Tom Cleary has been a member of Chicago Stagehands' Local Two since 1984. Its wide-ranging jurisdiction afforded him an opportunity to work in all facets of live stage. Sometimes that work would be in a television studio or hotel ballroom and other times it would be round-the-clock days at the opera. There were concerts too. Some productions monolithic and elaborate. Others seat-of-the-pants and wing it. Some indoors, others in the rain. There was rock 'n' roll, country, jazz, and blues. Some days the concert went up in a new state of the art football stadium. Other days it was a potholed and cracked out-of-the-way parking lot.

Such firsthand knowledge of what his members regularly encounter out in the workplace has proven to be a great foundation for Cleary in his fulfilling his full-time duties as Local Two's Secretary-Treasurer, a position those same members first elected him to back in 1996.

Tom Cleary was appointed to his position on the I.A.T.S.E.’s Board of Trustees in July 2006 in Calgary, Canada.