Listening to leadership podcasts can help us fit learning and development into our busy lives. These are our recommendations for the best podcasts out there!
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To be successful, it’s important to continuously learn and improve. However, we all live busy lives, and there's an absolute abundance of information out there. It's hard to find time to wade through it all and find the good stuff.
Luckily, there is a great source of knowledge available to us: podcasts, where valuable information is curated by presenters and shared concisely, clearly - and often with some humor thrown in for good measure.
And what's even better is that you can listen while you're on the go, running errands and ticking off to-dos.
If you're interested in the topic of leadership, here's something for you. I reviewed 30 podcasts on leadership so you can get an idea what they’re about. And out of this 30, I picked my personal favourites - your mileage may vary, but these are the ones I recommend!
“Business Wars,” hosted by David Brown, is a series of podcasts started in 2018. Since then, it expanded to 89 seasons and 548 episodes (!) that cover business battles between rivals in all industries – sports, travel, food, entertainment, technology, and others.
On the podcast, you can hear stories about wars between Tesla vs Detroit, Disney and Pixar vs. Dreamworks, Apple vs. Microsoft, Gucci vs. Louis Vuitton, Hershey’s vs. Mars… and so many more. You will get to look behind the curtain and see how the real business world is shaped.
HBR Ideacast is a weekly podcast from Harvard Business Review, a management magazine by Harvard Business Publishing. Covering topics like business, management, technology, and other important things like climate change, it can help you stay up-to-date on business trends and get some insights about your career and personal life.
The podcast is hosted by Curt Nickisch, the Co-Senior Editor of the HBR, and Alison Beard, an executive editor at HBR, who interview various experts like entrepreneurs, professors, and business specialists. Each episode is normally around 30 minutes, during which the guests share their knowledge through research, surveys, and personal experience.
To build a successful and long-lasting business, you will have to go through dark times of continuous challenges and painful self-doubt. And this is exactly what this podcast is about – the value of pain and resilience on your way to conquering new heights.
“How I Built This” is hosted by Guy Raz, a journalist and podcaster. He interviews world-famous entrepreneurs who share what it cost them to build their brands that became iconic. Failure and loss of hope, courage to innovate, and creativity – these are all inseparable parts of their success stories, which we often don’t hear about, but will hear on this podcast.
“My First Million” is a business podcast where the hosts, Sam Parr and Shaan Puri, brainstorm various ideas on current business trends and opportunities. They call themselves a team that “spoon-feeds you interesting business insights that you’d normally have to pay for.”
Sometimes, they also invite guests – business builders who create meaningful companies and share their knowledge.
In this podcast, you can hear unexpected business ideas, and valuable start-up advice, and also learn other secrets of entrepreneurship. And what’s great, it’s all presented you to in a funny (even hilarious) way, so you’ll never be bored.
“The Diary of a CEO” is a podcast launched by Steven Bartlett, an entrepreneur and a CEO who candidly talks about his business journey. And Bartlett seems to know a lot about entrepreneurship: at the age of 18 he, a university dropout, built a social media company; at 27, he resigned as a CEO; at 28, he co-founded a marketing and communications company and a software platform; then he launched a private equity fund. That does sound impressive.
Overall, “The Diary of a CEO” is about leadership, personal growth, and challenges one can face while building a business. Besides his own story, Bartlett also explores those of other influential people to uncover their recipes for success and hear their thoughts.
“Founders” by David Senra gives you a chance to learn business from history’s greatest entrepreneurs. He believes that we can learn from the past – basically, almost everything you want to try has already been tried by someone else, and you only need to learn from their lessons.
For this reason, every week, David reads a biography of a certain entrepreneur and finds ideas you could potentially use in your work. It sounds as if someone has already done your homework for you – and isn’t it great?
As it might be clear from its title, this podcast, hosted by Professor Laura Empson and Tony Hall, Lord Hall of Birkenhead, explores the problems of leadership – and there are many, since leadership is a complicated and often emotionally challenging thing to do.
By interviewing senior leaders from global professional organizations, Laura and Tony discuss their insights gained from research, leading, and advising, and reveal the reality, sometimes bitter, of a business leader.
This podcast can be very helpful for those who already are in a leadership role, or plan to get one – it will inspire you to look at things from a different angle, challenge your assumptions, and learn to find solutions.
The podcast was created by Brene Brown and was based on her book of the same name – “Dare to Lead.” Just like the book, the podcast is for leaders at every level who need some valid advice on how to do their job well.
Brown says that the Dare to Lead podcast “will be a mix of solo episodes and conversations with change-catalysts, culture-shifters, and as many trouble-makers as possible.” Together they discuss how daring leadership – which is, leadership that requires you to be vulnerable and open – can inspire leaders, helping with innovation and creativity and letting them improve life both at home and at the workplace.
Gary Vee (Gary Vaynerchuk) is an entrepreneur, author, and speaker, known for his work in digital marketing and social media as a chairman of communications company VaynerX and as a CEO of VaynerX subsidiary VaynerMedia.
Naturally, the Gary Vee podcast is about business and marketing – here you can find speeches on the subject, segments of DAILYVEE video series (daily video-documentary series on YouTube where Gary records interviews with businessmen and broadcasts investor meetings at VaynerMedia,) and thoughts he kept specifically for this podcast.
The People Managing People podcast by David Rice is for leaders, managers, and HR professionals who strive to build a positive workplace and bring out the best in their people. In the podcast, you will learn how to fix problems like turnover, burnout, and disengagement, and create a healthy work culture.
With guests from different backgrounds – best-selling authors, founders, culture innovators, and thought leaders, the podcast offers diverse perspectives on various topics like technology and performance management, employee experience, and culture. You will learn many things from real-life examples and stories!
By the way, if you're interested in the topic of management, here is a list of management books for you to read and learn more!
Hosted by Yaniv Bernstein and Chris Saad, the Startup podcast explores the topics that are important to building a Silicon Valley-style start-up. As the hosts point out, this podcast was “created by founders, for founders” – here you can get some practical insights on how to build a start-up, hear some useful, practical, and actionable advice, and just learn more about the world of entrepreneurship.
In the reviews, people call this podcast “a goldmine of knowledge,” underlying that it’s easy to listen to, full of unconventional wisdom, and makes you feel as if you’re led by an actual mentor on your way as a founder.
On this podcast, David Novak hosts conversations with entrepreneurs, founders, and CEOs from various industries, like business, sports, and medical leadership, to let them share things that have made them successful as leaders.
The podcast is informative and inspirational. Here you will learn how to become a more empathetic leader who understands that everyone on the team has their needs and goals, and why only those leaders who demonstrate certain qualities eventually win. Listeners mention that David has a unique talent to get people to open up – so you will hear incredible stories of people from all walks of life.
Some leadership principles, though widely popular, are already old-fashioned and simply don’t work with today’s workforce and economy. In The Leadership Antidote Podcast, Dr. Kim Hires shows listeners that there are other ways of leading – those based on imagination and innovation.
This podcast will be of great help if you’re a leader and look for ways to improve. You will get some practical advice and learn about strategies and tools that would make you reconsider your approach and become you an inspirational leader with a growth mindset.
“At the Table” by Patrick Lencioni, the author of many best-selling books, including “The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team,” offers practical advice for contemporary leaders from experts in leadership and business. Lencioni explores various work-related topics like culture, teamwork, and the building of world-class organizations – and the topics are not limited to the world of work only.
The style of conversations is simple and approachable, as Lencioni combines insights with humor and wisdom. If you read any of his books, you would know what we’re talking about!
On the Ed Mylett show, you can hear guests from almost every industry – science, sports, entertainment, business, politics, and health. The greatest performers will share their journey with you and give you their recipes for successful leadership.
Besides the amazing content, listeners point out Ed’s charisma, mentioning that he’s authentic, down-to-earth, and humble, and his choice of words makes the conversation really engaging.
The podcast hosts Jocko Willink, a retired Navy SEAL, and Echo Charles, a director and a producer, discuss the problems of leadership and discipline in business, everyday life, and war. This podcast can teach you how to be courageous enough to take ownership of your life, getting out of your comfort bubble.
“Implementing Extreme Ownership requires checking your ego and operating with a high degree of humility. Admitting mistakes, taking ownership, and developing a plan to overcome challenges are integral to any successful team.”
The lesson you can hear on this podcast will be useful for anyone who is interested in the topic of leadership, including businessmen, war fighters, and ordinary people.
The format of the podcast includes interviews, on-air coaching calls, and topical episodes, where you would learn how to achieve personal and professional development, as well as overcome blocks as a female professional.
“Women Taking the Lead” was named by Forbes Magazine as one of “The Best Podcasts for Female Entrepreneurs” and one of “The Top 18 Women-Led podcasts You Need to Download Now.” Isn’t it a good reason for you to give it a try?
On the Out of Office podcast, hosted by Mallika Kapur, you will get to hear unconventional conversations about life and leadership. Mallika interviews newsmakers and asks them things they normally don’t get asked about – their childhood, dreams, favorite books, failures and triumphs, family and love. Because, after all, these are things that define who they are and why they became successful.
These conversations are a mix of both personal and professional stories, giving you insights into people’s lives “in” and “out” of the office.
The podcast is hosted by Steve Rush, a transformation consultant and a leadership coach. He “hacks” into the minds of great leadership coaches, C-suite executives, and best-selling authors to learn important lessons they know about leadership.
His guests share ideas that would help you enhance your leadership skills and awareness. What’s important, Steve encourages them to talk about hard times when things went wrong and how exactly those times contributed to their success.
Steve’s passion makes the podcast inspirational, and the conversational style of the podcast makes it easy to listen.
Like HBR Ideacast, this podcast is hosted by Alison Beard and Curt Nickisch. But unlike Ideacast, it’s focused not on management and business but on leadership – which, as we know, are not the same thing.
Every Wednesday, the hosts pick case studies and conversations with business leaders, academics, and management experts who share their insights and inspiration.
The HBR on Leadership podcast will be of great help for those who either manage or motivate their team: they will show you how to cope with the complexities of a manager’s work, how to have conversations with people, and many other things.
“The Learning Leader Show” with Ryan Hawk is about leadership – but leadership that’s based on a growth mindset. The idea of the show is that true leaders are learners, and the best leaders always work hard to become a better version of themselves.
The podcast is a series of conversations with the world’s famous leaders – CEOs, entrepreneurs, coaches, athletes, and best-selling authors, where Ryan uncovers their best practices and characteristics as leaders.
It was highly recognized by Forbes which called it “the most dynamic leadership podcast out there,” and Inc Magazine – “one of the five podcasts to make you a smarter leader.”
McKinsey & Company is a management consulting firm that helps governments, businesses, and non-profit organizations achieve their goals. Naturally, the podcast, hosted by Roberta Fusaro and Lucia Rahilly, is dedicated to the most important issues of management and business.
It covers a wide variety of topics: leadership and change management, analytics and technology, strategy and marketing, organization, and the role of business in society. They’re quite informative, and discuss things like myths about women in the workplace, racial equity, and the meaning of AI for travel.
“Leaders are not born, they’re made” – this expression can best describe this show. The host Dave Stachowiak, a Vice President for The Dale Carnegie organization, holds insightful conversations with experts and researchers to let them share their understanding of the mechanics of leading people.
What’s important, Dave regularly involves in dialogues with listeners, encouraging their feedback.
The show has attracted 40 million downloads and is #1 search for management on Apple Podcasts, so it sounds like it’s worth a try, doesn’t it?
The podcast, hosted by Jim Vaselopulos and Jan Rutherford, is focused on the study of great leaders. The hosts interview leaders, discuss their favorite books, and speak with authors who research their journeys.
In the podcast description, Jim and Jan mention that leadership is one of the most important skills for an individual, an organization, and society in general – because it’s a skill that helps bring out the best in any individual, organization, or society.
On the podcast, McKinsey parents Bryan Hancock and Brooke Weddle lead discussions with various talent experts on leadership development and transformational change. The mission of the podcast is to help you learn how to turn talent into competitive advantage and handle today’s fast-changing talent landscape.
Among the episodes, you will find those that discuss the importance of empathy at work, the value of people as opposed to AI, workplace rituals we’ve lost because of the Covid-19 pandemic, inclusion, and generational stereotypes at the workplace. These sound like an interesting alternative to a typical work-related discussion, as these topics reflect changes happening to the world of business nowadays.
The Think Fast, Talk Small: Communication Techniques podcast is hosted by Matt Abrahams, a lecturer of Strategic Communication at Stanford Graduate School of Business. The idea behind the podcast is to teach listeners to communicate more effectively, by providing necessary tools, techniques, and practices.
Matt will help you deal with various communication tasks and problems: writing clear emails, efficiently conveying complex information, give interesting presentations at meetings, and many others. After all, productive communication is critical to your success in both professional and private life, so trying to improve your skills is not a bad idea at all, is it?
We often don’t pay enough attention to the issue of mental health at the workplace. On this podcast, Morra Aarons-Mele encourages us to reconsider our attitude and convictions. She explains that the most common mental illness we suffer from is various anxiety disorders, and for this reason, we urgently need “better models of leadership and a more holistic view of human health.”
While society tells us that we can’t succeed if we suffer from anxiety and depression, the experts on the podcast will tell you a different story – they’ve been there, but found their ways out.
This podcast is a must-listen for those who doubt themselves and need to find a source of confidence in themselves.
The Rework Podcast will show you new ways of how to work and run your business. Here Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson, the founders of Basecamp (a project management tool) as well as the host Kimberly Rhodes, discuss business and entrepreneurship, sharing their unique perspective on how to do everything possible for the well-being of their companies and customers.
The topics covered in the podcast are, related to entrepreneurship, productivity, and management. Some listeners think that the hosts can be too opinionated and even dogmatic, but they still find their advice valuable when it comes to building a sustainable business.
The future is already here: we have to operate in an AI-altered workplace, under the conditions of globalization and robotization. This podcast, hosted by Harvard Business School Professors Bill Kerr and Joe Fuller, helps understand how to reshape work to keep up with the things that change so fast. You will learn what steps you need to take today to stay relevant.
Interested in the future of work specifically? ➡️ Read more about podcasts that explore the future of work.
The TED Business podcast explores various problems in the business world. Every Monday, the host Modupe Akinola from Columbia Business School discusses ideas that would help you in your business journey: how to get a promotion, set smart goals, be innovative, and fight injustice in the workplace.
Here you can listen to such topics as the links between stress and creativity, the moral side of working hard, and how to be kind to yourself.
Business is not a bed of roses – it’s a war, often marked by unexpected turns and violent clashes. You’re not supposed to be nice on the battlefield. And to get a victory over your rival, you might have to resort to tactics that have nothing to do with chivalry.
That’s what this podcast is about – about battles between business opponents, backstabbing, hostility, and even betrayals.
Each successful company has a story that would surprise you, hidden behind a closed door. Think about it: you might use some company’s product or service every day and yet have no idea what was the cost the company paid for it.
Isn’t it fascinating to get a glimpse at the company’s “inner kitchen”?
Here are some episodes:
This podcast is a great resource for female leaders and organizations who would like to promote women to leadership positions. It aims to inspire women to get rid of self-doubt and lead with confidence, overcoming the glass ceiling.
By listening to this podcast, you will get the support you need to believe in yourself. You will realize that many women face the same challenges and share the same feelings, so you’re not alone on your path – and if they could do it, so can you.
Some episodes:
The world is changing fast but the concept of leadership seems to develop at a much slower pace, falling behind. Unfortunately, traditional solutions do not always fix contemporary problems – you will have to look for unconventional ideas and approaches, to improve leadership statistics. And this podcast will help you with that.
Here you will learn how to cope with chaos and negativity at work, practice self-reflection to empower yourself, understand the connection between your mind and body, and just stay at peace with yourself – in other words, you will learn things that will help you survive and be successful in a chaotic world that requires so much from you.
Some episodes:
Modern managers face challenges their predecessors would probably not consider challenges at all. Seriously, would managers of the industrial era care about disengagement and burnout? However, luckily, we live in a different world where employee’s needs are taken into account.
This, however, creates new problems for managers, many of which still use the old managing approach, autocratic and distant. To be a good manager, you’d have to stop treating people like machines – and this in this podcast, you can learn how.
What’s really cool, the episodes on the podcast are grouped into categories, which makes it easier for you to search for what you need. Let’s take a look at some examples:
If you want to become a good leader, you don’t have to reinvent a wheel – there are people who are willing to share their knowledge with you. So take a notebook, a pen (or use your phone – it’s whatever is comfortable for you,) and write down all the important leadership lessons and advice you hear.
The guests of the “How Leaders Lead” are real subject-matter experts. Condoleezza Rice (Former U.S. Secretary of State,) Indra Nooyi (former CEO, PepsiCo,) Ken Langone (co-founder of Home Depot,) Ginni Rometty (former CEO of IBM)… don’t they look like people who know something most people don’t? And now their knowledge is at your fingertips!
Some episodes:
Listening to something new can broaden your horizons and even help you find your passion. As you can see, there is a wide variety of authors and guests you can choose from, and topics for discussion are endless.
It might be hard to name the best leadership podcast out of all we mentioned. But pick something you think can inspire you. You never know how the ideas you hear will change your life – maybe you will find answers to your questions, get some fresh perspectives, or improve your management skills, or maybe you will find confidence to start a business! Keep searching your own ways, and we wish you good luck!
