For Mignon Williams, 42, a black marketing executive in Rochester, N.Y., affirmative action means opportunity. Recruited by Xerox Corp. in 1977 under a pioneering plan to hire women and minorities, Williams rose from saleswoman to division vice president in just 13 years. While Williams attributes her success mainly to hard work and business savvy, she acknowledges that her race and her sex played a role in her rapid rise. Affirmative action, she says, "opened the door, but it's not a free pass. If anything, you feel like you're under a microscope and have to constantly prove yourself by overachieving and never...
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