Becoming CEO is often seen as the culmination of a career. It is also the beginning of a job that demands a different approach to leadership.
In The CEO: The Role, the Reality, the Responsibility, published by Harvard Business Review Press, Nitin Nohria examines the choices and pressures that define the chief executive’s role—and why success in earlier leadership positions does not automatically prepare someone for the top job.
Drawing on decades of research and teaching, alongside firsthand work with hundreds of CEOs through Harvard Business School’s New CEO Workshops, Nohria brings readers inside the everyday practice of leading an organisation. He examines how chief executives direct their attention, translate strategy into action, shape culture, and manage relationships with employees, boards, investors, and other stakeholders.
The book explores the tensions that make the role so demanding. CEOs must take responsibility while enabling others to act, maintain a clear direction while responding to change, and stay informed when their position can make candid feedback harder to obtain. Their effectiveness depends on judgement, communication, and the ability to create the conditions in which others can succeed.
Nohria also considers how the job changes over the course of a CEO’s tenure. Taking charge requires listening, assessing the organisation, and establishing priorities. The years that follow demand reassessment and renewal. Preparing to leave brings another responsibility: developing future leaders and ensuring that the organisation’s prospects extend beyond the person currently at its helm.
This perspective gives The CEO relevance beyond the executive suite. For aspiring leaders, it illuminates the transition from managing a function or business unit to taking responsibility for an entire enterprise. For serving executives and board members, it offers a framework for examining leadership effectiveness, organisational resilience, and succession.
Combining research with practical insight, The CEO moves beyond the public image of the chief executive to examine the daily work of leadership—and what it takes to leave an organisation stronger.
About the Author
Nitin Nohria is the George F. Baker Jr. Professor of Business Administration and Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor at Harvard Business School. He joined the faculty in 1988 and served as the school’s tenth dean from 2010 to 2020. His research focuses on leadership and corporate performance. He is executive chairman of Thrive Capital and chairman of Exor N.V.
