Rita McGrath
Voted No. 1 Strategist by Thinkers50, Professor at Columbia University, and Top 10 bestselling author
why book rita?
- Rita McGrath is consistently ranked among the top 10 management thinkers globally, earning Thinkers50’s #1 award for strategy
- She is renowned for her ability to apply theory to real business problems, making complex concepts accessible and actionable for diverse audiences
- Rita has written 5 books on leadership, business, and organisational management, shaping the future of strategy and innovation
“Your insight generated great engagement and comments from leaders sharing eye-opening observations and building on your examples throughout. You delivered the inspiration and illustration desired and it was exactly the right focus and challenge for this team. The future- focus theme was the perfect close to our leadership summit.”
Rui Barbas, CSO, Nestle
Biography
Rita McGrath, one of the world’s top experts on strategy and innovation, is consistently ranked among the top 10 management thinkers in the world by the prestigious Thinkers50 and won their #1 award in strategy. She is a trusted partner and strategic advisor in the C-suites of many of the country’s biggest and most well-known companies – especially as they work to grow, evolve, reinvent themselves and see around corners.
She is considered one of the world’s foremost experts on strategic inflection points, the topic of her most recent book – Seeing Around Corners: How to Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2019). She is the author of 4 other books on leadership, business and organisational management including the best-selling The End of Competitive Advantage (Harvard Business Review Press, 2013). Her work on discovery-driven growth was praised by the late legendary management thinker Clayton Christensen as offering “some of the most important ideas of management and strategy that have ever been developed.” She is currently working on a book full of humor and insight for business leaders aimed at helping organisations become ‘2% less stupid’ by adopting permissionless structures.
Rita regularly sits down for in-depth conversations with high level authors and leaders in business for her popular podcast Thought Sparks. She also writes a regular Thought Sparks newsletter and shares insights across social media platforms, including LinkedIn, where she has more than 45,000 followers.
Rita is known for her energy, positivity, storytelling, and ability to connect with audiences. She is also a sought-after corporate speaker, a long-time educator at Columbia Business School, the author and host of the popular podcast and newsletter Thought Sparks, available on Youtube.
Resources
Podcasts
Topics
Creating an Early Warning System
A thought-provoking approach to spotting the leading indicators of big changes.
Learning to Live with Complexity
Complicated systems are predictable. Complex ones aren’t. The two require different approaches.
3 Approaches to Creating Customer Insight
Segmentation, consumption chain analysis and attribute mapping are reliable ways of generating actionable insights.
It’s Not About “Fixing” The Women – Creating Gender Balanced Workplaces
The rise of women to positions of power has been breathtaking. But all too often organisations fail to capitalise on their potential because they apply the wrong mental models – it isn’t about being gender blind, it’s about being gender bilingual.
Rita McGrath
testimonials
“Your insight generated great engagement and comments from leaders sharing eye-opening observations and building on your examples throughout. You delivered the inspiration and illustration desired and it was exactly the right focus and challenge for this team. The future- focus theme was the perfect close to our leadership summit.”
Rui Barbas, Nestle



