Glenn Newman is the Head of Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Belonging at UserTesting, where he sets the IDEB strategy, leads diversity talent acquisition, and partners with the business to build a more inclusive culture. He has more than eight years of experience in DEI, recruiting, and talent management across tech and professional services, and started his career as a Communication and Change Management Analyst. His training includes graduate-level coursework in Industrial-Organizational Psychology from the University of Georgia.
This Reimagining Company Culture conversation focused on what true vulnerability looks like in leadership, and how leaders distinguish performative vulnerability from the actual practice. Glenn made the case that vulnerability is one of the most misunderstood leadership skills and that the misuse of it is doing real damage to teams.
The synthesis below pairs his framing with research and field practice from People teams shipping inclusive leadership programs today.
Why Vulnerability Is the Missing Leadership Skill
Most leadership development programs teach communication, decision-making, and execution. Few teach vulnerability, even though it is the skill that determines whether the other three actually work in practice. Without vulnerability, communication becomes performance, decisions become unilateral, and execution becomes compliance.
Catalyst research on inclusive leadership shows that nearly half of an employee’s experience of inclusion is explained by manager behavior. Vulnerability sits at the center of inclusive manager behavior. Leaders who can admit mistakes, ask for help, and acknowledge what they do not know create teams where everyone else can do the same.
Glenn’s framing draws a sharp line between true vulnerability (sharing what is real and relevant in service of the team) and performative vulnerability (sharing what positions the leader as relatable). The two look similar from the outside; teams know the difference within weeks.
What True Vulnerability Looks Like in Leadership
What is the difference between performative and true vulnerability?
True vulnerability serves the team’s work. Performative vulnerability serves the leader’s reputation. The signal is what happens after the share: true vulnerability invites contribution and changes behavior; performative vulnerability ends the conversation and changes nothing.
How does vulnerability connect to belonging?
Belonging requires being seen for who you actually are. Leaders who model vulnerability create the conditions for that. Inclusion frameworks describe the destination; vulnerability is one of the practices that gets a team there.
What Actually Works in Inclusive Leadership
Train leaders in coaching, not just management
Coaching is where vulnerability gets practiced one-on-one. Leaders trained in coaching learn how to ask questions instead of issuing answers, which builds the team’s capacity rather than the leader’s indispensability. The investment compounds across the team’s tenure.
Connect equity to specific operational decisions
Equity becomes real when it shows up in compensation, promotion, and project assignment. Without operational anchors, equity remains a stated value that nobody can hold the company accountable to.
Use leadership development to model the work
Leadership skills development programs that include vulnerability as a core competency train the practice rather than leaving it to chance. The most effective programs combine training with peer feedback so leaders get specific signal on how their vulnerability is landing.
Where Employee Relations Fits in Inclusive Leadership
The strongest signal of inclusive leadership is what happens when something goes wrong. Companies running mature DEI programs treat ER cases as a place to demonstrate the cultural commitment, especially in cases involving senior leaders.
How ER infrastructure supports inclusive leadership
AI-powered employee relations workflows reduce the friction of intake, route cases consistently regardless of the parties involved, and produce trend data that exposes leadership behavior. The infrastructure is what protects inclusive practice from becoming inconsistent at the executive level.
Frequently Asked Questions About Vulnerable Leadership
What does true vulnerability look like for senior leaders?
True vulnerability for senior leaders includes admitting mistakes publicly, asking for help on hard decisions, and acknowledging the limits of their experience. The behavior signals that the team is allowed to do the same.
How does vulnerability connect to belonging at work?
Belonging requires being seen as who you are. Leaders who model vulnerability give employees permission to bring more of themselves to work, which produces the conditions for belonging.
Can vulnerability be taught?
Yes. The skill is built through coaching, peer feedback, and structured practice. The hardest part is not the technique but the willingness to be uncomfortable while learning, especially for leaders accustomed to projecting certainty.
How do you avoid weaponized vulnerability?
Watch for vulnerability that asks the team to caretake the leader rather than serving the team’s work. Weaponized vulnerability is a power move dressed in self-disclosure language; healthy vulnerability redistributes the conversational floor instead of taking it.
How does vulnerability connect to retention?
Teams led by vulnerable leaders retain people because employees feel known and trusted. The retention difference compounds across multiple years and is one of the most reliable predictors of long-term team performance.
How does vulnerability work in performance conversations?
Performance conversations test vulnerability in both directions. The leader has to give honest assessment, and the employee has to receive it without losing dignity. Harvard Business Review research on psychological safety found that high-performing teams pair candor with safety, which is the recipe performance conversations need. Skipping either side produces conversations that either avoid the truth or damage the relationship.
How does vulnerability connect to executive coaching?
Executive coaching is one of the most reliable places leaders practice vulnerability. The coaching relationship gives senior leaders a setting where they can examine assumptions, work through reactions, and build behavior changes that show up later in their team meetings. The investment compounds across the leader’s tenure.
One pattern worth naming: vulnerability is most credible when it changes the leader’s subsequent decisions. A leader who admits a mistake and then changes the operating practice that caused it builds trust at a different rate than a leader who admits the same mistake and changes nothing. Teams notice the difference quickly. Vulnerability without follow-through becomes a recognizable pattern that erodes credibility instead of building it.
The other piece is consistency across audiences. Leaders who practice vulnerability with their executive peers but not with their direct reports send a clear status signal that undermines the broader culture. The teams that build this skill durably do so by practicing it with their direct reports first, where the stakes feel lower, and bringing the practice to executive forums second.
Coaching infrastructure makes the difference durable. Without coaching, leaders revert to defaults under stress; with coaching, they have a place to examine the patterns and update them.
Inclusive leadership programs work best when they include time for real reflection. Most leaders need a setting where they can examine the patterns they default to under stress and decide which patterns serve the team and which ones cost the team. Without that reflective time, training cycles repeat the same content with the same outcomes year after year.
The Bottom Line for HR Leaders
Glenn’s argument is structural: true vulnerability is a learnable leadership skill that determines whether inclusion programs actually work. Companies that train this skill produce inclusive teams that perform across difference. Companies that skip it produce surface diversity with shallow inclusion underneath.
For People teams running inclusive leadership work, the practical move is to integrate vulnerability into leadership development, build coaching capability, and connect ER trend data to leadership behavior. The combination produces durable inclusion outcomes that survive personnel changes and economic pressure.
See how AllVoices helps People teams turn workplace signals into action.
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