You might not know the name Ursula M. Burns, but she has impacted your life whether you know it or not. Here is everything you need to know about this woman who went from the NYC projects to a CEO on the Fortune 500.

#1 First Black Woman CEO

 “I’m a black lady from the Lower East Side of New York. Not a lot intimidates me.”

Ursula M. Burns was the first Black woman to be a CEO of a Fortune 500 company. She was the CEO of Xerox (NASDAQ:XRX) and VEON, and served on the board of directors of Uber, American Express, and ExxonMobil and is currently the Non-Executive Chairwoman of Teneo.

#2 Integrum Holdings

Burns co-founded Integrum Holdings and led the White House National Program on STEM under President Barack Obama until 2016. And in 2014, she was the 22nd most powerful woman in the world.

#3 Family and School

“I’ve had many mentors, but the one that has the most impact was my mother.”

Burns was born in New York City in 1958 to a Panamanian immigrant single mother. She grew up in the Baruch House, which was a housing project. She attended an all-girls Catholic school, Cathedral High School, and then earned her undergrad in mechanical engineering in 1980 at Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute.

#4 Columbia University

“Dreams do come true, but not without the help of others, a good education, a strong work ethic, and the courage to lean in.”

An internship at Xerox funded her master’s degree from Columbia University in 1981. After the year-long internship, she officially joined the company after graduating from Columbia.

#5 Career Beginnings

Burns started out as a product developer. By 1990 she accepted an offer to be Senior Executive Wayland Hick’s Executive Assistant. After nine months, she then became Chief Executive Paul Allaire’s Executive Assistant.

#6 VP at Xerox

By 1999 Burns was the Vice-President for Global Manufacturing of Xerox. She was promoted in 2000 to Senior Vice President of Corporate Strategic-Services. By 2007, she was the President of Xerox, and then in 2009, she was CEO. In 2010, she became Vice-Chair of the President’s Export Council.

#7 Xerox Career

“Admiration takes on a whole new level when you appreciate just how complex it is to run a modern business.”

Burns was also the first woman to follow another CEO of a Fortune 500. From 2009 to 2016, she acquired Affiliated Computer Services, was named an International Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, and split Xerox into two independent companies: Conduent and Xerox. She was appointed as chairwoman of Conduent.

#8 Chair Positions

Burns left Xerox in 2017 and joined Teneo as a Senior Advisor. From 2017 to 2020, she was chairwoman at ExxonMobil Corporation, Datto Inc., Boston Scientific, the National Association of Manufacturers, American Express Corporation, the MIT Corporation, Nestle, the University of Rochester, FIRST, the RUMP Group, and the Rochester Business Alliance. She was elected Chairman and then CEO of VEON in 2018.

#9 Leadership Legacy

“This old notion that work is drudgery is nonsense. Most days, even back when Xerox was under siege, I could not wait to get to the office.”

By 2020, she was providing leadership counsel to the Ford Foundation, the Mayo Clinic, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and more. She was appointed to a position on the Board of Directors of Waystar and remained on the boards of IHS and Endeavor Group.

#10 Published Memoir

“I don’t want to overemphasize this, but not a day goes by when I don’t think about my mother and what she would think about what I just did. I often adjust my approach.”

In 2021, she published a memoir entitled, Where You Are Is Not Who You Are: A Memoir. In 2022, she was Vice-Chair of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness.

#11 Marriage and Life

Burns married fellow Xerox employee, Lloyd Bean in 1991. They raised two kids. They both attended MIT. Her husband passed away in 2019. Regarding motherhood and family life, she said, “You don’t have to be at every volleyball game. We can’t guilt ourselves.”

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