Speaker Enquiry

Martin Gutmann

Martin Gutmann, professor, author of The Unseen Leader, and TED speaker, uses historical insights to challenge leadership norms. With global experience and work featured in Forbes and TED Talks, Martin inspires leaders to rethink assumptions and embrace evidence-based, transformative approaches to aligning teams and achieving common goals.

Price Band C: £5K - £10K

Speaker Enquiry

Martin Gutmann

Price Band C: £5K - £10K

About Martin Gutmann

Martin Gutmann is an accomplished author, speaker, and scholar who explores how historical insights can address today’s most pressing challenges. A professor at the Lucerne School of Business and lecturer at ETH Zurich, he is the best-selling author of The Unseen Leader: How History Can Help Us Rethink Leadership.

Born in Sweden, Martin has lived and worked across the globe, including Japan, the US, Canada, Mauritius, Germany, and Switzerland. As the founding Managing Director of the Swiss School of Public Governance from 2016 to 2020, he developed a pioneering program for future global public sector leaders.

Martin’s thought leadership has reached millions through widely-read articles in Forbes, Big Think, and Fast Company, as well as appearances on top management podcasts like Phronesis and The Leadership Podcast. His TED Talk, “Are We Celebrating the Wrong Leaders?”, has been viewed over one million times, reflecting his ability to captivate audiences with story-driven talks anchored in modern organisational psychology and management evidence.

His book, The Unseen Leader, challenges conventional ideas about leadership, including the “Action Fallacy”—the mistaken belief that effective leadership requires constant action. The book, praised by thought leader Adam Grant as “provocative” and “challenging core assumptions,” has become a cornerstone for those rethinking leadership.

Martin holds a Ph.D. in history from Syracuse University, an Executive MBA from IE Business School, and higher education training from Harvard University and ETH Zurich. His career is defined by a commitment to inspiring leaders through historical perspective, actionable insights, and transformative ideas.

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Speaker Enquiry

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