Nitin Nohria
George Fisher Baker Jr. Professor of Business Administration Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor
Nitin Nohria served as the tenth dean of Harvard Business School from 2010-2020. He previously served as co-chair of the Leadership Initiative, Senior Associate Dean of Faculty Development, and Head of the Organizational Behavior unit.
As Dean, building on input from faculty, students, staff, and alumni, he identified five priorities for Harvard Business School: innovation in the School's educational programs; intellectual ambition to advance ideas with impact in practice; continued internationalization, through building a global intellectual footprint; creating a culture of inclusion, where every member of the community could do their best work in support of the School's mission; and fostering a culture of integration within HBS and across Harvard University. Activities undertaken in support of these priorities included:
A year-long course in the Required Curriculum of the MBA Program, Field Immersion Experiences for Leadership Development (FIELD), that provides students with intensive, immersive, small-group opportunities to develop the knowing, doing, and being of leadership.
The U.S. Competitiveness Project, a multi-faculty research-led effort to understand and improve the competitiveness of the United States—that is, the ability of firms operating in the U.S. to compete successfully in the global economy while supporting high and rising living standards for Americans.
The launch of the Harvard Innovation Lab, an initiative to foster team-based and entrepreneurial activities and deepen interactions among Harvard students, faculty, entrepreneurs, and members of the Allston and Greater Boston community; the i-lab ecosystem now includes the alumni Launch Lab X and the Pagliuca Harvard Life Lab.
Harvard Business School Online, the School's digital platform—encompassing CORe, courses, and the Live Online Classroom—that brings the dynamism of the HBS classroom to online learning.
Nohria's intellectual interests center on human motivation, leadership, corporate transformation and accountability, and sustainable economic and human performance. He is co-author or co-editor of 16 books. The most recent, Handbook of Leadership Theory and Practice, is a compendium dedicated to advancing research on leadership based on a colloquium he organized during HBS’s centennial celebrations. Nohria is also the author of over 50 journal articles, book chapters, cases, working papers, and notes. He sits on the board of directors of Bridgespan and on the board of trustees of Massachusetts General Hospital. In addition, he serves as an advisor to BDT Capital Partners, Piramal Enterprises, and Tata Sons, on the advisory board of Akshaya Patra and ShopX, and as a strategic advisor to Focusing Capital on the Long Term Global (FCLTGlobal). He has been interviewed by ABC, CNN, and NPR; written for Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, Washington Post, Financial Times, and Boston Globe; and cited in Business Week, Economist, Financial Times, Fortune, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal.
Prior to joining the Harvard Business School faculty in July 1988, Nohria received his Ph.D. in Management from the Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a B. Tech. in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (which honored him as a Distinguished Alumnus in 2007). He was a visiting faculty member at the London Business School in 1996.
He and his wife live in the Boston area and have two daughters.