As IBM’s Vice President, Corporate Social Responsibility, and Chief Impact Officer, Justina Nixon-Saintil drives the initiatives that enable IBM and its employees to transform their altruism into reality, with a focus on building an AI-prepared talent pipeline and social innovation.
Justina leads IBM’s efforts across employee volunteerism, education partnerships, and curricula to invest in the future of work, with a groundbreaking commitment to skill 30 million people worldwide by 2030. As of today, IBM has trained over 16 million learners worldwide. Through a strategic focus on developing talent, IBM’s free education program IBM SkillsBuild offers coursework and digital credentials on several topics including AI, data analytics and cybersecurity. This effort is upskilling adult learners, and connecting high school and university students, and faculty, with valuable new skills and career paths. As a trained engineer and a corporate leader, Justina has championed lifelong-learning for learners and STEM professionals around the world.
As IBM’s Social Impact focal point, Justina also spearheads corporate practices that underpin the company’s tradition of uncompromising ethics and transparency in its operations, including launching IBM’s Impact framework and disclosures.
In 2022, Justina led the launch of the IBM Impact Accelerator, which received the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation’s “Best Sustainability Program” award in 2023. The IBM Impact Accelerator is a pro bono social innovation program that applies IBM’s technologies and ecosystem of experts to scale projects that support communities facing economic and environmental stress.
Under Justina’s leadership, the program has already worked with 25 organizations on projects related to sustainable agriculture, clean energy, water management, resilient cities and supply chains, creating economic opportunities and catalyzing sustainable development for people worldwide. Though this effort, IBM has directly benefited approximately 2.5 million people to date.
Previously, as director of Corporate Social Responsibility at Verizon, Justina created and led programs to bridge the digital divide by providing access to broadband and educational resources. She was also an Engineer for the U.S. Department of Energy.
Justina earned her Master of Business Administration from New York University’s Leonard N. Stern School of Business and her bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She’s an Aspen Institute First Movers Fellow and is on the boards of Carnegie Learning and the New York Climate Exchange. She previously served as a board member for the Princeton Community Area Foundation.
