Postcards

How to hire in uncertain times

by Jessica Shambora

Who's hiring? Hardly anybody, yet. But as you dream about recovery, you'd better be thinking about how to upgrade your talent. You'll be hiring again someday. Really.

We talked about hiring at the recent Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, where this year's theme was "Betting on the Future." A session called "Building a Standout Start-up" was led by two CEOs who are in major hiring mode. We thought we'd MORE

Why Xerox CEO Burns is buying big

Xerox's $6.4 billion deal to buy Affiliated Computer Services--which walloped the stock yesterday--is evidence that new CEO Ursula Burns knows what she wants and won't waste time getting it. "Top line revenue growth," Burns replied, at Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit, when asked what is Xerox's "unfinished business."

The Summit interview was the first public sit-down for Burns and Anne Mulcahy since the former took over from the latter in the MORE

Behind Xerox's historic CEO handoff

By Beth Kowitt

In their first public conversation on their historic CEO handoff, Ursula Burns and Anne Mulcahy of Xerox (XRX) said the intensity and amount of attention it's received has really surprised them.

In July when Mulcahy, Xerox's chairman, stepped down as CEO and handed over the reins to Burns, it was the first woman-to-woman CEO succession in Fortune 500 history. Burns is also the first black woman to lead a MORE

Guest Post: Bridging college to career...to CEO?

You never know who your summer intern will turn out to be. In 1980, Ursula Burns was a summer intern in mechanical engineering at Xerox (XRX). Last month, she became CEO there. In 1985, Sallie Krawcheck was a summer intern at Fortune. She later climbed to the top tier of Citigroup (C), where she served as CFO and ran a $13 billion wealth management unit. Last week, Krawcheck moved to MORE

New power in Africa...and beyond

Leadership, essentially, is about inspiring others to carry on a mission. The leadership opportunity compounds in a connected, viral, global community.

Here's how leadership can spread: In 2006, Fortune and the U.S. State Department launched the Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership. Every year since then, we've selected two dozen or more of the best and brightest young women leaders in developing countries and invited them to the U.S. to shadow women MORE

Xerox's next CEO: Ursula Burns

by Jessica Shambora

Yesterday on Postcards we wrote about an historic event: Xerox (XRX) CEO Anne Mulcahy announced she will pass the baton to president Ursula Burns on the first of July in the first ever woman-to-woman transfer of the CEO role in the Fortune 500. Burns will also be the first African-American female to lead a company on the list. (Click here for a 2006 Fortune profile of Burns.)

While Fortune, MORE

Behind the Fortune 500's first female CEO handoff

by Patricia Sellers, with Jessica Shambora

This is a groundbreaking day in American business. With the decision of Anne Mulcahy to pass the chief executive role at Xerox (XRX) to Ursula Burns, the Fortune 500 has its first ever woman-to-woman CEO hand-off. The transition, due July 1, will also make Burns, 50, the first African-American female CEO in the Fortune 500.

Mulcahy and Burns prove how far women in corporate America have MORE

Global mentoring program kicks off in DC

I'm on the run in Washington, following meetings at the White House yesterday and a spectacular "Most Powerful Women Evening With..." dinner that Fortune hosted on Monday night in the Benjamin Franklin Room at the State Department. We had eight U.S. Senators with us--including our speakers, Senators Barbara Boxer of California and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas--and scores of women leaders, a touch of royalty (HM Queen Noor, who is MORE

Finding bits of inspiration

We're all looking for inspiration these days, aren't we? Not to be Pollyannish, but I'm jazzed following a dinner that I attended last evening. It was organized by Joan Amble, the EVP and corporate comptroller of American Express (AXP), and Skadden Arps partner Martha McGarry. These two women convened two dozen women who participate in Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit. Terri Dial, the CEO of Citigroup's (C) U.S. Consumer Bank, MORE

Warren Buffett in "heaven": the photo gallery

Amidst the chaos in the markets, it's difficult to find time to breathe, much less pore over 2,500 pictures from our Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit in early October. But I finally made it through our trove and want to share part of it with you.

If you've been reading Postcards, you know that we had Warren Buffett with us for three days. What a treat. More than that, the Berkshire MORE