Digital Academic Leadership Webinar Series Webinar 2 – Digital Academic Leadership: Awareness, Mindsets & Readiness

The second webinar in the Digital Academic Leadership Webinar Series, organized by the LEAD Academic Network，the EU–China Higher Education Research Center (ECHE) at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) within the framework of the World Education Research Association (WERA) International Research Network on Digital Academic Leadership, focused on the critical role of awareness and mindset in enabling effective digital leadership in higher education.

The session featured Prof. Dr. Tomas Veloz, an interdisciplinary researcher specializing in complex adaptive systems and mathematical modeling. In his lecture titled “Digital Academic Leadership: Awareness, Mindsets & Readiness,” Prof. Veloz explored how digital awareness and mindset shape the capacity of academic leaders to guide digital transformation in higher education, emphasizing that digital academic leadership requires continuous learning, strategic vision, and the ability to mobilize communities around digital innovation, highlighting that successful digital transformation in universities is a collective process rather than an individual effort.

Participants later joined breakout discussion groups to reflect on how digital awareness and mindsets influence leadership decision-making and organizational change in universities.

The webinar reinforced the idea that successful digital transformation in higher education requires not only technological adoption but also a shift in leadership culture, strategic thinking, and institutional readiness for innovation.