I strongly believe that through dedication and perseverance, one can overcome adversity to achieve success. It is a privilege to accept membership in the Horatio Alger Association, an organization which promotes this principle.

You have to stick up for what you believe in. And that, to me, is the biggest thing you can do about driving inclusion.

You define yourself by either what your clients want or what you believe they'll need for the future. So: Define yourself by your client, not your competitor.

I'm the ninth CEO of IBM. Every one of my predecessors has steered through a technological shift, and every one left the company in a better position than the person before them and prepared this company with a very strong balance sheet to allow it to continue to invest for the next shift.

Become a successful survivor by leveraging what you learned in adversity.

I've been head of strategy at IBM and together with my colleagues built our five-year plan. My priorities are going to be to continue to execute on that.