A Conversation with Nuno Fernandes, President, American Public University System (APUS)
What does great leadership look like? My conversation with Nuno explores his leadership philosophy, values, and approach to building teams where innovation thrives, failure is embraced, and personal growth is expected. This post—full video interview included at the end—unfolds his journey from Bosch intern to president of APUS, along with the insights he so generously shares to set other leaders up for success, exemplifying what great leadership looks like.
As the son of first-generation university students, Nuno believes his timeline was shaped the moment his parents decided to attend college. Following in their footsteps, he graduated himself—acknowledging this likely wouldn’t have happened had they not paved the way and recognizing how vastly different his life would be otherwise.
Fascinated by the butterfly effect, and realizing the life-changing impact of higher education, he remembers thinking, “How cool would it be if I had the chance to do this for other people and other families?” This thought is what led Nuno to pursue a CMO role at an international education company after spending eleven years managing sales, marketing, and product in industrial technology.
“How cool would it be if I had the chance to do this for other people and other families?”
The ripple effect of his parents’ decision transformed not only their lives and his, but countless others—today, Nuno serves as president of APUS, one of the largest universities in the United States with over 90,000 students. His path to university president is anything but traditional. He didn’t begin his career as an academic but as an economics graduate interning at Bosch. Within months, he was promoted to director of sales, leading his first team by the age of 24.
For Nuno, what really matters in leadership is the way you make people feel. “You have to make people feel that they can be better tomorrow than they are today.” He emphasizes the importance of building deep connections—understanding people’s desires, concerns, personalities, and motivations—so that consequently you can become a better leader by addressing each individual in a way that works best for them.
What really matters in leadership is the way you make people feel.
Nuno believes a leader’s first responsibility is to create an environment where people feel safe to make honest mistakes while trying to progress, innovate, and grow. For him, it is important to provide autonomy and empowerment for others to do their work, and to provide support if things go wrong. He’s learned that it’s in the less-than-ideal experiences where resilience, creativity, and negotiation skills are built. “There’s a lot to be said about failing, of lessons to be learned when you’re not succeeding, but you’re trying.”
“There’s a lot to be said about failing, of lessons to be learned when you’re not succeeding, but you’re trying.“
This mindset has helped create an atmosphere at APUS where collaboration flourishes, innovation thrives, and personal growth is expected. This approach recently contributed to APUS being certified as a Great Place to Work®, a global benchmark for workplace culture.
Reflecting on leaders who shaped him, Nuno recalls the person who hired him at Bosch. As a new graduate planning to work in finance, he unexpectedly found himself leading marketing—a function he knew nothing about. “He saw some talent in me that I didn’t know I had. And he really cared about me. He was a great mentor. He put me in situations where I was clearly not qualified to be there. But somehow, he believed in me.”
This early experience taught Nuno that as a leader, you have to bring out the best in others. He has found throughout his career that often, people don’t know what they’re truly good at. “As a great leader you have to have that capacity of trying to figure out what is really good in someone and then develop that.”
“As a great leader you have to have that capacity of trying to figure out what is really good in someone and then develop that.”
For Nuno, the secret to leadership is forming connections, so that the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. Leadership, he adds, is also problem-solving. He’s learned that problems aren’t solved with worry but rather with focus—and that you can train your mind just like you train your body. “Most things we call problems are just puzzles placed in front of you that you need to solve. And when you solve that puzzle, you move on to another puzzle, and so on and so forth. You just have to focus on the challenge. And solve is as fast as you can, and as well as you can, and then move on.”
Problems aren’t solved with worry but rather with focus.
When it comes to personal values, Nuno’s non-negotiables are Honesty, Innovation and Humility. He sees it as something special to develop yourself personally and professionally while remaining humble. “There’s something special about the capacity that you have to develop yourself personally and professionally, and to be successful, let’s say, financially or professionally, and to remain grounded and to remain a humble person.”
He believes the must-haves of great leadership include empathy, a wide vision to understand the impact of decisions, and an eye for talent. Nuno expresses gratitude for the ability to identify talent in others, to coach and mentor them, and to see them grow. Many who have worked with him for years are now in roles different from where they began—a reminder of the impact great leadership can have.
His advice is to build and nurture a strong network of collaboration early on, and, regardless of career stage, to be discerning when choosing where to work. Whether it’s your first job or you’re leading a company, find a place where you fit—and where leaders care about making you a better professional than you were yesterday. In the end, it’s not about the title, but about the shared experiences with great people along the way—“You become better because of them, and hopefully, they become a bit better because of you.”
In the end, it’s not about the title, but about the shared experiences with great people along the way.