Costas Markides
2011 Ranking: #31
Shortlisted: 2011 Thinkers50 Strategy Award
Costas Markides is professor of strategic and international management and holds the Robert P. Bauman Chair of Strategic Leadership at the London Business School.
A continual thread running through Markides' work is innovation in its many forms. He advocates continual corporate innovation - even when a company is doing very well.
His books include: All the Right Moves: A Guide to Crafting Breakthrough Strategy (2000); and Fast Second: How Smart Companies Bypass Radical Innovation to Enter and Dominate New Markets (2005) with Paul Geroski. Fast Second used the metaphor of a landscape to describe the business world, dividing organizations into "colonists and "consolidators. The former are good at exploring new business opportunities; but the latter are better adapted to commercializing them.
In recent years, increasingly Markides has turned his attention to how management ideas can be used to address social issues such as reducing drug related crime and improving education.
A native of Cyprus, he is a compelling performer and an enthusiastic supporter of Manchester United.
