Fearlessly authentic leaders and organizations are now needed more than ever and Leaderology wants to help recognize and celebrate them. The FAAF Awards, also known as The Fearlessly Authentic Leadership Awards™, are presented by Leaderology to leaders and organizations in the business community who are making a positive impact on the lives of others and the world around them. Click here to learn more!

For Leaders:

Any individual leader demonstrating fearlessly authentic leadership attributes is qualified to be nominated. As long as the nominee’s involvement includes working with colleagues or a community of effort they can be eligible for nomination. All we ask is that they are a current employee at a for-profit organization at the time of nomination.

You do not need to be an executive to be eligible for nomination. The nominee can hold a leadership position at any level within a for-profit organization (e.g. frontline supervisor, mid-level manager, or director and above).

Currently only individuals from for-profit organizations are qualified to be nominated for The FAAF Awards. While non-profit organizations do heroic work, we are choosing to focus on leaders in for-profit organizations because that is where representation of fearlessly authentic leadership is needed the most. However, Leaderology independently reserves the right to honor and recognize fearlessly authentic leaders from non-profit organizations as part of the Awards event in the early fall of 2026.

For Organizations:

A Fearlessly Authentic organization is one that fosters an environment of trust and psychological safety, nurtures a humanized workplace culture, and has created disruptive innovation to contribute positively to the greater community.

If this sounds like your current organization or employer then nominate them and let us celebrate them. Follow this link to nominate your organization.

PLEASE NOTE: While non-profit organizations undoubtedly demonstrate leadership courage, we are choosing to currently focus on for-profit organizations, where the need for fearlessly authentic leadership is most critical. However, Leaderology reserves the right to independently honor and recognize exceptional non-profit organizations as part of the FAAF Awards.

Follow these links to nominate yourself or nominate a colleague.

Yes and maybe!

Yes - you may nominate more than one leader. Simply go to the FAAF Awards page and submit another nomination.

Maybe - there are some restrictions based on the organization’s eligibility criteria. To nominate an organization, you must be a current employee of the organization you're nominating. If you work for multiple organizations, it is possible to nominate more than one organization. 

We encourage you to consider nominating both a fearless leader and an organization for the awards.

Yes - The system permits you or your organization to be nominated once or multiple times by different colleagues (“nominator[s]”). However, you cannot be nominated by the same “nominator” twice. Please note that nominating yourself or being nominated by multiple nominators does not have any bearing on you being selected for the Award. You just need one strong nomination submission.

The deadline for nominations is April 3rd, 2026.

Nope. Your Award is earned, not bought. You will not be charged or expected to pay any fees throughout the nomination to selection process.

For the Nominator:

After nominating an individual, you will receive a confirmation email. Of course, you are more than welcome to reach us by email for any further questions.

For the Nominee:

If you are nominated, you will receive a confirmation email. Make sure to check your spam and junk/promotions folders and flag emails as safe so you don’t miss any future correspondence. Your nomination is carefully reviewed by a team of Leaderologists. You will be notified by email if your nomination is shortlisted.

For the Organization:

After your nomination is submitted, the listed contact person for the organization will receive a confirmation email. The nomination is carefully reviewed by a team of Leaderologists.  

The objective selection process is carefully designed to identify the recipient of the Fearlessly Authentic Leadership Award. The selection process can be broken down into 4 phases:

I. Initial review: The submitted nominations will be evaluated as an initial screen to determine a short list of nominees.

II. Shortlisting of nominees: If shortlisted, you will receive an email confirmation with next steps.

III. FAAF360 Assessment: Once shortlisted, nominees will be required to complete an online FAAF 360 Assessment. This assessment consists of a set of questions to measure the following attributes of a Fearlessly Authentic Leader: Self Awareness, Genuine Communication, Embracing Vulnerability, Encouraging Diversity & Inclusion, Empowering Others.

Like any 360, nominees will provide a list of raters (colleagues) who have consented to providing anonymous feedback. The report will be shared with the nominee once finalists have been announced. This will not include Fearlessly Authentic Organizations.

IV. Judges Review: The complete nomination package (including supplementary documents and your FAAF 360 report) will be blind reviewed by our FAAF Judges Council. It is in this phase where the honoree of the Fearlessly Authentic Leadership Awards will be selected. This will not include Fearlessly Authentic Organizations.

A team of Leaderologists and Leaderology recognized Fearlessly Authentic Business Leaders will be reviewing your nomination at various points in the judging process. For objectivity purposes, your nomination submissions will be blind reviewed (Phase IV) by our FAAF Judges Council.

Yes. In the event that you (a leader) are shortlisted for the FAAF Awards and for the purposes of administering an online FAAF 360, Leaderology may reach out to your colleagues. However, we will not be reaching out without your consent. To do so, Leaderology will provide you with a communication template to notify your colleagues first before we reach out via email.

For the Organization Award, we may reach out to the listed contact person and other parties (CEO and/or CHRO) if they are short listed.

Information collected by the nomination form will be kept internal and used solely for the purpose of the FAAF awards. Data will not be distributed without explicit consent of the nominees, individuals, and organizations involved. We do not sell your data to third parties. You can read our privacy policy here.

Honorees will be notified in August 2026 and officially awarded September 10th, 2026 at our FAAF awards.

The Linden Club in Long Beach.