Abstract

This paper examines the leadership style of Ursula Burns and it describes what influences, values and behavior leadership has on an organization. Leadership has been defined as the processof of influencing others and of facilitating individual and collective efforts to accomplish shared objectives.

1. Provide a brief (one paragraph) background of the CEO. Born September 20, 1958 in New York City, New York Ursula Burns has been married to Lloyd Bean since 1988. She attended Columbus University where she earned her masters of sciences degree in mechanical engineering, Polytechnic Institute of New York where she earned her bachelor degree in mechanical engineering and Cathedral High School. She was named CEO in July 2009. Ursula Burns is the first woman to succeed another woman and the first African American woman to be the CEO of a fortune 500 company. She holds the seat of Madam Chairman and CEO of Xerox. 2. Analyze the CEO’s leadership style and philosophy, and how the CEO’s leadership style aligns with the culture.

Ursula Burns feels that you should adjust your leadership style in a way that makes it feel natural to you. Bringing people into an organization is an important role of a leader, Ursula believes they should fit into the organization and into the role you’re hiring them for. She says selecting the right people to create teams, a good strategy and the ability to communicate are all key parts of being a good leader. But she strongly believes that while accomplishing your leadership role you should remain true to yourself and feel natural. Her philosophy in life is “to succeed you must do something you love” a lesson she learned from her mother at an early age. Xerox has a famously strong culture for being nice everyone should feel part of a family, they say we are real people working with real people a team based company, it also a