Viveca Fairbanks-Henderson is Senior Vice President, Global Enterprise Programs, for Ecolab, the global leader in water, hygiene and infection prevention solutions and services. In this role, she is responsible for providing enterprise-wide leadership to address Ecolab’s most challenging and complex problems, delivering hundreds of millions of dollars annually in productivity savings, driving process improvements, and developing a strong talent pipeline for the organization.
Previously, Fairbanks-Henderson was Vice President and General Manager for the Ecolab Nalco Water Food & Beverage business in North America, with responsibility for managing a $350 million business while leading a team of over three hundred associates. In this role, she had the distinction of being the first and only Black female General Manager in Ecolab’s 100-year history. Prior to that role, she was the Vice President of Global Engineering for Ecolab’s Industrial business, where she led an organization of over six hundred associates to deliver $300 million in annual revenue by providing engineering solutions, plus managing operations to customers across the globe.
Before joining Ecolab in 2019, Fairbanks-Henderson spent 28 years in the consumer-packaged goods industry, with over two decades at Procter & Gamble and seven years with Kellogg’s. Her experiences included regional and global roles of increasing responsibility across Engineering, Supply Chain, Sustainability, Strategy, Research & Development, and Packaging.
Viveca is a member of the Ecolab Global Management Team, serves on the Ecolab Executive Diversity & Inclusion Council, is the Executive Sponsor of the Ecolab Black Leader Forum and is a member of the Ecolab Women’s Executive Forum. She is the Winner of the Transformation category for the WeQual Awards, the Americas 2024. In 2022, she was recognized as an Ecolab Woman of Impact on International Women’s Day and was named to Diversity Woman Magazine’s Power 100 List.
In addition, she serves on the Purdue University Engineering Advisory Council and is a member of several professional organizations including WeQual Executives, the CALIBR Global Leadership Network and CHIEF. She is committed to “lifting as she climbs” and invests time in mentoring individuals across Ecolab. Her passion to give back to the community shines through as a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated and The Links Incorporated. Also, she is a Lifetime Associate member of Jack & Jill of America Incorporated, an organization dedicated to nurturing future African-American leaders.
Fairbanks-Henderson earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Purdue University where she has established an endowment for the Minority Engineering Program.
Viveca, her husband Darren Henderson, and rising college first-year student Bryce Henderson reside in Naperville, Illinois. Outside of work, Viveca enjoys spending time with family and friends, traveling, reading, and collecting art.
She lives by the following motto: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit.”