Wendy Edmonds

Wendy Edmonds

Wendy M Edmonds INTERIM CHAIR Dept of Management, Marketing & Public Administration

Phone 301-860-3622 wedmonds@bowiestate.edu

Main Campus Center for Business and Grad Studies, Room 2323-A

Education

Ph.D. Organizational Leadership, University of Maryland Eastern Shore

M.S. Marketing, Johns Hopkins University

B.S. Technology Management, Bowie State University

Areas of Expertise

Toxic Followership, Leader/Follower Interrelatedness, Organizational Leadership, Qualitative Research

Biography

Dr. Wendy M. Edmonds is Associate Professor and Interim Chair of the Department of Management, Marketing, and Public Administration in the College of Business, where she leads departmental operations with a commitment to excellence, collaboration, and student success. As an internationally recognized scholar in toxic followership, she describes herself as a Workplace Toxicologist dedicated to fostering healthy and productive organizational environments.

With more than 16 years of experience in higher education, Dr. Edmonds has earned national and international recognition, including the 2024 Followership Award of Distinction at the Global Followership Conference in Glasgow, Scotland. She has led award‑winning student research, built industry partnerships, secured grant funding, and redesigned courses as a certified member of the Association of College and University Educators.  Her scholarship and leadership continue to influence academia, business, and communities locally and globally.

Research Interests

  • Toxic Followership
  • Organizational Leadership
  • Diversity

Awards & Honors

  • 2019-2021 Chair of the Followership Learning Community at the International Leadership Association
  • 2020 Certificate of Appreciation Award - Presentation - Be a Courageous Follower, Not a Toxic Follower in a Time of Crisis, Universidad Autonoma Indigena de Mexico.
  • 2020-2021 Emerging Scholar and recipient of the Emerging Scholars Award Fifteenth International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences
  • 2018 Idahlynn Karre Exemplary Leadership Award Organization: The Chair Academy Leadership

Personal Statement

Leaders and their leadership are often commented on, while little attention is paid to the followers who support and/or enable them. Much of what we think of as toxic leadership, however, is actually the product of toxic followership. Dr. Edmonds defines toxic followership as the actions of someone who, as a result of being manipulated by a trusted leader/authority, now exhibits unethical, destructive or disruptive behavior similar to that of the unscrupulous leader. Authoritarian rulers would be nothing without those who willingly follow, exchanging an ethical compass for a flawed human one. Followership is, in fact, one of the most pressing and least understood issues of our time.