Global Followership Conference

While followership research is increasingly becoming popular, its literature is thinly dispersed, making it difficult to find. Thus, Virginia Tech, through a mini-grant and two years of research, is building a digital followership collection with the goal of supporting and advancing the field. This session will introduce participants to the platform, share its potential benefits across contexts, and demonstrate the prospect of artificial intelligence for sustaining the field of followership.

This interactive session explores how traditional definitions of leaders and followers may unintentionally encourage passivity, potentially contributing to democratic erosion. Can a new definition of "follower" save democracy? And how can the followership community impact political engagement in democracies

This facilitated session explores how the human resource function can transition from a support function to a strategic partner by leveraging the power of followership. Participants will share interactive discussions and exercises to identify what they envision a more strategic role to be, how to pursue it using followership techniques, and what obstacles they will need to overcome along the way. Participants will leave with insights on where their HR function is going and how to get there with the help of followership.

This session will engage educators in a collaborative discussion on followership pedagogy, exploring key aspects such as texts and materials, course or workshop objectives, activities and assessments, challenges in teaching followership, and the integration of followership into the leadership curriculum.

Conflict isn’t just a leadership challenge—strong followership plays a critical role in transforming tension into progress. In this interactive session, we’ll explore how effective followers contribute to conflict resolution, strengthen team dynamics, and drive success. You’ll learn practical strategies for bringing up conflict, naming the difference between position and interest, and fostering collaboration even in high-stakes situations. Through real-world examples, participants will leave with a new perspective on conflict as a powerful force for positive change. This session will equip participants with the tools to turn conflict into an opportunity for growth.