TregoED Sandy Wozniak, Author at TregoED

Initiative Overload – Part 2: Avoiding Scattershot Implementation

August 8, 2019

Often, the thought of “one more initiative” is overwhelming for staff members. Initiatives may come from several different directions – district, department, PLC, etc. and be layered over top last year’s initiatives. Vetting new initiatives to see if you have the capacity and resources to succeed should be your first step (see previous blog). But, if in fact, the initiatives have been deemed to have merit and be appropriate, proper planning for implementation and assessment is crucial to ensure that staff will not experience fatigue and burnout before their year begins. Often, it’s not the number of initiatives in your district, but the scattershot implementation and layering, that cause the confusion and excess work.

So how do you launch organizational change initiatives and ensure fidelity, so you achieve goals and positive results? To begin with, you need:

Clarity about purpose – goals, expectations, and measures of success
Planning and sustained focus on implementation
Willingness and ability to invest the necessary resources
The capacity to do justice to multiple simultaneous initiatives

According to Dave Mattson, author of The Road to Excellence, to avoid common mistakes you should also:

Reach out to key stakeholders for feedback
Make key decisions collaboratively with your team
Communicate
Reinforce the reasons for the initiative and assess the change as you go along.

You can increase the capacity of your leadership team in all four of these areas by providing the tools to make effective, transparent decisions, prioritized and detailed plans and a process to detect and assess when things go wrong.

Implementing an initiative is a journey, but implementing several overlapping initiatives is a journey that requires a road map and critical thinking skills.

Initiative Overload – Part 1: Can you really do it all?

July 24, 2019

“Most people have far too many initiatives. Stay focused on your main purpose. There will always be more good ideas than the capacity to execute them.” Sean Covey

Luckily there is no shortage of worthwhile ideas or initiatives out there! So many worthy initiatives begin with the hope that this one will be the magic bullet – the one that increases academic success, improves climate, or streamlines administrative tasks. Restorative justice, new academic programs, classroom strategies, behavioral plans, professional learning programs -each of these initiatives and most others are worthwhile. But why are we doing them? Without a cohesive vision, overarching goals or compelling “why” that ties them together – and some well thought out implementation strategies – we run the risk of disjointed initiative overload -looking more like a tangled ball of string than a comprehensive plan for change.

Often, we accomplish more meaningful results by doing a better job with fewer things. As French author, Andre Maurois put it, “He who wants to do everything will never do anything.” Sometimes there is so much to do we know we cannot do justice to all that needs our attention. The same is true for initiatives- there are only so many we can do well at one time– and expect others to do well, also.

Can you really do it all?

When we have the discretion of choosing what to pursue or put forward, how do we determine what initiatives are worth the time and resources? Before adopting a new initiative, we can ask ourselves:

Is this a critical component of achieving an important goal for my school or district and how does it allow us to do what we are not otherwise doing?
What am I willing to not do because I am choosing to focus on this initiative?
How will I communicate the purpose of this and make sure to keep that purpose front and center?
Whose support do I need and what specific steps need to be taken in order to implement this?
What specifically will be different as a result of this and how will we measure success?
Would we be better served by investing time and resources in initiatives already in progress?

Before starting a new initiative, evaluate whether it’s a worthy priority that will produce results and have support. Read our next blog to determine how to successfully implement new initiatives to ensure their success alongside existing initiatives.

Making Decisions with Increasing Clarity

July 9, 2019

In a multi-part discussion of Common Administrator Mistakes and What to do Instead, (an Education Week Blog by Larry Ferlazzo), Andrew Miller, who has worked with educators world-wide, says “I think one of the biggest mistakes I’ve seen administrators make is lack of clarity on how decisions are being made….For example, an administrator might be sharing different options of schedule changes in order to receive feedback and decide. What could happen is the administrator isn’t clear what the process is he/she has in his/her head.” (emphasis is mine)

No surprise there, if you, as an administrator, keep your decision-making process “in your head” – your staff will likely feel “confused, wary, frustrated and disrespected.” Miller goes on to say, “People appreciate and need clarity, and making decision making rules visible and not hidden can make the process of that decision clear and build trust as well.”

This underscores the importance of consistently using a “formal” or standardized decision-making process like Decision Analysis and educating your staff on the process. Making the “decision-making rules visible” will also help you avoid what Dr. Jason Kotch sees as the additional common mistake of inadequate communication. Consistently using a process can help achieve many of Dr. Kotch’s key steps for enhancing communication, such as:

Establish norms to value everyone’s perspective regardless of position.
Facilitate the conversation so that the minds of the whole group can develop better ideas and solutions.
Share ideas and decisions with all stakeholders.
Invite others into the conversation and ask reflective questions.

Dr. Kotch adds “Without effective communication, you can turn good intentions and better decisions into big mistakes.” Using a transparent decision-making process lays a great foundation for an effective communication plan by making your thinking visible to all from start to finish.

With all the diverse decisions that cross administrator’s desks it is easy to understand how mistakes can be made, making your decision-making process visible is a great first step in providing clarity and improving communication and avoiding the common problems so many experience.

Use It or Lose It: Making PD Stick

June 14, 2019

The notion of “summer slide” is familiar to us all – that a certain amount of what is learned during a school year is forgotten or “lost” during the summer or times of disuse. While studies vary, the general finding is that the less certain concepts/skills are utilized, the greater the loss. We commonly lament the existence of summer slide for students – and seek ways to combat it. But knowing how easily skills loss occurs, do we work to combat that same slide for skills we as educators acquire?”

Most us have experienced having once been quite competent at something (e.g. playing the flute, booting a soccer ball, speaking a foreign language, calculating the volume of a sphere) – only to find ourselves “rusty” after returning to the activity after a significant hiatus.

But why do we retain some skills – e.g. riding a bike – while losing others? Some researchers posit that the more we value a skill and the harder we worked to develop it, the more we will retain it. Even after long periods of disuse, we more quickly regain those skills we value and worked at to master. And while using new skills feels awkward and unnatural to learners of any age, learners are more likely to push through the discomfort when they see value and relevance in what they are learning. And all skills require repeated practice.

Complex skills – like critical thinking and using analytic process- develop over an extended period of time. As with other skills, they feel awkward when learning and require repeated practice. Even with carefully designed workshops conducted to provide participants with enough of a grounding to address issues using process, practice is still needed. The more complicated and critical the issue or situation and the more stakeholders involved, the higher the level of required skill. Just as with students in schools, this ability develops over time – with practice, feedback, and reflection on successful and less successful use. And, as is true with all professional development, using the skills back on the job prevents skills loss.

Some ways districts can ensure skills stick:

Set a goal to use skills at least 2-3 times within 2 months of a workshop (use soon after a workshop dramatically affects continued usage)
Model use of skills at meetings, when making recommendations, etc.
Expect others to use the skills in these or other situations
Seek opportunities to practice applying skills on real issues
Privately and publicly reinforce use of skills to encourage further use
Have expert resources on staff who can support/coach use of skills
Find one type of decision (e.g. hiring, purchasing, etc.) in your systems and require use of process for those decisions

Like all education, professional development represents a significant and potentially invaluable investment. It’s worth ensuring it pays off! What steps do you take to make sure that your professional development sticks?

Department/Organizational Action Planning: Where the rubber hits the road

June 5, 2019

Developing a Strategic Plan that outlines your mission, vision and high-level goals for the next three to five years is an important task. But developing plans to ensure those goals are achieved, is where the rubber meets the road. No high-level goal will be realized until each department, school, and person, is clear on what they need to do in support of it. Using a solid process can provide better thinking producing better results.

Without a detailed roadmap, departments often have diverse approaches to their planning, or even worse, they have no structured plan and end up misfiring on achievement of district goals. Tuscaloosa City Schools under the leadership of Dr. Michael Daria, was determined to avoid this fate by ensuring individual departments used specific steps to drive the planning process. Although departments differed in their goals and objectives, a common language and step by step process ensured that each collaboratively devised a realistic and actionable plan which will help the district achieve its goals.

Recently, Tuscaloosa’s Special Education Department completed its planning to ensure optimal outcomes for students receiving specialized services. Staff members at the middle school and high school worked to create and sustain more effective advisory programs. And those involved in the Career-Tech program developed a comprehensive 3-year plan for continuous improvement. Each department/program now has specific, actionable goals – and a plan for achieving them!

The planning process helped each department go beyond goal setting. They each:

Developed an understanding of district goals as they relate to their department/program to get a clear picture of the current situation
Set departmental and program goals and objectives that support both district priorities and the needs of the department.
Determined indicators of success by asking: “What will success look like? What are the ideal outcomes?”
Developed a specific action plan for each objective, that specifies action steps, what group or individual is responsible and a due date.

TregoED’s departmental planning model allowed each area to develop comprehensive action plans that will help guide them over the course of the next few years and will serve as a GPS to help ensure continuous improvement. Even the best of district Strategic Planning is only a dream without a well thought out plan at the department level. You can achieve “Better Schools through Better Thinking” with the right processes in place.

In Results We Trust

May 16, 2019

Last night I watched “Free Solo”, a documentary about Alex Honnold, the first person to successfully free solo climb Yosemite’s El Capitan. The feat is unimaginable: hanging tetherless from tiny finger and toeholds thousands of feet about the valley floor. It looks terrifying to me, but I never expected him to be so open to admitting that aspects of this can be really scary to him too. Why not? Perhaps because we so rarely hear risk-takers admit to fear. Or perhaps it’s just easier to assume that these people don’t even feel fear. Honnold’s willingness to share his vulnerability and occasional fears creates an opening for connection. In many ways he may be different from the average person, but in sometimes being afraid, he is like the rest of us.

While we may have seemingly “fearless leaders” at work, tough challenges can bring out the fear in most of us. Rather than deny it, perhaps we should embrace it. Admitting fear or uncertainty may provide an opportunity for connection and trust-building.

Prevailing wisdom suggests trust is a prerequisite for team efficacy – a necessary ingredient which enables teams to tackle tough challenges. But what if we have it wrong? In fact, what if we have it backwards? What if trust can’t be adequately built without facing fear and tough challenges together? What if it is not something that enables us to take risks – but rather something that develops after facing these risks together? Author Daniel Coyle, The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups, argues exactly that. He says that weathering a crisis or challenge together is what builds trust. It is in being vulnerable and effective together – experiencing fear and uncertainty while successfully doing the hard things– that we build trust.

So what are we waiting for? We needn’t wait for teams to build trust before they tackle the tough stuff; rather, we need to forge ahead and trust that teams will build those relationships because they’ve tackled the tough stuff!

Hiring a Linchpin Principal

May 7, 2019

Thamizhpparithi Maari [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)]

linch·pin

/ˈlin(t)SHpin/

A person or thing vital to an enterprise or organization.

“A good principal is the linchpin of student achievement in their building.”

A pin passed through the end of an axle to keep a wheel in position.

“Without a good principal at the helm, the wheels will fall off the wagon.”

Either definition reflects the importance of the role of principal in student achievement. Good principals should be able to set goals, establish high expectations, and develop the talent in their schools to fully support teaching and learning. Those skills are the linchpin in student achievement.

So, how do you ensure that you are selecting the best candidate to do all of that for your school? The first step is to use selective hiring procedures that establish criteria that reflect not only those standards, but the unique needs of the building and community they will lead. The second step is to use the data on candidates and their demonstrated skills to evaluate them in relation to that criteria to give you a clear picture and confidence in your choice.

Decision Analysis, a clear-cut decision-making process developed by Ben Tregoe and Charles Kepner, was designed and built to do just that. Using a research-based process also has many benefits beyond just making the “right choice.” It can negate the effects of favoritism, provide a clear written record and justification of how the decision was made, standardize hiring procedures throughout the district, and give you a way to utilize stakeholder input in a meaningful way.

You could say that using Decision Analysis is the linchpin to ensure that you are selecting the best candidate to impact student achievement.

TregoED has been helping educational leaders gain the capabilities to solve problems and make great decisions for over 25 years. For more information on how to make Decision Analysis part of your hiring process, contact us at 609-252-2539.

Hey – where did everybody go? Supporting tough decisions

April 17, 2019

What could choosing transportation fuel options, planning a billion dollar bond referendum, and selecting a new math curriculum series possibly have in common? If you said, “they are all issues TregoED clients are currently working on” – you’d be right! But in addition, they each:

involve major decisions aimed at addressing existing problems
have a multi-year impact on many people
may result in big purchases
involve varied stakeholders with diverse perspectives

Decisions of this magnitude are the kinds we need to “get right”. And usually there are several varied and firmly-entrenched opinions of what is right. These decisions often involve a task force or recommending body comprised of stakeholders. Undoubtedly there is lively debate and disagreement along the way. Analytic process provides useful structure and a way to navigate the twists and turns of information demands, group dynamics, and weighty decisions.

Most likely, the group will arrive at a Best-Balanced Choice – which may or may not resemble what each person initially envisioned. At this point, you’d like to think each task force member is on board with the choice and you have a coalition of crusaders ready to sally forth and spread the word about the benefits of your recommendation! But what happens when you feel like you’re the last man or woman standing? What if you have people who believe in the choice, but don’t want to put their neck on the line to support it? What do you do? It can be lonely and confusing to be abandoned in a moment of public accountability.

Some ways to handle this include:

Double check to make sure that there is indeed consensus – not resistance – about what is being recommended
Determine who is willing to “go public” and be part of presentations or discussions as you roll-out the recommendation. These folks will be your public champions or advocates
Recognize that some people are just not likely to “go public” – but not because they don’t support the choice. They may fear controversy or conflict – or may not feel empowered to speak out. Find other ways for these people to contribute. They may be the quiet leaders, influencers – or keys for successful implementation.
Prepare all participants for success by creating talking points using the Decision Analysis work.

Embracing a controversial idea or solution takes courage. Opposition doesn’t mean we did not choose correctly- nor are people cowards who want to avoid opposition. We just need to help prepare team members for what follows and recognize there are many ways to support a solution.

Smaller Meetings…Bigger Hot Seats?

April 1, 2019

Leaders often face big “hot seat” meetings – lots of participants, opinions, issues, and controversy. Having a simple standard process can help them make sure that people are heard, information is processed, and suitable actions are taken. But what about the numerous intimate meetings that take place every day in schools? IEP meetings, for example, put parents, counselors, Child Study Team members, and teachers together to determine the course of action for just one student. These meetings, dealing with emotionally charged issues such as student placement, programs, and personnel needed to support the child, can be just as heated – although on a different scale. Wouldn’t that same simple standard process, used by the Superintendent, be considered equally valuable in these situations?

The Situation Appraisal process in its simplest form can improve the actual meeting and outcomes:

Start off your meeting by clarifying the goals of the meeting and allowing all participants to voice their issues and concerns. Write each of those issues on chart paper or a white board to keep a visible record and reinforce that all parties are being heard.
Look back at each issue – ask contributors to clarify if necessary, by asking “what do you mean by…?”
Determine which issues need to be dealt with first. Remember that the order of actions needed, does not necessarily reflect the order of importance.
To avoid the common occurrence of repeating this same meeting at the next one, record an action that will help resolve each issue and assign it to a person with a due date. Determining “by whom?” and “by when” is a crucial step in moving towards a resolution of issues.

Anytime that you have different perspectives, priorities, and are discussing change that can evolve into new concerns, you have the potential for difficult meetings. Special education meetings and conferences often have those exact components – made more complicated by other considerations that must come into play: lack of resources, time, money, legal issues, etc. No matter what the size or scope of the meeting, having a simple tool or process that makes your thinking visible and transparent can reduce feeling like you are in the “hot seat” and help all parties feel confident that they have been heard and the resolution is the best for our children.

School Culture: Monkey See, Monkey Do

March 21, 2019

Think back to the last time you thought it odd that something was done a certain way– but were too afraid to ask, “why?” Sometimes, there is an excellent (albeit not obvious) reason. Other times, the reason makes less sense – or may be akin to “it’s always been done that way.” Asking “why?” helps us understand and learn – and perhaps even improve.

It’s fascinating how quickly we adapt to doing things the expected way – even when it doesn’t seem to make sense. You may have heard the story about the 5 monkeys in a cage who learn to not climb a ladder to avoid being sprayed with cold water. Long after the water stops spraying, the “experienced” monkeys prevent new monkeys from climbing the ladder to avoid being sprayed. The monkeys have learned the old lesson well and keep applying it – even when circumstances change.

How often are we like the monkeys? District cultures (the collection of norms, practices, etc. that influence how people operate and treat each other), can be enormously useful in teaching others about what is expected. But they can also be counter-productive when what is being communicated runs counter to district goals and ideals. For example, a school leader may say how much they value feedback and involvement. However, if they get defensive when you ask “why?” or they limit involvement to performing tasks – not ever participating in decision-making – there is a disconnect between the message (what is being said) and the reality (what is being done.) With district cultures, as with elsewhere in life, the old saying applies: “your actions speak so loudly, I cannot hear your words.”

District cultures often teach us about what is and is not accepted and expected. But are they teaching lessons we want people to learn? Maybe, like the monkeys – we learn never to ask “why?” We may think that avoiding the “stupid” question may save us some embarrassment – but what does it cost the organization? It is those “why” questions that help identify opportunities for improvement.

What lessons are being learned from your district’s culture?