SmartSuite for the Chief Executive Officer
The Chief Executive Officer sets direction and is accountable to the board for performance, risk and culture. They use the strategy, portfolio and risk views to decide what the organization pursues, hold the executive team to its objectives and report to the board.
Reports to:
What you own
The Chief Executive Officer sets direction and is accountable to the board for performance, risk and culture.
- Set the vision, strategy and operating priorities
- Propose the strategic plan, budget and major investments to the board and direct their execution
- Own enterprise performance, risk appetite and culture
- Lead the executive team and hold it accountable for objectives
- Report to the board and shareholders
Reporting lines
Who this role reports to, who reports to them, and the peers they work with most.
Reports to
Direct reports
Works closely with
How SmartSuite supports this role
Lead
Planning. Shows company objectives and key results with live progress across every function.
Reporting. Delivers board-ready performance, portfolio and risk summaries from source data.
Risk and issues. Surfaces top enterprise risks and overdue actions in the same executive view.
Products this role uses most
Industry reference
Corporate governance codes such as the UK Corporate Governance Code (2024) and the OECD Principles, together with SOX Section 302 certifications for US registrants and sector regimes such as the UK's Senior Managers and Certification Regime, define the CEO's accountability to the board and regulators.
Related roles
Explore Further
Guides and definitions from the GRC Knowledge Center and the What-is glossary, chosen for this role.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Chief Executive Officer accountable for?
The Chief Executive Officer sets the vision, strategy and operating priorities, proposes the strategic plan, budget and major investments to the board and directs their execution, owns enterprise performance, risk appetite and culture, leads the executive team and holds it accountable for its objectives, and reports to the board and shareholders. In SmartSuite the CEO's view is built from Strategy & OKR Management, Portfolio Management and Enterprise Risk Management (ERM), which hold the objectives, investments and risks the executive team runs.
How does SmartSuite show a Chief Executive Officer progress against objectives?
SmartSuite shows company objectives and key results with live progress across every function in Strategy & OKR Management, so the CEO sees how each executive's area is tracking against the objectives agreed, as it happens. Holding the executive team to account becomes a conversation about specific key results and their current state rather than about a slide prepared for the meeting, and the Chief Strategy Officer maintains the cascade.
How does the CEO see top risks and overdue actions in the same view?
Top enterprise risks and overdue actions surface in the same executive view as performance, so the CEO is not reading risk from one report and delivery from another. Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) supplies the risks and their treatment status from the register the Chief Risk Officer owns; the CEO sees which top risks lack a funded response or have slipping actions, and can raise them with the accountable executive directly.
How does SmartSuite help the CEO decide what the organization pursues?
Portfolio Management holds the strategic initiatives and major investments the CEO brings to the board, alongside the objectives they serve in Strategy & OKR Management, so a decision to start, stop or fund an initiative can be made against its contribution to strategy and its current status. The Chief Operating Officer, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Strategy Officer each update their part of that picture, which keeps the portfolio view current without a reconciliation exercise.
How does the Chief Executive Officer report to the board?
SmartSuite delivers board-ready performance, portfolio and risk summaries from source data, so the CEO reports to the board from the same records the executive team works in. The Board Risk Committee Chair and Audit Committee Chair can read the risk and remediation records directly, which means the CEO's account and the committees' own reading reconcile, and board discussion starts from a shared picture rather than competing versions of it.
How quickly can an executive team get a working view in SmartSuite?
New customers can start with SmartSuite Onboarding, a guided four-week program around one or two priority workflows. For a CEO the first is the objectives view: load the company objectives and key results, the initiative portfolio and the top risks with their owners, and the dashboards read from them as the functions update their records. The CEO does not operate the system; the executives and their teams do, and the view improves as more of the organization's planning, delivery and risk work moves into it.
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