Locking in the Time for High-Impact

by Joe Schroeder, PhD, Associate Executive Director, AWSA

AWSA Update Poll

In line with the August 31st edition's article by Joe Schroeder entitled "Locking in the Time for High Impact, by Sept. 30, I will have _____.

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Every year, as a leader in education, you are given the opportunity to uplift the life trajectories of countless students under your care. That is a given. What you do with the opportunity is the variable. And research and experience show that there is a great deal of variability occurring in leadership practice. Said in another way, where high-impact principals “show up” in their schools and what they do when they are there differs greatly from what is often the norm. This article is designed to share some practical tips for locking in your priorities on a weekly basis -- thereby making exemplary practice your common practice -- so that 2016-17 can be your most high-impact year yet!

Countless credible sources emphasize that those who wish for high-impact first need to understand where and how to prioritize their time. For example, Doug Reeves’ research on leading schools shows that such schools benefit from a powerful three-way combination of leadership focus, consistent monitoring / support of that focus, and cultivation of educator efficacy as a result over time. Importantly, Reeves highlights that it all starts with identifying a few thoughtful priorities at the outset because “leadership focus is a prerequisite for everything else that leaders do.” Similarly, Paul Bambrick-Santoyo’s work with exemplary schools of all sorts describes how leaders “leverage” a small set of focused leadership actions around disciplined priorities that they enact each week which, over time, position them to have exceptional impact on teacher growth and student learning. Perhaps Stephen Covey (guru on all that is high-impact) underscores this discussion best by explaining that highly effectively leaders and highly effective organizations particularly excel at “keeping the main thing the main thing.”

So where to begin? Where might you find your leadership actions for focused attention so that you too might “keep the main thing the main thing”? Jon Saphier, Founder of Research for Better Teaching, Inc., has developed a helpful tool for leaders to use in identifying their “vital few” learning leadership priorities for a given time period. This tool, sometimes referred to as the RBT Clock, presents twelve research-based approaches for high-impact by school administrators. Now a principal wouldn’t choose to pursue all twelve; rather, 1-3 might be suffice. And the thoughtful principal would be wise to select those “vital few” leadership strategies that are most needed by the local school culture / staff in support of whatever instructional improvements by teachers are underway. So consider what areas of focus you are pursuing as a school and then choose 1-3 leadership practices from the RBT clock that could best support your teachers to develop deep knowledge, disposition, and skill in those areas. For sake of illustration, let’s say that, for my school, I have chosen to focus on the three leadership strategies listed as 12, 3, and 6 o’clock respectively on the RBT Clock, as shown in this figure.

Once you have your “vital few” leadership foci, then it’s time to put the rubber to the road by living your priorities in your daily work (something we often call “the big rocks”). Translating your leadership priorities into specific calendar activities each week is a helpful, practical approach for extracting more impact for the effort expended, something Bambrick-Santoyo refers to as “locking in the week.” Since “the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing,” I first want to lay out what an ideal work week would look like when I am living my leadership priorities. So, for the 12, 3, and 6 o’clock leadership priorities that I identified for myself in the previous illustration, this might translate into the following calendar within a given week of my work. It is important to note that these identified leadership priorities go into my calendar first. I then would add other weekly commitments / priorities I have for myself, such as shown in this figure of my locked-in week. Once you have this latter “locked-in” week articulated for yourself, take a look to see how much “white space” (i.e., uncommitted blocks of time”) remain on your weekly calendar. If you have 30-50% available white space, Bambrick-Santoyo’s experiences would have you believe that you should be able to live these calendar priorities for your leadership as a norm, rather than as an exception. From my locked-in week example, you can see that I have about 40% of the work week as white space.

Finally, logic holds that what you can identify as priorities for one week can then be built as habitual leadership priorities for the remaining weeks of the school year. So ask your administrative assistant / secretary to take the “locked-in” week that you have crafted and then schedule those priorities similarly into each remaining week of the school year best she/he can. Then give her/him authority to schedule remaining time requests (e.g., parent and teacher meetings) that naturally arise over time as part of the normal principal work load as appointments around these prioritized activities (i.e., “big rocks”) rather than as replacements to them.

In summary, I believe you will watch your impact grow as a learning leader if you can live the three major points of this article:

(1) Identify your “vital few” leadership priorities for 2016-17,

(2) Lock your leadership priorities (i.e., your “big rocks”) into one week, then into every

week, of the school year

(3) Have the discipline to follow through on your calendared priorities as your new

norm, rather than as the exception, on a weekly basis.

We go into much greater depth around such concepts in both our Learning Leaders Academy (which launches in Oshkosh on Sept. 14) and in our Managing to Lead workshop (which next is offered on July 25, 2017 in Stevens Point). But, as always, if you have further questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to me directly ([email protected] or @joeschroeder23). Best wishes for the most high-impact year yet!!

References

Bambrick-Santoyo, P. (2012) Leverage Leadership: A Practical Guide to Building Exceptional Schools. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Covey, S.R. (2004 ) The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.

Reeves, D.B. (2010) Finding Your Leadership Focus: What Matters Most for Student Results. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Research for Better Teaching, Inc. (2015) Making Every School a Reliable Engine of Constant Adult Learning or Where to Show Up and What to Do. Acton, MA: RBT.