LEAD2 online workshop on diversified and inclusive leadership has been successfully held on 25 November 2020

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The webinar, which was co-organized by Vrije University Brussel (VUB), Guangxi Normal University and Tongji University, took place on 25th November 2020, bringing together more than 70 scholars and researchers from European and Chinese higher education institutions, in order to facilitate knowledge sharing and experience exchange under the overarching theme of “diversified and inclusive leadership”. 

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In his opening speech, Professor Anthony Antoine, Executive Director of the Institute of European Studies at VUB, highlighted that academic leadership is still an underdeveloped study track and lacks pertinent resources in literature. Hence, the theme addressed in the current online workshop was essential and highly relevant to leaders at different levels in their decision-making process. 

During the webinar, three keynote speeches were delivered by reputable speakers. Professor Ivan Svetlik, former Rector at the University of Ljubljana, gave a lecture on diversified academic leadership: meaning and competence development. Professor Vinayagum Chinapah from Stockholm University presented a keynote speech on inclusive academic leadership. Professor John Taylor from Lancaster University furthered the topic of research on academic leadership and leadership development. Following these insightful keynote speeches, three intensive discussions were organized respectively. Differences and similarities were found in both the perceptions and practices of inclusive and diversified academic leadership among Chinese and European higher education institutions which provides new opportunities among partner universities to share experience and learn from each other. Besides, the needs for conducting academic research on leadership and leadership development in higher education were emphasized.  

At the end of the webinar, Jan Cornelis, former Vice-Rector at VUB, stressed the importance of leadership in higher education institutions: “You can have a very good governance structure, but if the leadership is not what it should be, you can’t completely govern the university.”  

More details of the event can be found here 

 

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