When Ursula Burns announced last week that she was leaving her position as CEO of Xerox, she also, in effect, announced the end of the minuscule representation of black women in leadership positions at companies within the Standard & Poor’s 500 index.
As New York magazine reports, the move now leaves a huge gap: Once Burns officially leaves later this year, there will no black female CEOs of any S&P 500 companies, and only 19 female CEOs. According to New York magazine, that means less than 5 percent of all CEOs at the country’s 500 biggest firms are women. In addition, there have also been only about 15 black CEOs since the establishment of the Fortune 500, the magazine notes.
Burns, who has been with Xerox since she started as an intern in 1980, remains with the company for now, but as a chairman, while Xerox searches for someone to replace her.
Read more at New York magazine.