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Speaker 1: Hi everyone, I'm Katie Curic and this is next question.

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Speaker 1: Ursla Burns has had an impressive business career that's often

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Speaker 1: summarized by an historic achievement that when she became the

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Speaker 1: CEO of Xerox back in two thousand nine, she was

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Speaker 1: the first ever black woman to head a Fortune five

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Speaker 1: hundred company, and as a side note, Ursula actually held

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Speaker 1: onto that title exclusively until only this year, when the

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Speaker 1: Fortune five hundred lists featured two black women. We'll get

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Speaker 1: to the corporate world's painfully slow diversity progress later, but

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Speaker 1: now the former Zerox CEO is adding another big first

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Speaker 1: to her achievements. First time author. I'm not a writer,

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Speaker 1: I don't pretend to even be one, and when this

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Speaker 1: thing started I could not believe that I had committed

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Speaker 1: to do this. She did commit to it and finished it,

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Speaker 1: and her memoir called Where You Are Is Not Who

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Speaker 1: You Are, is out now and it's fantastic. Unlike a

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Speaker 1: lot of books written by business leaders, this one is

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Speaker 1: about so much more than the corporate world. Ursula gets

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Speaker 1: very personal, sharing her childhood growing up in public housing

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Speaker 1: in New York City, her Catholic school days, her marriage,

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Speaker 1: and yes her thirty year ascent to the tippy top

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Speaker 1: of Xerox's ladder. In her prolog, Ursla admits writing this

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Speaker 1: life journey was one of the most difficult things she's

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Speaker 1: ever had to do, which, let's be honest, is saying

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Speaker 1: a lot. So we started our conversation there. Why do

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Speaker 1: you think it was so hard, Ursula? Because I did

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Speaker 1: it right in the middle of a huge number of

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Speaker 1: transitions in my life. Right one was the most obvious

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Speaker 1: was this pandemic. So I started the book before the

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Speaker 1: pandemic and then had to go back and re read

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Speaker 1: it for the fiftieth time in the context of the

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Speaker 1: pandemic and bring the book forward some of the messages

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Speaker 1: forward to the pandemic time. There was one one big issue.

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Speaker 1: The other is my husband passed away in January of

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Speaker 1: two thousand and nineteen, very unexpectedly. I know, I'm so sorry,

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Speaker 1: or and I was in the middle of this thing

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Speaker 1: as well. It was close to the end, and it

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Speaker 1: really did. The book made it really difficult to kind

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Speaker 1: of live in that moment because I had to, you know,

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Speaker 1: living that moment. Looking back at all of the my life,

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Speaker 1: my whole life, of which most of it was with him.

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Speaker 1: It's Okay, it's really hard to kind of put it

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Speaker 1: in context. It was just very difficult from that perspective,

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Speaker 1: as I can't imagine, honestly having to do that and

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Speaker 1: also deal with grieving and the fact that your husband's

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Speaker 1: death was so unexpected, and you know, I found when

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Speaker 1: my husband died, gosh, now twenty plus years ago, even

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Speaker 1: trying to concentrate was next to impossible. So very, very,

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Speaker 1: very difficult. You know, he's so exactly on point what

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Speaker 1: you just said. How you know you don't think about

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Speaker 1: I didn't. My mother died when I was twenty five,

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Speaker 1: and that was a shock in my life, right and

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Speaker 1: she was very young. She was forty nine when she died.

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Speaker 1: And a parent dying is one thing, it's crushing a

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Speaker 1: spouse dying. Even if my husband was twenty years old

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Speaker 1: than I was, he was eighty years old when he died.

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Speaker 1: His his death was unexpected. I mean it was literally

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Speaker 1: even though he knew he was getting older. It was

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Speaker 1: not something that I had brought into a context that

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Speaker 1: I could think about at all. So when I had to,

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Speaker 1: when I'm writing this book, he dies, and then I

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Speaker 1: have to basically stopped writing it, primarily because it couldn't

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Speaker 1: concentrate on anything, and the things that I had to

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Speaker 1: concentrate on to write and to review it, we're so

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Speaker 1: um horrible. From a contact standpoint, I didn't want to

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Speaker 1: think about my mother's death. I didn't want to think

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Speaker 1: about really great times, right because then I didn't want

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Speaker 1: to think about really bad times. So basically have to

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Speaker 1: kind of step away from the book for a long time,

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Speaker 1: step away from writing and thinking about it. And then

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Speaker 1: the third thing is we were going through a really

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Speaker 1: tough political time where there was not a message that

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Speaker 1: was coming from anywhere that was like peaceful. There was

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Speaker 1: no there was no place to rest, like your mind.

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Speaker 1: It was every time you every time I woke up,

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Speaker 1: and if I read anything about what was happening in

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Speaker 1: politics in the US, it just threw me into another

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Speaker 1: noneother tail spin. So I had to take literally when

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Speaker 1: they say time out, I had to take time out

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Speaker 1: and just kind of move away and not think about it,

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Speaker 1: and not think about my life and not think about

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Speaker 1: how you're trying to kind of put it in the

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Speaker 1: context of a book, because you said what you said

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Speaker 1: was so you don't live your life in reverse, you

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Speaker 1: live your life going forward. So you never think, you know,

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Speaker 1: the day that passed right before you, which I retell

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Speaker 1: days that happened before me in the book are not

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Speaker 1: concept funchal when they're happening, so you don't think about

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Speaker 1: them in that context. You just think about them, is okay,

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Speaker 1: so another day. But when you retell them, you retell

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Speaker 1: them from this perspective as if you knew they were consequential,

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Speaker 1: and they aren't. And I'm an engineer, so everything was

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Speaker 1: kind of illogical about the whole thing. And finally I

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Speaker 1: got through with my goodness, thank goodness, I got through

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Speaker 1: the whole process, and my The woman who helped me,

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Speaker 1: help me write, her name is Linda Frankie. It's very

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Speaker 1: very good. She was as good a because I did

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Speaker 1: all little writing right, I tell her, you know how,

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Speaker 1: you know how the process goes right, tells you back

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Speaker 1: then you have to read it and put it in context.

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Speaker 1: And I would dwell on certain things and try to

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Speaker 1: become really precise. And she was just very good at

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Speaker 1: at kind of moving me on. It's not letting you

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Speaker 1: get too deep into the minutia. But but in addition

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Speaker 1: to that, of course, you talk about the political scene.

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Speaker 1: We have this massive racial reckoning with the Black Lives

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Speaker 1: Matter movement that intersected with the pandemic. So, uh, that's

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Speaker 1: something that I think you've lived your entire life and career.

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Speaker 1: On the other hand, did that change the tone of

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Speaker 1: the book or did you? I know, you had to

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Speaker 1: go back and make sure that you did it from

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Speaker 1: the vantage point of where we are rather than where

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Speaker 1: you were when the book started. Absolutely, and it did

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Speaker 1: change the tone a little bit. My daughter keeps telling

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Speaker 1: me that I have to watch to not be shrill

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Speaker 1: because sometimes I get yeah, when I get into to

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Speaker 1: not be shrill, because you know, sometimes you get to

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Speaker 1: the point where you just are so engaged, so angry,

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Speaker 1: so um emotional about the topic that you get really

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Speaker 1: wrapped up into it and it gets um almost like

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Speaker 1: a lecture. We'll tell your daughter that's a very gendered word, ursula.

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Speaker 1: And I can't believe at her age she's telling you

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Speaker 1: not to be shrill. I need to talk to her.

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Speaker 1: My daughter is actually very um astute on these types

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Speaker 1: of things. She's a writer. She used it to me

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Speaker 1: for a very specific reason. It's kind of like the

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Speaker 1: way I raised the kids. I would get into it.

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Speaker 1: But the point was that I had to kind of

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Speaker 1: become emotional, but not be so emotional. And there at

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Speaker 1: some points in the in the book, and some points

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Speaker 1: even in the retelling, and when I was speaking in

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Speaker 1: press around around the you know, George Floyd's murder around

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Speaker 1: this whole time, how emotional and how troubling it was

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Speaker 1: to me that we are, that we are at a

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Speaker 1: point in this country. I'm at a point in my

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Speaker 1: life where I have I have quote unquote arrived, Katie.

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Speaker 1: I'm you know, literally, I have more money that could

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Speaker 1: possibly imagine. I am engaged in places I never thought

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Speaker 1: I would be. I have access to people that I

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Speaker 1: couldn't even can't even imagine, I know, much less hang

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Speaker 1: out with regularly. I'm very kind of set and I

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Speaker 1: now and even for my whole life, I've been involved

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Speaker 1: with kind of pushing it out and giving back. But

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Speaker 1: I sit here, and I sat there and said, can

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Speaker 1: you can I believe? Can Ursula Burns believe that this

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Speaker 1: is two thousand and twenty and we're still talking about

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Speaker 1: and dealing with and living with, very visually people who

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Speaker 1: have total disregard for other people's lives, who and and

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Speaker 1: and people who speak about it in leadership as if

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Speaker 1: it were a transaction, you know, just it just happened. So, no,

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Speaker 1: there's a bigger context to this, there is more emotion

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Speaker 1: to this. There are people who are affected in this,

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Speaker 1: and it has become ordinary. And that was to the point,

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Speaker 1: was that, you know, George Floyd and his family, George

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Speaker 1: Floyd suffered the ultimate and his family suffered. But I

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Speaker 1: don't think that the the political leadership understood that the

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Speaker 1: nation was struggling and that we, even though it wasn't

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Speaker 1: our direct family, we black and white, young and old,

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Speaker 1: were struggling, and instead of getting any kind of solace

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Speaker 1: or comfort, we got unbelievable responses like, you know, why

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Speaker 1: is this such a big deal? This whole context of

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Speaker 1: well he was a criminal. There's a whole bunch of

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Speaker 1: unfeeling in the middle of a pandemic. In the end,

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Speaker 1: so there was this like this kind of big gap

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Speaker 1: of don't you know what we need as a nation?

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Speaker 1: Don't you know what we need these people? Don't you

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Speaker 1: know what we need as a world? And the answer

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Speaker 1: was they The answer was no, I don't know, and

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Speaker 1: if I didn't know, I don't particularly care. And do

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Speaker 1: you think that things are changing? Our's law. I can't

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Speaker 1: help but think as I look around that we are

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Speaker 1: in the midst of a seismic cultural shift and attitudes

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Speaker 1: about race, diversity, equality inclusion, that these things are being

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Speaker 1: talked about in a way in my lifetime they have

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Speaker 1: never been talked about. Praise the Lord, thank God. And

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Speaker 1: do you see that too? Absolutely it is such. And

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Speaker 1: I'm asked all the time, asked all the time whether

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Speaker 1: or not this is a you know it's gonna last.

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Speaker 1: So I always put it in the context of the

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Speaker 1: of Hamiltons, and right, is it a moment or a movement?

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Speaker 1: And we are It could be a moment if we

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Speaker 1: let it be a moment if we just basically back off,

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Speaker 1: we meaning citizens in the world, we just back off

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Speaker 1: black and white, male and female, and just said the

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Speaker 1: status quo, the way we were living before is generally okay,

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Speaker 1: we'll just go back to that. Or if we that's

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Speaker 1: the moment, the movement, which is what I feel, which

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Speaker 1: is what I think you're saying you feel and see

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Speaker 1: as well that the movement is We're not We're not

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Speaker 1: able to forget everything and move backwards. We have to

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Speaker 1: move forward. I don't know what that is going to

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Speaker 1: look like at the end, but I know it's not

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Speaker 1: going to be what it was before. If we keep

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Speaker 1: our voices in the right tone and are really inclusive

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Speaker 1: of a lot of people's ideas, we will actually make progress,

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Speaker 1: not just changed, so it will be changed for the better.

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Speaker 1: I am so optimistic about this happening. Generally atenistic, but

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Speaker 1: I'm so optimistic about this happening because we, we people

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Speaker 1: will not allow it to just swipp slip back. We

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Speaker 1: will not allow the what I call the essential worker, Okay,

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Speaker 1: the essential worker who became essential only when we wanted

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Speaker 1: them to be essential. But before that, we didn't pay

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Speaker 1: any attention to them. Most of these people, we wouldn't

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Speaker 1: even pay them more than fifteen dollars an hour. We're

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Speaker 1: know these essential workers became core and critical to our lives.

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Speaker 1: Black people, under resourced people became visible to us for

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Speaker 1: the first time, really, and I think it's a it's

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Speaker 1: a good time and the book. Part of the journey

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Speaker 1: of the book when I read it again in the

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Speaker 1: final time, was I how do I say this? I

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Speaker 1: started there, That's my life, That's who I was, That's

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Speaker 1: who my mother was. For sure, she was a person

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Speaker 1: an invisible person, and that I want to ask you

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Speaker 1: about her because you have had such a fascinating life.

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Speaker 1: Firstless so impressive. Your mom was an absolute saint, and

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Speaker 1: she died, as you mentioned, at forty nine. She was

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Speaker 1: an immigrant from Panama. I was so struck when you

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Speaker 1: wrote about her biggest annual income was fort dollars and

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Speaker 1: three a year. Yes, had three children. Um raised you

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Speaker 1: all to value the importance of education. Your mom was

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Speaker 1: a truly amazing woman. And one of the things that

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Speaker 1: prompted me to ask you that that question now is

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Speaker 1: that forty nine she died. If she had had access

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Speaker 1: to better medical care, for example, you're convinced that she

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Speaker 1: would have lived a much longer life. But talk about

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Speaker 1: your mom for a minute, because what an unsung heroine

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Speaker 1: of not only your life, but probably represents a lot

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Speaker 1: of women like her. Yeah. I think that this is

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Speaker 1: the backbone of America. It is the dream of America

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Speaker 1: embodied in my mother. She did it. She basically came

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Speaker 1: here with very little, like literally nothing. She had a

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Speaker 1: high school education. She at the time had a husband,

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Speaker 1: he was he left early. A mother never spent time

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Speaker 1: thinking about or talking about what we did not have

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Speaker 1: that was not part of our daily discussions ever, including

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Speaker 1: my father. Never literally my aunt's told me about my father.

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Speaker 1: So my mother was just this person who when I

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Speaker 1: tell the story, when the when you look back, it

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Speaker 1: seems like she was this perfect saint. She was a

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Speaker 1: typical mother because she she cared about her children immensely.

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Speaker 1: She sacrificed everything in her sphere for us. That's basically

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Speaker 1: she lived for us. She had no idea she was

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Speaker 1: gonna diet for you nine Obviously, she thought that if

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Speaker 1: she raised good kids, and this is part of her spiritualism,

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Speaker 1: her religion, that if she thought she raised good kids,

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Speaker 1: that God would take care of everything. Else. She thought

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Speaker 1: if she raised kids that worked hard and took care

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Speaker 1: of themselves and big for her, took care of each other,

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Speaker 1: that God would take care of everything. So she had

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Speaker 1: these fundamental beliefs that a lot of you know, just

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Speaker 1: regular good old fashion hard work, keep an eye on

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Speaker 1: the people who are close to you. She struggled, And

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Speaker 1: when I was about sixteen or seventeen, I realized my

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Speaker 1: mother was really struggling. You know, when your kids you

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Speaker 1: just figure this is the way everybody lives. My mother

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Speaker 1: literally woke up early every single day, went to bed

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Speaker 1: late every single night, and every day she had to

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Speaker 1: figure out a way to have food for us on

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Speaker 1: the table, to keep us physically safe, to get enough

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Speaker 1: money to pay basic things. I learned later how much

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Speaker 1: she bartered for just about everything. How she would go

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Speaker 1: to my high school. I have to have discussions with

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Speaker 1: my high school because she couldn't paid the tuition. My

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Speaker 1: mother paid sixty five dollars a month for me to

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Speaker 1: go to high school. That's six fifty dollars a year.

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Speaker 1: She made four thousand, four hundred dollars. It's just unthinkable.

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Speaker 1: But the reason why it wasn't unthinkable for me when

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Speaker 1: I was growing up was that she didn't make it obvious.

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Speaker 1: She just made us obvious to ourselves, if you know

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Speaker 1: what I mean. We were it was all about us.

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Speaker 1: He never complained. She never really didn't know. I mean,

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Speaker 1: you said at sixteen she was struggling, but but she

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Speaker 1: never she never talked to you all of it. I

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Speaker 1: realized that when I when I was in high school,

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Speaker 1: because I went to a all girls, Catholic high school,

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Speaker 1: basically a high school above our meetings obviously, but it's

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Speaker 1: really great school. I mean high school in in the

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Speaker 1: Midtown New York City Cathedral High School. And when I

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Speaker 1: went there for the first time, I took I took

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Speaker 1: the bus out of our neighborhoods. I was, what's six fourteen,

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Speaker 1: I guess when I first went the first time, I

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Speaker 1: took the bus out way up to quote unquote Midtown.

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Speaker 1: I lived in the Lower Reside and that's where we stayed.

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Speaker 1: We stayed there. That was our world. And when I moved,

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Speaker 1: when I was going up and down on this bus,

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Speaker 1: and I started to realize people live in these great

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Speaker 1: neighborhood so this was pretty cool, and they had things

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Speaker 1: besides bodega's and and the like. And then I went

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Speaker 1: to school and met other children and their parents and

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Speaker 1: realized just the look of my mother, the look how

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Speaker 1: she dressed, how she looked. She was carrying a lot

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Speaker 1: of weight. You could tell that she had a lot

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Speaker 1: on her shoulders, even though it didn't you couldn't see

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Speaker 1: it physically right obviously, but you could see it in

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Speaker 1: her body. And that's when I said, whoa this is?

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Speaker 1: This is taking a lot from her, And is that

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Speaker 1: what inspired you to achieve and to really pursue excellence,

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Speaker 1: Because clearly you're a highly intelligent person, you know, And

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Speaker 1: you went to to college. You started, I guess in

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Speaker 1: chemical engineer and then engineering, and then you transferred to

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Speaker 1: mechanical engineering. You've got your masters and mechanical engineering. I mean,

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Speaker 1: what inspired you to to be such a huge achiever? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: my mom, it was about in the beginning, what perspective

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Speaker 1: do you have? Right? I mean, I had no perspective

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Speaker 1: on companies and hierarchies and c eos none. What I

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Speaker 1: wanted to do is get a job that I that

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Speaker 1: earned enough money. That's why I picked chemical engineering. This

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Speaker 1: was very insightful choice about you know, I just went

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Speaker 1: to a book. You're very practical, very practical. I need

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Speaker 1: a job that could pay the most money after four

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Speaker 1: years of college. We had no option but to go

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Speaker 1: to college. But my mother said, basically no choice. I

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Speaker 1: would always say how you're gonna pay for it? She said,

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Speaker 1: don't worry about that's me. You take care of your business.

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Speaker 1: I'll take care of my business. And so I looked

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Speaker 1: it up and it was chemical engineering. I was gonna

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Speaker 1: be a chemical engineer. Four years of college. You make

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Speaker 1: the most money twenty five thousand dollars or whatever. It

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Speaker 1: would have been dollars. That was I was like, oh

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Speaker 1: my god, because I mean twenty five thousand dollars, we

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Speaker 1: can change our life for twenty hours. It was that straightforward,

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Speaker 1: that practical decision, no complications, literally dollars a year, four

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Speaker 1: years of college that said. Of course I didn't go

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Speaker 1: to four years. I went to five and a half year.

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Speaker 1: I got my master's degree. And by the time I

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Speaker 1: ended college, you know, my mother was to the point

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Speaker 1: so sick, and I was dying literally a couple of

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Speaker 1: years after that. So right when I could have started

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Speaker 1: to switch it back and give it to her and

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Speaker 1: make her life a little bit more comfortable, which Katie

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Speaker 1: would have been easy to think about this right five,

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Speaker 1: I could have made her life easier without too much complications.

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Speaker 1: And I ran out of time, you know, I basically

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Speaker 1: that's right out of time. And she so she she

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Speaker 1: died in the hospital of that is, you know, the

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Speaker 1: center the heartbeat of hospitals in New York. But this hospital,

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Speaker 1: it was Bellevue, was so you know, let's overrun at

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Speaker 1: that point. It was so cry would have taken care

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Speaker 1: of all kinds of things that age was, you know,

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Speaker 1: how it was at that time, and so she didn't

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Speaker 1: get great care. I think that this is not that

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Speaker 1: the people ignored her. It was just as I was

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Speaker 1: not capable of pushing it. If my mother had gotten

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Speaker 1: sick when I was older, I would have literally been

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Speaker 1: able to her right advocate for her. And I just

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Speaker 1: didn't even know how to do it much says that

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Speaker 1: it was possible to do. You know, I had no

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Speaker 1: idea when my husband was sick the first time, when

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Speaker 1: he got ill, way before he died along collapse, when

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Speaker 1: he went into the hospital. Literally I was the general, Literally,

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Speaker 1: this is what's going to happen. This is that you

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Speaker 1: guys can't. I want to know what's going on, who's

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Speaker 1: going to see him, et cetera. If I had half

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Speaker 1: of that, my mother would have surely been alive. Sounds

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Speaker 1: like you you have a lot of I don't know.

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Speaker 1: It sounds like you're you feel a lot of guilt

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Speaker 1: about huge amount of guilt. Huge amount of guilt. It

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Speaker 1: took me a lot of time, and I'm not gonna

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Speaker 1: cry on this to get over the fact that you can't.

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Speaker 1: You can't live your life backwards to force right. If

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Speaker 1: you would have known, you would have done it. Differently.

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Speaker 1: But of course you didn't know, so you can't kind

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Speaker 1: of keep winding back about, well, I should have done this,

364
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Speaker 1: I should have done that. It wasn't that I knew

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Speaker 1: what to do and didn't do it. I had no

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Speaker 1: clue what I'm doing. That's one of the reasons why

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Speaker 1: now I pushed so hard for basic things that as

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Speaker 1: citizens of the world we have to have. We shouldn't

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Speaker 1: have to have somebody who who has time and energy

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Speaker 1: and power and position to advocate for us to get

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Speaker 1: things that are like the Pavlovs need right. Anyway, it

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Speaker 1: took a lot of time for me to get past that,

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Speaker 1: and even now I cry when I talked about it,

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Speaker 1: because she should have been able to enjoy our success

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Speaker 1: more more, not financially just being there. If you do

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Speaker 1: financially that you could have been able to perfect her

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Speaker 1: quality of life. And in a way you pay tribute

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Speaker 1: to her ursula because your title is where you are,

379
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Speaker 1: is not who you are, And that came from your mom.

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Speaker 1: And my mother had these amazing Pemanian English translations sayings

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Speaker 1: that were She said them all the time, and of

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Speaker 1: course when you're growing up you think you know, can

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Speaker 1: I hear this one more time. I'm gonna explode if

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Speaker 1: she says this one more time. You know, leave behind

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Speaker 1: max My name is Crystal, Maxine birth Um. God doesn't

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Speaker 1: like ugly, so she said, that doesn't like ugly, and

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Speaker 1: that meant you yourself can't be ugly, not things you.

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Speaker 1: God doesn't like ugly, so you can't be an ugly person.

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Speaker 1: She would say, leave behind more than you take away.

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Speaker 1: That's how we'll measure whether or not you're successful. It

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Speaker 1: is not about anything else by the whether or not

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Speaker 1: you leave and every interaction more, Oh my goodness, on

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Speaker 1: and on and on. She says, the world, don't worry

394
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Speaker 1: about the world can't happen to you. You have to

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Speaker 1: happen to the world. You know, all these all of

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Speaker 1: these statements, is like, and now I say it in

397
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Speaker 1: the book. Throughout my life, I lived with these statements

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Speaker 1: in my head. I literally buried in my head. Didn't

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Speaker 1: say them out loud all the time, but I literally

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Speaker 1: think about them and was raised with them in my soul.

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Speaker 1: And that's what. I'm not a perfect person by it,

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Speaker 1: by any stretch of imagination if you know me, but

403
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Speaker 1: I do you know, I actually spend a lot of

404
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Speaker 1: time reflecting on whether, you know, what can I do

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Speaker 1: better to make sure that I leave behind more than

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Speaker 1: I take away, to make sure that I am happening

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Speaker 1: to the world. I'm not sitting back and saying, oh

408
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Speaker 1: my god, I wish it those people would make it better.

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Speaker 1: And one of the reasons why I spent a lot

410
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Speaker 1: of time speaking and speaking out, particularly the younger people,

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Speaker 1: is that we have to engage. We cannot count on

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Speaker 1: others to take care of us. We have to take

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Speaker 1: care of ourselves and we have to take care of others.

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Speaker 1: And if we do it from that perspective and everybody

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Speaker 1: does it, then people will people will be taking care

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Speaker 1: of us. My entire journey, my entire success in life,

417
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Speaker 1: every single intrivin is based on the fact that I

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Speaker 1: had a great start in life and I had help

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Speaker 1: along the way. The great start in life is necessary

420
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Speaker 1: but not sufficient, right, So it got that, and then

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Speaker 1: I had unbelievable just either support from people who I

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Speaker 1: don't know, fellowship here or a scholarship here, or a

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Speaker 1: job here, and people who I do know. I write

424
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Speaker 1: about Vernon Jordan and as you know, he just passed

425
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Speaker 1: away and he was my absolute shining light outside of

426
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Speaker 1: my family was this man who decided that he was

427
00:23:43,320 --> 00:23:45,960
Speaker 1: gonna take me under his wing, plain and simple. That

428
00:23:46,080 --> 00:23:51,000
Speaker 1: was it. And out of nowhere starting in about there

429
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Speaker 1: was this kind of guy in the background. You know,

430
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Speaker 1: he's really big and he would always kind of be

431
00:23:57,440 --> 00:24:02,240
Speaker 1: not too far away from un levable experiences. Which how

432
00:24:02,280 --> 00:24:04,639
Speaker 1: did this happen? How did I get met President Clinton?

433
00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:10,080
Speaker 1: Vernon Jordan's said come on, let's go, met Barack Obama

434
00:24:10,160 --> 00:24:11,840
Speaker 1: for the first time before I said, oh, I'm going

435
00:24:11,880 --> 00:24:13,680
Speaker 1: to a thing, are you free, Yeah, come on over.

436
00:24:15,160 --> 00:24:20,760
Speaker 1: Just context connections by people who just said, yeah, I'll

437
00:24:20,800 --> 00:24:23,720
Speaker 1: take her with me. What do you think would have

438
00:24:23,800 --> 00:24:27,719
Speaker 1: happened if if if you hadn't had the kind of

439
00:24:27,760 --> 00:24:31,200
Speaker 1: mentors that you were so fortunate to have Ursla, from

440
00:24:31,280 --> 00:24:35,000
Speaker 1: Vernon Jordan's to ken Chenalt, to all kinds of leaders

441
00:24:35,080 --> 00:24:38,280
Speaker 1: who saw something special in you and said, we're going

442
00:24:38,359 --> 00:24:41,160
Speaker 1: to take her under our wing and we're going to

443
00:24:40,840 --> 00:24:45,800
Speaker 1: cultivate that spark and that passion that she has. I

444
00:24:45,800 --> 00:24:49,960
Speaker 1: would have had a good life. The difference between a

445
00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:55,439
Speaker 1: good life, earning a good living and an amazingly great

446
00:24:55,480 --> 00:25:01,200
Speaker 1: life for me, what were these people? So I literally

447
00:25:02,080 --> 00:25:04,480
Speaker 1: took my mother laid the foundation for me to have

448
00:25:04,520 --> 00:25:08,840
Speaker 1: a good life. These people transformed that good life into

449
00:25:08,880 --> 00:25:10,560
Speaker 1: a life where I write a book and people are

450
00:25:10,560 --> 00:25:13,959
Speaker 1: going to read it, into a life where where George

451
00:25:13,960 --> 00:25:18,280
Speaker 1: Floyd is murdered and I have a voice that people

452
00:25:18,280 --> 00:25:21,000
Speaker 1: will listen to to try to help to amplify the

453
00:25:21,040 --> 00:25:24,199
Speaker 1: issues that we are dealing with, and to amplify my

454
00:25:24,280 --> 00:25:27,320
Speaker 1: ideas about some of the solutions, my ideas that are

455
00:25:27,600 --> 00:25:31,240
Speaker 1: cultivated and gotten from from friends. What the difference between

456
00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:37,159
Speaker 1: that and having a good life is our friends and

457
00:25:37,240 --> 00:25:41,520
Speaker 1: support and and you can't literally shoulders to stand on

458
00:25:41,560 --> 00:25:44,240
Speaker 1: and people to push you and encourage you and smack

459
00:25:44,280 --> 00:25:47,880
Speaker 1: you when you're doing silly things, which everybody. My husband

460
00:25:47,920 --> 00:25:49,679
Speaker 1: was one of these people as well, just who just

461
00:25:49,720 --> 00:25:53,320
Speaker 1: basically said, just you know, stop settled down, et cetera.

462
00:25:53,480 --> 00:25:59,160
Speaker 1: It's the difference between ordinary and extraordinary. That's what friends support.

463
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:02,360
Speaker 1: But could the kind of support that I got, That's

464
00:26:02,400 --> 00:26:07,440
Speaker 1: what the outcome is when we come back. How Ursula

465
00:26:07,640 --> 00:26:11,920
Speaker 1: led xerox in a world that no longer needs xeroxy.

466
00:26:11,960 --> 00:26:23,800
Speaker 1: That's right after this, I was fascinated to learn that

467
00:26:23,840 --> 00:26:27,439
Speaker 1: you really didn't deal with head on racism yourself until

468
00:26:27,520 --> 00:26:30,600
Speaker 1: you got to college. But the reason why, Katie, is

469
00:26:30,600 --> 00:26:32,920
Speaker 1: because we lived in an environment where we were all

470
00:26:33,800 --> 00:26:35,879
Speaker 1: the same. I mean, so we'll got that at the

471
00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:39,720
Speaker 1: Catholic school, for example, when you went there, not a

472
00:26:39,720 --> 00:26:42,240
Speaker 1: lot of problems with race for me. My brother seemed

473
00:26:42,280 --> 00:26:46,200
Speaker 1: to have had more um as I found out later,

474
00:26:46,240 --> 00:26:48,639
Speaker 1: but for me it was it was not. I was

475
00:26:48,680 --> 00:26:50,960
Speaker 1: a very um and I say this in the book

476
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:53,760
Speaker 1: I Lived Inside my Head. I was. I'm a very

477
00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:58,359
Speaker 1: self contained person, genuinely an introvert. So I actually flew

478
00:26:58,400 --> 00:27:01,240
Speaker 1: below the radar screen and money most of my life.

479
00:27:01,280 --> 00:27:06,520
Speaker 1: I literally did what people said fairly compliant, obeyed the

480
00:27:06,560 --> 00:27:09,600
Speaker 1: rules quote unquote by the route, obeyed the rules, performed

481
00:27:09,680 --> 00:27:13,800
Speaker 1: fairly well. So I was I was more um. I

482
00:27:13,840 --> 00:27:16,399
Speaker 1: was just easier to deal with. When I got to

483
00:27:16,880 --> 00:27:19,080
Speaker 1: high school and then to college is when I started

484
00:27:19,119 --> 00:27:23,200
Speaker 1: to to open up my mouth more. And obviously then

485
00:27:23,200 --> 00:27:25,160
Speaker 1: people started to notice me more, and that was when

486
00:27:25,200 --> 00:27:27,359
Speaker 1: I started to see things more. But I think that

487
00:27:27,400 --> 00:27:29,080
Speaker 1: when I was, particularly when I was growing up, I

488
00:27:29,119 --> 00:27:32,520
Speaker 1: saw a very little of this what we now call

489
00:27:32,800 --> 00:27:36,120
Speaker 1: like and what what I saw overt rate racism, where

490
00:27:36,560 --> 00:27:42,280
Speaker 1: people literally disregarded me and my accomplishments because I was

491
00:27:42,440 --> 00:27:44,760
Speaker 1: because I had I looked a certain way. And Yeah,

492
00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:46,480
Speaker 1: one of the things that was good about that is

493
00:27:46,480 --> 00:27:50,439
Speaker 1: that it was such bs you know it was I

494
00:27:50,720 --> 00:27:53,360
Speaker 1: said it was a great, great foundation because it said

495
00:27:53,640 --> 00:27:56,359
Speaker 1: it was so be it. It's it's it's debunking in

496
00:27:56,440 --> 00:28:00,400
Speaker 1: my own heart. You know that when you see, uh black,

497
00:28:00,520 --> 00:28:04,760
Speaker 1: when I see a black person, they're just regular people

498
00:28:04,760 --> 00:28:08,000
Speaker 1: who can accomplish what everybody else can accomplish. And so

499
00:28:08,040 --> 00:28:10,000
Speaker 1: I didn't kind of grew up in this whole stigma

500
00:28:10,320 --> 00:28:12,000
Speaker 1: kind of a thing. I even grew up in a

501
00:28:12,040 --> 00:28:13,640
Speaker 1: bad neighborhood. I talked about this, this this is a really

502
00:28:13,680 --> 00:28:16,200
Speaker 1: bad neighborhood, and this thought, Okay, we let's live in

503
00:28:16,240 --> 00:28:19,639
Speaker 1: a bad neighborhood. In hindsight, you realize, particularly when I

504
00:28:19,720 --> 00:28:23,040
Speaker 1: left my neighborhood, that there were choices being made by

505
00:28:23,359 --> 00:28:27,840
Speaker 1: funding officials, by leaders, that we could put less resources

506
00:28:27,920 --> 00:28:30,800
Speaker 1: there because these people live there, will put more resists

507
00:28:30,880 --> 00:28:32,760
Speaker 1: there because these kind of people will live there. But

508
00:28:32,840 --> 00:28:35,600
Speaker 1: I didn't grow up with it in my face. It's

509
00:28:35,640 --> 00:28:39,280
Speaker 1: amazing what you recognize in hindsight isn't ursula. And I'm

510
00:28:39,320 --> 00:28:42,479
Speaker 1: sure that this writing this book helped you kind of

511
00:28:42,520 --> 00:28:48,440
Speaker 1: put those pieces together and recognize that that racism and

512
00:28:48,600 --> 00:28:53,000
Speaker 1: prejudice against you know, listen, you have the trifecta black,

513
00:28:53,560 --> 00:28:57,040
Speaker 1: poor female. I said, it's in the book. A guy

514
00:28:57,120 --> 00:28:59,240
Speaker 1: told me this when I was in I think I

515
00:28:59,280 --> 00:29:01,240
Speaker 1: was nice. So what a third or fourth grade I

516
00:29:01,320 --> 00:29:03,440
Speaker 1: was in the class he had come to school. I

517
00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:06,840
Speaker 1: went to a Catholic grade school. He came to school

518
00:29:06,840 --> 00:29:09,240
Speaker 1: to speak about something I don't know. I don't even

519
00:29:09,240 --> 00:29:12,960
Speaker 1: remember what it was. And I we were told to

520
00:29:13,000 --> 00:29:15,200
Speaker 1: ask questions and we had all these questions arranged and

521
00:29:15,240 --> 00:29:17,360
Speaker 1: I had to ask one of the questions. I asked

522
00:29:17,360 --> 00:29:20,760
Speaker 1: the question. He responded. At the end, when we were leaving,

523
00:29:20,760 --> 00:29:21,880
Speaker 1: we had to go up and shake his hand, and

524
00:29:21,920 --> 00:29:23,600
Speaker 1: he said to me, you had such a great question.

525
00:29:24,160 --> 00:29:27,040
Speaker 1: And I don't know exactly how he said it, but

526
00:29:27,080 --> 00:29:30,120
Speaker 1: what he said to me was, you know, you're really smart,

527
00:29:30,200 --> 00:29:31,800
Speaker 1: and it's such a great question. It's kind of too

528
00:29:31,800 --> 00:29:34,800
Speaker 1: bad that you're you're black, and you're a girl, and

529
00:29:34,920 --> 00:29:40,440
Speaker 1: you're poor, basically and literally. I I put that away

530
00:29:40,440 --> 00:29:43,840
Speaker 1: in the back of my head for years and then

531
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:47,080
Speaker 1: remembered it when I got a little bit older and

532
00:29:47,280 --> 00:29:50,720
Speaker 1: remembered it in such a way that that it struck

533
00:29:50,760 --> 00:29:54,360
Speaker 1: me that, yeah, there was one of those two, one

534
00:29:54,400 --> 00:29:57,640
Speaker 1: of those three things that was really a problem, the

535
00:29:57,720 --> 00:30:00,320
Speaker 1: poor part, which is something that we can work to

536
00:30:00,400 --> 00:30:05,240
Speaker 1: eliminate um throughout the world, abject poverty. And by the way,

537
00:30:05,240 --> 00:30:07,760
Speaker 1: we were not We didn't have abject poverty, but we

538
00:30:07,760 --> 00:30:11,400
Speaker 1: were like one level above it. I can't give people

539
00:30:11,480 --> 00:30:14,760
Speaker 1: the understanding of the life that I grew up and

540
00:30:14,800 --> 00:30:17,440
Speaker 1: we had. My mother had nothing, nothing, We lived in

541
00:30:17,480 --> 00:30:21,160
Speaker 1: a horrible building. Walk into our apartment. It was a sanctuary.

542
00:30:21,480 --> 00:30:22,680
Speaker 1: Didn't have a lot of stuff in it, but it

543
00:30:22,720 --> 00:30:24,760
Speaker 1: was clean and organized. But anyway, this and I said,

544
00:30:24,800 --> 00:30:28,120
Speaker 1: oh my god, it's black and and a girl. What

545
00:30:28,320 --> 00:30:30,360
Speaker 1: is what he said? Black and a girl were not

546
00:30:30,440 --> 00:30:32,560
Speaker 1: things that I would trade off, even if somebody said

547
00:30:32,560 --> 00:30:34,120
Speaker 1: to me, you have an option to start differently. I

548
00:30:34,440 --> 00:30:37,320
Speaker 1: kind of like both of those things about me. And

549
00:30:37,360 --> 00:30:42,239
Speaker 1: how can that be a strike against you? And I

550
00:30:42,280 --> 00:30:45,840
Speaker 1: realized as I got older that it actually was. It

551
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:51,080
Speaker 1: actually was, And the way the only way to turn

552
00:30:51,160 --> 00:30:56,000
Speaker 1: that around is to use this this isolation that you

553
00:30:56,040 --> 00:30:58,560
Speaker 1: feel if you're in a big crowd to your advantage.

554
00:30:58,640 --> 00:31:01,520
Speaker 1: And I say this in the book when I started working,

555
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:04,280
Speaker 1: if there was a big meeting and all of the

556
00:31:04,320 --> 00:31:07,360
Speaker 1: employees had to go, or the old of the engineers

557
00:31:07,360 --> 00:31:09,680
Speaker 1: had to go, I guarantee you if I raised my hand,

558
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:13,240
Speaker 1: somebody would call me because the only person who looked

559
00:31:13,240 --> 00:31:16,680
Speaker 1: like me in the room was me. Literally, when I

560
00:31:16,680 --> 00:31:20,280
Speaker 1: started at Xerox, there must have been ten black women

561
00:31:20,440 --> 00:31:24,120
Speaker 1: anywhere near engineering in the company. I can't, I don't.

562
00:31:24,200 --> 00:31:28,320
Speaker 1: I meant no black women none. So you you transformed

563
00:31:28,320 --> 00:31:31,719
Speaker 1: your differences into an advantage, to an advantage. But basically

564
00:31:31,800 --> 00:31:34,120
Speaker 1: saying they're kind, I'm pretty good, I'm pretty smart. That

565
00:31:34,200 --> 00:31:36,800
Speaker 1: kind of I kind of knew that. And if and

566
00:31:36,800 --> 00:31:38,680
Speaker 1: I had an opinion about everything, my mother would say,

567
00:31:38,840 --> 00:31:42,720
Speaker 1: always say you're you could be wrong and strong. I

568
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:46,640
Speaker 1: had an opinion everything even is always a bad opinion. Uh,

569
00:31:46,960 --> 00:31:50,160
Speaker 1: and so I basically and I was definitely taught early

570
00:31:50,320 --> 00:31:55,080
Speaker 1: to speak out to literally, I'm not sit down, and

571
00:31:55,160 --> 00:31:58,920
Speaker 1: kind of just taught that your mom, my mom, my

572
00:31:58,920 --> 00:32:01,280
Speaker 1: mom really pretty basics she said, if you have a

573
00:32:01,320 --> 00:32:03,440
Speaker 1: point of view, she didn't quite say in these words,

574
00:32:03,680 --> 00:32:06,160
Speaker 1: speak up. Nobody's gonna be able to say we read you.

575
00:32:06,200 --> 00:32:09,440
Speaker 1: Nobody's gonna read your mind. My mom's motto for all

576
00:32:09,480 --> 00:32:13,640
Speaker 1: of us was let him know you're there. And I

577
00:32:13,680 --> 00:32:16,000
Speaker 1: don't know where even she got that, because she was

578
00:32:16,120 --> 00:32:19,959
Speaker 1: kind of shy and of a totally different generation like

579
00:32:20,040 --> 00:32:25,600
Speaker 1: your mom was obviously different circumstances and much more privileged

580
00:32:25,640 --> 00:32:30,760
Speaker 1: but but not uber privileged upbringing. But she she really

581
00:32:30,840 --> 00:32:35,200
Speaker 1: kind of understood, especially for her daughters, the importance of

582
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:38,160
Speaker 1: letting people know you're there, of not being a shrinking violet,

583
00:32:38,200 --> 00:32:40,600
Speaker 1: of speaking your mind, of being this is this is

584
00:32:40,600 --> 00:32:42,920
Speaker 1: a generational thing because if you think about your mother

585
00:32:42,920 --> 00:32:46,160
Speaker 1: and my mother were in the same um generational times

586
00:32:46,640 --> 00:32:49,880
Speaker 1: they were they were raising us at the start of

587
00:32:50,680 --> 00:32:53,680
Speaker 1: this kind of outcry by women. It was the beginning

588
00:32:53,800 --> 00:32:57,320
Speaker 1: of this by women, the modern outcry by women to

589
00:32:57,360 --> 00:33:01,440
Speaker 1: be heard and to be to have We start to realize,

590
00:33:01,480 --> 00:33:03,240
Speaker 1: women start to realize that there was a little bit

591
00:33:03,280 --> 00:33:08,400
Speaker 1: more to us than the public male public was giving

592
00:33:08,440 --> 00:33:10,520
Speaker 1: us credit for. And so or you know, our goal

593
00:33:10,560 --> 00:33:13,320
Speaker 1: in life didn't have to be to please our bosses

594
00:33:13,400 --> 00:33:16,920
Speaker 1: and to make them feel like the man, absolutely or

595
00:33:17,040 --> 00:33:22,800
Speaker 1: or necessarily to please our any male colleague, including our husband,

596
00:33:22,920 --> 00:33:27,880
Speaker 1: and make them feel like the men at our expense, right,

597
00:33:27,920 --> 00:33:33,080
Speaker 1: So I absolutely understand how relationships work, and you obviously

598
00:33:33,120 --> 00:33:34,320
Speaker 1: a lot of it has to do with making a

599
00:33:34,400 --> 00:33:36,640
Speaker 1: person feel good. But what happened in the past is

600
00:33:36,680 --> 00:33:40,560
Speaker 1: we did that to the exclusion of any look on ourselves.

601
00:33:40,640 --> 00:33:42,920
Speaker 1: And what we were starting to live through I know

602
00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:46,040
Speaker 1: I was living through was this idea that I had

603
00:33:46,360 --> 00:33:49,280
Speaker 1: a point of view and I had some worth and

604
00:33:49,320 --> 00:33:50,720
Speaker 1: so this had to be a little bit more of

605
00:33:50,720 --> 00:33:54,880
Speaker 1: a partnership um in marriage for sure, right And in fact,

606
00:33:54,960 --> 00:33:58,160
Speaker 1: that's so critically important. You talk a lot about how

607
00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:01,760
Speaker 1: your husband Lloyd supported you through the years, and we've

608
00:34:01,800 --> 00:34:04,960
Speaker 1: seen millions of women drop out of the workforce during

609
00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:09,200
Speaker 1: the pandemic because domestic labor is just not evenly divided.

610
00:34:09,840 --> 00:34:13,720
Speaker 1: And you know, we've been set back decades in terms

611
00:34:13,760 --> 00:34:17,880
Speaker 1: of progress. And I know that that having a supportive

612
00:34:17,920 --> 00:34:21,840
Speaker 1: spouse and having someone who helps is so critically important

613
00:34:21,840 --> 00:34:24,680
Speaker 1: and was so critically important to your success. I want

614
00:34:24,680 --> 00:34:27,160
Speaker 1: to I have to ask you about Xerox and being

615
00:34:27,160 --> 00:34:30,000
Speaker 1: the CEO. So you were one of these long time

616
00:34:30,080 --> 00:34:35,120
Speaker 1: loyal employees of a corporation and that happens a lot

617
00:34:35,239 --> 00:34:38,120
Speaker 1: less often now, as you know millennials and gen z

618
00:34:38,360 --> 00:34:41,560
Speaker 1: s or our masters at job hoppying they are going

619
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:44,840
Speaker 1: to have fourteen jobs or so on average before they retire.

620
00:34:45,200 --> 00:34:48,080
Speaker 1: But you were as loyal as the day is long

621
00:34:48,520 --> 00:34:52,480
Speaker 1: to xerox um and that loyalty paid off. You became

622
00:34:52,560 --> 00:34:55,480
Speaker 1: CEO of the company in two thousand nine. Is that

623
00:34:55,560 --> 00:34:59,879
Speaker 1: writer's law? And uh? But at the same time, holy cow,

624
00:35:00,440 --> 00:35:02,680
Speaker 1: you kind of inherited a bit of a ship chow

625
00:35:02,760 --> 00:35:06,560
Speaker 1: excuse my French, because you had to manage the decline

626
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:09,440
Speaker 1: of a company that had really seen its hey days,

627
00:35:09,840 --> 00:35:15,120
Speaker 1: you know, decades before, because of of of massive changes

628
00:35:15,400 --> 00:35:19,000
Speaker 1: in technology in the world. And how hard was that

629
00:35:19,080 --> 00:35:21,400
Speaker 1: and what kind of shape was Xerox in when you

630
00:35:21,520 --> 00:35:25,480
Speaker 1: suddenly found yourself in charge. Yeah, the good news about

631
00:35:25,520 --> 00:35:29,120
Speaker 1: this is that I was preceded by a woman, right

632
00:35:30,480 --> 00:35:34,400
Speaker 1: and okay who really inherited the ship show. She was

633
00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:37,400
Speaker 1: the French for the description of the company company gay company.

634
00:35:37,440 --> 00:35:40,680
Speaker 1: But it was a mess when she got it. We

635
00:35:40,680 --> 00:35:43,160
Speaker 1: would literally we were running out of cash when she

636
00:35:43,200 --> 00:35:45,480
Speaker 1: took over the company. That's right, It almost went bankrupt,

637
00:35:45,600 --> 00:35:51,360
Speaker 1: right right, And she really she really laid the foundation

638
00:35:52,080 --> 00:35:56,320
Speaker 1: was Xerox to have another set of generations. And but

639
00:35:56,520 --> 00:35:58,040
Speaker 1: by the time I got the company and I was

640
00:35:58,600 --> 00:36:02,080
Speaker 1: her second for my whole you know, for my whole

641
00:36:02,080 --> 00:36:05,040
Speaker 1: senior career. Um. And she may be president in two

642
00:36:05,080 --> 00:36:06,719
Speaker 1: thousand and seven and a member of the and the

643
00:36:06,719 --> 00:36:09,240
Speaker 1: board elect me, remember the board in two thousand and seven,

644
00:36:09,280 --> 00:36:11,200
Speaker 1: preparing me for to you know. But one of the

645
00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:16,960
Speaker 1: things that I realized from Anne was that you know, uh,

646
00:36:17,000 --> 00:36:19,719
Speaker 1: that there was that there was a future that we

647
00:36:20,680 --> 00:36:24,520
Speaker 1: didn't have to succumb to the easy route of just

648
00:36:25,080 --> 00:36:28,560
Speaker 1: the easier route of just kind of letting it happen.

649
00:36:29,280 --> 00:36:32,720
Speaker 1: It's because there was a lot of explanation and defense

650
00:36:32,760 --> 00:36:37,360
Speaker 1: about letting it happen. Literally, we were being um substituted,

651
00:36:37,920 --> 00:36:42,680
Speaker 1: We're being made irrelevant by technology. We're running where every

652
00:36:42,719 --> 00:36:44,960
Speaker 1: time we ran into a problem, we found a new solution,

653
00:36:45,000 --> 00:36:46,799
Speaker 1: found a new solution. So we were always running and

654
00:36:46,840 --> 00:36:51,600
Speaker 1: catching up. But the fundamental value of the company as

655
00:36:51,640 --> 00:36:56,040
Speaker 1: a document management company in the old sense, as you

656
00:36:56,080 --> 00:37:01,120
Speaker 1: can see today, is literally, um no longer as valuable

657
00:37:03,520 --> 00:37:07,720
Speaker 1: that you were. You were rendered obsolete pretty much literally

658
00:37:07,800 --> 00:37:12,360
Speaker 1: by these things. Yeah, by these things, and there's smaller

659
00:37:12,400 --> 00:37:16,560
Speaker 1: and smaller and by the way perfectly and the clouds

660
00:37:17,120 --> 00:37:19,320
Speaker 1: to have the file cabinets, the paper and the story.

661
00:37:19,480 --> 00:37:21,920
Speaker 1: So yes, we kept running. When I took all the

662
00:37:21,920 --> 00:37:24,080
Speaker 1: thing that was really great about it was that we

663
00:37:24,080 --> 00:37:26,880
Speaker 1: were again cornered, if you know what I mean. There

664
00:37:26,920 --> 00:37:31,120
Speaker 1: was some there's something interesting about having few choices, and

665
00:37:31,160 --> 00:37:33,160
Speaker 1: people said, oh my god, you're a great patetice grape.

666
00:37:33,200 --> 00:37:36,279
Speaker 1: Mind I said, if you have a thousand choices, making

667
00:37:36,280 --> 00:37:37,960
Speaker 1: the right one, it's probably harder than if you have

668
00:37:38,040 --> 00:37:41,719
Speaker 1: to right. If you have to, you make one one

669
00:37:41,760 --> 00:37:43,799
Speaker 1: of them is probably stupid the other. And we had

670
00:37:44,160 --> 00:37:49,480
Speaker 1: no choice but to look for different options for the

671
00:37:49,520 --> 00:37:51,799
Speaker 1: future of this company. We had no choice but to

672
00:37:51,840 --> 00:37:56,640
Speaker 1: do that, and fortunately I had a predecessor and a

673
00:37:56,680 --> 00:37:59,800
Speaker 1: board who said, let's take some chances and look. Not

674
00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:03,600
Speaker 1: every single one of them worked, but a lot of

675
00:38:03,640 --> 00:38:09,080
Speaker 1: them did. And still very very fraught time for Xerox

676
00:38:09,239 --> 00:38:12,160
Speaker 1: during my tenure and even today, is this whole idea

677
00:38:12,160 --> 00:38:15,680
Speaker 1: about recreating itself yet again, to become more, to become

678
00:38:15,680 --> 00:38:19,680
Speaker 1: relevant yet again. We'll keep happening to Xerox. Not every

679
00:38:19,680 --> 00:38:22,600
Speaker 1: single company has a right to exist forever. I say

680
00:38:22,600 --> 00:38:24,920
Speaker 1: this as well, and at some point you may have

681
00:38:24,960 --> 00:38:28,000
Speaker 1: to say done done. But I think that when I

682
00:38:28,080 --> 00:38:29,600
Speaker 1: was there, for sure, and I think even now it's

683
00:38:29,600 --> 00:38:32,320
Speaker 1: too early to call that for a company like Xerox

684
00:38:32,360 --> 00:38:35,439
Speaker 1: that still has an amazing number of people that still

685
00:38:35,560 --> 00:38:38,920
Speaker 1: can deal lot well with large corporations, et cetera. So

686
00:38:38,960 --> 00:38:41,000
Speaker 1: there's a way to trying to extract value. You should

687
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:43,200
Speaker 1: do that as long as possible. The great news is

688
00:38:43,239 --> 00:38:46,799
Speaker 1: that I was I was so long in the company

689
00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:51,840
Speaker 1: that it was part of my life. It was you know,

690
00:38:51,880 --> 00:38:55,600
Speaker 1: it was right then a literally I woke up every

691
00:38:55,640 --> 00:38:58,719
Speaker 1: day walked into this place. There was no way in

692
00:38:58,800 --> 00:39:02,319
Speaker 1: the world I could just sit back and let it

693
00:39:02,480 --> 00:39:05,759
Speaker 1: kind of driftful, dribble away. I had to, you know,

694
00:39:05,880 --> 00:39:08,840
Speaker 1: not only me, but the whole hundred ten thousand people,

695
00:39:08,880 --> 00:39:12,560
Speaker 1: fifty thou people aboard of directors and management team. We

696
00:39:12,600 --> 00:39:14,960
Speaker 1: had to fight for it, fight for tough man. Though

697
00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:17,920
Speaker 1: it's like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, in

698
00:39:18,000 --> 00:39:20,800
Speaker 1: some ways, large e stand for pieces of our business.

699
00:39:20,880 --> 00:39:24,280
Speaker 1: Absolutely absolutely, And I talked about this in the context

700
00:39:24,320 --> 00:39:27,440
Speaker 1: of a couple of things. After I retired, it became

701
00:39:28,400 --> 00:39:31,120
Speaker 1: a more popular I'm not saying I started this, but

702
00:39:31,280 --> 00:39:33,360
Speaker 1: one of the things that I struggled with continuously was

703
00:39:33,840 --> 00:39:41,960
Speaker 1: whether or not it was reasonable or fear to disrupt

704
00:39:42,280 --> 00:39:46,919
Speaker 1: people's lives as dramatically as you do when you make

705
00:39:46,960 --> 00:39:50,680
Speaker 1: them redundant in an environment like Rochester, New York, which

706
00:39:50,680 --> 00:39:52,520
Speaker 1: is where a lot of our employees were at the time,

707
00:39:53,160 --> 00:39:57,960
Speaker 1: well other other communities that were basically dependent on an

708
00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:01,359
Speaker 1: industry or two in their towns. Is there a way

709
00:40:01,400 --> 00:40:04,040
Speaker 1: for us to kind of balance it out a bit?

710
00:40:04,600 --> 00:40:06,479
Speaker 1: And I said this, I talked about this in the book.

711
00:40:06,800 --> 00:40:09,600
Speaker 1: We had a lot of time when I was CEO,

712
00:40:09,719 --> 00:40:11,560
Speaker 1: but even right before that, when it was president, when

713
00:40:11,560 --> 00:40:13,640
Speaker 1: we're going through it, when Anne was CEO, when I

714
00:40:13,680 --> 00:40:15,920
Speaker 1: first started working for her, but we had to make

715
00:40:15,920 --> 00:40:17,799
Speaker 1: decisions about whether or not we were going to just

716
00:40:17,880 --> 00:40:21,279
Speaker 1: lay off ten thousands of people, and if we could

717
00:40:21,280 --> 00:40:27,440
Speaker 1: do save like fifty of them by not maximizing profit

718
00:40:27,560 --> 00:40:31,200
Speaker 1: like this, not maximizing profit, could we balance it such

719
00:40:31,200 --> 00:40:34,080
Speaker 1: that it could be a little bit more graceful transitions?

720
00:40:34,120 --> 00:40:39,160
Speaker 1: That is today a standard discussion that CEOs have to

721
00:40:39,200 --> 00:40:43,200
Speaker 1: have because communities governments are saying out loud, what the

722
00:40:43,239 --> 00:40:46,240
Speaker 1: heck are you doing? You can't. I do get profit

723
00:40:46,320 --> 00:40:50,040
Speaker 1: and profitability, but I also get the fact that you

724
00:40:50,239 --> 00:40:53,520
Speaker 1: can't just dump on Rochester, New York a thousand more

725
00:40:53,600 --> 00:40:57,640
Speaker 1: unemployed people. The government's gonna end up taking care of them.

726
00:40:57,680 --> 00:41:01,480
Speaker 1: So you transfer wealth to a shareholder at the expense

727
00:41:01,600 --> 00:41:03,839
Speaker 1: of the government. Call right, And I think I think

728
00:41:03,840 --> 00:41:07,040
Speaker 1: now companies are coming under much greater scrutiny and this

729
00:41:07,360 --> 00:41:11,640
Speaker 1: you know, you know, race for quarterly profits and all

730
00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:16,200
Speaker 1: that is just companies are expected to be more humanitarian,

731
00:41:16,360 --> 00:41:21,640
Speaker 1: honestly and full citizens of the world. Full citizens of

732
00:41:21,680 --> 00:41:24,359
Speaker 1: the world have to be engaged and interested in their

733
00:41:24,440 --> 00:41:27,480
Speaker 1: shareholders wealth and profit. They have to be engaged and

734
00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:30,440
Speaker 1: interested in the communities that they work and live in,

735
00:41:30,680 --> 00:41:33,880
Speaker 1: and social issues. Have to be engaged in government and

736
00:41:33,880 --> 00:41:36,440
Speaker 1: social issues. I'm on this all the time, even when

737
00:41:36,480 --> 00:41:39,240
Speaker 1: I was CEO, on this idea that we can't be silent.

738
00:41:39,280 --> 00:41:42,920
Speaker 1: How in the world can we be silent when we

739
00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:58,600
Speaker 1: come back Ursula's unflinching advice for today's business leaders. I

740
00:41:58,640 --> 00:42:01,759
Speaker 1: wanted to ask you about, uh, this year's Fortune five

741
00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:06,600
Speaker 1: hundred lists because they saw a few records CEOs or women.

742
00:42:06,719 --> 00:42:11,560
Speaker 1: There are two black women. But still progress is so slow.

743
00:42:12,160 --> 00:42:15,400
Speaker 1: And I know you write about feeling this otherness, and

744
00:42:15,840 --> 00:42:18,239
Speaker 1: you know, I thought it was fascinating that that you

745
00:42:18,239 --> 00:42:20,000
Speaker 1: know the fact that you don't play golf and that

746
00:42:20,040 --> 00:42:22,440
Speaker 1: you would never play it Augusta because they didn't accept

747
00:42:22,480 --> 00:42:26,000
Speaker 1: black members until nineteen and you know, and why should

748
00:42:26,000 --> 00:42:27,840
Speaker 1: you have to play golf if you don't like golf?

749
00:42:27,920 --> 00:42:31,280
Speaker 1: You know, But what else can be done to improve

750
00:42:31,400 --> 00:42:34,640
Speaker 1: these numbers? When you consider that women make up, you know,

751
00:42:34,719 --> 00:42:38,600
Speaker 1: fifty two of the professional workforce, and the number in

752
00:42:38,680 --> 00:42:42,200
Speaker 1: C suite jobs it's under ten percent. I mean, you know,

753
00:42:42,440 --> 00:42:46,400
Speaker 1: I've been talking about this ursula and interviewing people about

754
00:42:46,440 --> 00:42:50,920
Speaker 1: this for thirty years. Thirty years. Let me tell you

755
00:42:50,960 --> 00:42:54,040
Speaker 1: what I come to the conclusion. And I said this

756
00:42:54,080 --> 00:42:56,319
Speaker 1: out loud, and of course I'm getting more bullback on

757
00:42:56,400 --> 00:42:58,439
Speaker 1: this in a little bit, but I'm gonna continue saying

758
00:42:58,480 --> 00:43:02,520
Speaker 1: it in to a until something else changes. I actually

759
00:43:02,560 --> 00:43:06,040
Speaker 1: became a fan of quotas. Let me tell you what

760
00:43:06,080 --> 00:43:11,080
Speaker 1: happened with women. The numbers that you just um told

761
00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:18,799
Speaker 1: us about are a recent um reality. Ten years ago

762
00:43:19,760 --> 00:43:23,359
Speaker 1: literally the number was a quarter of that. We were

763
00:43:23,400 --> 00:43:26,680
Speaker 1: like fifteen, so half of that. Let me tell you

764
00:43:26,719 --> 00:43:35,520
Speaker 1: what happened. California, Europe, UK and Western Europe start to

765
00:43:35,560 --> 00:43:39,840
Speaker 1: talk about the fact that their states or the governments

766
00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:44,680
Speaker 1: were going to require companies to have a diverse board,

767
00:43:45,000 --> 00:43:48,879
Speaker 1: and they said of the board should be California did

768
00:43:48,880 --> 00:43:53,160
Speaker 1: it whatever surprised. Let me tell you what happened. Out

769
00:43:53,200 --> 00:43:57,640
Speaker 1: of the woodwork came these fully formed adults called women

770
00:43:57,920 --> 00:44:01,240
Speaker 1: who were ready and able to serve on boards. Before

771
00:44:03,080 --> 00:44:06,760
Speaker 1: you said it, thirty years. For my entire career, forty

772
00:44:06,840 --> 00:44:09,399
Speaker 1: years in business, we've been talking about this. It's really

773
00:44:09,400 --> 00:44:15,120
Speaker 1: hard to find them. And the women on everything. Wait

774
00:44:15,120 --> 00:44:20,160
Speaker 1: a second, yeah, hello, Ursula Burns could be on I

775
00:44:20,200 --> 00:44:21,960
Speaker 1: am on lots of them, but I could be on

776
00:44:22,160 --> 00:44:25,759
Speaker 1: twenty of them. But it's ridiculous, dulous. But here's the

777
00:44:25,920 --> 00:44:31,200
Speaker 1: here's why I say quotas work for a while. Quotas

778
00:44:31,239 --> 00:44:35,400
Speaker 1: are the penalty for not doing what you should be

779
00:44:35,480 --> 00:44:39,520
Speaker 1: doing by yourself. Right. We've been talking about it for years,

780
00:44:39,600 --> 00:44:42,239
Speaker 1: thirty years, as you say, forty years, I'll do it.

781
00:44:42,440 --> 00:44:44,680
Speaker 1: We can't find them, we don't really know someone on

782
00:44:44,800 --> 00:44:47,360
Speaker 1: some one we find literally, I don't know where California

783
00:44:47,400 --> 00:44:52,960
Speaker 1: said and out of nowhere appeared these women. Enough, they're

784
00:44:53,000 --> 00:44:56,040
Speaker 1: not all the same. There's there's forty that they're out.

785
00:44:56,160 --> 00:44:59,839
Speaker 1: They appeared in the c suite. Oh my goodness. They

786
00:44:59,840 --> 00:45:03,800
Speaker 1: were born yesterday, educated the day after yesterday, and today

787
00:45:03,880 --> 00:45:05,919
Speaker 1: they became you know, they've been there all the time.

788
00:45:06,680 --> 00:45:09,160
Speaker 1: The problem with this progress, though, I will tell you

789
00:45:09,200 --> 00:45:12,520
Speaker 1: that the thing that troubles me is that we've made

790
00:45:12,520 --> 00:45:16,400
Speaker 1: the progress in women with the exclusion of women of

791
00:45:16,440 --> 00:45:19,960
Speaker 1: color of any sort. Most of these, as you you

792
00:45:20,000 --> 00:45:23,600
Speaker 1: said it, most of this is majority of women, white women,

793
00:45:24,040 --> 00:45:27,920
Speaker 1: and we've made that progress without a lot of progress

794
00:45:27,960 --> 00:45:31,840
Speaker 1: in brown and black males. So the step it's we

795
00:45:31,960 --> 00:45:34,680
Speaker 1: can't seem to kind of get the momentum rolling across

796
00:45:34,719 --> 00:45:37,680
Speaker 1: the board. We always have to make. It's always a choice.

797
00:45:37,680 --> 00:45:40,160
Speaker 1: And I say women, white women have to help us,

798
00:45:40,360 --> 00:45:43,200
Speaker 1: right because they have to. Now they're sitting on these

799
00:45:43,200 --> 00:45:45,080
Speaker 1: in the c suite and the new boards, they have

800
00:45:45,120 --> 00:45:47,359
Speaker 1: to ask the question, what the hell are you guys doing,

801
00:45:47,960 --> 00:45:51,400
Speaker 1: Why in the world are you not Why in the

802
00:45:51,400 --> 00:45:53,440
Speaker 1: world don't we as a leadership team or a board

803
00:45:53,440 --> 00:45:57,279
Speaker 1: have more, even more diversity than this gender diversity. So

804
00:45:57,880 --> 00:46:03,440
Speaker 1: it's taking us forever it had as required pushes um,

805
00:46:03,480 --> 00:46:06,680
Speaker 1: you know, legal pushes, nudges, whatever the heck it is

806
00:46:07,040 --> 00:46:10,720
Speaker 1: to make the progress. Hopefully we will make enough progress

807
00:46:10,840 --> 00:46:13,640
Speaker 1: that that becomes redundant, that those legal needs become a

808
00:46:13,760 --> 00:46:16,839
Speaker 1: legal means, become redundant. I'm hoping that that's the case.

809
00:46:16,880 --> 00:46:18,680
Speaker 1: But until it becomes the case, I want people, I

810
00:46:18,719 --> 00:46:21,040
Speaker 1: want NASDACT to keep pushing and saying no, you're not

811
00:46:21,080 --> 00:46:25,000
Speaker 1: gonna list on this, on this mechanism to to sell

812
00:46:25,080 --> 00:46:29,000
Speaker 1: your company, to present your company, until you present yourself

813
00:46:29,080 --> 00:46:31,560
Speaker 1: to the world like a fully formed company, which is

814
00:46:31,600 --> 00:46:33,920
Speaker 1: a company that has a lot of people of different

815
00:46:33,920 --> 00:46:36,600
Speaker 1: types of working and in fact that that leads me

816
00:46:36,680 --> 00:46:40,000
Speaker 1: to my final question, what did you tell some of

817
00:46:40,040 --> 00:46:42,239
Speaker 1: these people who called you, probably in a bit of

818
00:46:42,239 --> 00:46:48,399
Speaker 1: a panic ursula, when this racial justice movement became too

819
00:46:48,440 --> 00:46:51,000
Speaker 1: loud to ignore. I mean, it wasn't new, but it

820
00:46:51,040 --> 00:46:53,879
Speaker 1: was too loud to ignore at that point, what would

821
00:46:53,880 --> 00:46:58,960
Speaker 1: you tell business leaders about how to improve UH diversity

822
00:46:58,960 --> 00:47:02,400
Speaker 1: and equality and inclusion in their companies? Right? And we

823
00:47:02,480 --> 00:47:06,080
Speaker 1: did this through a mechanism I did after George Floyd died.

824
00:47:06,120 --> 00:47:09,359
Speaker 1: I remember flying to London, back to London, landing and

825
00:47:09,400 --> 00:47:12,760
Speaker 1: getting a call almost immediately I got to my flat

826
00:47:13,600 --> 00:47:17,640
Speaker 1: um from a very very good European business leader, amazing guy,

827
00:47:18,080 --> 00:47:22,120
Speaker 1: um all the right foundational elements to actually have a

828
00:47:22,120 --> 00:47:24,959
Speaker 1: sensible conversation with. He called me and said, I think

829
00:47:25,000 --> 00:47:28,200
Speaker 1: I got this, but I'm a little confused. He was unbelievable.

830
00:47:28,719 --> 00:47:30,400
Speaker 1: I think I got it, and I just want to

831
00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:33,359
Speaker 1: talk to you about what's actually happening. This was the move,

832
00:47:33,480 --> 00:47:35,719
Speaker 1: the marches that were happening all over the world. I mean,

833
00:47:36,280 --> 00:47:39,560
Speaker 1: George Floyd is killed in Minnea, in Minnesota, and people

834
00:47:39,560 --> 00:47:43,800
Speaker 1: in London and marching Chinese people, you know, young everybody.

835
00:47:43,960 --> 00:47:46,160
Speaker 1: So he said, he just didn't he he think he

836
00:47:46,200 --> 00:47:48,000
Speaker 1: thought he got it, but he didn't really get. My

837
00:47:48,239 --> 00:47:52,680
Speaker 1: question to him was, I won't say name what. I'm

838
00:47:52,680 --> 00:47:54,239
Speaker 1: more than happy to talk to you about this, but

839
00:47:54,280 --> 00:47:56,759
Speaker 1: why are you calling me? He said, what do you mean?

840
00:47:56,840 --> 00:47:58,799
Speaker 1: I said, why don't you call talk to somebody on

841
00:47:58,840 --> 00:48:01,920
Speaker 1: your board or talk to somebody in your management team.

842
00:48:01,960 --> 00:48:04,960
Speaker 1: His was the response, I don't have anybody on my

843
00:48:04,960 --> 00:48:09,239
Speaker 1: board and my management team that's anyone of color. I said,

844
00:48:09,280 --> 00:48:15,000
Speaker 1: what so yeah, I said, well, first first thing to do,

845
00:48:15,560 --> 00:48:19,000
Speaker 1: start close to home. You get you have to start close.

846
00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:20,719
Speaker 1: You have to fix your house before you can tell

847
00:48:20,800 --> 00:48:22,520
Speaker 1: how bunch of people how to fix their houses. Right,

848
00:48:22,960 --> 00:48:25,040
Speaker 1: you don't have a uh, you don't have a diverse

849
00:48:25,120 --> 00:48:27,799
Speaker 1: management team, you don't have a diverse board. Shame when

850
00:48:27,880 --> 00:48:30,160
Speaker 1: you I didn't quite say it this way, what do

851
00:48:30,239 --> 00:48:32,520
Speaker 1: you do? Start close to home. Literally, you have to

852
00:48:32,520 --> 00:48:35,360
Speaker 1: have people who are in your house nudging you along

853
00:48:35,360 --> 00:48:38,120
Speaker 1: the way, giving you insights. So, first of all, I

854
00:48:38,160 --> 00:48:41,839
Speaker 1: tell the business leaders, get a diverse team around you,

855
00:48:42,280 --> 00:48:46,319
Speaker 1: get a diverse board around you. You're the people who

856
00:48:46,600 --> 00:48:49,719
Speaker 1: you have to have a diverse organization, not because you

857
00:48:49,760 --> 00:48:52,640
Speaker 1: just want to be quote unquote altruistic, even though that's

858
00:48:53,120 --> 00:48:56,840
Speaker 1: reason enough, because it's not altruism is called equality. But

859
00:48:56,960 --> 00:48:59,680
Speaker 1: even if you have to be altruistic, Okay, you don't

860
00:48:59,719 --> 00:49:02,520
Speaker 1: need to go that far. Results are better. Well, it's

861
00:49:02,560 --> 00:49:05,520
Speaker 1: been studied in every business school. You can imagine. Diverse

862
00:49:05,560 --> 00:49:10,279
Speaker 1: teams performed better than non diverse teams. Diverse companies profitability

863
00:49:10,360 --> 00:49:15,120
Speaker 1: and longevity, their future readiness is significantly better than non Okay,

864
00:49:15,120 --> 00:49:17,439
Speaker 1: So we don't have to actually do this anymore because

865
00:49:17,480 --> 00:49:19,200
Speaker 1: we want you to feel bad. You have to do

866
00:49:19,200 --> 00:49:21,439
Speaker 1: it because you serve your shareholder is better. First, start

867
00:49:21,560 --> 00:49:27,200
Speaker 1: close to home to literally speak up this voting rights

868
00:49:27,239 --> 00:49:31,080
Speaker 1: thing that's happening right now. Companies are actually debating whether

869
00:49:31,120 --> 00:49:33,080
Speaker 1: they have a voice in this. I keep saying, what

870
00:49:33,120 --> 00:49:34,959
Speaker 1: do you mean where they have We're not talking about

871
00:49:35,000 --> 00:49:38,840
Speaker 1: supporting radical ideas. Here, we're not even talking about supporting

872
00:49:39,000 --> 00:49:42,040
Speaker 1: a black or brown person. I'm not or Asian part.

873
00:49:42,120 --> 00:49:45,719
Speaker 1: We're just talking about supporting the right of any citizen. Well,

874
00:49:45,800 --> 00:49:48,319
Speaker 1: you saw Ken Fraser and Ken Channa come out and

875
00:49:48,360 --> 00:49:51,960
Speaker 1: talk about what was happening in Georgia. Fraser the CEO

876
00:49:52,080 --> 00:49:57,640
Speaker 1: of Mirk, Yeah, and myself and seventy others went out,

877
00:49:57,760 --> 00:50:01,799
Speaker 1: Black and brown business leaders, why now and sign this

878
00:50:01,920 --> 00:50:05,360
Speaker 1: letter and paid for them to be full page ads

879
00:50:05,360 --> 00:50:07,160
Speaker 1: in the Journal and the Times, well to Journal New

880
00:50:07,200 --> 00:50:10,600
Speaker 1: York Times. Why because, first of all, we were ashamed

881
00:50:10,640 --> 00:50:12,600
Speaker 1: that we hadn't spoken up before, and we wanted it

882
00:50:12,680 --> 00:50:16,759
Speaker 1: to be a yell everybody understand. And we were surprised

883
00:50:16,760 --> 00:50:20,920
Speaker 1: at how few other business leaders were speaking up. It

884
00:50:20,960 --> 00:50:25,359
Speaker 1: shouldn't be required that black people speak up about all inequality.

885
00:50:25,400 --> 00:50:30,960
Speaker 1: It affects them, Inequality affects everyone everyone. So second thing

886
00:50:31,080 --> 00:50:33,040
Speaker 1: is make sure that you speak up on issues that

887
00:50:33,120 --> 00:50:37,200
Speaker 1: you are engaged as a business, not a personal crusade

888
00:50:37,280 --> 00:50:40,920
Speaker 1: of business. You need. We need a free and fair

889
00:50:40,960 --> 00:50:44,200
Speaker 1: democracy for our business to operate. Well, that's all you

890
00:50:44,239 --> 00:50:45,560
Speaker 1: have to do, is that's all you have to tell

891
00:50:45,680 --> 00:50:48,600
Speaker 1: the state leaders. That's all we need and this is

892
00:50:48,600 --> 00:50:51,000
Speaker 1: what we think. That is someone someone's on. Second. So therefore,

893
00:50:51,040 --> 00:50:54,800
Speaker 1: get involved. First, start close to home. Second, get involved.

894
00:50:54,800 --> 00:50:57,480
Speaker 1: Do not let this crap slide by you. It's not

895
00:50:57,600 --> 00:51:01,040
Speaker 1: only about profits in the quarter. It's about readying the world,

896
00:51:01,320 --> 00:51:05,000
Speaker 1: ready in the United States for its future. Third, inspect

897
00:51:05,320 --> 00:51:09,160
Speaker 1: the numbers. I am always surprised at this. Facts and

898
00:51:09,239 --> 00:51:12,640
Speaker 1: data don't lie. Look at pay equity in your company,

899
00:51:12,880 --> 00:51:16,680
Speaker 1: look at performance of different types of people in your company.

900
00:51:16,840 --> 00:51:19,480
Speaker 1: Look at the numbers. Track when you see problems, fix it.

901
00:51:20,040 --> 00:51:23,840
Speaker 1: And we you know, we do this with profit. Literally

902
00:51:23,880 --> 00:51:27,160
Speaker 1: we do it with profit, with you know, to the penny.

903
00:51:27,640 --> 00:51:29,799
Speaker 1: We don't do it with other areas well. We don't

904
00:51:29,800 --> 00:51:32,080
Speaker 1: have enough enough women, well why I don't really know.

905
00:51:33,000 --> 00:51:34,960
Speaker 1: Next year we don't have enough women. Were just not

906
00:51:35,000 --> 00:51:37,480
Speaker 1: a priority for them. But by the way, if they

907
00:51:37,480 --> 00:51:41,200
Speaker 1: want to retain a workforce of young people, I mean

908
00:51:41,280 --> 00:51:45,040
Speaker 1: it's it's you know, they say all altruism is self serving,

909
00:51:45,120 --> 00:51:49,640
Speaker 1: but there is. I'll take that. I'll take that for now.

910
00:51:50,000 --> 00:51:52,800
Speaker 1: I I literally don't like this to the extent that

911
00:51:52,840 --> 00:51:54,719
Speaker 1: it's becoming where everybody who gives money puts a name

912
00:51:54,760 --> 00:51:56,959
Speaker 1: on things. But that's a different, a totally different show.

913
00:51:57,360 --> 00:51:59,720
Speaker 1: But I tell you what if we need to start

914
00:52:00,080 --> 00:52:03,120
Speaker 1: with self serving altruism, which is I tell you a

915
00:52:03,120 --> 00:52:06,000
Speaker 1: lot of how I got for You know, scholarships were

916
00:52:06,120 --> 00:52:09,360
Speaker 1: named after people, right, So I'm I say, God, bless you,

917
00:52:09,400 --> 00:52:12,240
Speaker 1: thank you very much, or whoever it is that you admire,

918
00:52:12,280 --> 00:52:15,240
Speaker 1: blessed you, thank you very much. I do believe that

919
00:52:15,800 --> 00:52:19,360
Speaker 1: there is an equal amount of altruism that is done

920
00:52:19,440 --> 00:52:24,319
Speaker 1: with no lights on them. Right. And I'm really into

921
00:52:24,360 --> 00:52:26,879
Speaker 1: civil servants lately, you know, I just started to realize how,

922
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:29,000
Speaker 1: I mean, how thankless a job these guys, and most

923
00:52:29,040 --> 00:52:30,480
Speaker 1: of us don't even know who they are, but look

924
00:52:30,480 --> 00:52:33,200
Speaker 1: at them. They're hustling away trying to get you know, whatever,

925
00:52:33,320 --> 00:52:36,280
Speaker 1: whatever done. I think that we're at a point where

926
00:52:36,760 --> 00:52:40,280
Speaker 1: it's not a moment, it's a movement where you cannot

927
00:52:40,320 --> 00:52:44,880
Speaker 1: ignore the voices of people. Technology helps here. We cannot

928
00:52:44,880 --> 00:52:49,480
Speaker 1: ignore people just paying attention to how you're doing. People

929
00:52:50,520 --> 00:52:53,560
Speaker 1: in this movement have a huge amount of power. They

930
00:52:53,680 --> 00:52:58,880
Speaker 1: cannot um minimize how important their voice and their impact is.

931
00:52:58,920 --> 00:53:00,680
Speaker 1: If they want to see change, have to speak up.

932
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:02,799
Speaker 1: If I want to see change, I have to speak up.

933
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:05,680
Speaker 1: I cannot so I mean I do. I cannot take

934
00:53:05,680 --> 00:53:08,160
Speaker 1: the easy path, right Sometimes I just want to sleep,

935
00:53:09,239 --> 00:53:11,279
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, just kind of you get

936
00:53:11,280 --> 00:53:15,040
Speaker 1: it as well, just go and you know, stay silent

937
00:53:15,120 --> 00:53:18,480
Speaker 1: for but you really somebody else, let somebody else this battle.

938
00:53:18,560 --> 00:53:20,920
Speaker 1: But you can't, You really can't, because what are the

939
00:53:21,000 --> 00:53:22,960
Speaker 1: part of life is the battle, right because with the

940
00:53:22,960 --> 00:53:25,080
Speaker 1: battle comes all the fun and all that stuff like that,

941
00:53:25,120 --> 00:53:28,480
Speaker 1: the engagement interaction with people. But I want to make sure.

942
00:53:28,480 --> 00:53:29,880
Speaker 1: I want to make sure. And one of the reasons

943
00:53:29,880 --> 00:53:31,160
Speaker 1: why I wrote the book was to make sure that

944
00:53:31,160 --> 00:53:34,719
Speaker 1: people understand it does not take super people. Literally, this

945
00:53:34,800 --> 00:53:37,040
Speaker 1: is not a superperson. You're not looking at a superperson.

946
00:53:37,360 --> 00:53:40,000
Speaker 1: If anybody was super it was my mom. I literally

947
00:53:40,480 --> 00:53:43,719
Speaker 1: was a hard working, kind of average Joe and who

948
00:53:43,880 --> 00:53:46,919
Speaker 1: who literally was pretty smart did okay, fine, fine, fine,

949
00:53:46,960 --> 00:53:49,239
Speaker 1: fine fine. A lot of us in the world. A

950
00:53:49,400 --> 00:53:55,280
Speaker 1: huge amount of help differentiated me. And then literally all

951
00:53:55,320 --> 00:53:58,080
Speaker 1: of the lessons of the person who died a long

952
00:53:58,120 --> 00:54:01,520
Speaker 1: time ago came into play. It was like almost perfect

953
00:54:01,560 --> 00:54:04,960
Speaker 1: came into play where I could repeat her words and

954
00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:08,399
Speaker 1: try to live by those words, and it was impactful

955
00:54:08,800 --> 00:54:12,720
Speaker 1: and relevant today. And that's the point of the book.

956
00:54:12,760 --> 00:54:15,080
Speaker 1: It's not about any great story about this. You know,

957
00:54:15,400 --> 00:54:18,480
Speaker 1: I found goal in the no I literally just had

958
00:54:18,520 --> 00:54:20,839
Speaker 1: a lot of help, a lot of help from the

959
00:54:20,920 --> 00:54:23,360
Speaker 1: time I was born to know a lot of help.

960
00:54:23,400 --> 00:54:28,120
Speaker 1: And you're using it now to pay it forward and

961
00:54:28,160 --> 00:54:31,920
Speaker 1: make the world a better place. Ursula, Thank you, Ursula,

962
00:54:32,000 --> 00:54:36,560
Speaker 1: Maxine Max Burns. The book is called Where You Are

963
00:54:36,800 --> 00:54:39,439
Speaker 1: Is Not Who You Are? A real tribute to your

964
00:54:39,560 --> 00:54:43,600
Speaker 1: sweet mom, your incredible mom. You talk about your business

965
00:54:43,640 --> 00:54:48,680
Speaker 1: experience or life experience. It's a fantastic memoir. Congratulations on it.

966
00:54:52,960 --> 00:54:55,879
Speaker 1: A big thank you to Ursula Burns, who we all

967
00:54:55,920 --> 00:54:59,600
Speaker 1: agree is very cool. Her book is called Where You

968
00:54:59,640 --> 00:55:04,680
Speaker 1: Are Is Not Who You Are? Next week on next Question.

969
00:55:05,680 --> 00:55:09,719
Speaker 1: There was this very strange distinction between the public perception

970
00:55:09,760 --> 00:55:11,120
Speaker 1: of what it meant to be a man and how

971
00:55:11,120 --> 00:55:14,799
Speaker 1: men were um demonizing me and saying I was a

972
00:55:14,800 --> 00:55:17,480
Speaker 1: traitor to my own gender. How women were publicly applauding me,

973
00:55:17,600 --> 00:55:21,359
Speaker 1: but the men who needed it were privately writing how

974
00:55:21,440 --> 00:55:25,280
Speaker 1: the hottie from Jane the Virgin, Justin Baldoni is trying

975
00:55:25,320 --> 00:55:30,040
Speaker 1: to change how we think about masculinity, one man, one

976
00:55:30,120 --> 00:55:34,360
Speaker 1: reader at a time. That's next Thursday, on Next Question,

977
00:55:40,080 --> 00:55:42,279
Speaker 1: Next Question, with Katie Kurik is a production of My

978
00:55:42,440 --> 00:55:46,399
Speaker 1: Heart Media and Katie Kurik Media. The executive producers Army,

979
00:55:46,560 --> 00:55:51,080
Speaker 1: Katie Curic, and Courtney Litz. The supervising producer is Lauren Hansen.

980
00:55:51,400 --> 00:55:56,799
Speaker 1: Associate producers Derek Clements, Adriana Fassio, and Emily Pinto. The

981
00:55:56,840 --> 00:56:00,399
Speaker 1: show is edited and mixed by Derrick Clements. For more

982
00:56:00,440 --> 00:56:03,239
Speaker 1: information about today's episode, or to sign up for my

983
00:56:03,320 --> 00:56:06,920
Speaker 1: morning newsletter, wake Up Call, go to Katie Correct dot com.

984
00:56:06,960 --> 00:56:09,600
Speaker 1: You can also find me at Katie Correct, on Instagram

985
00:56:09,640 --> 00:56:13,200
Speaker 1: and on my social media channels. For more podcasts from

986
00:56:13,239 --> 00:56:17,279
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

987
00:56:17,600 --> 00:56:19,800
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,