Each year, a group called Thinkers50 creates a list of the world's best business minds. This year, UCLA Anderson alumnus Marshall Goldsmith (PhD '77, also included among Anderson's 100 Inspirational Alumni) was included on the list at Number 7. (In 2010, Goldsmith ranked #14.). This is how Goldsmith is described by Thinkers50.
Marshall Goldsmith is one of the world’s best known – and best paid – executive coaches. Ranked among the top 10 executive educators by the Wall Street Journal, recent profiles in the New Yorker and the Harvard Business Review confirm his place at the top of his chosen profession. Goldsmith’s reputation is based on results.
In support of business leaders he has racked up an impressive 7 million air miles and coached over 50 major CEOs. His books include Coaching for Leadership and The Leader of the Future. Hyperactive and relentlessly positive, Goldsmith is based in California. Goldsmith’s coaching methodology is now being used by Hewitt Associates, the largest executive coaching firm in the world.
The site also conducted an interview with Goldsmith and posted a video of him talking about his work. (Due to incompatibility between the Thinkers50 site and this blog, we are unable to post the video here.) In the interview, Goldsmith is asked when the executive coaching business took off and how has it evolved. Says Goldsmith:
It started about 10 years ago, but it really took off in the last five. If you look back through history I’m sure great leaders had someone who acted as a coach – so it’s not a new idea. But it is still a relatively unsophisticated field.
One problem is that executive coaching is growing while therapy and other fields are shrinking. This has encouraged some people to move out of those areas into coaching. Coaching is huge at the moment. There is a bandwagon effect. Coaching will remain but I wouldn’t expect the bandwagon to continue indefinitely. It will fall back.
Along with being ranked number seven on the list, Goldsmith was awarded the 2011 Thinkers50 Leadership Award.
UCLA Anderson Professor Richard Rumelt, who holds Anderson's Harry and Elsa Kunin Chair in Business and Society, was shortlisted by the same group for the 2011 Thinkers50 Strategy Award and the 2011 Thinkers50 Book Award for his most recent book Good Strategy, Bad Strategy.
Comments