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World Happiness Fellowship

 If you are leading through complexity, change, or burnout and you want leadership to feel more steady, more human, and more effective, I invite you to join us. ~ Alexia Georghiou, Founder World Happiness Fellowship
Leaders in their respective fields gather  to explore what it truly means to live with purpose, resilience, and joy. This is happiness; not just a feeling, but a shared human practice rooted in compassion, wisdom, and connection.
This is the movement. This is the fellowship. This is happiness.
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Elia Gourgouris, Ph.D. America’s Happiness Doctor

Dr. Elia Gourgouris also known as America's Happiness Doctor, is the author of the #1 best-selling Amazon book, 7 Paths to Lasting Happiness which has been translated in 5 languages. He co-authored the highly acclaimed book 7 Keys to Navigating a Crisis: A Practical Guide to Emotionally Dealing with Pandemics and Other Disasters.

He's the President and co-founder of The Kindness Factor International and just produced a documentary feature film called For Such A time As This on the impact of kindness worldwide!

Opening Keynote; How to Effectively Navigate ANY Life Challenge with Resilience & Manifest Success & Happiness!

This keynote equips professionals with a framework for navigating challenges with resilience and for creating workplace cultures that foster well‑being, engagement, and performance. Attendees will explore four personality responses to challenges and learn to shift to a Navigator mindset, enabling effective leadership in any circumstance. The session highlights the power of H.O.T. (Honest, Open, Transparent) communication, the traits that define resilient leaders, and practical strategies for building inclusive, resilient, high‑trust cultures that drive organizational success. Participants will leave with actionable insights to strengthen resilience skills across their teams and enhance overall organizational effectiveness.

FINTEK TV interview at the NY Stock Exchange

 

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Kim Black, Former Pwc Wellness Director, Founder Sage Leadership and Wellness

Kim Black is the founder of Sage Leadership & Wellness and a leadership consultant, certified executive coach, and speaker whose work sits at the intersection of organizational psychology, happiness science, and leadership effectiveness.

She brings 25 years of experience from PwC, where she held multiple senior leadership roles, including serving as Wellbeing Director for PwC’s U.S. and Mexico workforce of approximately 75,000 employees.

Interactive Experience; The Belonging Effect: Escape Room Edition - Unlocking the Keys to Inclusion, Trust & Wellbeing

This isn’t a lecture - it’s an experience. In this high-energy breakout, participants become part of The Belonging Escape Room, an interactive simulation where teams must “unlock” inclusion, trust, and wellbeing through real-world HR challenges. Each lock represents a workplace dilemma: misfired feedback, invisible burnout, or an overlooked voice. To escape, participants must decode data, rewrite dialogue, and design rituals that build psychological safety.
 
Along the way, they’ll discover how belonging directly drives performance and retention: Gallup research shows disengagement now costs organizations $8.9 trillion globally, while replacing a single employee costs 50–200% of annual salary. Gamified learning increases knowledge retention by 75% (ATD), so participants leave with muscle memory, not just notes.
 
The session closes with each team designing a “Belonging Ritual Card” - a practical, measurable culture habit they can pilot within 30 days.
 
Learning Objectives:
  • Experience how trust, inclusion, and wellbeing influence team performance under pressure.
  • Diagnose three everyday leadership blind spots that erode belonging and design rituals to fix them and prevent them from happening again.
  • Leave with a ready-to-use “Belonging Ritual” to implement immediately - and a business case to sustain it.
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Closing Keynote

Enrique Rubio CEO & Founder Hacking HR

Top voice and disruptor of HR

Technology with a Soul: How We Can Leverage AI to Strengthen Human Happiness at Work

Can we leverage AI to make people happier at work?

AI alone will not create happiness, but how we design work, relationships, and communities around AI absolutely can. This keynote explores why community, belonging, and human connection matter more than ever as technology reshapes how we work.

While AI promises efficiency, speed, and scale, it also risks deepening isolation, fragmentation, and disconnection if deployed without intention. Drawing on insights from global organizations and communities, this session challenges the assumption that smarter tools automatically lead to better work experiences. Instead, it reframes AI as a powerful enabler that can either erode or strengthen trust, collaboration, and well-being depending on the choices leaders make.

The session introduces the idea of being connected by design: intentionally shaping workplaces where AI supports human relationships. Participants will explore how AI can help reduce friction, free up time for meaningful interactions, and reinforce a sense of belonging, when guided by human-centered values and community-first thinking.

Ultimately, this keynote invites leaders to rethink the future of work not as a technological race, but as a human one. Moving from isolation to belonging requires more than new tools. It requires new ways of thinking, new forms of leadership, and a renewed commitment to building workplaces where people feel seen, supported, and connected in an AI-powered world.

Session Objectives

By the end of this keynote, participants will be able to:

  1. Reframe the role of AI at work from a productivity tool to a human-enabling force that supports happiness and well-being.
  2. Understand why community and belonging are critical drivers of happiness in increasingly digital and AI-augmented workplaces.
  3. Identify how poorly designed AI implementations can unintentionally increase isolation and unhappiness, and how to avoid it.
  4. Explore practical ways leaders can design AI-enabled environments that strengthen trust, collaboration, and connection.
  5. Rethink leadership in the age of AI by placing human happiness, relationships, and purpose at the center of technology decisions.

March 20, 2026

9am-2pm

Summit 2 Banquet Room

Crown Plaza Hotel

401 W Summit Hill Dr SW

Downtown Knoxville, TN 37902

Join us for a day that brings together energizing speakers and the newest insights in cognitive performance. We’ll explore the science of happiness and how it directly fuels motivation, engagement, and real productivity inside an organization.

Arrive on time to grab some coffee and settle in. We will be serving a nourishing lunch with interaction and fun. 

A retreat-style experience for leaders who need to refuel.

This is not another conference.
It’s a pause.

The World Happiness Fellowship is an in-person retreat designed for leaders across industries and disciplines who are carrying a lot—and want to leave resourced, grounded, and clear.

Expect research-backed insights, globally recognized speakers, and space to breathe, reflect, and reconnect with what sustains you as a leader.

Who will be there:
Leaders from business, nonprofit, government, education, healthcare, and community organizations.

Come as you are.
Leave refueled.

SHRM® PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT CREDITS

HR professionals can earn 3 PDCs toward SHRM-CP® or SHRM-SCP® recertification for an additional $15 

  • Attendees will receive a separate email with instructions to add PDCs. 

The Fellowship is just the beginning. It connects you to the Knoxville Happiness Coalition’s year-round leadership community; where monthly webinars and in-person gatherings support leaders in sustaining clarity, energy, and wellbeing long after the event ends.

Through the investment and support of the Knoxville Happiness Coalition, tickets for our Knoxville leadership community are available at a preferred rate of $30 per seat.
Get the BUNDLE OF JOY!!! Annual Membership to the Knoxville Happiness Coalition and World Happiness Fellowship 1.0 with $199 Founding Member offer included VIEW DETAILS
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World Happiness Fellowship Presenting Sponsor
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World Happiness Fellowship Partner
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Come for Fellowship Find Community

The Knoxville Happiness Coalition is for leaders who are committed to building healthier workplaces through consistent, thoughtful leadership. ~ Alexia Georghiou, Founder 

We are launching membership to the Knoxville Happiness Coalition, and we’re inviting leaders who understand that well-being and performance are not competing priorities. They are connected, and the organizations that recognize this are the ones that will thrive.

The Coalition is designed for executives, founders, and workplace decision-makers who want practical support in creating healthier, more resilient teams. Members will have access to monthly expert-led sessions on the issues leaders are genuinely dealing with: burnout and brain health, effective communication, cross-cultural awareness, executive presence, navigating sensitive conversations, and the policies that influence day-to-day experience at work.

This is not a motivational group and it is not theoretical. It is a professional community where leaders can learn, apply, and refine approaches that support both people and performance. It offers a space to stay connected to the ideas and practices that many of you are exploring through the World Happiness Fellowship, and to bring them into your organization with intention.

If you are building environments where people can think clearly, work sustainably, and contribute at their best, we would be glad to have you join us.

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Alexia Georghiou’s content has been developed and proven on the LearnFormula platform over 5+ years with inclusion in the 2025 mini MBA for CPA’s.

  • Taken primarily by:

    • Accountants

    • Project managers

    • Human Resources professionals

  • 25+ classes focused on holistic leadership development

  • 4.6 / 5.0 average rating

  • 2K+ verified reviews

As an adjunct professor at the University of Tennessee, Alexia teaches professional development courses on civility, listening as a leadership skill, executive presence and burnout.

Her writing has appeared in Florida SHRM Newswire and MSN News, and she has been interviewed by the Knoxville News Sentinel and HR Dive.

Alexia has lived experience as an executive woman in menopause. Her work, Menopause Matters: Supporting Women in the Workplace has been featured in HR Pulse by The American Society for Healthcare Human Resources Administration (ASHHRA). 

Under her leadership, the Knoxville Happiness Coalition Academy is recognized by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) to offer Professional Development Credits (PDCs) for SHRM-CP® and SHRM-SCP® through self-paced online and in-person learning programs.

Community for Purpose-Driven Changemakers

Access to Expert Leadership Development

Gain year-round guidance from leadership experts who help you strengthen your professional presence, communication, and decision-making skills.

Academy High-Impact Workplace Topics

Academy courses on AI, Executive Presence, Burnout & Brain Health, difficult conversations (including substance use), cross-cultural communication, generational motivation, crisis communication, ageism, menopause policy, and more.

Support for Creating Belonging

Learn practical strategies for empathetic leadership, employee well-being, and inclusive policies—empowering you to better support teams through challenges, changes, and growth.
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Our mission

KNOXVILLE HAPPINESS COALITION ACADEMY

Empowering leaders to create thriving, high-performing teams through our Academy

Alexia Georghiou is a keynote speaker on happiness and human-centered leadership, organizational development consultant, and founder of the Knoxville Happiness Coalition and World Happiness Fellowship.

Author of The Future of Work is Human and The Future of Success is Happiness featured at national and international conferences. 

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