Betsy Bernard ’77
Major: Government
Profession: President and Chief Executive Officer of AT&T Business and President-designate of AT&T
Hometown: Morristown, NJ

While at St. Lawrence, Betsy Bernard was one of the first participants in St. Lawrence’s Kenya Semester Program. It was through this experience that she learned the value of “ the notion of operating outside one’s comfort zone.”

Betsy credits her “fantastic liberal arts education” with developing skills that have been invaluable in her career. St. Lawrence taught her how to read, write, analyze, synthesize and critically evaluate information and gave her strong written and verbal communications skills. Another valuable lesson which Betsy learned at St. Lawrence, through her involvement in athletics and student life roles, was how to be part of a team and how to be an effective leader.

After she graduated from St. Lawrence, Betsy began her career at AT&T and held various positions in sales, marketing and operations. She became vice president of the Business Market Group at Pacific Telesis, then vice president of the Business Market Group at Pacific Teles, and later executive vice president of USWest.

The lifelong lessons and other experiences she gained at St. Lawrence have pushed her to become one of the highest-ranking female executives in the telecommunications industry. One main lesson that Betsy has learned in her 25 years in the telecommunications industry is how to “treat every experience as an opportunity to learn. Failures can actually teach more than success.”