Ursula Burns Biography
Ursula Burns is an American business executive, who was born September 20, 1958, in New York, New York, and held the positions of chairman 2010–17 and CEO 2009–16 of the global document management and business services corporation Xerox Corporation. She was the first African-American woman to hold the position of CEO of a Fortune 500 business and the first woman to succeed another woman in such a role.
Burns grew up in a housing project for the underprivileged on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. She was the second of three children raised by a single mother who ran a daycare out of her home and worked odd jobs like ironing and cleaning to help pay for Burns’ tuition at the Roman Catholic preparatory school Cathedral High School.
Burns, who performed exceptionally well in math, later graduated with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Brooklyn’s Polytechnic Institute of New York University in 1980. She joined Xerox as a summer mechanical engineering intern under the company’s graduate engineering program for minorities the same year she started working toward a master’s degree in mechanical engineering at Columbia University, which in turn helped pay for a portion of her tuition costs.
Ursula Burns Age
Ursula Burn was born on September 20, 1958. She is 65 years old in the year 2023.
Ursula Burns Height
Ursula Burn has a moderate height of 1.68 m
Ursula Burns Education
Burns, who performed exceptionally well in math, later graduated with a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Brooklyn’s Polytechnic Institute of New York University in 1980.
She joined Xerox as a summer mechanical engineering intern under the company’s graduate engineering program for minorities the same year she started working toward a master’s degree in mechanical engineering at Columbia University, which in turn helped pay for a portion of her tuition costs.
Ursula Burns Family
Burns’s parents were immigrants from Panama. They lived in Rochester, New York, and Burns was married to Lloyd Bean until his passing in 2019. Bean also worked at Xerox. She has a stepson named Malcolm who graduated from MIT and a daughter named Melissa who was born in 1992. Burns has contributed significantly to New York’s McQuaid Jesuit High School
Ursula Burns Husband
Burns was married to Lloyd Bean until his passing in 2019.
Ursula Burns Children
Burns has a stepson named Malcolm who graduated from MIT and a daughter named Melissa who was born in 1992.
Ursula Burns Networth
Ursula Burns has an estimated net worth of $1.25 Billion dollars.
Ursula Burns Community activities
Burns offers leadership advice to a variety of community, educational, and nonprofit groups, including the National Academy Foundation, MIT, the U.S. Olympic Committee, FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), and others.
She serves on the founding board of directors of Change the Equation, an organization dedicated to enhancing STEM education in the United States. Between 2013 and 2014, she held the position of vice chairwoman of The Business Council’s executive committee.
She has given the commencement address at numerous universities, including Georgetown University, Xavier University, Howard University, Rochester Institute of Technology, and the University of Rochester.
She has been included on Forbes’ list of the 100 most powerful women in the world numerous times. She was ranked as the 29th in 2015. She was listed as one of “America’s Top 50 Women In Tech” in 2018. She may have been on a list of Hillary Clinton’s probable vice presidential candidates in 2016 as revealed by leaked emails.
Ursula Burns Career
Burns joined Xerox as a full-time employee in 1981 after earning his master’s degree and swiftly advanced to a position in product development. Since 1992, she has advanced through a variety of managerial and engineering positions.
In 2000, she was named senior vice president of corporate strategic services, where she was responsible for overseeing the production process. Burns eventually had the chance to expand her leadership in the fields of global research, product development, marketing, and delivery thanks to the job, and in 2007 she was made president of Xerox. She was appointed CEO two years later, and in 2010 she was elected board chairman.
Burns sought to overhaul Xerox, which was struggling with dwindling revenue when she became an officer. In order to achieve this, she switched the company’s emphasis from products to services and managed the acquisition (2010) of Affiliated Computer Services, a company that outsourced business services.
However, she was unable to make Xerox come to life. She started the process of separating the company’s service holdings into the independent business Conduent in 2016, and the deal was completed in 2017. Burns left her position as CEO in 2016 and her chairman of the board position the following year.
Burns had a number of other appointments during this time. She was chosen by U.S. President Barack Obama to assist in leading the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Education Coalition in 2009; she held the position until 2016.
The STEM Education Coalition is a national coalition of more than 1,000 technological organizations working to enhance student engagement and performance in the aforementioned subject areas through legislative advocacy. Burns also served as chair of the President’s Export Council (PEC), a body of labor, industry, and political leaders that advises the president on how to encourage the expansion of American exports.
She served on the PEC from 2010 to 2016. Burns also served on the boards of a large number of businesses, including Exxon Mobil, Uber, and VEON.In 2017, the latter, an Amsterdam-based telecom company, named her executive chairman; the following year, she was promoted to chairman and CEO. However, she resigned from both positions in 2020. Burns released his autobiography Where You Are Is Not Who You Are the following year.
