Hitendra Wadhwa is Professor of Practice at Columbia Business School, where he teaches the most popular MBA leadership elective, Personal Leadership & Success. He is the recipient of the Dean’s Award for Teaching Excellence and the MAC Award for the Most Dynamic and Engaging Professor.

Hitendra’s mission is to codify and teach scientific principles of Inner Mastery and Outer Impact. With a Ph.D. in Management Science from MIT and a lifelong study of the world’s mystic traditions, Hitendra brings a mathematician’s rigor and a truth-seeker’s spirit to some of today’s most vexing questions about authenticity, success, leadership, human potential, and more. His widely acclaimed research and teaching on leadership have been covered by Inc., Forbes, Fortune, CNN, Psychology Today, BBC World Service, Financial Times, and Wall Street Journal.

Hitendra is the founder of Mentora Institute, which is at the forefront of creating a new model of leadership for the 21st century where executives create ever-growing Outer Impact through ever-deepening Inner Mastery. Through its digital learning platform, Mentora has created a pocket “flight simulator” for leadership that helps learners gain mastery in a wide range of leadership skills through MicroPracticeTM. His clients include Accenture, SAP, Pfizer, Tata Group, Ericsson, GE, Kraft Heinz, Siemens, Lululemon, a Big-4 Accounting Firm and Morgan Stanley.

In the past, Hitendra was an Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Company and the CEO/founder of a Silicon Valley start-up, Paramark, which was twice recognized as a Top-100 Internet technology company by Technologic Partners/Venture Wire.