World's Top 30 Management Professionals for 2021
Guru #1
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.
Guru #2
Tom Peters
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.
Guru #3
Ram Charan
Ram Charan is a world-renowned business adviser, author and teacher. For 40 years, he has worked with top leaders at some of the world’s most successful companies, including Toyota, Bank of America, ICICI Bank, Aditya Birla Group, Novartis, Humana, and Fast Retailing. Ram is famous for cutting through the complexity of running a business in today’s fast changing world. He has shared his real-world solutions through 32 books and many articles in Harvard Business Review, Fortune, and other publications. His book Execution, coauthored with former Honeywell CEO Larry Bossidy, was a New York Times best-seller for 150 weeks. Another best-seller, What the CEO Wants You to Know, explains how the business fundamentals Ram learned growing up in India apply to every business, from street vendors to corporations. Ram is an energetic interactive speaker who has won teaching awards from GE’s Crotonville Institute and Northwestern. His most recent book is Rethinking Competitive Advantage: New Rules for the Digital Age.
Guru #4
John Kotter
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.
Guru #5
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.
Guru #6
James Collins
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.
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 BBC, CNN, The Economist, Fast Company, Financial Times, Forbes, Fortune, Inc., 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.
Guru #8
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.
Guru #9
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.
Guru #10
Annie McKee
Dr. Annie McKee is an executive coach and advisor to leaders of Fortune/FTSE 500 companies, governments and NGOs around the globe. Annie is committed to a person-centered approach that enables leaders to develop their emotional intelligence, enhance their strategic thinking and abilities, and build their the capacity to create cultures where everyone—and the enterprise—can thrive. In addition, she is a Senior Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania where she teaches and leads the PennCLO Executive Doctoral program.
Annie is the bestselling coauthor of three books published by Harvard Business Review Press: Primal Leadership, with Daniel Goleman and Richard Boyatzis (2002/2014); Resonant Leadership, with Richard Boyatzis (2005), and Becoming a Resonant Leader, with Richard Boyatzis and Frances Johnston (2008). She is also the author of Management: A Focus on Leaders (Pearson/Prentice Hall 2014) and her newest book, How to be Happy at Work: The Power of Purpose, Hope and Friendship was released in 2017.
Guru #11
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 Journal, Harvard Business Review, USAToday, Fast 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.
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Guru #12
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.
Guru #13
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.
Guru #14
Sandy Ogg
Sandy Ogg is the Founder of CEO.works. Sandy has spent over 30 years working with and learning from successful CEOs around the world. From 2011 to 2016, Sandy worked as an operating partner in private equity at the Blackstone Group, serving Blackstone’s nearly 100 portfolio companies. Prior to Blackstone, he was the Chief Human Resources Officer for Unilever, where he overhauled Unilever’s operating framework and leadership system. Throughout his career, Sandy has also held various other roles, including at Motorola, Dove Associates, The VIA Consulting Group (which he founded), and The Center for Leadership Studies.
He is a member of SVP funds’ Advisory Council and is primarily involved in management recruiting and leadership at SVP portfolio companies. Sandy is also the Chairman Of The Board of Nord Anglia Education and Prometric. His career began performing sea rescues as a line officer in the U.S. Coast Guard. He holds a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy; he subsequently received a master’s in human development from George Washington University, and an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management.
He has served on the boards of INSEAD, The Rotterdam School of Management (Erasmus University, Netherlands), The European Academy for Business in Society (Vice Chairman), and BBH Advertising in London.
Guru #15
Harry Kraemer
Harry M. Jansen Kraemer, Jr. is an executive partner with Madison Dearborn Partners, a private equity firm based in Chicago, Illinois and a Clinical Professor of Management and Strategy at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.
He was named the 2008 Kellogg School Professor of the Year. Harry is the author of two bestselling leadership books: “From Values to Action: The Four Principles of Values-Based Leadership” and “Becoming The Best: Build a World-Class Organization Through Values-Based Leadership”.
He is the former chairman and chief executive officer of Baxter International Inc., a $12 billion global healthcare company. He became Baxter’s chief executive officer in January 1999, and assumed the additional responsibility of chairman of Baxter’s board of directors in January 2000.
Before joining Baxter, Mr. Kraemer worked for Bank of America in corporate banking and for Northwest Industries in planning and business development.
Mr. Kraemer is active in business, education and civic affairs. He serves on the board of directors of Leidos Corporation, Sirona Dental Systems , VWR International, Sage Products Inc., and Catamaran Corporation and on the board of trustees of Northwestern University, The Conference Board, NorthShore University Healthsystem and the Archdiocese of Chicago Finance Committee and School Board.
He is a member of the Dean’s Global Advisory Board of Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. He is a member of the Commercial Club of Chicago, the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, and the Economics Club of Chicago. He is a past member of the Business Roundtable, the Business Council, and the Healthcare Leadership Council.
Guru #16
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)
Guru #17
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.
Guru #18
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.
Guru #19
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.
Guru #20
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.
Guru #21
Brian 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.
Guru #22
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”.
Guru #23
Dave Crenshaw
As an author, speaker, and online trainer, Dave Crenshaw is a master of building productive leaders.
The irony of Dave’s productive mission is his inherently chaotic and unfocused nature. When he was clinically diagnosed as “off-the-charts” ADHD he took this as a personal challenge and developed simple systems to be organized and productive despite himself. Now, hundreds of thousands of high-performers worldwide utilize Dave’s training to improve focus, productivity, and profitability.
Dave has decades of experience training leaders in Fortune 500 companies, universities, and organizations of every size. His humorous and engaging approach always hits the mark with audiences. His speeches are described as dynamic and life-changing.
Dave’s courses on LinkedIn Learning—such as Time Management Fundamentals and Improving Your Focus—are consistently among the most popular in the world and have received tens of millions of views. His five books have been published in eight languages, the most popular of which is The Myth of Multitasking—a time management bestseller.
He also frequently appears in the news worldwide, including TIME magazine, FastCompany, USA Today and the BBC News. However, Dave is most proud of being cited by Chuck Norris in The Official Chuck Norris Fact Book.
He is the founder and CEO of Invaluable Inc., a coaching and training corporation that promotes productive leadership on both the personal and organizational level.
Dave lives in the shadow of Utah’s Rocky Mountains with his wife and children.
Guru #24
Jonathan H. Westover
Jonathan H. Westover, Ph.D. is a US-based Amazon.com # 1 Best Selling Author, ranked # 1 HR, Innovation, and Future of Work Global Thought Leader & Influencer (Thinkers360), entrepreneur, management consultant, teacher, and research academic based in Orem, Utah. He serves on a host of nonprofit, community, and association boards and committees and has received numerous awards for his teaching, research, and service to the community.
Dr. Westover is a professor and chair of Organizational Leadership in the Woodbury School of Business at Utah Valley University, Academic Director of the UVU Center for Social Impact and the UVU SIMLab, and Faculty Fellow for Ethics in Public Life (previously the Associate Director) in the Center for the Study of Ethics. Dr. Westover has been published widely in academic journals, books, and practitioner publications. He is a regular visiting faculty member in other international graduate business programs.
Consulting: Jonathan is an experienced organizational leadership, people management, and organizational development consultant and managing partner and principal at Human Capital Innovations, LLC). For two decades, he has worked to help transform organizations across the globe. He is also the producer and host of the Human Capital Innovations (HCI) Podcast and Managing Editor of Human Capital Leadership Magazine. Previously, Jonathan was an external consultant with the firm Targeted Learning, and an internal consultant in the Human Resource Development office at Brigham Young University, in the corporate Organizational Development office at InterContinental Hotels, and in the corporate Organizational Development office at LG Electronics in Gumi, South Korea.
Jonathan is a member of the Forbes Coaches Council, Non-Resident Fellow in Social and Development Policy with the Nkafu Policy Institute (part of the Denis & Lenora Foretia Foundation), member of the HR Certification Institute CEO Advisory Council and past member of the board of directors, member of the Humantelligence Scientific Advisory, Board Chair and Director of the Corporate Division of the Global Listening Centre, a CIPD Academic Fellow, and an Advance HE Senior Fellow. Jonathan has been published widely and quoted as a management expert in popular and professional media locally, nationally, and abroad (such as in Forbes, The Economist, U.S. News and World Report, The Wall Street Journal, TED-Ed, HR.com, SHRM.org, HRCI.org, The Washington Post, and USA Today).
Guru #25
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.
Guru #26
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.
Guru #27
Tamara J. Ericksonis
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.
Guru #28
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.
Guru #29
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.
Guru #30
Rhenald Khasali
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.