Dear colleagues,
We are organizing the session on "Network Leadership: Perspectives, Methods, and Applications" during the Sunbelt conference in Daytona Beach, Florida which will take place from June 22 to 28, 2026. The Conference Website can be found https://www.insna.org/events/sunbelt-2026---daytona-beach. Fare clic o toccare se si considera attendibile questo collegamento." target="_blank" rel="noopener">here.
To submit your abstract, use this https://whova.com/call_for_speakers/9S8ZVpXDjqv6NdsDN42JguF39zzUagN3oqnz0ksSaFmpZiH7pPS0oc4WlkCo9CnT/. Fare clic o toccare se si considera attendibile questo collegamento." target="_blank" rel="noopener">link and select the session on Network Leadership: Perspectives, Methods, and Applications. The deadline for submissions is January 28th.
Leadership is a pervasive phenomenon in contemporary organizational research. Increasingly, scholars recognize that leadership cannot be fully understood by focusing solely on individual traits or formal positions within hierarchies. Instead, leadership influence often emerges from the relational structures and networking behaviors of organizational members, giving rise to informal forms of leadership, such as shared, distributed, or collective leadership. Importantly, leadership also extends beyond organizational boundaries, shaping influence patterns in governments, coalitions, and broader professional, academic or social communities.
Social network analysis offers a powerful conceptual and methodological framework for examining leadership within and across these contexts. By focusing on interdependencies among individuals, groups and organizations, a network perspective sheds light on how and when influence processes unfold, enabling a richer understanding of leadership as embedded in social structures.
This track invites contributions that advance the study of networks and leadership through relational, methodological, and empirical lenses. We welcome both qualitative and quantitative approaches, as well as multi-level designs that connect individual, organizational, and ecosystem dynamics.
Possible topics include, but are not limited to:
• New theoretical perspectives on leadership through a network lens;
• Empirical applications of social network analysis to the study of leadership in and as networks;
• Multilevel and multiplex approaches to leadership;
• Leadership emergence and effectiveness;
• The dark side of leadership;
• Relational methods and applications to the study of social influence and contagion in groups and organizations.
Thank you!
Session organizers: Daniele Mascia, Francesca Pallotti, Stefano Tasselli, and Andrew Parker
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Daniele Mascia
Full Professor
Luiss University
Rome
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