He came out of nowhere. The mysterious "Spartan," as named by a new famed reporter, showed up just in time to save the city's local high school students from being completely slaughtered by a Columbine-like incident. Since then, he has taken the law into his own hands, brutally assaulting anything that decides to harm a fellow citizen. But just who is the Spartan and where did the masked hero come from? Five people, who have never met, are about to be connected by the search to answer this question, but the answer may not be the one they wanted...

Are you ready to lead? Will you pass the test?

Despite all the effort through the years to understand what it takes to be an effective leader, the challenges of leadership remain enormously difficult and elusive; even today, most CEOs don't last five years in the job. The demands to deliver at a consistently high level can be unforgiving.

The loneliness. The weight of responsibility. The relentless second-guessing and criticism. The pressure to build all-star teams. The 24/7 schedule that requires superhuman stamina. The tough decisions that often leave no one happy. The expectation to always have the right answer when it can be hard just to know the right question.

These challenges are brought into their highest and sharpest relief in the corner office, but they are hardly unique to chief executives. All leaders face their own version of these tests, and the authors draw on the distilled wisdom, stories, and lessons from hundreds of chief executives to show how every aspiring leader can master these challenges and lead like a CEO. These foundational leadership skills will make all aspiring executives more effective in their roles today and lift the trajectory of their careers.

The CEO Test is the authoritative, no-nonsense insider's guide to navigating leadership's toughest challenges, brought to you by authors uniquely qualified to tell the stories. Adam Bryant has conducted in-depth interviews with more than 600 CEOs. Kevin Sharer spent more than two decades as president and then CEO of Amgen, where he led its expansion from $1 billion in annual revenues to nearly $16 billion. He has served on many boards and is a sought-after mentor for CEOs of global companies.

Leadership is getting harder as the speed of disruption across all industries accelerates. The CEO Test will better prepare you to succeed, whether you're a CEO or just setting out to become one.

Get ready to make the biggest jump of your career. The chasm separating managers from leaders is widening as the skills required to be an effective leader grow in number and complexity. But you're ambitious. You want to cross that chasm. And your organization needs you to cross it in order to join its bench of stars who will lead with empathy and humanity and ground the organization's strategies in a meaningful, mission-driven, and purposeful way. The Leap to Leader is your trusted playbook for making the biggest jump of your career. You'll learn from more than a hundred successful leaders who share their powerful insights and compelling stories of how to make the leap, along with practical strategies and tactics for building a loyal following, moving up quickly to broaden your impact, and making the subtle but crucial mindset shifts that are required to lead others effectively. As senior managing director at the ExCo Group, Adam Bryant has worked directly with hundreds of fast-rising executives, sharing the leadership development frameworks, tools, and approaches that are at the heart of this book. He draws on the collective wisdom of the one hundred mentors at his firm—all former CEOs or global business leaders—who know what it takes to make the leap to leader. As the creator of the iconic Corner Office column in the New York Times, Bryant has spoken with more than a thousand leaders over the years about the challenges and nuances of leadership. The leap to leader doesn't have to be a leap of faith. If you're ready to make the jump, start here.

More than two hundred CEOs reveal their candid insights on how to build and foster a corporate culture that encourages innovation and drives results

In "Quick and Nimble," Adam Bryant draws on interviews with more than two hundred CEOs to offer business leaders the wisdom and guidance to move an organization faster, to be quick and nimble, and to rekindle the whatever-it-takes collective spark of a start-up, all with the goal of innovating and thriving in a relentlessly challenging global economy. By analyzing the lessons that these leaders have shared in his regular "Corner Office" feature in "The New York Times," Bryant has identified the biggest drivers of corporate culture, bringing them to life with real-world examples that reflect this hard-earned wisdom.

These men and women--whose ranks include Jeff Weiner of LinkedIn, Tony Hsieh of Zappos, Angie Hicks of Angie's List, Steve Case of Revolution (and formerly AOL), and Amy Gutmann of the University of Pennsylvania--offer useful insights and strategies for creating a corporate culture of innovation and building a high-performing organization that unleashes the passion and energy of its employees.

As the world shifts to more of a knowledge economy, the winners will be companies that can attract and retain the best and brightest employees by creating an environment where they can grow, contribute, and feel rewarded. Through the wisdom of these leading chief executives, "Quick and Nimble" offers a keen understanding of the forces that shape corporate culture and a clear road map to bring success and energy to any organization.

He came out of nowhere. The mysterious "Spartan," as named by a new famed reporter, showed up just in time to save the city's local high school students from being completely slaughtered by a Columbine-like incident. Since then, he has taken the law into his own hands, brutally assaulting anything that decides to harm a fellow citizen. But just who is the Spartan and where did the masked hero come from? Five people, who have never met, are about to be connected by the search to answer this question, but the answer may not be the one they wanted...

Dozens of top CEOs reveal their candid insights on the keys to effective leadership and the qualities that set high performers apart

What does it take to reach the top in business and to inspire others? Adam Bryant of "The New York Times" decided to answer this and other questions by sitting down with more than seventy CEOs and asking them how they do their jobs and the most important lessons they learned as they rose through the ranks. Over the course of extraordinary interviews, they shared memorable stories and eye-opening insights.

"The Corner Office" draws together lessons from chief executives such as Steve Ballmer (Microsoft), Carol Bartz (Yahoo), Jeffrey Katzenberg (DreamWorks), and Alan Mulally (Ford), from which Bryant has crafted an original work that reveals the keys to success in the business world, including the five essential personality traits that all high performers exhibit--qualities that the CEOs themselves value most and that separate the rising stars from their colleagues. Bryant also demystifies the art of leadership and shows how executives at the top of their game get the most out of others.

Leadership is not a one-size-fits-all skill, and these CEOs offer different perspectives that will help anyone who seeks to be a more effective leader and employee. For aspiring executives--of all ages--"The Corner Office" offers a path to future success.