In 2003—2008, Ksenia studied international economics and trade relationships at the Department of World Economy and World Politics at the National Research University — Higher School of Economics in Moscow and, before graduating, began working with the Infrastructure and Energy Group of the Moscow office of the World Bank.

In 2008, she co-authored a joint study by the World Bank and International Finance Corporation on the potential of energy efficiency in Russia, which marked the beginning of fundamental federal policy shifts in Russia. A year later, Ksenia was part of the expert consortium consulting the Ministry of Economic Development and the Ministry of Energy of the Russian Federation in drafting Law No. 261-FZ "On Energy Saving" and subsequently assisted a number of Russian regions and municipalities in preparing energy efficiency strategies and programs.

Ksenia’s work in the World Bank sparked her professional interest in urban systems, resource efficiency and environmental friendliness. In 2010, she received a Fulbright scholarship and became a student at the Master of City Planning program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. There she specialized in urban environmental planning, community-level energy efficiency policies, alternative resolution of urban disputes and mediation of multilateral urban negotiations. In 2011, Ksenia did her summer internship at an Indian consensus building consultancy and, among other things, worked on resolving inter-religious conflicts in Bangalore. Her dissertation research was devoted to sustainability issues of Olympic mega-event legacy planning and resulted in the book "Sustainability transformations in Olympic host cities".

As an ambassador of the program strengthening scientific and technological exchange between MIT and Russia, Ksenia returned to Moscow to teach the course "Modern global trends of urban development" and conduct research seminars at the master’s program "Urban Development and Spatial Planning" at the National Research University Higher School of Economics Graduate School of Urbanism, which had opened just two years before. At the same time, she helped launch the joint program of the Moscow Architecture School MARSH and Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration "New Leaders of Territorial Development".

In 2013, Ksenia moved to Bonn, Germany, to join the UN-Habitat and ICLEI project "Urban Low Emissions Development Strategies". She led the spatial development component of the project and assisted rapidly growing cities of Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia and India to obtain international technical assistance and implement best practices in the field of urban environmental and low carbon planning.

In 2014—2017, she founded and led the Center for Urban Studies of the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO. Under her leadership, the center published its flagship study "Governing spatio-economic development of a city: hidden resources"; implemented a number of consulting projects for the Government of Moscow, JSCo 'Central Exurban Passenger Company', Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.; held a series of educational and strategic seminars for the administrations of Samara, Ufa, Kazan, Khabarovsk, Orenburg and other cities; acted as an intellectual partner of the Moscow Urban Forum, and published a large number of articles.

In 2017−2018, she worked as an adviser to the mayor of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk on urban development curating, among other things, corporate-municipal relations with foreign resident companies, such as Exxon, Schlumberger, and Shell.

Since 2019, Ksenia has lived in Houston with her husband, daughter, and two dogs. She works for Rice University Kinder Institute for Urban Research and continues to her mentorship project СityCompass.