Home Page

Most Powerful Women

Leena Nair

The 113-year-old luxury brand Chanel shook up its ranks in 2021 when it picked as its CEO a human resources executive who had never run a company, let alone had experience with the rarified world of high fashion. That did not scare Leena Nair, 54, whose entire professional life has broken the mold. One of few female students at her university in India, she built her career at global giant Unilever. Mass sales of Unilever’s miniature shampoo sachets and soap bars in the world’s poorest communities are a stark contrast to Chanel’s $6,000 handbags and $50,000 watches, yet Nair’s supply-chain and marketing chops might be what Chanel needs. The $17.2 billion-in-revenue company says it is committed to innovative R&D and wants to rein in a pervasive black market of knockoffs and resales. Nair, Chanel’s first Indian-born CEO, and an outsider, is determined not to be the last, citing as one of her mantras, “Lift as you climb.”

Courtesy of Chanel
  • Title
    CEO
  • Affiliation
    Chanel
  • Country/Territory
    U.K.
The 113-year-old luxury brand Chanel shook up its ranks in 2021 when it picked as its CEO a human resources executive who had never run a company, let alone had experience with the rarified world of high fashion. That did not scare Leena Nair, 54, whose entire professional life has broken the mold. One of few female students at her university in India, she built her career at global giant Unilever. Mass sales of Unilever’s miniature shampoo sachets and soap bars in the world’s poorest communities are a stark contrast to Chanel’s $6,000 handbags and $50,000 watches, yet Nair’s supply-chain and marketing chops might be what Chanel needs. The $17.2 billion-in-revenue company says it is committed to innovative R&D and wants to rein in a pervasive black market of knockoffs and resales. Nair, Chanel’s first Indian-born CEO, and an outsider, is determined not to be the last, citing as one of her mantras, “Lift as you climb.”