7 Indian-origin persons among world's top management gurus

Seven Indian-origin intellectuals have made it to the list of world’s most influential business thinkers.

These management gurus are changing the way business is done. Their ideas are setting the course for future of commerce.

Every two years, the Thinkers50 ranks such scholars based on their work. Among various parameters, they take into account relevance of their ideas, international outlook, impact of the ideas, and business sense.

Let’s look at some of the best brains that have been changing the business with their ideas.

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Rakesh Khurana

Rank: 46

Rakesh Khurana is an American organisational theorist and the Marvin Bower Professor of Leadership Development in organisational behaviour at Harvard Business School.

He received his bachelor's degree from Cornell University, and then went on to do his PhD in organisational behaviour from Harvard.

He has written 12 books including Next Generation Business Handbook: New Strategies from Tomorrow's Thought Leaders, The Power of LEO: The Revolutionary Process for Achieving Extraordinary Results, and Searching for a Corporate Savior: The Irrational Quest for Charismatic CEOs.

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Anil Gupta

Rank: 44

Dr. Anil K. Gupta is widely recognised as one of the world’s leading experts on strategy, globalisation and emerging markets.

Economist magazine named him as one of the world’s ‘rising superstars’ in a 2010 cover story on ‘Innovation in Emerging Economies’.

Some of his books include Global Strategies for Emerging Asia and Getting China and India Right.

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Subir Chowdhury

Rank: 40

Subir Chowdhury has been a thought leader in quality management strategy and methodology for more than 20 years. Currently, he is the Chairman and CEO of ASI Consulting Group.

Subir’s work has earned him numerous awards and recognition. The New York Times cited him as a ‘leading quality expert’; BusinessWeek hailed him as the “Quality Prophet.”

He has authored 13 books including the international bestsellers The Power of Six Sigma and The Ice Cream Maker.

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Richard Florida

Rank: 25

Director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School, Richard Florida is an ‘urbanist’, as well as a commentator on creativity and innovation.

He has also authored books such as Who's Your City? and Cities and the Creative Class.

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Jeffrey Pfeffer

Rank: 24

Jeffrey Pfeffer is an American business theorist and the Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organisational Behaviour at the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University.

He is well known for his work on resource dependence theory, and more recently on evidence based management.

He has written books such as Hidden Value: How Great Companies Achieve Extraordinary Results with Ordinary People and The Knowing-Doing Gap: How Smart Companies Turn Knowledge into Action.

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Richard Rumelt

Rank: 23

Richard Rumelt is the Harry and Elsa Kunin Chair in Business and Society at UCLA Anderson School of Management.

He is known for his work of business strategy.

Some of his books include Strategy, Structure, and Economic Performance and Good Strategy/Bad Strategy.

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Teresa Amabile

Rank: 22

Teresa Amabile is the Edsel Bryant Ford Professor of Business Administration in the Entrepreneurial Management Unit at Harvard Business School.

Her research investigates how life inside organisations can influence people and their performance.

Her most recent book is The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work.

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Nitin Nohria

Rank: 21

Nitin Nohria is dean of Harvard Business School.

Nohria was born in Nohar (Rajasthan) India. His father, Kewal Nohria, was the former Chairman of Crompton Greaves in India and was an influence upon Nohria's decision to embark upon a career in business, according to Wikipedia.

Nohria graduated from St. Columba's School in New Delhi following which he earned a B.Tech in Chemical Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and earned a Ph.D. in Management from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

His books include What Really Works: The 4+2 Formula for Sustained Business Success, and The Arc of Ambition.

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Nirmalya Kumar

Rank: 20

Kumar has recently joined Tata Sons as a member-group executive council. Earlier, he was Professor of Marketing at the London Business School.

He is one of the world’s leading thinkers on strategy and marketing.

He also served on Boards of Directors of Indian firms including ACC Limited and Zensar Technologies.

Kumar was educated at La Martiniere Calcutta school, and received his Bachelors of Commerce degree from Calcutta University in 1980. After graduation, he went abroad for further studies.

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Gary Hamel

Rank: 19

Dr. Gary P. Hamel is an American management expert. He is a founder of Strategos, an international management consulting firm based in Chicago.

Best known for Competing for the Future, co-authored with the late CK Prahalad, Gary Hamel is also a visiting professor at London Business School.

According to Thinkers50, “He champions the need for a revolution in management through the Management Innovation Exchange (MIX) and through his work with the Management Innovation Lab (MLab). His most recent book is What Matters Now (2012).”

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Marcus Buckingham

Rank: 18

Marcus Buckingham is a British-American author, researcher, motivational speaker and business consultant.

Most of his writing is based on the principle that people can achieve better results if they focus on their strengths rather than focussing on their weaknesses.

His books include Now, Discover Your Strengths and First, Break All the Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently.

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Richard D’Aveni

Rank: 17

D'Aveni is a leading strategy consultant and also the Bakala Professor of Strategy at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College.

His books include Strategic Capitalism and Beating The Commodity Trap.

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Sylvia Ann Hewlett

Rank: 16

Sylvia Ann Hewlett is an economist and the founder of the Center for Talent Innovation, a Manhattan-based think tank. She is an expert on gender and workplace issues.

Hewlett is the author of books, including When the Bough Breaks, Off-Ramps and On-Ramps, and Winning the War for Talent in Emerging Markets.

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Amy Edmondson

Rank: 15

Amy C. Edmondson is the Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management at HarvardBusinessSchool. Her field research into teamwork.

Her books include Teaming: How Organizations Learn, Innovate, and Compete in the Knowledge Economy, and Teaming to Innovate.

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Lynda Gratton

Rank: 14

Lynda Gratton is a British organisational theorist, consultant, and Professor of Management Practice at London Business School. She is well known for her work on organisational behaviour.

Her books include The Shift: The Future of Work is Already Here and Hot Spots: Why Some Teams, Workplaces, and Organizations Buzz with Energy - And Others Don't.

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Daniel Pink

Rank: 13

Daniel H. Pink is an American author who has written five books about business, work and management. His books include A Whole New Mind and Drive and To Sell is Human.

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Jim Collins

Rank: 12

James Collins is an American business consultant, author, and lecturer on the subject of company sustainability and growth.

He is best known for his books on what makes companies long-lived and great. Some of his books include Built to Last, Good to Great, and How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In.

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Pankaj Ghemawat

Rank: 11

Pankaj Ghemawat is an economist, global strategist, speaker and author.

He is Anselmo Rubiralta Professor of Global Strategy at IESE Business School and Distinguished Visiting Professor of Global Management, Stern School of Business, New York University.

Pankaj Ghemawat received his Bachelor’s degree in Applied Mathematics and his Ph.D. in Business Economics from Harvard University.

Entering Harvard College at the age of 16, he was accepted to Harvard Business School’s Ph.D. program at 19, and completed his doctorate in three years, according to Wikipedia.

Ghemawat's books include Commitment, Games Businesses Play, and Redefining Global Strategy.

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Marshall Goldsmith

Rank: 10

Marshall Goldsmith is one of the world’s leading executive coaches.

He has authored and edited of 34 books. His most famous works include MOJO and What Got You Here Won't Get You There.

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Herminia Ibarra

Rank: 9

Herminia Ibarra is the professor of Organisational Behaviour and Area Chair for the Organisational Behaviour Department at INSEAD.

Prior to joining INSEAD she was a faculty at the Harvard Business School for thirteen years.

Her book include Working Identity: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career.

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Linda Hill

Rank: 8

Linda Hill is the Wallace Brett Donham Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School.

She is the co-author of ‘Being the Boss: The 3 Imperatives of Becoming a Great Leader and Breakthrough Leadership’, a program that helps organisations transform midlevel managers into more effective leaders.

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Michael Porter

Rank: 7

He is a leading authority on company strategy and the competitiveness of nations and regions. Michael Porter's work is recognised in many governments, corporations and academic circles globally.

Porter is also the Bishop William Lawrence University Professor at Harvard Business School.

Some of his books include Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors, Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance, and Competitive Advantage of Nations.

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Rita McGrath

Rank: 6

Rita McGrath is an associate professor of management at the Columbia Business School.

She is best known for her work on strategy, innovation and entrepreneurship, including the development of discovery-driven planning.

Some of her books include The End of Competitive Advantage and Discovery Driven Growth.

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Vijay Govindarajan

Rank: 5

Vijay Govindarajan, known as VG, is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading experts on strategy and innovation.

He is the Earl C. Daum 1924 Professor of International Business at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College.

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.

HBR picked reverse innovation as one of the Great Moments in Management in the Last Century.

Govindarajan did his graduation from India and was awarded the President’s Gold Medal by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, the award is given to the first ranked chartered accountancy student. He went to do his MBA from HarvardBusinessSchool in 1976.

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Don Tapscott

Rank: 4

Don Tapscott is one of the world's leading authorities on innovation, media and the economic and social impact of technology. He is CEO of The Tapscott Group, and was founder and chairman of the international think tank New Paradigm.

His clients include top executives of many big companies and government leaders from many countries.

Don has authored or co-authored 15 widely read books about information technology in business and society. His most recent book, Radical Openness: Four Unexpected.

Principles for Success, were published in 2013.

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Roger Martin

Rank: 3

Roger Martin is Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto and an author of several business books.

Martin has expanded several important business concepts in use today, including integrative thinking.

He has been recognised by several business publications as one of the field's most important thinkers.

Some of his books include Fixing the Game, Bubbles, Crashes, and What Capitalism Can Learn From the NFL, and The Design of Business: Why Design Thinking is the Next Competitive Advantage.

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W. Chan Kim & Renee Mauborgne

Rank: 2

W. Chan Kim is a Korean-born business theorist and Professors of Strategy and Management at INSEAD. He is also co-director of the INSEAD Blue Ocean Strategy Institute in Fontainebleau, France. He is known as co-author of the 2005 book Blue Ocean Strategy.

Renee Mauborgne is the professor of strategy at INSEAD. She, too, is the co-director of the INSEAD Blue Ocean Strategy Institute.

The duo together wrote the famous book Blue Ocean Strategy. This is a business strategy book first published in 2005.

The book illustrates what the authors believe is the best organisational strategy to generate growth and profits.

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Clayton Christensen

Rank: 1

Clayton Christensen is the Kim B. Clark Professor of Business Administration at the HarvardBusinessSchool. He is best known for his study of innovation in commercial enterprises.

His first book, The Innovator's Dilemma, articulated his theory of disruptive innovation and it received the Global Business Book Award for the best business book of the year.

His most recent book is ‘How Will You Measure Your Life: Finding Fulfillment Using Lessons from Some of the World’s Greatest Businesses.

He serves on the board of directors of Tata Consultancy Services.

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