Scott Allen welcomes Dr. Barbara Kellerman — Harvard scholar, author of Bad Leadership, Followership, and Leaders Who Lust — for her annual Leader and Followers of the Year reflection. Kellerman brings her signature scholarly rigor and intellectual honesty to a politically charged moment, naming Donald Trump as her 2025 Leader of the Year — not as an endorsement, but as an assessment of sheer impact — while shining a light on the lesser-known figures mounting a meaningful resistance.

This is a conversation that challenges listeners to think systemically about power, followership, and the fragility of democratic norms, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum.

Key Takeaways:

• Impact, not ethics, defines the choice. Kellerman’s Leader of the Year is determined by magnitude of influence — which is why Trump’s transgression, aggression, and expansionism made him unavoidable.
• Followers aren’t passive. From Gandhi to MLK to today’s organizers, followers without formal power can metamorphose into leaders when their ideas resonate and their timing is right.
• Ideas are power. Writers Anne Applebaum and Timothy Snyder exemplify how intellectual leadership — with no formal authority — can shape public consciousness.
• Grassroots can move millions. Indivisible founders Leah Greenberg and Ezra Levin helped mobilize what may be among the largest protests in U.S. history — No Kings Day — out of near obscurity.
• The system itself is the problem. Gerrymandering, the Electoral College, lifetime Supreme Court tenure, and the financial incentives of division are structural issues that transcend any single leader.