Business leaders are proud of being rational. They sharpen their minds with market intelligence reports, case studies, and academic frameworks in the search for that elusive competitive advantage. However, most will scoff when asked if they have read a novel recently. Too busy. Too impractical. It’s too fictional. But fiction might just be the missing link in the leadership arsenal.
Think about it: business is people—customers, employees, partners. Decisions, negotiations, and marketing all depend on understanding human behavior. And what better training for this than spending a few hundred pages living in another’s skin? Fiction compels leaders to experience lives other than their own and gives them a front-row seat to the drama of emotional nuance, moral complexity, and intricate relational dynamics. Read enough, and suddenly, it’s not about the decisions you’re making—it’s about decisions involving a rich understanding of human consequences.
Reading fiction doesn’t indulge leaders; it sharpens skills they can’t acquire in an MBA program.
Empathy has been much overused as a term, but it is part of leadership and a competitive advantage. Great leaders do more than understand balance sheets; they read human beings. This becomes instinctive through fiction. Take Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go; not a business book, this is a subtle and profound tale of love, memory, and loss. Yet, listen carefully to what the story says about people; it shows how they communicate the unsaid, act out of fear, and even in the most hopeless situations, cling to hope. A leader who knows these things only does not manage people; he or she inspires them to be productive. Moreover, he or she does not sell to customers; instead, he or she sells them with such intimacy that they will be loyal for life.
Consider Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. One’s ambition, self realization, and the consequences of unfettered expectation govern Pip’s transformation from a naive boy to an encumbered mature man. Leaders who fail to reflect and only chase success experience the same disillusionment as Pip. However, those who do grow bind their mistakes in the past and change their objectives to achieve success that is on a more sustainable path..
And then there’s the matter of creativity. The marketplace is very aggressive in its competition. Every sector is overstocked with goods, and the champions can be recognized by their uniqueness. Creative solutions that an algorithm or strategic playbook drive innovation cannot foresee. Fiction is a boot camp for creativity, stretching the mind, introducing new ways of thinking, and disrupting established thought patterns. If you read One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, you’ll see generations who warp reality to their ends. That’s not practical advice; it teaches one vital lesson: You’ve got the world as malleable as you make it. That thinking disrupts industries, reshapes norms, and develops leaders who will innovate differently.
If not creativity and empathy, then resilience must be considered. The great novels do not merely entertain; they subject the characters to hell and challenge them to find a way out. Business leaders face hell every day. Markets crash. Deals fall through. Competitors outmaneuver. Fictional characters are portrayed as examples of perseverance, but instead of example analysis, you feel every struggle, every gut-wrenching setback, and every glorious breakthrough. That’s why so many executives have The Count of Monte Cristo on their all-time favorite lists: it’s the quintessential story of grit, patience, and strategic revenge—long-term thinking taught when the world has written you off.
Another striking example is Jeffrey Archer’s Kane and Abel. This powerful story of two men from vastly different backgrounds who struggle to succeed is a profound reflection of ambition, competition, and the sacrifices involved. Business leaders will connect with the paradox between competition and reliance, ambition and moral values, and how personal history influences choices. The similar paths that Kane and Abel take remind us that leadership is not winning alone but knowing when to join forces with others and where to resist.
Storytelling, of course, is the cherry on top. No great brand, no legendary leader, succeeds without it. Businesses aren’t built on products alone; they’re built on narratives. People don’t just buy what you sell—they buy the story behind it. The best marketers are not number crunchers; they are novelists at heart. They can create a story that grabs an audience and makes them feel something. Read F. Scott Fitzgerald, and then you’ll understand the allure of aspiration and the heartbreak of chasing an impossible dream. Read Toni Morrison, and you’ll see what history, identity, and cultural depth mean to a people. Those are the foundations of brands that do not just exist but matter.
However, some will always argue that fiction is a luxury, a diversion for those with too much time. Reading fiction doesn’t indulge leaders; it sharpens skills they can’t acquire in an MBA program. One ability to transcend the empirical data. Another capability is to engage people emotionally. Creativity to create where others may stop. Strength to withstand challenges that might shatter ordinary thinking minds.4
So, pause the next time you reach for another business book promising the latest management hack. Pick up a novel instead may teach you more about leadership than any CEO memoir ever could.