Forty Under 40: Vonnice Boone

For Vonnice Boone, inclusion isn’t just her job. It’s her heart’s passion. Born in Washington, D.C., Boone’s family moved to Maryland when she was in first grade.

“I grew up in a terrible place,” she said. “I’ve seen people overdose on drugs, seen people dead. Things could have gone very differently for me.” Bussed to a white school, her first-grade teacher was Black and incredibly influential on Boone. “She taught me Black girl magic before it became a real thing,” she said. “She taught me how to stand out as a Black girl in white schools.”

Boone attended Bennett College in North Carolina for a year but dropped out for health reasons. Four years later, she started again at North Carolina A&T State University. Boone graduated in 2007 with an accounting degree, then earned her MBA from the University of Maryland in 2012. She’s currently working on her Ph.D. in education, with a focus on performance improvement leadership.

Working at contract accounting positions as her husband moved for his job, they landed in Bentonville in 2015. Boone began in Walmart’s audit services in 2018, moving to senior auditor in 2019.

Passionate about inclusion, Boone took her current position in March. Her goal is to help Walmart become more inclusive by hiring a diverse workforce and understanding how to set them up for success and promotions. She supports nine associate resource groups, with ownership of LatinX, inABLE and Women’s Resource Community.

An adjunct accounting professor at the University of Arkansas for the past year, Boone also co-chairs the Sam M. Walton College of Business advisory board, working to bring awareness about people of color.

Active in Alpha Kappa Sorority, Boone hopes to bring a chapter of the National Black MBA Association to Northwest Arkansas.