Harvard Executive Education Programme
Developed for CSA members, this intensive residential programme at Harvard Business School equips chiefs of staff with the strategic insight and leadership skills to become trusted, high-impact leaders driving success within their organisations.
Oxford Executive Education Programme
Programme Overview
The Harvard Executive Education Programme immerses you in real-world case studies that tackle today’s toughest organisational challenges. In the classroom, you’ll analyse leadership dilemmas, practice influence and conflict-management techniques, and hone strategies for building trust and alignment across teams. Outside the sessions, you’ll exchange insights and experiences with fellow chiefs of staff, expanding your network and sharpening your perspective. By week’s end, you’ll have a deeper understanding of your strategic impact as chief of staff and leave ready to influence at the highest levels.
Learning Objectives
Executive Presence
The programme will teach participants to cultivate a commanding yet approachable presence, dubbed the “bartender” persona, so that others instinctively confide in them and follow their lead even without formal authority. You’ll learn how to build trust, maintain confidentiality, and leverage personal influence to secure buy-in for critical initiatives.
Self-Reflection & Growth Mindset
Participants can expect to learn techniques for ongoing self-assessment and professional growth. Drawing on Harvard’s emphasis on pairing high-quality content with candid peer feedback, you’ll practice identifying your strengths and development areas, setting personal learning objectives, and integrating “opportunity gap” thinking into your role.
Ambidexterous Leadership
The programme will teach participants to lead their organisations in both stabilising current operations and exploring new opportunities. Drawing on Professor Michael Tushman’s research, you will learn to design processes that support teams focused on efficiency, alongside units charged with innovation, and to switch leadership approaches between the two modes.
Mastering Difficult Conversations
The programme will help you to navigate the hardest conversations, whether giving feedback to C-suite peers or challenging your principal in a way that maximises clarity and preserves relationships. You’ll rehearse frameworks for framing problems role-playing high-impact exchanges that diffuse conflict and surface real issues.
"It is hard to overstate the significance of the experience ... the sensation that comes from interactions with folks who truly get what you do, how you do it, and what keeps you motivated."
– Darren Goodsir, Chief of Staff to the Vice-Chancellor, University of Sydney
Take your seat at Harvard.
Applications close 27 June 2025
Apply now