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- Powerful leadership. Jennifer Rumsey grew up in Columbus, Ind. It didn't mean much to her at the time, but the city is the headquarters of Cummins, a 104-year-old manufacturer that produces power generators and diesel engines.
Rumsey started working for Cummins 24 years ago and became the company’s CEO this time last year. With revenues of $28 billion, Cummins is ranked No. 146 on the Fortune 500, making Rumsey one of the 52 female CEOs who lead 10.4% of Fortune 500 businesses.
As she marks one year in the CEO job for her hometown manufacturer, Rumsey is reflecting on what drew her to Cummins and what has kept her there for more than two decades. In college, she studied mechanical engineering and got a job working for a fuel cell startup, which she thought would be integral to the future of environmentally-friendly energy. But the experience didn’t feel rewarding. “I realized I was working long hours on a technology that was far from being actually used by a customer and making a real impact in the world,” she says.
She arrived at Cummins as the company was focused on reducing the environmental impact of diesel engines used in trucking, agriculture, marine power, and more. That felt like it had more of a real-world impact.
Rumsey has risen through the ranks, overseeing several different engineering categories and Cummins’ components business before serving as chief technical officer and then CEO.
Her approach to leadership is inspired by her experience as a woman in engineering—"I have had people comment that I don't look like an engineer"—and by the business leaders who preceded her. Cummins' longtime CEO J. Irwin Miller was an early believer in stakeholder capitalism, which acknowledges the needs of employees and communities, not just shareholders. As leader of the National Council of Churches, he helped organize the 1963 March on Washington; later, the company exited South Africa during the apartheid regime. (Miller was also known for his contributions to modern architecture.) Miller died in 2004, just a few years after Rumsey joined the company.
For Rumsey, continuing that legacy means building a diverse team and addressing the company’s role in climate change through various commitments to develop new technologies, reach net-zero, and reduce greenhouse gasses. The company says it reduced greenhouse gasses 31% between 2018 and 2021.
“As I was becoming CEO, I realized that we are really at a unique and critical time for our business—and for our world,” she says. “Climate change is a real crisis. And we have a responsibility and a role to play in helping to address it.”
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
@_emmahinchliffe
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