Featuring the HBR IdeaCast: HBS Legend Nitin Nohria on the Biggest Surprises CEOs Face

Becoming CEO may be the ultimate career goal for many executives. But the job itself can be radically different from what aspiring leaders expect.

Nitin Nohria has spent more than three decades studying CEOs and working with them in Harvard Business School’s workshops for new chief executives. In his new book, The CEO: The Role, the Reality, the Responsibility, he explores the realities of the job—and the surprises that even highly experienced executives encounter once they reach the top.

In this episode of the HBR IdeaCast Nohria shares with host Alison Beard why CEOs quickly discover that they can't actually run the company themselves, and why CEOs are particularly vulnerable to being insulated from reality: information tends to become increasingly “sugarcoated” as it travels up the organization. Plus, the importance of humility, building the right senior team, and managing the CEO's most precious—and finite—resource: time.

Listen to more episodes of the HBR IdeaCast in your favorite podcast app, or head to: https://hbr.org/2018/01/podcast-ideacast