Leaders50 combines recognised business titans with hidden gems, including DEWESoft CEO Jure Knez, Chatterbox founder Mursal Hedayat, and former Build-a-Bear CEO, Sharon Price John
LONDON 14 SEPTEMBER 2026 – Thinkers50 today unveils its Leaders50 2026, a biennial list of 50 exceptional leaders from around the world.
What makes Leaders50 unique is who chooses it. Nominations come exclusively from Thinkers50 Ranked Thinkers and recipients of the Thinkers50 Distinguished Achievement Awards – the experts, scholars and authors who study leadership for a living and help define contemporary management thinking. Rather than measuring company size, revenue or media profile, they nominate leaders on the evidence of their impact, contribution, purpose, and commitment to developing others.
That collective perspective gives Leaders50 a depth that conventional rankings cannot replicate. It connects scholarship and practice, allowing nominators to recognise not only visible performance, but also the ideas, behaviours, and purposeful choices that are changing how organisations and teams are led – including work that may not yet command broad public attention.
This expert-led approach enables Leaders50 to recognise outstanding leadership wherever it occurs. The 2026 list includes internationally recognised figures, such as Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, and Leena Nair, CEO of Chanel, but it also brings important, less familiar stories to a global audience. Among these hidden gems is Jure Knez, founder of DEWESoft and Acrobat City, an entrepreneurial hub in Slovenia; former refugee Mursal Hedayat, founder of the UK-based social enterprise Chatterbox; and Sharon Price John, former CEO of Build-a-Bear and now CEO of children’s apparel company Carter’s. Their inclusion exemplifies the list’s ability to look beyond the most visible and obvious names and identify leaders that the world’s foremost management thinkers believe deserve wider attention.
“The challenges facing the world, organisations, and individuals are enormous. We do not know all the elements needed to tackle these challenges, but we do know that it will require exceptional leadership. Leaders50 shines a light on remarkable leaders who are making a real impact in the world, so that others may learn from them, be inspired by them, and take on the mantle of purposeful leadership.” – Des Dearlove, co-founder, Thinkers50
Those named to the Leaders50 will be honoured at the Thinkers50 London Summit & Leaders50 Awards Gala on 2 November 2026. The inaugural Leaders50 Distinguished Achievement Awards will also be announced on the night. Apply for accreditation.
2026 Leaders50
The full Leaders50 listing (in alphabetical order) is:
Tarang Amin
CEO, e.l.f. Beauty
Bill Anderson
CEO, Bayer
Ana Paula Assis
Senior VP and Chair for IBM Europe, Middle East, North Africa and Asia Pacific
Mary Barra
CEO, General Motors
Subha Barry
President, Seramount
Ed Bastian
CEO, Delta Airlines
Cécile Béliot
CEO, Bel Group
Olivier Blum
CEO, Schneider Electric
Jesper Brodin
Senior advisor to the IKEA Foundation; chair of The Earthshot Prize
Niels Christiansen
CEO, LEGO Group
Ken Denman
Managing Director, Sway Ventures
Saori Dubourg
CEO, Greiner AG
Aicha Evans
CEO, Zoox
Margo Georgiadis
CEO-partner, Flagship Pioneering
Mursal Hedayat
CEO and founder, Chatterbox
Jensen Huang
Co-founder, President and CEO, Nvidia
Merete Hverven
CEO, Visma
Andrea Illy
Chair, illycaffè
Sharon Price John
President and CEO, Carters
Francine Katsoudas
Executive Vice President and Chief People, Policy & Purpose Officer, Cisco
Ken Keller
Chair and CEO, Daiichi Sankyo, Inc.
Jure Knez
President and co-founder, DEWESoft
Li Bin
Founder, Chairman, and CEO, NIO
Mike Mahoney
Chair and CEO, Boston Scientific
Raja Al Mazrouei
CEO, Etihad Credit Insurance
Frédéric Mazzella
Founder of BlaBlaCar and Dift
Kenneth McGrath
CEO, Lidl
Doug McMillon
Former President and CEO, Walmart
Florent Menegaux
CEO, Michelin Group
Michael Miebach
CEO, Mastercard
Francesca Moriani
CEO, Var Group
Satya Nadella
CEO, Microsoft
Leena Nair
CEO, Chanel
Vas Narasimhan
CEO, Novartis
Kevin Nolan
President and CEO, GE Appliances
Jacqueline Novogratz
Founder and CEO, Acumen
Ndidi Okonkwo Nwuneli
Executive Chair, Sahel Group; co-founder, Wealth4Impact
Miranda Qu
President and co-founder, Xiaohongshu
Cindy Rose
CEO, WPP
Leigh-Ann Russell
CTO and global head of engineering, BNY
Etienne Salborn
Founder, Social Innovation Academy
Dilhan Pillay Sandrasegara
CEO, Temasek
Ted Sarandos
Co-CEO, Netflix
Jim Hagemann Snabe
Chairman, Siemens AG
John Stankey
Chair and CEO, AT&T
Nick Studer
President and CEO, Marsh Risk
Lisa Su
Chair and CEO, AMD
Jessica Tan
Executive Vice-President and President, Sun Life Canada
Warner Thomas
CEO, Sutter Health
Suresh Venkatarayalu
SVP and CTO, Honeywell; President of Honeywell Connected Enterprise
ABOUT THINKERS50
Founded in 2001 by business journalists Des Dearlove and Stuart Crainer, Thinkers50 began as the first global Ranking of Management Thinkers. Over the past quarter century, it has grown into a worldwide platform and a vibrant Community. Today, Thinkers50 encompasses the Thinkers50 Distinguished Achievement Awards alongside the Hall of Fame, Radar, Coaching Legends, Leaders50, Coaches50, and curated Booklists. The Thinkers50 London Summit & Awards Gala has been described by the Financial Times as the “Oscars of management thinking.”
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