World's Top 30 Management Professionals for 2020

Guru #1

Rita Gunther McGrath

Rita Gunther McGrath is a world-renowned thought leader and a professor at Columbia Business School, where she directs the popular Leading Strategic Growth and Change program. She is widely recognized as a premiere expert on leading innovation and growth during times of uncertainty. In her speeches and consulting, Rita works with Fortune 1,000 companies, helping boards, CEOs, and senior executives act strategically in rapidly changing and volatile environments. She has received the #1 achievement award for strategy from the prestigious Thinkers50 and has been consistently named one of the world’s top ten management thinkers in its bi-annual ranking.

Rita is recognized as one of a small group of experts who have built today’s best-in-class innovation practices, and her tools for making innovation a managed proficiency was integral to the foundation of the “lean startup” movement. In 2009, she was elected as a Fellow of the Strategic Management Society in recognition of her impact on the field. She has also been elected as a Fellow of the International Academy of Management and has received the “Theory to Practice” award at the Vienna Strategy Forum.

Rita is the author of the best-selling The End of Competitive Advantage (Harvard Business Review Press, 2013) and the upcoming Seeing Around Corners: How to Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Sept. 2019). She has written three other books, including Discovery Driven Growth, cited by Clayton Christensen as creating one of the most important management ideas ever developed.

Rita is a highly sought-after speaker at exclusive events around the globe, including the Global Peter Drucker Forum and various CEO summits. She regularly contributes articles and perspectives in business-oriented publications such as Fast Company, the Wall Street Journal and Fortune.  One of the most published authors in the Harvard Business Review, Rita’s writing includes the breakthrough article “Discovery Driven Planning” (1995).

Her work is often cited in the press, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Financial Times, CNN Business, and NPR’s Marketplace. She has been rated one of the 25 smartest women to follow on Twitter by Fast Company and was voted HR Magazine’s “Most Influential International Thinker.”

Rita is the founder of Valize, a company focused on helping organizations go beyond innovation theater by developing tools to implement the Discovery Driven Growth approach.

Previously in her career, Rita served as an IT director, worked in the political arena, and founded two startups. She received her Ph.D. from the Wharton School (University of Pennsylvania) and has degrees with honors from Barnard College and the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs. She is married and is proud to be the mother of two delightful grownups. For more information, visit RitaMcGrath.com.

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Guru #2

Tom Peters

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A navy personnel turned management professional Tom Peters writes and speaks about a very special area of management i.e. personal and business empowerment and problem solving methodologies. Peter went to Severn School for High School and attended Cornell University receiving a bachelors degree in civil engineering in 1965 and a masters degree in 1966. He later studied business at Stanford Business School receiving an M.B.A. and Ph.D. In 2004 he also received an honorary doctorate from the State University of Management in Moscow. He is called the most provocative and engaging management guru in the USA. He is also called the Red Bull of management thinkers. He is a best selling author of the book In Search of Excellence which became a bestseller and had exposure in the United States at a national level when a series of television specials based on the book and hosted by him appeared on PBS.

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Guru #3

Philip Kotler

Dr. Philip Kotler is a world famous Management and Marketing guru and a distinguished professor at the Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management in Chicago. Called the Father of Modern Marketing, he is hailed by Management Centre Europe as the foremost expert on the strategic practice of marketing in the world. Dr. Kotler is known to many as the author of what is widely recognized as the most authoritative textbook on marketing Marketing Management, now in the 15th edition. Also he has authored or co authored dozens of leading books on different aspects and applications of “broadened” marketing. He is also author of three recent books: Confronting Capitalism, Democracy in Decline, and Advancing the Common Good.  His message to managers is that Capitalism and Democracy must be improved to advance better the lives and prosperity of all working people, not just the rich.  In addition Dr. Kotler has published more than one hundred articles in leading journals including the Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review, Business Horizons, California Management Review. Dr. Kotler runs World Marketing Summits in 20 countries on leading management and marketing developments to companies and organizations in the U.S. Europe and Asia. A seasoned business concept guru, Kotler is hired by businesses and organizations from every corner of the world to train up and develop their people so as to prepare them for new challenges.

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Guru #4

John Kotter

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John Kotter has been a Harvard Business School professor for over 30 years and is an internationally renowned author on leadership and change. His 18 books include international bestseller Leading Change and followed by Our Iceberg Is Melting, which puts his 8-step process for change into a fun and easy to read format. In addition to the Leadership Guru Award John Kotter was awarded, Business Week magazine rated Kotter the #1 leadership guru in America based on a survey they conducted of 504 enterprises in 2001. After his 30 years of success in teaching, he decided to start a company that would arm leaders to tackle the challenges of changing times, Kotter International helps organizations execute Kotters strategies, and leaves them with the capability to take on future business challenges and react to them quickly with agility and direction. John Kotter received full marks on being unique with his concepts and ideas. His presence on the stage alone commands absolute attention allowing listeners to gather enough information to use in the future. His comeback to the guru list is attributed to the licensing of his Leading Bold Change workshops based on his bestseller Our Iceberg is Melting which is refocusing the international business public to his global contribution.

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Guru #5

Bob Nelson

Dr. Bob Nelson is considered one of the world’s leading experts on employee motivation, performance, engagement, recognition and rewards.  He is president of Nelson Motivation Inc., a management training and consulting company located in San Diego, California that specializes in helping organizations improve their management practices, programs and systems.

He has worked with 80 percent of the Fortune 500 companies and has presented on six continents. He is a co-founder of Recognition Professionals International and previously worked closely with Dr. Ken Blanchard (The One Minute Manager) for 10 years as his vice president, chief of staff and ghost writer.

Dr. Nelson has sold 5 million books on management and motivation, which have been translated into 37 languages, including:

  • 1501 Ways to Reward Employees
  • 1001 Ways to Engage Employees 
  • The Management Bible
  • Employee Recognition and Engagement For Dummies
  • The 1001 Rewards & Recognition Fieldbook
  • 1001 Ways to Take Initiative at Work
  • Please Don’t Just Do What I Tell You: Do What Needs To Be Done!
  • Keeping Up in a Down Economy: What the Best Companies Do to Get Results in Tough Times
  • Ubuntu: An Inspiring Story of an African Principle of Teamwork and Collaboration

He has appeared extensively in the national media including CBS 60 Minutes, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, PBS, National Public Radio and has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, BusinessWeek, Fortune, Inc., and other media to discuss how to best motivate today’s employees.

He holds an MBA in organizational behavior from UC Berkeley and received his PhD in management with Dr. Peter F. Drucker “The Father of Modern Management” at the Drucker Graduate Management School of Claremont Graduate University in Los Angeles. He teaches in the MBA program at the Rady School of Management at the University of California in San Diego.

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Guru #6

Tamara J. Ericksonis

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Tamara J. Ericksonis a McKinsey Award-winning author, a leading expert on generations in the workplace, and a widely-respected authority on leadership, the changing workforce, collaboration and innovation, and the nature of work in intelligent organizations. She has three-times been named one of the 50 most influential living management thinkers in the world by Thinkers50, the respected ranking of global business thinkers. Erickson is an Executive Fellow, Organisational Behaviour, at London Business School, where she has designed and co-directs the school’s premier leadership programme for senior-most executives, Leading Businesses into the Future. She is the Founder and CEO of Tammy Erickson Associates, a research-based firm dedicated to helping clients build intelligent organizations. An experienced executive, Erickson has served on the Board of Directors of two Fortune 500 corporations, with experience on the Governance, Audit, and Compensation Committees. She holds a BA degree from the University of Chicago and an MBA from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration.

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Guru #7

Hal Gregerson

Hal Gregersen is Executive Director of the MIT Leadership Center and a Senior Lecturer in Leadership and Innovation at the MIT Sloan School of Management where he pursues his vocation of executive teaching, coaching, and research by exploring how leaders in business, government, and society discover provocative new ideas, develop the human and organizational capacity to realize those ideas, and ultimately deliver positive, powerful results.

He is a Senior Fellow at Innosight and a former advisory board member at Pharmascience, a privately held pharmaceutical company based in Montreal, Canada.  Before joining MIT, he taught at INSEAD, London Business School, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College, Brigham Young University, and in Finland as a Fulbright Fellow.

Gregersen’s most recent book, The Innovator’s DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators, flows from a path-breaking international research project (with Jeff Dyer & Clayton Christensen). They explored where disruptive innovations come from by interviewing founder entrepreneurs and CEOs at 100+ of the most innovative companies in the world and by assessing how 8,000+ leaders leverage five key innovation skills to create valuable new products, services, processes, and businesses.

To grasp how leaders find and ask the right questions – ones that disrupt the world – Gregersen is now studying 100+ renowned business and government leaders. This question-centric project, conducted in collaboration with Clayton Christensen, is surfacing insights into how leaders build better questions to unlock game-changing solutions. Gregersen is also founder of The 4-24 Project, an initiative dedicated to rekindling the provocative power of asking the right questions in adults so they can pass this crucial creativity skill onto the next generation.

Gregersen has co-authored ten books and published over 50 articles, book chapters, and cases on leading innovation and change. His research has been highlighted in global media such as BBCCNNThe EconomistFast CompanyFinancial TimesForbesFortuneInc.The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. He has received several awards for his cutting edge work, including: 2013 Thinkers50 Innovation Award Nominee, 2012 Chartered Management – British Library Book of the Year Award for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and the 2009 McKinsey Award runner-up for the best article in Harvard Business Review.

Putting his research to practice, Gregersen regularly delivers high impact keynote speeches and executive workshops with companies like Accenture, Adidas, AT&T, Christie’s, Coca-Cola, Daimler, Danone, Genentech, IBM, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, LG, Lilly, McAfee, Marriott, MasterCard, Sanofi Aventis, SAP, Vivendi, WalMart, World Economic Forum, & Yahoo! He also works with governments, not-for-profit and NGO organizations to generate greater innovation capabilities in the next generation of leaders.

Gregersen has lived and worked outside the United States for over a decade – in England, Finland, France, and the UAE.  He and his wife now reside in Boston where he pursues his lifelong avocation, photography, and she her lifelong love, painting.

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Guru #8

David Burkus

One of the world’s leading business thinkers, David Burkus’ forward-thinking ideas and bestselling books are changing how companies approach innovation, collaboration, and productivity.

As a skilled researcher and inspiring communicator, Burkus is one of the foremost minds shaping the future of business. The bestselling author of three books, Burkus’ latest work Friend Of A Friend, explores the science of how networks and relationships drive business—both inside and outside of the organization. By blending the most current research in psychology, sociology, economics, and network science, Burkus offers a fresh perspective on how to improve our networks and build key connections.

Burkus’ award winning books have been translated into more than a dozen languages, and his TED Talk has been viewed over 2 million times. By making cutting-edge organizational research accessible and applicable, Burkus pushes audiences to reconsider how they work both individually and in teams and unlocks the methods top performers use to thrive at work and in life.

A renowned expert, Burkus’ writings have appeared in the Wall Street JournalHarvard Business ReviewUSATodayFast Company, and more. He’s been interviewed by NPR, the BBC, CNN, and CBS This Morning. Since 2017, Burkus has been ranked as one of the world’s top business thought leaders by Thinkers50. Provocative and persuasive—Burkus shares captivating stories and practical takeaways that give audiences compelling insights into how organizations and individuals can do their best work ever.

You can connect with David here or learn more about how to bring him your event or company as a keynote speaker.

Want more? We’ve created a ton of free resources around all of David’s books. We’d love to share them with you and keep connected with you. Just click the button below and we’ll send them right to your inbox.

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Guru #9

Ram Charan

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Ram Charan is a business adviser, author and speaker with 35 years of experiences. He worked with companies such as GE MeadWestvaco, Bank of America, DuPont, Novartis, EMC, 3M, Verizon, Aditya, Birla Group, Tata Group, GMR, Max Group, Yildiz Holdings and Grupo RBS. Ram is famous for cutting through the complexity of running a business in the fast changing environment of today. He has been praised for his real world solutions shared with millions through his books and articles in top business publications. His ideas have been widely accepted for being practical relevant and highly actionable. Through keen observations he forms powerful insights that help business leaders face their toughest challenges in the areas of growth talent development corporate governance and profitability. He is an energetic interactive speaker who has won several awards such as the Bell Ringer award at GEs famous Crotonville Institute and best teacher award at Northwestern.

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Guru #10

Subir Chowdhury

Subir Chowdhury is chairman and CEO of ASI Consulting Group, LLC, a global leader on strategic initiatives, quality consulting, and training. Under Subir’s leadership, ASI Consulting Group has helped hundreds of clients around the world save billions of dollars and increase revenues. Subir has worked with many organizations, large and small, across diverse industries including manufacturing, healthcare, food, government, and nonprofit organizations. His client list includes global Fortune 100 corporations and industrial leaders such as American Axle, Berger Health Systems, Bosch, Caterpillar, Daewoo, Delphi, Fiat-Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Hyundai Motor Company, ITT Industries, Johns Manville, Kaplan Professional, Kia Motors, Leader Dogs for the Blind, Loral Space Systems, Make It Right Foundation, Mark IV Automotive, Procter & Gamble, the State of Michigan, Thomson Multimedia, TRW, Xerox, and more.

Subir is recognized as one of the “50 Most Influential Management Thinkers in the World” by Thinkers 50 of London, UK. Hailed by the New York Times as a “leading quality expert” and by BusinessWeek as “The Quality Prophet,” Subir is the author of fifteen books, including several international bestsellers, The Ice Cream Maker (Doubleday Random House, 2005), The Power of Six Sigma (Dearborn Trade, 2001), and Management 21C (Financial Times, 1999). His books have sold more than a million copies and have been translated in more than twenty languages.

Subir is an honorary member of the World Innovation Foundation (WIF) and has been inducted into the Engineering, Science and Technology Hall of Fame and honored by the Automotive Hall of Fame. He is a recipient of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers’ Gold Medal, the Society of Automotive Engineers’ (SAE) Henry Ford II Distinguished Award for Excellence in Automotive Engineering and the American Society of Quality’s first Philip Crosby Medal for authoring the most influential book on quality. The Society of Automotive Engineers established the Subir Chowdhury Medal of Quality Leadership, an annual award that recognizes those individuals who promote innovation and expand the impact of quality in mobility engineering, design, and manufacturing. The United States Department of Homeland Security presented the “Outstanding American by Choice Award” to Subir for his contributions to the field of quality and management.

In 2014, University of California at Berkeley established the Subir & Malini Chowdhury Center for Bangladesh Studies–the first of its kind in any academic institutions in the United States. The center awards graduate fellowships, scholarships, and research grants that focus on ways to improve the quality of life for the people of Bangladesh. Each year the Subir Chowdhury Fellowship on Quality and Economics is awarded by both Harvard University and the London School of Economics and Political Science to doctoral and postdoctoral student respectively to research and study the impact of quality in the economic advancement of a nation. His philanthropic efforts through the Subir & Malini Chowdhury Foundation focus on the education of those less fortunate in the world.

Born in Chittagong, Bangladesh, Subir received his undergraduate degree in aeronautical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur, India, and his graduate degree in industrial management from Central Michigan University, Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. He has received distinguished alumnus awards from both institutions, as well as an honorary doctorate of engineering from the Michigan Technological University. Subir is frequently cited in the national and international media. He delivers keynote addresses around the globe sharing the stages with heads of state and business leaders. He lives with his family in Los Angeles, California.

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Guru #11

James Collins

James Collins - Best Leadership Speaker Trainer

James Collins is a business consultant, author, and speaker on leadership and company sustainability and growth. His bestsellers include Built to Last which is coauthored by Jerry Porass, Good to Great and the most recent is Great by Choice. Built to Last was a fixture on the Business Week best-seller list for more than six years, and has been translated into 25 languages. Jim Collins talent and guru factor come from his ability to research and put that research data into an easy to understand format… his contributions to leaders around the world has been help them sustain superior success. His uniqueness is not from the content he creates but in his approach to gathering valuable information. He is a fact based speaker and uses that to inspire audiences to taking the required steps to creating and sustaining great organizations. Jim Collins is mostly known in North America but his books are internationally known and revered.

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Guru #12

Erica Dhawan

Erica Dhawan is the world’s leading authority on Connectional Intelligence and the Founder & CEO of Cotential.

Through speaking, training and consulting, she teaches business leaders innovative strategies that increase value for clients, deliver results and ensure competitiveness.

She is the co-author of the bestselling book Get Big Things Done: The Power of Connectional Intelligence. Erica was named by Thinkers50 as “The Oprah of Management Ideas” and featured as one of the emerging management thinkers most likely to shape the future of business. She hosts the award winning podcast Masters of Leadership.

Erica speaks on global stages ranging from the World Economic Forum at Davos to companies such as Fedex, Pepsico, and McGraw Hill Financial. Erica writes for Harvard Business Review, Forbes, Fast Company and the Huffington Post.

Erica also serves as a board member to Lufthansa Innovation Hub. Previously, she worked at Lehman Brothers and Barclays Capital. She has a MPA from Harvard University, a MBA from MIT Sloan, and a BS in Economics from The Wharton School.

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Guru #13

Hortense Le Gentil

Hortense is an Executive Leadership Coach and the President and Founder of JAY Consulting. She works with decision makers in the business world, including many C-suite executives from Fortune 500 companies, supporting them in their development and leadership by working with them on the alignment between their personal values and their professional activities.

Prior to coaching full time, le Gentil spent over 30 years in business in various industries, working for leading multinational companies in the areas of media consulting, marketing, and advertising. She then founded and spent 10 years as CEO of an entrepreneurial start-up (in metals recycling).

Hortense is part of the MG100 Coaches, Marshall Goldsmith’s Pay It Forward project, and is a certified Marshall Goldsmith Stakeholder Centered™ Coach. She has been selected to receive a Thinkers 50 coaching award for excellence in her field. She is the author of several articles about leadership and coaching in such publications as Leader to Leader and Les Echos.

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Guru #14

Herminia Ibarra

Herminia Ibarra is the Charles Handy Professor of Organizational Behavior at London Business School. Prior to joining LBS, she served on the INSEAD and Harvard Business School faculties.

An authority on leadership and career development, Thinkers 50 ranks Ibarra among the top management thinkers in the world. She is a fellow of the British Academy, a member of the World Economic Forum’s Expert Network, a judge for the Financial Times/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award, one of Apolitica’s 100 most influential people in gender policy, and the 2018 recipient of the Academy of Management’s Scholar-Practitioner Award for her research’s contribution to management practice.

She is the author of best-selling books Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader and Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career. Ibarra also writes regularly  in leading academic journals and business publications including the Harvard Business Review, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and New York Times. Ibarra speaks internationally on leadership and organizational transformation.

A native of Cuba, Ibarra received her M.A. and Ph.D. from Yale University, where she was a National Science Fellow.

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Guru #15

Barbara Kellerman

Barbara Kellerman is the James MacGregor Burns Lecturer in Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. She is the Founding Executive Director of the School’s Center for Public Leadership. And from 2003 to 2006 she served as the Center’s Research Director. Kellerman has held professorships at Fordham, Tufts, Fairleigh Dickinson, George Washington, Uppsala, and at both Dartmouth and the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. She also served as Dean of Graduate Studies and Research at Fairleigh Dickinson, and as Director of the Center for the Advanced Study of Leadership at the University of Maryland.

Kellerman received her B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College, and her M.A. (in Russian and East European Studies), M.Phil., and Ph.D. (in Political Science) degrees from Yale University. She was awarded a Danforth Fellowship and three Fulbright fellowships. At Uppsala (1996-97), she held the Fulbright Chair in American Studies. Kellerman was cofounder of the International Leadership Association (ILA), and is author and editor of many books including Leadership: Multidisciplinary Perspectives; The Political Presidency: Practice of Leadership; Bad Leadership; Followership; Women and Leadership (co-edited with Deborah Rhode); Essential Selections on Power, Authority, and Influence (2010); The End of Leadership (2012); and Hard Times: Leadership in America (2014).The End of Leadership was long listed by the Financial Times as among the Best Business Books of 2012, and selected by Choice as “essential” reading. It was also named by Choice as an “Outstanding Academic Title for 2013.” In 2015 Hard Times: Leadership in America received an Honorable Mention Award for its “significant contribution to the field of leadership” from the University of San Diego. And, in 2016 it too was selected by Choice as an “Outstanding Academic Title.” Kellerman has appeared often on media outlets such as CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, NPR, MSNBC, Reuters and BBC, and has contributed articles and reviews to the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, and the Harvard Business Review.

Barbara Kellerman speaks to audiences all over the world, including Berlin, London, Moscow, Rome, Sao Paolo, Shanghai, Zurich, St. Gallen, Jerusalem, Turin, Toronto, Montreal, Mumbai, New Delhi, Amsterdam, Kyoto, Munich, Beijing, Sydney, Buenos Aires, Leipzig, and Seoul. She has served on many different boards and was ranked by Forbes.com as among “Top 50 Business Thinkers” (2009) and by Leadership Excellence in top 15 of “thought leaders in management and leadership” in 2008-09 and 2010-2011. In 2010, she was given the Wilbur M. McFeeley award by the National Management Association for her pioneering work on leadership and followership. In 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019 she was ranked by Global Gurus as among top 20 on the list of “World’s Top 30 Management Professionals.” In 2016, she was given the Lifetime Achievement Award by the International Leadership Association. Her most recent book, Professionalizing Leadership, was published in 2018 by Oxford University Press. It was reviewed as “exceptional” and “highly recommended” by Choice. And it appeared on Forbes’ “Recommended Books for Creative Leaders in 2018.” Kellerman’s next book (co-authored with Todd Pittinsky) is titled, Leaders Who Lust: Power, Money, Sex, Success, Legitimacy & Legacy. It will be published in 2020 by Cambridge University Press. She also blogs regularly at barbarakellerman.com.

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Guru #16

W. Chan Kim

W. Chan Kim is the Co-Director of the INSEAD Blue Ocean Strategy Institute and a Chair Professor of Strategy and International Management at INSEAD. His book Blue Ocean Strategy, co-authored with Renée Mauborgne, has sold 3.6 million copies and is a bestseller across five continents.

Kim is ranked in the top 3 management gurus in the world in the Thinkers50 listing of the World’s Top Management Gurus and the Journal of International Management recognizes him as one of the world’s most influential academic journal authors in global strategy. He was selected for the 2011 Leadership Hall of Fame by Fast Company magazine and was named among the world’s top 5 best business school professors by MBA Rankings. He also received the Nobels Colloquia Prize for Leadership on Business and Economic Thinking. He is a Fellow of the World Economic Forum and an advisory member for the European Union. He also serves as an advisor to several countries.

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Guru #17

Gary Hamel

Gary Hamel was recently ranked by The Wall Street Journal as the worlds most influential business thinker and by Fortune magazine as the worlds leading expert on business strategy. Hamel authored books like Competing for the Future Leading the Revolution and The Future of Management and What Matters Now. In twenty years Hamel has authored 17 articles for the Harvard Business Review and is the most reprinted author in the Reviews history. He has also written for the Wall Street Journal Fortune, The Financial Times and many other leading publications around the world. Currently he is a Visiting Professor of Strategic and International Management. As a consultant and management educator Hamel has worked for companies such as General Electric Time Warner Nestle Shell Best Buy Procter Gamble 3M IBM and Microsoft. His pioneering concepts such as strategic intent core competence industry revolution and management innovation have changed the practice of management in companies around the world.

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Guru #18

Noel M Tichy

Dr. Noel M Tichy is an American management consultant author and educator. Dr. Tichy not only extends hi s expertise to business firms and private sectors but also to the academies as well. A dedicated Professor of Organizational Behaviour and Human Resource Management at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, Noel is also the Director of Global Business Partnership which ran the Global Leadership Program. He has a great impact in developing senior executives managing skills especially in this age when there are huge threats of globalization for small and rising organizations. His past works include heading GEs Leadership Center and also a working as a professor at Columbia University Business School. Dr. Tichy is the author of good number of books. His most recent book is JUDGMENT How Winning Leaders Make Great Calls. His huge contribution in management arena regarded him as one of the Top 10 Management Gurus by Business Week. He is widely known in the North America.

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Guru #19

Roger Martin

Roger Martin is Premier’s Chair in Productivity & Competitiveness and Academic Director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the Rotman School of Management. From 1998 to 2013, he served as Dean. Previously, he spent 13 years as a Director of Monitor Company, a global strategy consulting firm based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he served as co-head of the firm for two years. His research work is in Integrative Thinking, Business Design, Strategy, Corporate Social Responsibility and Country Competitiveness. He writes extensively and is a regular contributor to: Harvard Business Review’s The Conversation blog, the Financial Times Judgment Call column, and Washington Post’s On Leadership blog. He has written eighteen Harvard Business Review articles and published eight books: Playing to Win (with A.G. Lafley) (Harvard Business Review Press (HBRP), 2013)

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Guru #20

Don Tapscott

Don Tapscott is Adjunct Professor of Management at the Joseph L.Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto. He is a Canadian business executive, author, consultant and speaker who specializes in business strategy, organizational transformation and the role of technology in business and society. Tapscott holds a B.Sc. in Psychology and Statistics, and a M.Ed. specializing in Research Methodology. He also holds three honorary Doctor of Laws granted by the University of Alberta, Trent University, and McMaster University. During his Master’s of Education at the University of Alberta, he ran for mayor of Edmonton in the 1977 municipal election. Tapscott has authored or co-authored fourteen books on the application of technology in business and society. His book,Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything, co-authored by Anthony D. Williams, was an international bestseller and was translated into 20 languages. His another book The Digital Economy was among the first to show how the internet would change the way we did business.

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Guru #21

Alex Osterwalder

One of the world’s most influential proponents of business model innovation and value proposition design, Alexander (Alex) Osterwalder provides a framework for large companies and startups to innovate by rapidly experimenting with new business models and value propositions. He is co founder of Strategyzer, an innovation powerhouse that helps organizations develop growth engines, better customer understanding, more attractive value propositions and powerful business models via online applications and blended online/offline courses.

Osterwalder invented the Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, Culture Map, and Business Portfolio Map, to help business people with practical tools to help address important strategic jobs. He simplifies the strategy development process, turning complex concepts into digestible visual models. As a result, a better language for identifying and communicating value is created and disseminated throughout an organization. Osterwalder’s talks – which illuminate the application of these practical tools with current market examples – consistently rank first or second among his peers at global conferences. By punctuating his informative speeches with humor and interactive exercises, Osterwalder establishes a deep and direct connection with audiences ranging from five to 5,000 and beyond, commanding high levels of participation, engagement and enthusiasm. His speeches further reveal how his business model and value proposition frameworks allow companies to grasp and maintain a competitive advantage in the midst of a crowded, or previously uncharted, industry.

  • passionate entrepreneur, in 2010, Osterwalder co-founded Strategyzer, a leading innovation powerhouse that helps organizations develop growth engines, improve customer understanding, and establish more attractive value propositions and business models. His world-renowned Business Model Canvas is trusted by more than five million business practitioners from leading global companies, such as Coca-Cola, GE, Mastercard, Ericsson, Fujitsu, 3M, Intel and Microsoft, and is outlined in his international best-seller, “Business Model Generation” (Wiley, 2010), which was named among the 12 best business books of all time by USA Today. His second book, “Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want” (Wiley, 2014), continues the conversation by addressing how to find a better fit between a product and its intended market.

Osterwalder won the 2015 strategy award from Thinkers50 and currently ranks #7 among the top 50 business thinkers of the world. In 2013, he won the European Union’s inaugural Innovation Luminary Award. A frequent keynote speaker at Fortune 500 companies,

Osterwalder travels the world discussing his ideas and strategies at leading universities such as Wharton, Stanford, Berkeley, IESE, MIT, KAUST and IMD. He holds a doctorate from HEC Lausanne, Switzerland, and is a founding member of The Constellation, a global not-for-profit organization aimed at eliminating HIV/AIDS and Malaria.

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Guru #22

BRIAN P. MORAN

Brian Moran, President and Founder of The 12 Week Year, has 30 years of expertise as a corporate executive, entrepreneur, consultant and coach. His background as a corporate executive combined with his experience as an entrepreneur positions him with a unique skill set to help individuals and organizations grow and prosper.

Brian’s corporate experience includes management and executive positions with UPS, PepsiCo, and Northern Automotive. As an entrepreneur he has personally launched and led successful businesses and been instrumental in the success of many others. In addition, he has consulted for dozens of world-class companies.

Brian is a recognized expert in the field of leadership and execution. His realization that most people don’t lack ideas but struggle with effective implementation led him to the development of The 12 Week YearTM. In addition to his books, Brian has been published in many of the leading business journals and magazines. He is a sought after speaker, educating and inspiring thousands each year. Brian lives in Michigan with his wife Judy and their two daughters.

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Guru #23

Joseph Eugene Stiglitz

Former senior vice president and chief economist of the World Bank and a professor at Columbia University, Joseph Eugene Stiglitz is a great economist. He received the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 2001 and the John Bates Clark Medal in 1979. His latest book The Price of Inequality hit The New York Times best seller list in 2012. He is known for his critical view of the management of globalization. Stiglitz founded the Initiative for Policy Dialogue (IPD), a think tank on international development based at Columbia University in the year 2000. He chaired very important positions in institutions like Columbia University, University of Manchester’s Brooks World Poverty Institute, Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. Stiglitz has over 40 honorary doctorates and at least eight honorary professorships, as well as an honorary deanship. Stiglitz’s work focuses on income distribution, asset risk management, corporate governance, and international trade.

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Guru #24

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez

Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez is the world’s champion in project management. He has transformed a tactical topic such as project management into one of the central issues in CEO’s 2030 agenda. He argues that projects are the lingua franca of the business and personal worlds from the C-suite to managing your career or relationships.

Antonio’s research and global impact in modern management been recognized by Thinkers50 with the prestigious award “Ideas into Practice”. He has influenced CEOs of leading organizations; preeminent business media such as Harvard Business Review and The Economist; top business schools like Instituto de Empresa and Duke CE; renowned thought leader conclaves, such as Thinkers50 and the Peter Drucker Forum. His vision has impacted thousands of organizations leaders and MBA students.

He is a visiting professor at some of the world leading businesses schools (including Duke CE, Skolkovo, IE, Solvay, Vlerick); and a much in demand keynote speaker at events worldwide. Author of the bestselling “The Focused Organization” (Gower 2012) and contributor to four other business books. His next book, “The Project Revolution” (LID 2019) has been just published.

Global Chairman of the Project Management Institute in 2016, his work focuses on advising senior leaders on  ; prioritize and implement strategic initiatives; build high-performing teams; work across silos and become a learning organization; all essential elements to create a culture that strives for execution, excellence, and collaboration.

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Guru #25

Lynda Gratton

Lynda is a Professor of Management Practice at London Business School where she directs ‘Human Resource Strategy in Transforming Companies’ – considered the world’s leading programme on human resources.

Lynda is the founder of Hot Spots Movement and since 2008 she has led the Future of Work Research Consortium which has brought together executives from more than 100 companies.

Over the last 20 years Lynda has written extensively about the interface between people and organisations. Her eight books cover the link between business and HR strategy (Living Strategy), the new ways of

working (The Democratic Enterprise), the rise of complex collaboration (Hot Spots and Glow) and the impact of a changing world on employment and work (The Shift).

In 2012 The Shift received the business book of the year award in Japan and has been translated into more than 15 languages. In 2015 The Key won the CMI Management Book of the Year. This book looks at the impact of the changing world on corporate practices and processes and on leadership. In 2016, Lynda Gratton and co-author Professor Andrew Scott, published The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity, which, translated into many languages, continues to generate significant interest across the world, also in Japan, where it quickly became a bestseller. It was shortlisted for the FT Business Book of the Year award.

Lynda’s work has been acknowledged globally – she has won the Tata prize in India; in the US she has been named as the annual Fellow of NAHR and won the CCL prize; whilst in Australia she has won the HR prize. Lynda is a Fellow of the World Economic Forum and has chaired the WEF Council of Leadership. She has served as a judge on the FT Business Book of the Year panel, chairs the Drucker Prize panel and is on the governing body of London Business School. In 2017, Lynda became an Advisor for @GoogleOrg’s initiative to help people prepare for the changing nature of work and was also, as the only foreigner, invited by Prime Minister Abe of Japan to join a new advisory council “Council for designing the 100-year-life society”.

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Guru #26

Vijay Govindarajan

Vijay Govindarajan (VG) is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading experts on strategy and innovation. He is the Coxe Distinguished Professor at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College and Marvin Bower Fellow at Harvard Business School. The Coxe Distinguished Professorship is a new Dartmouth-wide faculty chair. He was the first Professor in Residence and Chief Innovation Consultant at General Electric. He worked with GE’s CEO Jeff Immelt to write How GE is Disrupting Itself, the Harvard Business Review (HBR) article that pioneered the concept of reverse innovation – any innovation that is adopted first in the developing world. HBR picked reverse innovation as one of the Great Moments in Management in the Last Century. In the latest Thinkers 50 Rankings, Govindarajan is rated the #1 Indian Management Thinker. VG writes about innovation and execution on several platforms including Harvard Business Review and Bloomberg BusinessWeek. He is a co-leader of a global initiative to design a $300 House. Govindarajan has been identified as a leading management thinker by influential publications including: Outstanding Faculty, named by Business Week in its Guide to Best B-Schools; Top Ten Business School Professor in Corporate Executive Education, named by Business Week; Top Five Most Respected Executive Coach on Strategy, rated by Forbes; Top 50 Management Thinker, named by The London Times; Rising Super Star, cited by The Economist; Outstanding Teacher of the Year,voted by MBA students. VG received his doctorate from the Harvard Business School and was awarded the Robert Bowne Prize for the best thesis proposal. He also received his MBA with distinction from the Harvard Business School where he was included in the Dean’s Honor List. Prior to this, VG received his Chartered Accountancy degree in India where he was awarded the President’s Gold Medal for obtaining the first rank nationwide.

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Guru #27

Jeffrey Pfeffer

JEFFREY PFEFFER is the Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University where he has taught since 1979. He is the author or co-author of 15 books.

Pfeffer has presented seminars in 39 countries throughout the world as well as doing consulting and providing executive education for numerous companies, associations, and universities in the United States.

Jeffrey Pfeffer has won the Richard D. Irwin Award presented by the Academy of Management for scholarly contributions to management and numerous awards for his articles and books. He was listed in the top 25 management thinkers by Thinkers 50 and as one of the Most Influential HR International Thinkers by HR Magazine. In November, 2011, he was presented with an honorary doctorate degree from Tilburg University in The Netherlands.

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Guru #28

David De Cremer

David De Cremer is currently the Provost Chair at National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School, where he is also a professor at management and organizations, a fellow at Cambridge Judge Business School, a fellow at St. Edmunds college, and an affiliate researcher at the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. He also holds research and teaching positions at Stanford University, as fellow at the Hoover institution (a public policy think tank), and teaching in executive degrees like the Stanford-NUS international management program. Finally, he is a research member of The Justicecollaboratory at Yale Law School, Yale University.

Before moving to Singapore, he was the KPMG endowed professor in management studies at Cambridge Judge Business School, University of Cambridge.

He is the founder of the Erasmus Center of Behavioral Business Ethics at Rotterdam School of Management (the Netherlands) and the LEading Artificial intelligence & Digital management (LEAD) platform. His background is in psychology and economics (nowadays referred to as behavioral economics), and integrating these insights has led him to examine the power of the (biased) human reality across a wide variety of settings, including financial, interpersonal and cultural interactions. He received the honor to become a fellow of the Royal Dutch Academy of Science in 2005. In 2009-2010 he was named the most influential economist in the Netherlands (Top 40 of economists) and in 2016 he was named a Global Top Thought Leader in the area of organizational trust, alongside late management guru Stephen Covey and Richard Edelman (President and CEO of Edelman; publisher of the annual Edelman Trust Barometer).

He was born in Belgium (Leuven) and has lived and worked in Europe, UK, US, Middle-East and Asia.

Across a wide range of industries, he has contributed to significant executive development and corporate culture initiatives in Europe, the Middle-East and Asia. His consulting clients include, among others, Novartis, AB Inbev, KPMG, Solvay, IBM, Barclays, Rabobank, ING, Cisco, Bayer, Exmar, DSM, and Huawei.

He is a very active researcher and applies the newest discovered insights directly into his consultancy and coaching work. Based on his wealth of research knowledge he contributes regularly to TV and radio business programmes, and writes for popular financial, academic and business magazines like Harvard Business Review. Recently, he received the honor of a personal blog for The European Business Review.

He is also the recipient of several research excellence awards, an associate editor of the Academy of Management Annals, a member of the International Advisory Board of California Management Review and has contributed as a keynote speaker to conferences and symposia all over the world.

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Guru #29

Rhenald Khasali

rhenal

Rhenald Khasali is an academic and business practitioner who was born in Jakarta. He is a respected professor at the Faculty of Economics Universitas Indonesia and Chairman of the Graduate Management Science Universitys Faculty of Economics. As a professor he holds a Ph. D. from the University of Illinois and is fairly productive in generating writing. Several books have been produced and among them is titled Nine Phenomenon, Business Success, Presentation Change, Recode, Change Your DNA and many more. Rhenald Khasali focuses on development business. He asserts that real luck is when opportunity meets with preparation furthermore Entrepreneurship is not exist by itself but must be created.

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Guru #30

Natasha Bowman

For nearly 20 years, Natasha Bowman, JD, SPHR has labored to transform the American workplace from the inside out. As a champion for employees, she’s worked with a broad range of organizations as a c-suite Healthcare HR executive to create an engaging environment in which employees are respected, genuine leaders are cultivated, and top performance is achieved. Natasha is an award winning, modern day pioneer of workplace equality, inspiring organizations to not just pay lip service to workplace rights but craft highly-engaged cultures where every employee is truly dignified and valued for their contribution. Because of her ability to diagnose workplace issues and provide proven solutions to organizations, she is often referred to as The Workplace Doctor.

Natasha Bowman has developed a reputation as an expert workplace consultant through her firm, Performance ReNEW and as a labor and employment law attorney. Her clients include 4A’s, Translation LLC, United Masters, Stashed, The Freeman Company, SmartBrief, Wiley Publishing, The Touch Foundation and Manhattan College to name a few. Apart from her rich expertise and cross-sector experience, she brings an ardent intellectual commitment to the field by serving as an adjunct professor of human resources for distinguished institutions such as Georgetown University, Fordham University, Manhattan College, and The Jack Welch Management Institute.

She is a sought after international keynote speaker for conferences and organizations worldwide and has shared her passion for creating positive and engaging workplaces by speaking at the New York Police Department, The City of Detroit, Ford Motor Company, The Employers’ Association, Temple University , Microsoft, and the Society for Human Resources Management just to name a few. Her expertise is frequently quoted in national publications such as Forbes, Business Insider, U.S. News and World Reports, Bloomberg BNA and HR Magazine.

In 2017, her best-selling book, You Can’t Do That at Work! 100 Legal Mistakes That Managers Make in the Workplace was published and has been adopted as a critical resource for managers in organizations across America.

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