Shaping History

Great leaders make an impact: they challenge beliefs and change the way things are done; they shape the course of history. Some are born leaders, the vast majority become leaders. Most achieve fame and recognition in their lifetime; a few die unrecognised, leaving their legacy to shine after they have gone.

Not all these hundred great leaders were worldly, not all were virtuous and some were even seriously flawed, but they all made a difference to the world in which we live; for better, and at times for worse, men and women chose to follow them.

From the founders of religions, to reformers and explorers, statesmen and military commanders, revolutionaries and businessmen, these are stories of the determination and courage, selfishness and self-sacrifice, humility and egoism, greed and generosity, genius and luck, imagination and innovation that transformed these hundred men and women into great leaders.