Donna Haddad is an AI ethics and governance leader with more than twenty-five years of experience advising on global technology transactions, emerging technologies, and strategic legal risk. Most recently, she served as Vice President and Associate General Counsel at IBM, where she was a founding board member of IBM’s AI Ethics Board and, beginning in 2014, served as senior counsel for Watson AI, helping support the global growth of transformative AI technologies.

Over the past decade, Donna has developed deep expertise in AI ethics, governance, and risk management, advising businesses, boards, executive stakeholders, and C-suite leaders on how to advance innovation responsibly. Her work focuses on helping organizations build practical governance frameworks that enable growth while maintaining trust, accountability, and appropriate legal and ethical guardrails.

Donna is currently the Inaugural Executive in Residence for Governance, Risk, and Emerging Technology at Northwestern University’s Energy Innovation Lab. There, she collaborates with Lab leadership, faculty, and external partners to bring real-world legal, governance, and risk perspectives to the Lab’s research and forums, helping bridge the gap between innovation, regulation, and commercial application. Donna also serves on the Executive Committee of the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law Board.

She earned her J.D. from Northwestern Pritzker School of Law and her B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Northwestern University.