We’ve compiled our list of the top thought leaders and experts that are teaching leadership all over the world today.
Several factors were taken into account when building this list,
including the experts popularity, the uniqueness & newness of their
message, and how much time they spend out of their home country
R. Michael Anderson
R. Michael Anderson makes this list based on the strength of two factors; the amount of international speaking and training he does and the uniqueness of his material.
As an American who lives in the UK, he’s often seen speaking all around Europe as well as the Middle East and South-East Asia.
He’s the only person on this list that has the real-world experience of founding, scaling, and exiting three software companies when he lived in California, he also has the theoretical background of holding advanced degrees in psychology and neuroscience.
Audiences love his evidence-based approach mixed with his vulnerable and authentic stories. Learn more about Michael at www.RMichaelAnderson.com.
Marshall Goldsmith
As the founder of executive coaching firm Marshall Goldsmith Partners
LLC. Goldsmith has worked closely with more than 120 major CEOs and
their management teams during his career and is named by Forbes as one
of the five most respected executive coaches.
Marshall Goldsmith is the million-selling author or editor of 31 management related books, including the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers MOJO, What Got You Here Won’t Get You There, and Triggers.
He was recognized as the #1 Leadership Thinker in the World and one
of the top five Management Thinkers in 2015, as well as one of the top
ten Most-Influential Business Thinkers and the top-ranked executive
coach at the 2013 biennial Thinkers50.
Marshall’s mission is simple; to help successful people achieve positive, lasting change in behavior; for themselves, their people, and their teams.
The Wall Street Journal ranks him among the top 10 executive educators.
Rosalind Brewer
Rosalind G. Brewer is an American businesswoman, and the CEO of Walgreens Boots Alliance since March 2021. She is one of only two Black women CEOs of Fortune 500 companies (along with Thasunda Duckett).
Brewer is the first African American woman to become CEO of Walgreens Boots Alliance, group president and COO of Starbucks, and CEO of Sam’s Club.
Additionally, Brewer was made the only African American member of the board of directors at Amazon in 2019. She also served as a member on the Board of Directors at Lockheed Martin and Molson Coors Brewing Company.
Brewer continues to serve as a member on the Board of Trustees for Westminster School, the Board of Councilors for the Carter Presidential Center, and serves as the Board of Trustees Chair at Spelman College.
USA Today referred to her as “one of corporate America’s most prominent women and black female executives.” Brewer has been noted a “Highly Powerful Woman” by both Forbes and Fortune magazines
Ken Blanchard
Few people have influenced the day-to-day management of people and
companies more than Ken Blanchard. A prominent sought-after author,
speaker, and business consultant, Blanchard is universally characterized
as one of the most insightful, powerful, and compassionate individuals in business today.
Ken is one of the most influential leadership experts in the world
and is respected for his years of groundbreaking work in the fields of
leadership and management.
For more than 35 years, Blanchard has been creating the best managers
in the world, training over 150,000 people each year. From the
award-winning First-time Manager program—based on the best-selling
business book, The New One Minute Manager®—to Situational
Leadership® II, the most widely taught leadership model in the world,
Blanchard is the provider of choice for Fortune 500 companies as well as
small to medium businesses, governments, and educational and nonprofit
organizations.
Ken Blanchard may just be the godfather of Leadership and Management.
Earlier in his career, he would have had the top spot. But because he’s
scaled back his international speaking, we are putting him at #3.
Simon Sinek
Described as “a visionary thinker with a rare intellect,” Sinek teaches leaders and organizations how to inspire people.
With a bold goal to help build a world in which the vast majority of people go home everyday feeling fulfilled by their work, Sinek is leading a movement to inspire people to do the things that inspire them.
In his career Sinek has discovered some remarkable patterns in how we think, act, and communicate. He wrote Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action to explore his idea of The Golden Circle, what he calls “a naturally occurring pattern, grounded in the biology of human decision making that explains why we are inspired by some people, leaders, messages and organizations over others.”
His talk “How Great Leaders Inspire Action” is listed as the third most popular TED presentation of all time.
Robin Sharma
Ranked as one of the Top 5 leadership gurus in the world in an independent global survey of over 22,000 business people, Sharma will help your people perform brilliantly and leave everything they touch better than they find it.
His mantra is that everyone, regardless of title, must be a leader in the new economy. They should take up challenges of personal excellence and do what is required.
Sharma has published 12 leadership related books and founded the leadership training firm Sharma Leadership International.
As a speaker, he is dynamic and structured providing presentations based on his book, The Leader Who Had No Title, in which he delivers the message that anyone in any role can be a leader.
Robin Sharma is consistently voted in the top 10 of the best leadership speakers and trainers.
Patrick Lencioni
Named in Fortune magazine as one of the “ten new gurus you should know,” Patrick Lencioni is the founder of The Table Group and the author of 10 books which have sold over 4 million copies and been translated into more than 25 languages.
Lencioni is a writer of books on business management, particularly in relation to team management. He is best known as the author of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, a popular business tale that explores work team dynamics and offers solutions to help teams perform better.
In his career, Lencioni has also written for or been featured in numerous publications including Harvard Business Review, Inc., Fortune, Fast Company, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal and Businessweek.
Patrick is president of The Table Group, a management consulting firm specializing in executive team development and organizational health. As a consultant, he has worked with senior executives and executive teams in organizations ranging from Fortune 500s and high tech start-ups to universities and non-profits. He also gives talks on leadership, organizational change, teamwork, and corporate culture. Consistently the top rated keynote speaker at major conferences, he shares his models and inspires his audiences through his accessibility, humor, and storytelling.
The Wall Street Journal called him one of the most sought after business speakers in America.
Jim Collins
Jim Collins is a business consultant, author, and speaker on leadership and company sustainability and growth.
His talent and guru factor comes from his ability to research and put
that research data into an easy to understand format. Jim’s contributions to leaders around the world have helped them sustain superior success. His uniqueness is not from the content he creates but in his approach to gathering valuable information.
In 1995, he founded a management laboratory in Boulder, Colorado,
where he conducts research and engages in Socratic dialogue with CEOs
and senior-leadership teams.
Having invested a quarter century researching the topic, he has
authored or coauthored six books that have sold in total more than 10
million copies worldwide, including leadership classics such as, Built to Last and Good to Great.
His newest release, Great by Choice, answers the penetrating question, Why do some companies thrive in uncertainty, even chaos, and others do not?
Jim Collins is a fact based speaker and uses that to inspire
audiences into taking the required steps to creating and sustaining
great organizations.
Daymond John
Daymond Garfield John is an American businessman, investor, and television personality. He is best known as the founder, president, and chief executive officer of FUBU, and appears as an investor on the ABC reality television series Shark Tank.
Based in New York City, John is the founder of The Shark Group.
In 2015, John co-founded Daymond John’s Success Formula, a program designed to teach business owners and entrepreneurs how to start and grow their business.
In September 2019, Daymond John’s Success Formula rebranded to Next Level Success.
One of the organizations the program works with is the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship.
The program offers a $1,500 scholarship to two students a year. This scholarship is given in hopes to inspire a new generation of entrepreneurs.
Mel Robbins
Melanie Robbins is an American podcast host, author, motivational speaker, and former lawyer.
Prior to joining CNN as a legal analyst, Robbins worked as a criminal defense attorney Robbins is known for covering the George Zimmerman trial for CNN; She hosted Cox Media Group’s The Mel Robbins Show, A&E’s Monster In-Laws, and Fox’s Someone’s Gotta Go.
In 2011, Robbins published Stop Saying You’re Fine: Discover a More Powerful You. She spoke at TEDx San Francisco about a psychological trick that she termed “the five second rule”. Her talk, viewed more than 31 million times on YouTube as of February 2023, launched her public speaking career.
On February 28, 2017, Robbins released her second book, The 5 Second Rule: Transform Your Life, Work, and Confidence with Everyday Courage. It was the top non-fiction book on Audible and sixth most-read book on Amazon in 2017.
She collaborated with Audible to release the Audible Original programs Kick Ass with Mel Robbins in June 2018 and Take Control of Your Life in 2019.
Her syndicated daytime talk show with Sony Pictures Television, The Mel Robbins Show, premiered on September 16, 2019. On January 29, 2020, Sony announced that the show would be canceled following its first season due to low ratings.
In 2014, Robbins received the Gracie Award for Outstanding Host–News/Non-fiction.
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This page details the top 10 international leadership experts, including influential authors, business consultants, and speakers who are teaching leadership around the world. Some key factors that were considered include the popularity and newness of their ideas as well as their international reach. The experts share research-backed insights and inspiring stories to motivate leaders and organizations to achieve sustainable success.
Are you looking to improve your leadership skills and take your organization to the next level?
If you need guidance from one of these or another international leadership expert for corporate training or keynote speaking, our team here is ready to help. With decades of experience teaching leadership around the world, we can provide tailored and practical solutions to make you a more effective and inspiring leader. Get in touch today to bring the top experts in the world to give your leaders the best.
