Mark Cutifani leads AngloGold Ashanti, a gold company that has presence in twenty five countries. It is the most globally spread and balanced gold company in the world, with approximately 63 000 employees, half of whom are in South Africa. They generate about $9 billion revenue a year, with approximately $3bn cash with which to pay dividends, capital, etc. What they do is technically not simple as they mine some of the deepest mines in the world. There are challenges like safety, environmental management, community relationships, and a whole range of other complexities.

BRLP: Tell us something interesting about your childhood that helped prepare you for leadership Cutifani: I was born and raised in an industrial town just south of Sydney where coal mining was prevalent. I am a product of a mixed family. My father was Italian, a migrant at about nineteen years of age and he couldn’t speak a word of the language. My mother is from an Irish background but Australian born. Her family owned pubs. So you had a young Italian migrant and an Australian girl with an Irish background. Quite a volatile paring.

What kind of a leader or aspiring leader am I? This article is about a few key parameters that we can use to measure our leadership attitude. Leadership Platform uses the term ‘seamless leader’ to describe a specific kind of leader that we believe most of us can become. Several of these universal principles have been discussed in articles in this column in the past. See how you measure against these standards! But first, consider a seamless attitude: A seamless attitude: It is a positive attitude coupled with the ‘mastery of universal principles that govern the ability to move barriers to full potential and excellence’.

Thomas Fuller, an English churchman and historian who lived in the 17th century, penned this truth: “He does not believe that does not live according to his belief.” Seamless leaders do not fall trap to this truth. They strive to be honest with themselves, others and towards society. How many times do we want to say something in a meeting but don’t because of fear or concern for what others may say or think, or what the boss may do to you? When this happened you were not being honest and therefore authentic, and chose to be manipulated by fear. Seamless leaders learn to be honest in a diplomatic or caring way. Some leaders however, go so far down the path of diplomacy or so called caring that they forget to be honest and therefore authentic.

Louis Von Zeuner the Deputy CEO of ABSA will be retiring in approximately a year. I reflected on a leadership conversation I had with him some time back. Here are just a few highlights: At the time the two of us had a very intense and interesting discussion around certain leadership principles. He came across as a humble, teachable, loyal, approachable, down to earth man that can be tough when he needs to be. I remember thinking to myself that ABSA and Maria Ramos were very fortunate to have him on the team.

Lindiwe Mazibuko, Parliamentary Leader of the DA, was born in Swaziland in 1980 and then, with her South African parents, moved back to South Africa, Kwazulu Natal in 1986 where she was educated. After school she started a BA degree in music but dropped out after a year. Later, in 2006, she completed a BA in French, Classics, Media & Writing, and a post graduate degree in political communication, in 2007. During the year that she completed her political communication course, she did research on different parties’ policies. She says: “I liked what I read and what I saw about the DA. I especially liked the attitude and ethos of the party leader Helen Zille, who had just been elected at that stage.” One thing led to another, not calculated. The opportunity as a researcher for the DA presented itself and its outlook happened to fit with her views at the time. The rest is history.

Shortly before the selection of Pieter De Villiers as Springbok Coach over four years ago, I held a leadership conversation with Heyneke Meyer, and wrote the following piece, which is still relevant today: “As someone that has been in the leadership and people game for many years, let me summarise what a decision to make Heyneke Meyer the Springbok Coach may mean for SA Rugby: absolute passion for the game and not for self-enrichment; a gifted coach who has the ability to get the best out of players; caring for the character of players and them winning in life overall rather than on the field only; a coach that prefers to be in the background while players win in the forefront; honesty with players that will play for the coach because they respect him; a leader that is an example on the practicing field and more specifically off the field; a team that will go to war for each other- ‘die’ for one another on the field!”

For a seamless leader, repetition is a core element in the development of character and leadership competence. No skill of real value is possessed without the application of much repetition. Every skill we learn is the result of practice and experience. Think of learning to read and write, to drive a car, to speak a new language, to master a sport or to learn to paint. It is a human frailty to resent repetition. Without this ability we will not be able to reach our full potential. According to leadership psychologist, Colin Wilford, “all behaviour is made possible by a myriad of electrical pathways in the brain. As we learn new tasks and make them habits we create a new sequence of electrical impulses in the brain that continue to follow the same pathway in the same order. Changing the pathways/habits once set is not easy, but it is refreshingly possible as we overcome our failings and turn them into strengths”.

...What our National Planning Commission is in effect telling us here is that we need to change the way we understand leadership and adopt what we have coined: Seamless Leadership; if we are to accomplish that which has been asked of us.  Why am I mentioning all this? Because a truly seamless society, lead by seamless leaders – whether in homes, businesses or civil society – depends to a large extent on how and what we are doing to develop those who will be present when 2030 arrives... To the youth: ...We are launching an initiative right here in The Star Workplace. We call it our “You(th) the Leader Series”. What we are going to give you once a month is a lesson in leadership...

The critical role that a seamless attitude plays in life was sharply brought home to me a week ago when we heard the distressing news that two sons of friends from the Eastern Cape had died in a plane crash. The two brothers were in fact participating in a final flight before the one brother was to qualify for his pilot’s licence. After we heard the news we phoned the mother of the two boys and it was an intensely emotional experience. Why mention this matter? Life is about attitude. It really is! Life is also about traumatic and painful experiences as indicated above. The workplace is filled with challenging situations. Nothing impacts more on personal happiness and leadership ability than a heritage of a positive and seamless attitude towards life in general and in particular towards our leadership role in the work place and in our families. What is a seamless attitude?