The sixth webinar of the Digital Academic Leadership Webinar Series, organized by the EU–China Higher Education Research Center (ECHE) at Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), successfully concluded a rich and inspiring series of lectures delivered by academic experts from different international contexts. Throughout the series, participants had the opportunity to engage with current research, diverse perspectives, and critical reflections that deepened our understanding of Digital Academic Leadership. The final session brought together academics, researchers, and higher education practitioners to reflect on the ethical and human dimensions of Digital Academic Leadership in the age of artificial intelligence.
The session featured Prof. Marieta du Plessis. She is a registered industrial psychologist and award-winning professor, brings over a decade of consulting and academic experience dedicated to helping individuals and organisations thrive. She is a respected researcher in leadership, organisational behaviour, and positive organisational psychology. Her inspiring work focuses on enhancing well-being, trust, and flourishing in the workplace, offering powerful insights for shaping the future of people and organisations.
Professor Marieta du Plessis’s lecture shifted the focus of Digital Academic Leadership from technical capabilities to the ethical and human character required of academic leaders. Her central argument was that responsible and ethical digital academic leadership should not be treated as only one competency among many, but as the foundation guiding every digital decision. She warned that although AI and digital systems can increase efficiency, productivity, and institutional visibility, they may also weaken human connection, reduce intrinsic motivation, create loneliness, and make meaningful academic relationships less visible. In universities, this is especially important because academic work depends on mentorship, trust, intellectual risk-taking, critique, and genuine human presence.
The lecture organized these concerns around three key tensions: efficiency versus dignity, visibility versus privacy, and agility versus accountability. Digital tools such as dashboards, automated feedback systems, student-risk platforms, and performance metrics can support coordination and decision-making, but they may also reduce people to data points, ignore personal context, intensify surveillance, or prioritize speed over ethical reflection. Du Plessis emphasized that digital academic leaders must keep the human visible, name ethical tensions before they become normal practice, and lead with conscience rather than competence alone. In her closing message, she argued that the ethical pressures of digital transformation are already present, and the task of leaders is to notice them, name them, and ensure that digital innovation protects dignity, quality of human interaction, and responsible academic leadership.
Overall, the webinar emphasized that Digital Academic Leadership in the age of AI requires more than technical competence or institutional policy. It requires conscience, ethical judgment, and a sustained commitment to keeping the human visible. Prof. Du Plessis concluded that the ethical pressures of digital transformation are already present in higher education, and that the responsibility of digital academic leaders is to notice these tensions, name them, and ensure that digital innovation protects dignity, human connection, and responsible academic practice.
