User:Honest20/sandbox

Introduction
Ursula M. Burns is chairman and chief executive officer of Xerox. With sales approaching $23 billion, Xerox (NYSE: XRX) is the world’s leading enterprise for business process and document management.

When Burns joined Xerox in 1980 as a mechanical engineering summer intern, the company was the leader in the global photocopying market. As she later assumed roles in product development and planning, the company was securing its leadership position in digital document technologies. From 1992 through 2000, Burns, at a pivotal point in the company’s history, led several business teams including the company’s color business and office network printing business.

In 2000, Burns was named senior vice president, Corporate Strategic Services, heading up manufacturing and supply chain operations. Alongside then-CEO Anne Mulcahy, Burns worked to restructure Xerox through its turnaround to emerge as a leader in color technology and document services. A key factor in the company’s turnaround was its research and development of new products and technologies, and at the time Burns was responsible for leading Xerox's global research as well as product development, marketing and delivery. In April 2007, Burns was named president of Xerox, expanding her leadership to also include the company's IT organization, corporate strategy, human resources, corporate marketing and global accounts. At that time, she was also elected a member of the company’s Board of Directors.

Burns was named chief executive officer in July 2009 and shortly after, made the largest acquisition in Xerox history, the $6.4 billion purchase of Affiliated Computer Services, catapulting the company’s presence in the almost $600 billion business services market and extending the company’s reach into diverse areas of business process and IT outsourcing. Xerox is on track to have two-thirds its revenue come from Services by 2017.

On May 20, 2010, Burns became chairman of the company, leading the more than 140,000 people of Xerox who serve clients in more than 180 countries. Building on Xerox’s legacy of innovation, they’re enabling workplaces — from small businesses to large global enterprises — to simplify the way work gets done so they can focus more on their core business.

Burns earned a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering from Polytechnic Institute of NYU and a Master of Science degree in mechanical engineering from Columbia University.

In addition to the Xerox board, she is a board director of the American Express Corporation and Exxon Mobil Corporation. Burns also provides leadership counsel to community, educational and non-profit organizations including FIRST - (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), National Academy Foundation, MIT, and the U.S. Olympic Committee, among others. She is a founding board director of Change the Equation, which focuses on improving the U.S.’s education system in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). In March 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama appointed Burns vice chair of the President’s Export Council.

Ursula Burns in the News
Les Echos.fr, “Ursula Burns: The future of Xerox is not 3D printing”, 2014 April 7 In interview with French financial daily newspaper Ursula Burns responds to questions about the decline in printing, growth in services and Xerox’s approach to 3D printing.

Financial Times, “Reshaping Xerox”, 2014 April 6 Video interview with Ursula Burns discusses how she has led a radical reshaping of Xerox away from its traditional focus on documents hardware to business services.

USA Today, "Engineering a revolution at Xerox”, 2014 March 26 Article looks at Xerox’s transformation to becoming a computer services company.

Fortune.com, "Backstage with Xerox CEO Ursula Burns", 24 March 2014 Xerox CEO Ursula Burns explains how Xerox is changing, and why we're changing.

CNBC Squawk Box, 18 March 2014 In a video interview Xerox CEO Ursula Burns explains the company's place as an established leader in document technology and its growing business services presence. "The personality of Xerox is not gender-based, but it is one that enables women", 29 Sept. 2013 Issue Q&A with Ursula Burns in which she discusses Xerox's transformation to a products and services company and her personal journey

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

I was raised by a wonderful mother in the rough and tumble public housing projects on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Many people told me I had three strikes against me: I was black. I was a girl. And I was poor.

Mom didn’t see it that way. She constantly reminded me “where I was didn’t define who I was.” She knew that education was my way up and out. On a modest salary, Mom somehow managed to send me to good Catholic schools. Back then I was prepared for one of three career options: nun, teacher, or nurse.

None of those paths felt quite right for me and I began to dream of becoming an engineer. Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute offered me a spot in the freshman class and I panicked—a classic case of being careful what you wish for. I didn’t have the right preparation. The school was in a different borough of New York City that seemed foreign and distant. I feared the students would surely be smarter than me.

It was my first “lean back, lean in” crossroads. It would have been so simple to let go of my dreams and set out on a more predictable journey. However, the courage and confidence that my mother and Cathedral High School had given me enabled me to lean in. It wasn’t easy. I had a lot of catch-up courses to master. I was an oddity in a sea of predominantly white males. I doubted myself big time. I started out in chemical engineering, which I hated, and switched to mechanical engineering, which I loved. And, ever so slowly, I regained my footing.

My life since then has been a series of lean in moments: taking an internship with Xerox in upstate New York, going to an Ivy League school for a graduate degree, signing on with Xerox, and climbing the ladder to the top. As CEO, I pulled the trigger on a major acquisition, which has transformed Xerox from a copy and printing company to a technology and services enterprise.

Dreams do come true, but not without the help of others, a good education, a strong work ethic, and the courage to lean in. That’s why I spend so much time with organizations that help minorities and women gain the education and self-respect they need to take risks, to dream big, and, I hope, to someday pay it forward.