6 Quotes & Sayings By Ursula Burns

Ursula Burns is the Chair and CEO of Xerox Corporation. She is the first African-American woman to head a Fortune 500 company and the first African-American female chief executive of a major global corporation. She has served as president, CEO and member of the board of directors of Xerox since 2004. Under her leadership, Xerox has taken steps to expand its leadership in technology and innovation, and to strengthen its core business and increase value for customers and shareholders.

1
As I've progressed in my career, I've come to appreciate - and really value - the other attributes that define a company's success beyond the P&L: great leadership, long-term financial strength, ethical business practices, evolving business strategies, sound governance, powerful brands, values-based decision-making. Ursula Burns
2
Find something that you love to do, and find a place that you really like to do it in. I found something I loved to do. I'm a mechanical engineer by training, and I loved it. I still do. My son is a nuclear engineer at MIT, a junior, and I get the same vibe from him. Your work has to be compelling. You spend a lot of time doing it. Ursula Burns
3
Race and gender definitely came up, occasionally, in my life at work. But the bigger challenge that I had was age. I took roles earlier in my career than people expected, and so a lot of what I got was, 'Do you actually know enough to do this?' Ursula Burns
4
My mother was amazing. I guess, in our community, if you wanted to get by you had to work hard. So she cleaned offices. She did everything that you could imagine. We were really poor. But she would say, 'Where you are is not who you are.' Ursula Burns
5
Fresh out of college, you tend to join a company because it's a job. But, you tend to stay because it becomes a career; you start to feel at home. In the beginning of your career, you're focused on you: 'I like this place because I'm doing rewarding work; they take good care of me; the people are nice; there's runway for me, ' etc. Ursula Burns