Shaping Myself into an Effective Leader

On pages 147 - 148 of the Jossey-Bass Reader, Robert Evans cites a partial quote that rang true to me as a core belief I have about effective leadership: “They [bring] themselves with them to graduate school…and the [take] themselves back to their schools…knowing some new things, perhaps, but still basically themselves” (Blumberg, 1989). While this thought may scare those that feel hard work and experience will trump innate ability and passion any day, it gave me an all-encompassing positive feeling about what I may be capable of producing upon completion of this program. I feel the passion for educational change in my bones, and have successfully led multiple organizations. What I feel I most need is a backbone of knowledge and true understanding of leadership vocabulary and how to mend them in application of second order change.

Leadership, like many other facets of human nature, is hinged upon appropriate balance; there is a continuum for multiple factors of effective leadership. For instance, the continuum of transactional and transformational leadership is one that will dictate a school’s fate. Will it bend to the will of bureaucratic reform agendas, encourage defiance and creativity through only a school-based agenda, or fall happily somewhere in between? Then there’s the continuum of McGregor’s theories X & Y: should the effective leader micromanage his workforce into submitting to a school vision due to their solely extrinsic motivating factors, or place the vision and goal production in staff members’ hands since they will be intrinsically motivated to produce significant tasks? There are many other continua for leadership improvement, and it seems that an effective leader will find his place on each before selecting his leadership position. Then, once he has met his staff and established a shared vision, he will shift along the continua (ever so slightly) until the scale of change shifts in his favor.

In determining the 3-5 characteristics each school leader must possess, I have to say I have an affinity for Mark Goldberg’s list, and until I complete this course and its assessment, I am not sure I have the leeway to produce a better one. To choose these characteristics is not to falsify my own beliefs, but to acknowledge that this list was compiled through soliciting successful school leaders, and to verify that I find myself thus far in full belief that these ARE the five most important characteristics of a school leader.

1) A Bedrock Belief – Walking your talk is easier when you truly believe in what you’re communicating to others – both verbally and nonverbally. I would be more willing to take risks if I were in a position of trust earned through affirmation of my own personal leadership strengths and weaknesses.

2) Courage to Swim Upstream – In today’s world of high-stakes testing and litigious minds, I value school leaders that hold their school to its own standards and vision, regardless of its popularity in the mind of bureaucrats. We have to be willing to discuss Dewey and Socrates’ views on education and experience while questioning the status quo. We have to determine where we stand on the continuum of child and curriculum, and hold our ground when others try to push us more toward one direction or the other.

3) Social Conscience – As Leithwood highlights in “Transformation School Leadership in a Transactional Policy World, the recession of the 1980s prompted a loss of public confidence in schools as the instruments for social improvement. While I believe parents should be the number one contributor to a child’s social development and improvement of understanding social norms, the school must follow up these efforts as a close second. Schools should embrace their standing as a litmus paper for the surrounding community, and reach out to the greater world in an exchange of ideas and principles, for our common philosophical question on this earth is, “What does it mean to be human?” (IB Philosophy HL Course Focus)

4) Seriousness of Purpose – School leaders serve as the voice of their school. They should continually speak with a sense of purpose, a zeal for the goings-on of the students and faculty around them. We should maintain integrity and ethical behavior, as the development of the child is a serious, significant task. We should maintain academic rigor. If a student has mastered everything in his/her courses, why is he/she in school? This is a difficult, but important, question for every school leader.

5) Situational Mastery – Thus far my nemesis on the list… An effective school leader should be able to improvise, diffuse parental “bombs” unruffle “goose feathers”, provide impromptu resources for instructors, know the cliques of faculty members inside and out, and predict, predict, predict problems and possible solutions. I once heard a saying I rather like to fit this principle – “When you come to a wall, you have two options: Go around it as if it isn’t there, or shape the wall to fit your needs and climb over it, growing as an individual and leaving the wall behind you.” I think it’s far better to shape the wall, but I often find myself finding a creative way to go around it. I satisfy peoples’ needs by listening, but I don’t tend to actively engage in the problem to truly leave it behind.

I truly look forward to the next five weeks of this course, as I hope to make myself more of an authentic leader, and practice behaviors and concepts of motivation in my internship. Thankfully, I have a wonderful working relationship with my peers, so they should tolerate my experimentation rather well!