The document discusses 8 Indians who are among the top 50 thinkers on the Thinkers50 list. It provides details on each of the Indians ranked, including their positions, areas of focus, and notable publications. Vijay Govindarajan is ranked 3rd for his work on strategy and innovation. Nitin Nohria is the dean of Harvard Business School ranked 13th. Nirmalya Kumar focuses on marketing strategies and is ranked 26th. Pankaj Ghemawat studies globalization and is ranked 27th. Vineet Nayar placed employees first at HCL and is ranked 40th. Rakesh Khurana researches leadership and is ranked 41st. Sheena Iyengar

1. 8 Indians Among Top 50 Thinkers
Is it the business gurus or the executives in the boardroom that shapes the future of global
business? Thoughts make a great difference in the world of business. Therefore, going by
Thinkers 50 list, business professors and management innovators are the ones who do the real
thinking. Thinkers50 is keeping pace with ideas and thoughts that are influencing the global
business and managers over a decade now. The ranking will guide us to the personalities who
are known little to the general public but admired throughout the business world. Amongst
the 50, eight Indians are included in the list of top Management Thinkers from across the
globe.
1. Vijay Govindarajan
Vijay Govindarajan, popularly known as VG has been ranked at number 3. He is the Earl C.
Daum Professor of International Business at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth
College in New Hampshire. Being world’ s leading expert on strategy and innovation,
Govindarajan said, “ It is humbling to be ranked number 3 alongside great management
thought leaders as well as to receive the Breakthrough Idea Award for the $300 House
Initiative. These recognitions are motivators to work even harder to justify the honors.” He
has penned none books including the best sellers “ Ten Rules for Strategic Innovators” and
“ the Other Side of Innovation” . “ The Other Side of Innovation” is his recent book which
draws spotlight on how to change an innovative idea into a successful commercial business.
Govindarajan is also responsible for posing the question that sparked a global challenge to
build a $300 house. He has also worked with Jeff Immelt, General Electric’ s CEO and
written a article with him collaborating with Chris Trimble which introduces the concept of
reverse innovation and is rated by Harvard Business Review as one of the ten big ideas of the
decade, and is the title of his forthcoming book, (with Chris Trimble), to be published by
HBR Press in April 2012. Govindarajan has been ranked above Jim Collins (4), Michael
Porter (5), Roger Martin (6), Marshall Goldsmith (7), and Marcus Buckingham (8).
2. Nitin Nohria
The dean of Harvard Business School, Nitin Nohria is ranked 13 in the list. The present dean
has served in various senior positions at HBS including the co-chair of the Leadership
Initiative, senior associate dean of faculty development and head of the organizational
behavior unit. The author, co-edit
or of 16 books and over 50 journal articles, working papers and books has recently published
his new book, " The Handbook of Leadership Theory and Practice", co-edited with Rakesh
Khurana. The book pulls together the most modern thinking on leadership associated with
number of experts who attended a leadership colloquium structured by Nitin during the
School's centennial celebrations. His three books, "In Their Time: The Greatest Business
Leaders of the 20th Century", "Paths to Power: How Insiders and Outsiders Shaped American
Business Leadership" and "Entrepreneurs, Managers, and Leaders: Leadership Lessons from
the Airline Industry" glances at the history of American leadership. The books scrutinize the
lives of great leaders, their path to power and lessons to be learned by them.

2. 3. Nirmalya Kumar
Ranked 26, Nirmalya Kumar is a marketing professor at London Business School. Apart
from that, he is also the co-director of Aditya Birla India Centre. The growth of India as an
economic force and marketing strategies are his domain of focus. The Author of several
books is credited with introducing
the concept of "3Vs": valued customer, value network and value proposition. His books like
"Marketing as Strategy: Understanding the CEO's Agenda for Driving Growth and
Innovation", "Global Marketing" and "Private Label Strategy: How to Meet the Store Brand
Challenge" focuses on the marketing strategies. India's Global Powerhouses: How They Are
Taking on the World, Kumar gives an insider's guide to doing business with Indian leaders
and companies. His latest book "India Inside: The Emerging Innovation Challenge to the
West", is co-authored with Phanish Puranam a London Business School colleague. Being a
dedicated collector of the work of Indian artist Jamini Roy, Kumar has the largest collection
of Roy paintings outside of India.
4. Pankaj Ghemawat
The Anselmo Rubiralta Professor of Global Strategy at IESE Business School, in Spain,
Panka Ghemawat is ranked 27th in the list. Popular for his efforts on globalization, he
authored books like "Games businesses play: Cases and Models", "Creating value through
international strategy", "Redefining gl
obal strategy"; "Crossing borders in a world where differences still matter" and "Strategy and
the business landscape". His latest work "World 3.0: Global prosperity and how to achieve it"
scrutinizes the assumptions made regarding globalization. He disagrees with the idea of
single global economy as mentioned in the The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman. He
refutes on the base economic measures and indicators. He says, in a semi-globalized world at
best.
5. Vineet Nayar
Vineet Nayar, the Vice Chairman and CEO of HCL Technologies, a global information
technology services company based in India, is raked 40th. His exceptional management
philosophy of placing his employees first and customers second stimulated his triumph. His
book "Employees First, Customers Second" sp
eaks about his management upheaval. Following his less conservative management system,
Nayar never minds a dance with company's employee at wide Direction event, both on stage
and crowd. He feels it reduces barriers between CEO and employee. With an engineering
degree in India, followed by an MBA, Nayar boarded HCL back in 1985 and became the
president of the company in 2005, CEO in 2007 and Chairman in 2010. HCL has won awards
for best employer and most influential upcoming company under Nayar.

3. 6. Rakesh Khurana
Ranked as 41st among the top management thinkers, Rakesh Khurana is the Marvin Bower
professor of leadership development at the Harvard Business School. His main focus is into
macro-organizational theory and the dynamics of executive labor markets. Famous for his
book Searching for a Corporate Savio
r: The Irrational Quest for Charismatic CEOs, Rakesh has authored and edited four books and
several articles. His managerial articles throw light on the problems associated with
fascinating leadership. "From Higher Aims to Hired Hands: The Social Transformation of
American Business Schools and the Unfulfilled Promise of Management as a Profession" is
his second book that deals with the expansion of American business education and the
profession of management elevated fundamental queries about the efficiency of business
education and the types of business leaders and managers they have been educating. Khurana
is also the co-author with Nitin Nohria, that positions dominance for generating value for
society as the purpose of management.
7. Sheena Iyengar
The S.T. Lee Professor of Business at Columbia Business School, and research director of the
Jerome A. Chazen Institute of International Business, Sheena Iyengar is the only Indian
female included in the list. She is ranked at 48th number. Known for her work on choice,
Iyengar has received the Best Dissertation Award from the Society of Experimental Social
Psychology in 1998, for her thesis, "Choice and Its Discontents."
The Art of Choosing, the award winning book published in 2010 inspected several aspects of
choice like how and why people make choice and how many factors manipulates their choice.
She aims at making people better equipped handle the overpowering variety of choice in
everyday life.
Choices for Iyengar were not that easy. Suffering from worsening sight, she was unable to
read and was completely blind by her late teens. Regardless of obstacles, Iyengar pursued her
ambitions to go to college, and pursued an academic career.
8. Subir Chowdhury
The Chairman and CEO of ASI Consulting Group and esteemed quality expert and strategist,
Subir Chowdhury is at the 50th number. He suggests CEOs and senior leaders of Fortune 100
companies as well as organizations in the public, private and not-for profit sectors all over the
world, serving them make quality a part of their business culture.
Business week labeled Chowdhury as "The Quality Prophet". He authored "The Power of Six
Sigma: An Inspiring Tale of How Six Sigma is Transforming the Way We Work", an
international bestseller and 12 other business titles. Design for Six Sigma is his first book on
the topic and credited with popularizing the DFSS philosophy worldwide. The Ice Cream
Maker is a business fable about Pete and the ice cream factory he manages; in which he
establishes the next generation management system, LEO: Listen, Enrich and Optimize. His
latest book is The Power of LEO: The Revolutionary Process for Achieving Extraordinary
Results.