Leadership Traits | Corporate Speaker | Sandy Gluckman

Dr. Sandy Gluckman, corporate speaker, leadership consultant and author of "Who's In the Driver's Seat" teaches corporate executives and managers the leadership traits of highly effective leaders. 

In her corporate speeches, Sandy Gluckman explains how she became an expert in leadership traits.  She was born in Johannesburg South Africa, during the apartheid era.  The South Africa she grew up in was led by arrogant, self-righteous, self-serving bigots whose egos convinced them that being white made them superior  - which helped them justify the horrific practice of apartheid. By the time she left South Africa, it had slipped from an incredible first world into an aids infested, crime ridden third world where today there is an unemployment rate of 48%, a rape every 23 seconds, a murder every 27 seconds and where the Minister of Health denies that Aids is a problem although one third of the population are HIV positive.  This has massive implications on business and the economy, apart from the shocking human suffering it creates.

As a result of watching these egotistical leaders, Sandy was compelled to get a PhD in psychology with post-grad studies in organizational behavior and then she founded a leadership and organizational development consulting and training company.  At this time, Nelson Mandela was released from prison and became president of South Africa.  Sanctions which the world had imposed on South Africa went away and it joined the world again.  Sandy was highly sought after to work with the leaders of the major organizations in South Africa who were faced with having to transform their leadership traits to re-engage with millions of disenfranchised and alienated employees.  Some could and some could not.  Those who successfully transitioned themselves and the company from the old way of thinking to the new were those who were able to change their outdated leadership traits and adjust the way in which they spoke to the employees.  They were able to reach out to the spirit of the employees in a way that resulted in corporate growth.  Their pull was stronger than their push.  In every single case, the companies that were unable to make this transition were led by leaders who could not let go of their old autocratic behaviors and ways of speaking, so they were unable to bridge the gap between themselves and disengaged workers.  Their push was stronger than their pull.  Many companies did not make it.

As a corporate speaker and leadership consultant, Sandy Gluckman is able to use this firsthand experience to provide examples of leadership traits of both highly successful leaders and those that failed miserably.  She witnessed that the leaders who were able to tap into the spirit of their employees and motivate them to move mountains possessed the same fundamental leadership traits:  humility, authenticity, driven by vision, courage, able to see the funny side of life, and focused on building high performing business teams and making profitable decisions.  Sandy uses this experience along with the vast research she has done on some of the United States' most effective business leaders such as Richard Branson, Howard Shultz, and Herb Kelleher  to teach leadership traits to executives, managers and other leaders worldwide.

When Sandy is hired as a corporate speaker, her audiences are shocked to learn that U.S. employee disengagement has reached staggering proportions.  According to the Gallup organization, more than half of all employees in the USA are not acting in ways that create business success.  They are switched off and tuned out. This equates to about 22 million disengaged employees, costing the American economy up to $350 billion a year. This is a dismal picture of employee participation , with major implications for productivity,  performance and corporate growth.  Gluckman believes that our economic recession is partially due to this disconnect between leaders and employees. 

With a U.S. recession looming, it is imperative that companies keep their employees switched on, so leaders must hone their leadership traits to reconnect with these employees.  Leaders must take off their blinders and allow themselves to see employees, hear them, know them– and explore two things:

1. What do I do that switches employees off and creates this disengagement?
2. What can I do differently?