Summary

In this episode of the Leadership Lab series, Susanna Kempe, CEO of the Laidlaw Foundation, speaks with Sergei Guriev, Dean of London Business School, about the value of negative feedback for leaders, the rise of radical transparency, and evidence-based strategies to counter misinformation on social media. 

Professor Guriev became Dean of London Business School in 2024, following a varied career as Professor of Economics and the first Provost of Sciences Po in Paris. He has also served as Chief Economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and as a speechwriter for former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. His research has been published in top academic journals, including The American Economic Review and The Quarterly Journal of Economics, and he has contributed to The New York Times and The Financial Times. 

Reflecting on his leadership journey, Professor Guriev remarks, “Real leadership is when you excite people with a vision... explaining why this organization is making that country and the world a better place.” He emphasises that leaders are not necessarily born, sharing how he stepped into his first major leadership position as Rector of the New Economic School in Moscow to help build and shape the institution. 

Guriev also discusses how radical transparency, driven by social media, has reshaped leadership. While it can make leaders more risk-averse, he notes it can also help align people around shared goals, particularly in mission-driven organizations. 

This thoughtful and timely conversation explores how modern leaders can adapt to an era of scrutiny and misinformation while remaining visionary, courageous, and grounded in purpose. 

Time-codes  

00:21 - We talk a lot with our scholars about leadership being a journey, not a destination. Where did it all begin for you?  

01:41 - Before that, in your childhood or as a student, did you have any leadership roles?  

02:32 - Your career has spanned, obviously academia, as a scholar, policy making, and also, as you say, leadership of academic institutions. How did you move between those different roles? Was it intentional?  

03:55 - As you know, ethical leadership is really important to us. We have our undergraduate program at 20 partner universities soon to be 22 and ethics is a strong part of that you in your various roles, have had to make choices around the values that are important to you. And in 2013 you actually left Russia, partly because of some of the choices that you made. Won't ask you to rehash all of that now in terms of what those choices were, but Were you conscious about how brave you were being at the time and what the consequences of them would be right?  

07:17 – That reminds me of the fact that you've been talking about leadership through the eyes of Hamlet. And obviously Indecision is at the very heart of the play,  from Hamlet's perspective.  

07:54 – What are some of the other leadership lessons we can learn from Hamlet?  

10:14 – Do you think there is something empowering about saying to people when you bring me a problem, also, at least have thought about the solution so that there isn't a feeling of the leader being the one who has to have all the answers, or who takes on maybe that more of a sort of patriarchal command and control leadership figure?  

11:45 –You've talked a lot about how currently transparency and the sort of radical transparency that social media imposes, changes how people need to think about leadership. Can you share a bit more about that? 

14:20 - I read your book spin dictators - what struck me about that was that very often bad actors use social media more effectively than perhaps those who we might consider to be better leaders, or those who embrace ethical leadership, is that fair?  

20:19 - Isn't there some research which suggests that correcting false information actually just embeds the false information?  

22:08 – In terms of how organisations either support or are complicit in allowing this to go on – do you think that Meta knows that their algorithms promote false information? Do you think that organizations should hold themselves to a higher standard, or is there a conflict with their fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders?  

26:57 – You've talked before about the fact that ethical leadership can mean different things to different people, and good people can vehemently disagree and both be absolutely true to their own values. Can you talk a bit more about that sort of situation? 

28:58 – You've lived in Russia, you're now also a French citizen. You've lived in the US. You're now living in the UK. What has that taught you about different countries, different cultures, leadership differences? 

31:43 - Obviously, we have Laidlaw scholars here specifically to try and propel more women into the C suite. And whilst I'm encouraged, when you put it in that context, that there is progress, there does still seem to be quite a long way to go. How do you think LBS and scholarships like ours helps promote that equality? 

35:03 - Do you think the current situation in the US, where firms are actively rowing back from their DEI programs will negatively impact that positive momentum that you've been talking about? 

36:50 - You've been at LBS for about a year now. What has surprised you the most about it? 

37:55 - Being a global citizen is something that is at the heart of LBS, and yet there is pushback in the UK, particularly at the moment. How do you feel about that?  

41:07 – US academic institutions are under some threat at the moment. Would this be an opportunity for the UK actually to take advantage of that in order to do even better than they're already doing?  

42:41 - Shearer West, who's the Vice Chancellor of University of Leeds, was my last interview, and she said, “How do you know, when you are thinking about big strategic changes or new initiatives within a university, how the people on the ground, the grassroots, what they're really feeling and how they might react to something, or just what it is that they really need?” 

45:09 - What would you like to ask the next person?