Raised in Arthur, North Dakota, Doug Burgum is no stranger to rolling up his sleeves. Before earning his MBA from Stanford, he put himself through North Dakota State University while moonlighting as a chimney sweep. In 1983, Doug famously “bet the farm” by mortgaging $250,000 of inherited farmland to provide the seed capital for a software startup, Great Plains Software. He led the company through a successful IPO and grew it to over 2,000 employees before its acquisition by Microsoft for $1.1 billion. Doug then spent six years as senior vice president of business solutions at Microsoft and later co-founded Arthur Ventures and Kilbourne Group, further cementing his reputation as a businessman and investor. During this time, he also served on the GSB’s Advisory Council and established a family foundation to support education and enrichment-related projects that improve the quality of life in rural North Dakota communities.
Doug transitioned to politics in 2016, winning the North Dakota governorship despite not having prior political experience or the state Republican Party’s endorsement. He was re-elected in a landslide in 2020, with Forbes recognizing him as “America’s Best Entrepreneurial Governor.” During his tenure, North Dakota enacted the largest tax cut in state history, and achieved the country’s highest growth in real GDP and lowest unemployment rate. At Doug’s initiative, it also became the first state to require cybersecurity education for all K–12 students.
Today, Doug serves as the 55th U.S. secretary of the interior, nominated by President Donald Trump in November 2024 and confirmed in January 2025. He also chairs the Trump administration’s National Energy Dominance Council, tasked with overseeing all departments and agencies involved in the permitting, production, generation, distribution, regulation, and transportation of American energy. In this role, he has championed streamlined processes and responsible resource development as essential to unlocking America’s energy potential and maintaining global competitiveness. A longtime advocate for technology as a problem-solver, he emphasizes both the promise of innovation and the urgency of treating artificial intelligence as a national security priority.
True to his entrepreneurial roots, Doug continues to identify emerging challenges and apply innovative solutions, now simply on a much larger stage.
