Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. (GeekWire File Photo)
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. (GeekWire File Photo)

It’s not unprecedented for a Microsoft CEO to write a book. Remember “The Road Ahead”? Now Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is following in Bill Gates’ footsteps with his own book, called “Hit Refresh,” to be published by Harper Business in the fall of 2017.

“Hit Refresh follows three storylines: Nadella’s personal journey of transformation, the change that is taking place today inside his storied technology company, and one that is coming in all of our lives as intelligent machines become more ambient and more ubiquitous throughout society,” the publisher says in a news release.

In the book, Nadella “explores how people, organizations, and societies can and must transform—hit refresh—in their persistent quest for new energy, new ideas, relevance and renewal,” says Harper Business. “Nadella writes that uniquely human qualities like empathy will become more valuable in a world where the torrent of technology will disrupt like never before.”

Nadella says in the release, “Ultimately, I am writing for Microsoft team members, customers, and partners in hopes that these stories of transformation will be useful to them as they navigate their own path.”

The book deal comes more than two years after Nadella took over as Microsoft CEO, and weeks after he announced the biggest acquisition in the company’s history, the $26.2 billion purchase of LinkedIn. Nadella has been increasingly sharing his philosophical take on computers, artificial intelligence and humanity, including an essay in Slate this week.

Talking about the book at the Aspen Ideas Festival on Wednesday with author Walter Isaacson (video below), Nadella said it will be “meditations of somebody who’s a sitting CEO of a company going through a pretty cathartic transformation. It’s a moment in time where there is a lot of change — change with us, there is change in industry, there is change in the society.”

He said he wants to “write about it as I’m going through it. … It’s very much the trials and tribulations of a person going through a transformation, which is the hardest thing.”

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