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Executive Education

Adjunct Professor of Executive Education

Portrait of Andrew W Sykes, Faculty at the Kellogg School of Management

Andrew holds over 25 years of leadership, organizational performance and business development experience. He has consulted to some of the world's largest companies, including Google, Microsoft, Pinterest, Shell Oil, McDonald's, Nokia, Abbvie, Merck, British Aerospace, Unilever, Blue Cross Blue Shield and many others. 

Andrew's passion is professional speaking, education and activating high-impact habits. He speaks on the art of creating high-impact habits for revenue-responsible leaders and teams. He brings new and challenging perspectives to the topics he discusses, honed by his experience working around the world. He has lived or worked on six continents but calls Chicago home.

His education background is in actuarial science, he is a current behavioral researcher for BRATLAB and writer on the topic of high-impact habits. He founded and leads Habits at Work and the Behavioral Research Applied Technology Laboratory (BRATLAB). His current research interests and keynotes focus on trust in leadership, sales and business more generally. He is also a lead facilitator for Cerené, an experience company that helps people become unrecognizable to themselves in all the best ways! 

His courses at Kellogg cover a wide variety of topics including Habits, Trust, Sales, Leadership and Entrepreneurship. He is the author of the book "The 11th Habit. Design your Company Culture to Foster the Habits of High Performance. He is an aspiring performance poet, and uses poetry as part of his teaching pedagogy and professional speaking and is currently completing his book of poetry: "Woooof".


About Andrew
Research interests
  • How to create trust in sales teams
  • and leadership teams. How to create high impact habits at scale and change company culture as a result. A habits approach to DE&I. Fund raising as a sales skills for Not for Profit leaders. The art of human transformation: How to become unrecognizable to yourself in 108 days
  • in all the best ways!To sell is to lead: the similarities and common skills that salespeople and leaders need to excel.
Teaching interests
  • All aspects of building
  • maintaining and restoring trustEntrepreneurial selling and sales skills
  • habits and disciplines more generally. Leadership habits and communication skills.Fund raising and team leadership in not for profit organizations. The art of human transformation: How to become unrecognizable to yourself in 108 days
  • in all the best ways!To sell is to lead: the similarities and common skills that salespeople and leaders need to excel.
  • Health Insurance Associate, 1994, Health insurance design and pricing, AHIP
    Managed Healthcare Professional MHP, 1994, Managed care and health insurance design, NA, AHIP
    Fellow of the Faculty of the Actuaries in Scotland, 1992, Actuarial Science, Faculty and institute of actuaries
    Bachelors, 1990, Actuarial Science and Mathematical Statistics, Witwatersrand University, Cum Laude
  • Professional speaker and performance poet, andrewsykes.com, 2005-present
    Lead Facilitator, Cerené.life, 2021-present
    Founder, Behavioral Research and Applied Technology Laboratory, 2005-present
    Founder and CEO, Habits at Work, 2008-present
    Chief Wellness Officer, Vitality Health, 2007-present
    Founder and CEO, Health at Work, 2005-2007
    CEO and Chief Actuary, NMG Consultants and Actuaries, 1992-2004
    Health and Life Product Development, Swiss Reinsurance Company, 1991-1992

Selling Yourself and Your Ideas (LDEVX-477-0)

It’s been said that humans are “meaning making machines.” More than 70,000 years ago, near the outset of the Cognitive Revolution, we created language to help protect and organizeourselves.1Over the ensuing millennia, we have developed myriad ways to communicate with each other. Present day, our communications take many forms, and so we find ourselves in conversations, meetings, presentations, and even as producers on social media. As business leaders, we move through these many forms of communication in the course of a week, and indeed we can even traverse each of them within one day. At no time in history have interpersonal communication skills been as important as they are today. In the Agrarian Age, a farmer who ploughed the field a little better than their neighbors could not acquire significantly more wealth. In the Industrial Age, a factory worker who assembled widgets a little faster than the person next to them could not acquire significantly more wealth. Today, anyone, anywhere in the world, who is a little better at expressing their ideas can see a sudden, massive increase in wealth that is unprecedented in human history. In the 21st-century knowledge economy, you are only as valuable as your ideas. Says Gallo, “The ability to convince others that your ideas matter is the single greatest skill that will give you a competitive edge at a time when the combined forces of globalization, automation, and artificial intelligence trigger a wave of anxiety across every profession in every country. In the next decade, your ideas-and the ability to articulate those ideas successfully-will count more than ever. Persuaders are irreplaceable." Selling Yourself & Your Ideas is a course that will force you out of your comfort zone to help you develop the knowledge, skills, and disciplines you need to be a powerful and influential communicator, no matter the situation in which you find yourself.

Global Initiatives in Management (GIM) (INTLX-473-0)

All FT GIM classes will hold a final, mandatory class session. Please refer to each class's syllabi for the date and time.

Global Initiatives in Management (GIM) is an international experiential learning course designed to provide students with an introduction to the unique business opportunities, management practices and market dynamics of a specific region or global industry. The course combines in-class lectures, reading discussions and case studies during the winter quarter with ten days of international field research over spring break. Immersed in the culture and language of their host countries, students will have the opportunity to meet with local business and government leaders, conduct interviews and collect data for their group research projects, and experience some of the unique social and cultural facets of the region. Final presentations and written research reports are due in spring quarter after completion of the overseas portion of the class. Each class section is taught by a faculty member with deep knowledge of the region or industry and supported by an advisor from the Kellogg staff who assists students in planning the field experience. Students are financially responsible for their travel costs, and financial aid is available to those who qualify.

Entrepreneurial Selling (ENTRX-454-0)

"Selling is a life skill. Revenue is a daily pursuit. Do you currently have what it takes to succeed in selling and revenue-generation? Are you willing to embrace the role as ""Owner of Your Business"" no matter what that means in your current context? This course is designed as an adventure of discovery. You will be pushed out of your comfort zone as we move through a series of discussions and practice that will leave no room for guessing regarding your potential for impact. Whether or not you are directly tied in to the sales function of your business, you will be taught the daily expert moves that lead to magnetic sales interactions and will leave the course with a path forward for mastering these moves and bringing them to your company. Whether you manage a multi-national company or are venturing out on your own, you can’t afford to waste time guessing at foundational habits. Starting at the individual level, you will begin activating high-performance habits that allow for immediate implementation and impact. The transformation will continue as you learn what it takes to widen the scope, and shift your mindset, to embed new practices within every client and team-member interaction – driving to objectively positive results. The work we do in Entrepreneurial Selling: Own Your Business will serve you, your clients, and your team. Andrew Sykes and Craig Wortmann built this course specifically with you in mind and they can’t wait to get started and see what you do once you take it beyond the classroom. Who should be taking the course: Revenue-responsible leaders, Managers of Sales Operations and Teams, Managers responsible for Growth, Entrepreneurs, Prospective Entrepreneurs"