The Top 50 Management Thinkers

CELEBRITIES LIKE MALCOLM GLADWELL AND SHERYL SANDBERG DROP OFF THE LIST

The number of Stanford faculty on this year’s list also climbed from two to three with Pfeffer joined by Jennifer Aaker and part-timer Nilofer Merchant (though Stanford marketing guru Chip Heath tumbled out of this year’s ranking). Duke (Dan Heath – Yes, Chip’s brother) and UCLA (Richard Rumelt) each lost their lone representative on the Thinkers50, while Haas retained the two spots held by Morten Hansen and Henry Chesbrough. In addition, several high-ranking MBA programs were shut out of the Thinkers50, including the University of Chicago (Booth), Northwestern (Kellogg), Yale, and the University of Virginia (Darden).

That said, academics weren’t the only thought leaders voted into the Thinkers50. Long-time executive coach Marshall Goldsmith and motivator Daniel Pink each cracked the Top 10. And best-selling authors Jim Collins, Seth Godin, and Sylvia Ann Hewlett also made the list. However, the rankings also reflect that several thought leaders, including Sheryl Sandberg, Thomas Friedman, Tom Peters, Malcolm Gladwell, and Paul Krugman, have seen their influence wane in recent years.

NUMBER OF WOMEN ON LIST NEARLY TRIPLES IN SIX YEARS

The rankings also suggest the increasing prominence of female management thinkers. This year, women captured 14 spots in the Top 50, up from five just six years ago. In fact, women hold four of the top ten spots in this year’s list. What’s more, the list now includes Zhang Ruimin, Chairman and CEO of the Haier Group, one of the world’s largest consumer products manufacturers. And these are just two examples of the changing demographics for leading thinkers, says Crainer in a press statement. “We are delighted to see so many new faces in the Thinkers50 ranking. The guru industry used to be pale, male and stale but that is no longer the case. Today it’s eclectic, didactic and hectic. There are a lot of great new ideas and thinkers coming through. As boundaries between disciplines blur, it’s also getting harder to pigeon-hole them into traditional disciplines like strategy, marketing or innovation.”

Indeed, the Thinkers50 list is comprised of 10 different nationalities and 30 countries, including Bangladesh, South Korea, India, and Cuba.

As a result, Dearlove adds, it is less centered around American and European cultural mores. “Management thinking is no longer the preserve of the West. The last few rankings saw an Asian invasion with the emergence of the Indian thinkers. In 2015, we are seeing the arrival of Chinese management thinkers on the world stage.”

BIG WINNERS INCLUDE MARSHALL GOLDSMITH AND OXFORD’S RACHEL BOTSMAN

Thinkers50 also conferred several awards this year. Rachel Botsman, a visiting lecturer at Oxford University and co-author of What’s Mine Is Yours: How Collaborative Consumption is Changing the Way We Live, nabbed the Breakthrough Idea Award – despite not being ranked in the Top 50. Harvard’s Linda Hill received the Innovation Award, beating out Harvard peer Gary Pisano. The Talent Award went to Wharton’s Stewart Friedman, while the Lifetime Achievement Award was doled out to Henry Mintzberg, Cleghorn Professor of Management Studies at the Desautels Faculty of Management at McGill University in Montreal.

Other award winners include: MIT’s Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee (Digital Thinking Award), Zhang Ruimin (Ideas Into Practice), Marshall Goldsmith (Leadership), Oxford’s Sally Osberg and Toronto’s Roger Martin (Social Enterprise Award), the University of Lausanne’s Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur (Strategy Award), and INSEAD’s Erin Meyer (RADAR Award – i.e. “Future Thinker”).

Other business school professor not listed in the Thinkers50 who were finalists for awards include: IE Business School’s Lee Newman (Breakthrough Idea), Enrique Dans (Digital Thinking), and Juan Pablo Vazquez Sampere (Innovation); Dartmouth Tuck’s Vijay Govindarajan (Innovation); Columbia Business School’s Heidi Grant Halvorson (Leadership) and Adam Galinsky (Talent); INSEAD’s Gianpiero Petriglieri (Leadership); Oxford’s Pamela Hartigan (Social Enterprise) and Alex Nicholls (Social Enterprise); Harvard’s Rebecca Henderson (Social Enterprise); Ivey’s Niraj Dawar (Strategy); Brandeis International Business School’s Benjamin Gomes-Casseres (Talent), University  College London’s Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic (Talent); Wharton’s Maurice Schweitzer (Talent); MIT Sloan’s Zeynep Ton (Talent); Northwestern Kellogg’s Lauren Rivera (RADAR); and NYU Stern’s Arun Sundararajan (RADAR).

Rosabeth Moss Kanter (Harvard), Ed Lawler (USC Marshall), Ed Schein (MIT Sloan), Ran Charan (Author and Consultant), Andrew Kakabadse (Henley), and Richard Rumelt (UCLA Anderson) were also inducted into the Thinkers50 Hall of Fame.

To read more about each of the Top 50 Management Thinkers, go to the next page.

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