as Vice President of the Montana Contractors Association in 2008. The Longs have two children and focus much of their time on activities with their extended family.

Dan is a Founder and President of Great West Engineering, a civil engineering firm based in Helena, Montana. He is a licensed professional engineer in Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming. Dan’s career has involved design and management of a variety of civil and structural engineering projects, primarily for smaller communities throughout Montana. He served eight years on the Montana Board of Professional Engineers and Land Surveyors, one of those as board chair, as well as chairing several standing and ad hoc committees. Dan has also been active in professional societies at local, state and national levels. Dan has served in the past on the MSU Civil Engineering Department Advisory Committee. 

Dan was born and raised in Big Timber, graduating from Sweet Grass High School in 1976. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil Engineering from Montana State University in 1980. Dan has been a lifelong Bobcat fan. He and his wife Cheryl have endowed an MSU athletic scholarship for engineering and education student athletes.

Dan and Cheryl (an Education graduate of Eastern Montana College) currently live in Helena and have two grown children. The family enjoys outdoor activities, particularly spending time at their cabin in the Tobacco Root Mountains.

Mary Jane McGarity is the Vice President for Development at the Montana State University Alumni Foundation supervising a large team of professionals responsible for major and planned gifts to the University and its academic units. McGarity brings over thirty years of experience developing and managing projects for private and public clients in the non-profit and engineering fields. 

McGarity earned her B.S. in Environmental Engineering in 1982 from the Montana School of Engineering in Butte. She began her career with Boeing, and served as an engineering consultant to industry, negotiating long term contracts and managing environmental projects with clients in several key market sectors including petrochemical, aerospace, semiconductor, and government (Interior, Agriculture, Energy, and Defense).  Her project work addressed air, water, and waste issues and required a technical understanding of federal, state, and local regulations, environmental engineering, and air and water quality sciences. She started the Pacific Northwest Office of Radian International, LLC in 1990 to provide environmental and engineering consulting services to industry and government. She has been a speaker at various professional conferences including American Institute of Chemical Engineers and Air and Waste Management Association.

Helene Michael retired from Boeing as Vice President of Manufacturing Operations for the Boeing 737 Program responsible for Wings and Final Assembly Manufacturing, Materials Management, Industrial Engineering, Tooling and Equipment Services.

Mrs. Michael has a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering Technology from Montana State University (1985) and attended the University of Virginia Darden Executive Program in 2001.

Helene has been on the Engineering Advisory Council since 2007. She has also been engaged with the Women in Engineering student chapter and was the keynote dinner speaker in 2005 and 2011.

In 2013 Helene received an Honorary Doctorate in Engineering from Montana State University (MSU) and has for the past two years actively mentored students participating in the MSU Mentoring Program.
In 2014 Dr. Michael became a new member of the MSU Alumni Foundation Board of Governors and accepted an invitation to join the Building Commitee for the Norm Asbjornson Innovation Center.

Helene is married to Tom Michael and they live in rural Montana, where she in 2014 joined the Upper Swan Valley Historical Society (USVHS) Board of Directors to contribute and learn more about the local area and the history of Swan Valley. The Michaels enjoy the outdoors and playing golf as well as spending time with their three beautiful dogs.

Margaret is not your average CIO.  She is a full stack IT leader leading the R&D for Incyphae and Resonea Inc; a Med/Tech startup that is setting a new standard for sleep health screening and management. Her interest in startups began when she led the bootstrap of a profitable startup within American Express. Once she got the bug for the fast pace innovation of the startup world there was no looking back. Her 25+ year leading global IT teams has given her a breadth of experience in the development and implementation of digital products (mobile and web), big data, business intelligence, campaign and offer systems, financial processing, enterprise data management, database development, data center migrations and cybersecurity. She is a popular speaker at local IT clubs, as well as, a frequent invited speaker to the Grace Hopper Conference.

She received a Master's in International Management from the American Graduate School of International Management (Thunderbird) and a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science Engineering from Montana State University. She holds three U.S. Patents (8504474, 6941376, 7783566) for inventions developed at American Express. She is a member of the ASU Department of Information Systems Professional Advisory Board, the Engineering Advisory Council for MSU, and a council member of the AZTech Councils Women in Information Technology.

When she is not working, Margaret enjoys running, rock climbing, reading and enjoying time with her daughter and husband.

Ryan W. Parker serves as Chief Operating Officer of TBL Systems. In this role, he is responsible for the daily operations of the company including execution, strategy, marketing, and human resources. Throughout his career, Ryan has regularly created break-through solutions for his clients and customers that have allowed them to drive significant business impact while realizing the economies of scale necessary for their businesses.

Prior to TBL Systems, Ryan spent over two decades at Intel Corporation leading multiple high growth businesses and driving them to worldwide scale.  Ryan was highlighted in the “Intel Rock Star” advertising campaign for his transformative work helping retailers merge the online and in-store experience benefiting customers such as Proctor & Gamble, Walgreens, Best Buy, Kraft, and Adidas.  Ryan has been featured in many prominent publications including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Money Magazine, Business Week, and Wired.  Ryan’s teams that have also won several distinct awards including Reader’s Digest’s “Top 25 Breakthroughs to Improve Your Life” for their innovative smart home technology and the International Design Excellence Award.  Ryan has been a transformative leader with a strong track record of creating high growth, high margin businesses.

Ryan graduated from Montana State University with a Bachelor’s degree in Industrial and Management Engineering and earned his Master’s degree in Business Administration from W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University.  Ryan is a strong supporter of improving education and, as a portion of his volunteer work, he acts as both an Engineering Advisory Board Member and a W. P. Carey MBA Distinguished Speaker.  He was also honored with an appointment into the Academy of Distinguished Alumni for his career achievements and community leadership.

Dr. Ray is the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Bend Research, Inc., where he began working in 1983. After Bend Research’s sale to Capsugel in October 2013, Dr. Ray was appointed to their Scientific and Business Advisory Board.

During his time at Bend Research, Dr. Ray held numerous positions specializing in the development and commercialization of a wide range of products. He was instrumental in directing the management of large-scale programs to advance pharmaceutical compounds through the development process to commercialization, and served as the primary management contact for client companies. In addition to his expertise in advancing pharmaceutical processes and products, Dr. Ray has extensive experience in commercializing diverse products for the electronics, energy, medical, agricultural, and space industries.

Dr. Ray holds a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Oregon State University and a master’s degree and doctorate in chemical engineering from the University of Colorado - Boulder. He is a licensed Professional Engineer in Colorado and Oregon. Dr. Ray holds 24 U.S. patents and has 41 scientific publications.

Bill Sanderson has spent 40 years in the global petroleum industry. He currently acts as a senior advisor to IHS, the global information and energy research firm. He has held a variety of senior management positions, including Vice President of IHS Energy, President and CEO of Purvin & Gertz, Inc., and management positions in Champlain Petroleum, now Valero Energy.

In addition to being a business leader at IHS and Purvin & Gertz, Bill has directed each firm’s crude oil valuation and market analysis services, provided expert testimony in a wide range of legal and regulatory matters, and provided merger and acquisition assistance for petroleum-related businesses. Bill is a 1976 Chemical Engineering graduate from Montana State University. He is a native of Miles City, Mont., and currently lives in the Flathead Valley.

Michael Sanderson is President and Chief Executive Officer of Sanderson Stewart an award-winning engineering, planning and design firm with employees in Montana, North Dakota, Idaho and Colorado.  Sanderson Stewart has been recognized multiple times by industry analyst the Zweig Group on its prestigious list of “Best Firms to Work For” in the architecture and engineering industry, and Sanderson Stewart was named by the United States Chamber of Commerce as the 2014 America’s Small Business of the Year.

Mr. Sanderson is a Fellow of the Institute of Transportation Engineers and served as ITE’s International President in 2018.  Michael was the organizer and founding chair of LeadershipITE, ITE’s premier leadership development program for the transportation industry.  

Mr. Sanderson is also an active leader in civic, educational and non-profit organizations.  He currently serves on the board of directors of the Alberta Bair Theater for the Performing Arts in Billings, Montana, and he serves on both the President’s Advisory Council and the College of Engineering Advisory Council at Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana.

Michael holds BS and MS degrees in Civil Engineering from Montana State University. He holds a MBA degree from the University of Montana, and he has studied executive management and leadership at the Harvard Business School. Michael lives in Billings, Montana with his wife, Sara, and his children, Quinn Rose and North Henry.

Michael is a frequent lecturer and panelist on topics of corporate culture, organizational strategy, and the innovative business practices that build great small businesses, as well as topics related to the future of transportation and the transportation profession.

Nancy Seleski  is director of Supply Chain Planning at 3M.  In her 31-year career, she has held a variety of positions including manufacturing engineer, operations management, Six Sigma Black Belt and Master Black Belt, division quality manager and division supply chain manager.  In her current role, she is responsible for developing global planning strategies, processes, and tools across the global supply chain organization.

In addition to her direct responsibilities, Nancy is also a very active mentor and advocate for women at 3M.  She has been involved with the formation of a global Women’s Leadership Forum and is passionate about developing new employees.

Nancy grew up in Columbia Falls, MT and attended Montana State University from 1982-1986, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering.  She was inspired to become an engineer by her father, who is also a Montana State University graduate of Chemical Engineering (1956). 

Nancy enjoys being active and loves the outdoors – skiing, boating, fishing, gardening, and running.  She and her husband, Pat, live an hour north of St. Paul in a log house on 20 acres of woods.

Mike Stears retired as Vice President, Supply Chain at Exabyte Corp., where he was responsible for driving efficiencies in Exabyte’s supply chain, which included improving product development processes, spearheading cost reduction initiatives, and improving time to market for Exabyte products. Stears re-engineered how Exabyte works with suppliers and contract manufacturers to maximize productivity and cost efficiency. Stears also oversaw a review of internal operations.

Prior to joining Exabyte, he was a senior executive at Seagate, where he was responsible for key areas of its disk drive operations. Mr. Stears’ most recent position at Seagate was Senior Vice President of Asia-Pacific Disc Drive Operations in Singapore. Prior to that, he was Senior Vice President of Mobile Drive Development at Seagate and was responsible for developing leading-edge technology products and successfully qualifying them with major OEMs. During his tenure at Seagate, Stears also served as Senior Vice President of Product Launches as well as Launch General Manager. He started his career with product director and engineering positions at MiniScribe and StorageTek. He earned a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from MSU and earned a Certificate in Executive Management through the rigorous executive training program offered by Stanford and the National University of Singapore.

Jean Bennington Sweeney retired from 3M in 2017 as Vice President for Corporate Social Responsibility. She held a diversity of positions with 3M including product development, manufacturing management, business general manager, and two international assignments as Manufacturing Director for 3M Australia in Sydney and Managing Director of 3M Taiwan in Taipei. In the last 10 years at 3M, she was responsible for 3M's global environment, health, safety, and sustainability programs including technical and regulatory expertise in environment, safety, ergonomics and industrial hygiene, and 3M's strategies for environmental footprint reductions and sustainability. Ms. Sweeney is a graduate of MSU College of Engineering with a BS in chemical engineering and holds an MBA from St. Thomas University in St. Paul, Minnesota.  She is chair of the Montana State University Alumni Foundation and serves on nonprofit boards in Minnesota, Montana and Switzerland.  Ms. Sweeney funds the W.J. Bennington Scholarships for Women in Engineering in honor of her father who was a 1951 graduate of Montana State University in architectural engineering.

John Tubbesing is vice president of Manufacturing Technology Integration, and leads the Boeing Research & Technology (BR&T) Research Center in Washington State.

The organization is part of BR&T, Boeing’s advanced central research and development unit. BR&T provides innovative technologies that enable the development of future aerospace solutions while improving the cycle time, cost, quality and performance of existing Boeing products and services.
Tubbesing leads a team of engineers, scientists, technologists, and technicians who are responsible for developing and implementing advanced manufacturing technologies and processes into the production systems for Boeing Commercial Airplanes and Boeing Defense, Space & Security.
Prior to this assignment Tubbesing was director of BCA Production Engineering, where he led the development, implementation and optimization of the BCA build plan and was responsible for the functional excellence of Manufacturing, Tooling and Liaison Engineering.

Since starting his career at Boeing in 1987 Tubbesing has served in a number of key leadership roles, including director of Payloads Engineering, with responsibility for overseeing safety and product integrity, the integration of the functional requirements and aesthetics within the airplane payload to deliver value for airline customers and for Boeing. He was also responsible for executing functional excellence across the Payloads skill and leading the flammability compliance system. Tubbesing has also served as chief engineer for 747/767/777 Interiors.

Tubbesing earned a bachelor of science in engineering from Montana State University, and certificates in aerospace operations management and business administration from the University of Washington and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, respectively.

Ray Webb, a Montana native, retired in 2013 after 35 years working in the aerospace and defense sector on avionics, missile, missile defense, unmanned system, and technology programs. Ray founded Broadwater Enterprise Solutions, LLC, in 2000 and continues to help clients develop customer solutions.  Ray is known as a leader who can ignite innovation in teams to provide technology, products, and services quickly. Ray has worked in all phases of product development from concept development, detailed design, production, and directly on the flight line with the warfighter. Ray has a BS in Electrical Engineering from Montana State University (1978) and an MA in Management, Human Relations, and Organizational Behavior.

Gary was a co-founder of Webridge, an enterprise web-based software startup, which was acquired by Huron Consulting Group. A recognized authority on electronic research administration (eRA) and compliance systems, he frequently speaks at seminars and conferences and has worked with numerous research institutions formulating their eRA strategies. Formerly, Gary was Director of Consumer Marketing and co-founder of The Palace, the industry-leading Internet virtual worlds company formed by Intel and Time Warner. He held a number of marketing management positions at Sequent Computer Systems after starting his career at Hewlett Packard, where he managed a group of software application developers creating some of the first electronic data interchange (EDI) applications used in the electronics industry. Gary has both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Industrial and Management Engineering from Montana State University.

Bill Wuertz is Blackmore Sensors and Analytics vice president of engineering.  Previously, he was vice president of engineering for Seagate Technology.

Prior to joining Seagate, Wuertz was vice president and general manager of LSI Corporation’s RAID Storage Division, vice president of the Client/Server Business Unit for Symbios Logic Corporation and director of Design Tools & Libraries for AT&T. He also held management positions in product marketing and design for NCR Corporation.

Wuertz earned a bachelor’s of science degree in electrical engineering from Montana State University.