New Boss Of The Year In South Africa

Online, October 18, 2010 (Newswire.com) - The 2010 Boss of the Year titlebearer is Lerato Mosiah, General Manager of Healthcare at Afrox, SA's leading gasses and welding product's company.

Lerato, who began her career as a medical sales representative in 1995, holds several science degrees as well as a GIBS MBA. Her training included completing her pharmacy internship at the Florence Nightengale Hospital.

Lerato's attitude toward leadership is refreshing and honest: " When faced with challenges, you must always have an open mind and you must tell yourself that you will never know everything all the time.

"If things don't turn out the way I expect, I do some introspection...and...it's a lesson again...one of the traits as a leader is to always, always make sure that you take in lessons."

This flexibility and recognition of others' opinions and strengths resulted in her nomination for Boss of the year 2010 by employee Jenny Young who says: "Lerato really cares for her staff. She is a real people's person who motivates, rewards, finds solutions and backs up her staff.

"Our department has a great diversity of people and she treats all the same; she respects each person and has no favourites. She is a great listener and takes everyone's opinion into consideration."

Lerato says her greatest achievement as a leader has been to create a sparkle in the eyes of her team: "The biggest thing really has just been to see them grow, to see myself making a difference in their lives.

"... to see people's eyes sparkle, because they always want to be at work, and simply because I've made an effort to listen to people, I collaborate well with the team...I give them the right to be who they are, and to grow into who they are."

Lerato is also a strong believer in giving back to the community and volunteers as an Orientation Leader for First Year students at theUniversity of North West.

MTN SA Foundation is the patron and main sponsor of this prestigious Award, which celebrates its 21st anniversary in 2010, and is widely acknowledged and lauded for the role it plays in identifying and developing workplace leadership in SA.

Eunice Maluleke, Head of MTN SA Foundation, says: "As a progressive and innovative organisation, MTN SA Foundation would like to play a leading role in acknowledging and celebrating leadership excellence in South Africa.

"We need great business leaders with vision, who can articulate that vision, passionately own it and drive it to completion. Without passion, the position of leadership is meaningless. And passionate leaders inspire others to strive for more and achieve more; they inspire confidence and success in their peers and colleagues.

"Good leaders make people feel that they are at the very heart of the success of the organisation; that they make an essential difference. When that happens, people grow and deliver and go on to inspire others."

Born in Meadowlands, Soweto, and now based in Gauteng with her family, Lerato unwinds from the stresses of corporate life with a game of golf on the green fairway; tinkling on the piano; swimming or listening to music. Spirituality plays an equally important role in her daily life and she finds that reading and travelling also aid in bringing balance to her life.

Her greatest personal challenge? Learning to swim....but she is expecting her first baby and so that challenge may soon be overtaken.

She is inspired by her own boss whom she describes as a great communicator, but her other role model is Condoleza Rice who was the Secretary of State in the previous US Government administration: " She is a lady, and grew up in a home that placed strong values on education and discipline.

Says Lerato, "I'm happy to say that I have a great team to work with; It's easy to lead them! As much as I make it my job to inspire and motivate, I also inculcate the values of hard work and discipline. For me, as a leader, discipline plays a big part in my life."

Apart from the honour of being rated amongst the best bosses in South Africa, the recipient of the award and his/her nominator, as well as all the finalists and their nominators will receive prizes from an A-list of sponsors.

Sponsors of the Boss of the Year® Award are: MTN SA Foundation as patron and main sponsor and Stabilo as Founder Sponsor. Prize-givers are; Aramis and Designer Fragrances; Arthur Kaplan Jewellers; The Blue Train; Paintings courtesy of Die Kunshuis Clanwilliam; Europcar, Hugo Boss, Jaguar SA and Sheaffer Pens.