So You Want to Lead Effectively?

Before holding my current position as a Technology Integration Specialist, I taught middle school math for nine years. During that time, I also served as a grade level team leader and math department chairperson. I was a respected member of the Leadership Team by virtue of being a team leader and department chair. While I held those positions, I never really reflected much upon my leadership style or philosophy. I just took it for granted, “I had what it takes” to fulfill the job responsibilities entrusted to me. We might call it leadership “savvy.” The principal saw something in me that led him to believe that I was the best person for these jobs and I was not going to let him down.

I had a good rapport with the majority of the people I worked with and for the most part everyone did what they were supposed to. I think my organizational skills and attention to details served me well as department chair and team leader. I knew from year to year inside and out what my team and department and I were expected to carry out and accomplish. I was good at it. As I look back now, it’s clear to me that there was very little collaboration or engagement with all constituents. The principal, who was primarily driven by test scores and school accreditation, ran a tight ship. He was in charge. No one dared to rock the boat. It was his way or the high way. He told me what needed to be done and I did it. I told my team and department what needed to be done and they did it. It was rarely up for discussion. It was very top-down leadership, like the pyramid model.

Clearly the leadership landscape has changed, (how did I miss it?), and my narrow vision based on my very limited experience of an allegedly good leader has been blown out of the water! After so much reading, reflecting, discussing, and deliberating the contemporary leadership theories and models during the past three weeks, I see now the lamb taking precedence over the lion, unheroes eclipsing heroes, and PEOPLE ranking higher than policies, procedures, processes, and physical plants. Nowadays, when you lead a school, organization and detail management will only get you so far. It’s more about serving and transforming leadership, gathering at tables and guiding from the side, swimming upstream and respecting those you wish to silence. No one is on the mountaintop calling all the shots. The mountaintop is where we’re going, propelled by vision and passion, collaboration and shared leadership, synergy and the pursuit of excellence. That is where we’re going to experience and celebrate the success of all students! To get there, we need leaders who are effective:

E - Egos left at the door; servant model
F - Focus on the prize, i.e., promoting the success of every student.
F - Form alliances with all stakeholders.
E - Emotional management: take care of self
C - Collaborate and problem solve
T - Trust and integrity; talk the talk AND walk the walk
I – Improvement of student learning is the foremost idea
V - Vitality and Passion; inspire them to follow you
E – Envision success and demand excellence

If I had to write a definition of an effective leader before I started this course, I probably would have emphasized the organizational and managerial aspects of leading with a hierarchical bent. "Old school" leadership, that is what I knew; that’s what I had experienced for most of my teaching career. And the gentleman who was leading that way was held in high regard, touted as “one of our best.” That may have worked then, but it will not work now. In summary, I believe that a successful principal today must (1) be willing to serve students, staff, and the community, (2) be willing to stop, listen, and rethink, (3) be open to change and new ideas, and (4) believe passionately that students can succeed and that teachers can help make that happen.

Extreme Leadership: Power to the People

It’s not uncommon these days during a quick channel surf, (which I’m really good at), to encounter shows like “Extreme Makeover:  Home Edition,” “Nip/Tuck,” and “What Not to Wear.”  These programs, with their promises of rapidly transforming one’s home, body, and wardrobe, indicate that the mood is ripe for changing where we live, how we look, and what we wear, especially when these things are lacking or insufficient for survival and satisfaction.  Is it surprising then that a new style of leadership is being prescribed for school leaders in the 21^st Century, i.e., “transformational” leadership to replace “transactional” leadership?  I think not!  Maybe that need to change and adapt was always part of our psyche and culture, and is only now making it to the pop charts.  But when it comes to school leadership, it just makes sense that if the tried-and-true ways of doing things aren’t working, then it’s time for us to change, and I mean radically change, to transform, to make something new out of the old, even to the point where the original is indiscernible, as long as the results are better and constantly improving. 

Let’s consider a new show, a spin-off, and call it “Extreme Makeover:  School Leadership Edition.”  Instead of architects and carpenters, we have principals and teachers.  Just as the design team is completely comfortable allowing the demolition of the old structure to make way for the new, our school team is okay with letting go of the old ways of doing things as leaders.  Instead of power relationships, unidirectional interactions, and linear thinking, they welcome a democratic approach among teachers and students, lots of relationships and interdependence, and “thinking outside the box.”  The task is laid out:  we need a new way of doing school to improve student learning.  What can you give me?  The outcome is uncertain, but the leaders trust that their players will support and enhance the vision because they have been given a role in developing it.  There’s more to be gained when they buy in and celebrate what they bring to the table rather than backing down and complying to policies and procedures from on high just to get by.  Where are the innovation, creativity, and transformation in that?  Give them a voice and a chance and watch what happens!

I think this transformational leadership has great potential in the area of technology integration in schools.  However, it will take a very daring leader to make it happen, one who appreciates standards but doesn’t enforce them in a lockstep fashion.  One size doesn’t fit all!  Schools are not assembly lines.  Giving students the same textbooks, lining them up in the same rows, and following the same course schedules year after year hasn’t quite worked.  The results have not been spectacular or radical.  Do we repeat this mistake by doing the same with our technology tools?  Do we give every student and every teacher the same set of tools and software and show them exactly how to use them to get exactly the same results?  How boring and unimaginative!  I think the time has come that we give up our control and give over the power. Stop wasting time obsessing over the training manuals, user guides, and policies, and making sure everything is in working order.  Try everything!  Don’t rule out the latest gadgets because “we’ve never done it that way before.”  Imagine the possibilities if we gave teachers and students the tools and just let THEM figure it out, let them discover how it applies.  Is this extreme?  I don’t think so.  It's what our current situation demands!  Who’s ready to take a chance?