Overview

Gender

female

Joan Spero is an adjunct senior research scholar at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. She is a member of IBM’s Audit Committee. Spero served as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations for Economic and Social Affairs from 1980 to 1981. From 1981 to 1993, she held several positions with American Express Company, the last being executive vice president, corporate affairs and communications.

From 1993 to 1996, Spero served as U.S. Under Secretary of State for Economic, Business and Agricultural Affairs, and from 1997 through 2008, she was president of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. She is a director of Citigroup Inc. and International Paper Company. From 2009 to 2010, she was a visiting fellow at the Foundation Center.

She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the American Philosophical Society, a trustee emeritus of Columbia University, an honorary trustee of the Brookings Institution, and a trustee of the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and the International Center for Transitional Justice. Additionally, during the past five years, she served as a member of the supervisory board of ING Group. Spero became an IBM director in 2004.