Authentic leadership in education

Authentic leadership for me is about integrity... doing what is right even when no-one is looking, it is about having your ethical antennae up at all times, it is about relationships and it is about people.

Focus

To lead authentically in education I think there are two key places the leader needs to focus their energy. Firstly and most importantly is the learner. Trevor Grice, the founder director of Life Education Trust NZ, often quoted that with all decisions we needed to ask ourselves one question "will this make a difference for our children?" It makes decision making a whole lot more simple. If it is going to make a positive difference, especially a significant one, then that would suggest it is a path worth pursuing, if not then don't go there.

The second area of focus needs to be the people you have in your team. In schools these are your teachers and support staff. If you don't have them working as well as they can then the learners suffer.

Expectations

Now if we want our team to work as well as they can for the learners in our care then we need to be clear about expectations and these need to relate to making positive differences for our learners. I am not talking statistics here necessarily, sometimes we get too focused on numbers and forget the stories and the people that sit behind them. What I am talking about is the range of differences that could occur from fulfilling these expectations, and these may be social, academic, well-being, spiritual, physical etc.

We need to review the expectations regularly and ask ourselves, are they still appropriate? Do they reflect the needs of our learners today and in the future? And don't forget to ask ourselves if the language is appropriate. Once we have agreed on these expectations then we need to reinforce these valued outcomes by living them, promoting them, sharing the good news stories relating to them and whatever else we can to help them stay alive in our community.

I am sure many of you have heard theories around an individual or group usually aiming for the expectations that are held for them, meaning if you don't expect much of me then it is likely that I will not aspire to do much more than you expect. This is a generalisation of course but is interesting when we relate it to the workplace. We need to reflect on whether the expectations we have for individuals meet the wider expectations we have established.

Managing poor performance

If you have an underperforming staff member, and there are staff like that, then first you need to review the expectations you have around that person... do you expect them to fail? If so then it could be that they are living up to your expectations, which aren't particularly high. So you raise the bar.

There are many ways to raise the bar but ultimately we have two outcomes, they either improve or not. Some of this rests with the approach taken and this for me is where authentic leadership really comes in to play. It is suggested that people fail in the workplace for some major reasons; they need more training, this workplace is not the right fit for them or the job itself is just not the right one for them (aside from other circumstantial and motivational reasons of course). As an authentic leader how we have a conversation around expectations is vital, if the outcome is going to be one where the individual is left with their dignity as intact as possible then you need to be really mindful about how you construct this. For me it all hinges on relationships, finding a place and space where it is comfortable for them to have a conversation with you.

To be able to address the underperformance in relation to expectations that make a difference for our learners is important. To listen to the human being you are talking to and hear them is vital. I don't believe for a second this is easy at all, as a leader it can make you feel vulnerable especially when you are dealing with vulnerability in another person at the same time. That being said I don't think it is an excuse to hide behind procedure or process and forget the impact we are making on another human being. In the ideal world the other party leaves feeling heard and comfortable with the decision going forward, if they are in the wrong workplace or wrong profession they have had the opportunity to talk things through and understand it for themselves. If they are in the right place or profession but need to improve, again it has been discussed and they are now able to move forward knowing the expectations and that their leader is behind them in their development... both of these outcomes are positive for all parties and ultimately the learners benefit which is our primary focus.

Of course this isn't always the outcome despite our best efforts. We cannot control how another person will think or feel, we can only offer them the best opportunity to engage in professionally led dialogue for improvement.

Sometimes we will be faced with ethical dilemmas and the decisions we have to make are not going to be easy but we do have opportunities to do things as right as possible, and when given that chance I say go for the authentic leadership path!

Spending time... are you investing it well?

I love that phrase 'spending time'. It makes so much sense (or cents!) How often do we stop our constant doing-ness to consider if we are spending our time well? I know I don't do it often enough, however it occurred to me this evening that I really need to stop and think about it seriously.

Today I went out to work on a neat wee project, doing some filming with some folks I used to do some work for. It was a fun day out and I was lucky that my mum was able to look after our little boy. This evening I had to attend a meeting and my little boy was less than impressed that mummy was leaving again. The meeting was not particularly pleasant to be honest and as I drove home I started asking myself some big questions, the biggest being, was that a good use of my time?

I am lucky, there are many opportunities I am exposed to and I want to say YES to them all. However if I do that I find that I am actually unable to do them all justice and something suffers, usually my own wellbeing... this is an old treadmill I have been on and not an experience I wish to repeat yet again. So tonight as I was driving I did some maths, I am sure that many others have done this before me and probably far more eloquently but just in case here is some of my thinking.

There are 1440 minutes in a day. Now lawyers and accountants (and other businesses too I am sure) charge out their time in blocks of minutes. Imagine if in our lives every minute was worth $100. (please note: I chose a round number because maths isn't a strength of mine and it's a big lot of money because I think it helps to demonstrate a significant 'value' for our time) That's a lot of money in itself really but wait.... at that rate our time is worth $6000 per hour or $144 000 per day... wow, that is a whole lot of money. What would you do if you have $144 000 to spend?

If I had $144 000 to spend I would want to give some to my family, use it to help others, do what I could to be healthy and invest in my learning probably. Those things are important to me, so they'd be top of the list anyway. The disconnect comes when I look at how I have spent a day and I have not addressed those things in the measures I would like and worse still when I feel that the time I have had has been poorly used, taken for granted or wasted. Tonight for a short time I felt really angry but then I needed to think about what I was giving up to feel angry (see my post about being as big as you dare to be for more information about this type of mindfulness) and I also started to equate it to a dollar amount.

For every minute spent angry that is $100 worth of time gone that could have been spent with my family or in my learning or helping others. And if I spend half a day angry then I have wasted $77 000 worth of my time that could have been better spent on other things including investing wisely in my own health.
The same applies for screen time. Entertainment is great for our health, but it is all about balance and I know TV and other technologies are easy time thieves.

You see I just don't spend money like that, I am more conscious of what I do with my money, but I do let time slip through my fingers and wonder where another day has gone. I know it's normal that there will be days like that at times but I wonder what would happen if we were more aware and thought about where we are investing our time and whether we are really investing in our goals and the important things/people in our lives.

Letting go to keep moving ahead

Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing the monkey bars...
you have to let go at some point in order to move forward. C.S. Lewis

I like this analogy, I like it a lot. If we hold on too long then we might fall off altogether but we do have a choice!

Life is full of ups and downs, to be fair some people have had more than their fair share of disappointments. I have met a few people in recent months who have gone through significant change in their lives and the thing that comes through so strongly is the power that our attitude has on our ability to make peace with our circumstances (current or past!).

I remember hearing Robyn Moore speaking a long time ago about gratitude and forgiveness, how the act of gratitude helps us let go and move forward. During the session she got us to think of a past hurt and the people who were connected with it and then suggested that we think about what we can be grateful to those people for. At the time I struggled with this. She talked about the ability in that moment of gratitude for us to find forgiveness so we could move forward. It wasn't until a number of years had passed that this really made sense to me. Like a lot of folk I had had a bad relationship and it ended in hurt. I had moved on largely but it wasn't until one day driving in incredibly icy conditions where I really understood what Robyn was talking about. As I came to a steep downhill section, I was extremely nervous, the road ahead was treacherous... and at that moment it occurred to me to use engine breaking which my ex-partner had taught me. When I had navigated the worst of it for some reason the words of Robyn came back and it all made sense. I felt lighter, I felt really free.

There is a wise old saying that goes something like this, holding onto anger is like holding a hot coal and expecting the other person/people to get burnt. All is does is hurt us, it uses our energy, it has the capacity to sap our joy... all while the other party is usually quite unaware that any hurt or anger remains. I can't say that I have mastered this but the awareness I now have has helped hugely with more recent disappointments and given me a strategy to manage the ups and downs. Developing an attitude of gratitude is worth the effort.

I guess this also about owning our feelings rather than allowing your emotions to be dictated by others- we are not puppets and whilst we may not be responsible for the circumstances we find ourselves in, we do have power over our own emotions. This does not mean we will not feel anger or hurt or disappointment, of course we will and rightly so, but if we stay angry or hurt or disappointed then we need to look at ourselves and ask if we are hanging on to a monkey bar or hot coal that is no longer serving us. If we are holding on to those negative emotions we are potentially causing ourselves deeper hurt, greater pain.

We deserve every joy that life offers us and too often miss it when our hearts and minds are cluttered with unresolved anger. So, in thinking about this, who or what in your life could you from something to be grateful for so you can keep on swinging ahead in your life?

Image sourced: http://www.barbarabutler.com/glossary.php?doc_id=1104936268&section=climbing

What I learned from doing sit ups last month!

Well June was notable for a few reasons: I did my first presentation for a group as a speaker under my own name; I attended a meeting of a group I have become an associate with and learned heaps (mostly that there is still heaps for me to learn); I discovered some great publicity opportunities for a children’s theatre production we are putting together on a very tight budget; and I did a whole heap of sit ups and can still hold a plank position for more than 2 minutes and it’s this last one that has prompted me to write this week.

At the end of May something popped up on Facebook and I thought it seemed like a good idea at the time, it was sort of social (as I tried to rope in other FB friends) and I thought it would help stave off the preparing for hibernation instinct that I fall into as winter sets in. This idea/challenge was a sit up/belly toning exercise challenge for the whole of June, steadily increasing in number of reps and time as the days clocked by. To ensure I stuck with this regime I made it public on Facebook and set myself a pretty dire consequence for lack of completion and that was posting a photo of myself wearing a bikini!

It is now July, the challenge is completed. My belly is no trimmer really but my back hurts a little more now. Yes I know that isolated exercise doesn’t work and I also know that having chocolate, chips and cheese and crackers is not a recommended daily diet necessity (the hibernating bear instinct is strong in this one, and I figured that as I was punishing myself I deserved a treat now and then!!!) So why did I continue with this challenge when clearly it wasn’t my thing? Well for one I felt that I’d let others down if I didn’t and secondly and more importantly the consequence of not completing was too grim! This does prove that making goals public and setting powerful consequences supports motivation, that is a good thing. However it also proves that I am super self-conscious about my body and that is not a good thing. Why should a consequence like that be so incredibly negative?

I really ought to know better, I have studied the topic of body image, I have even taught young people about it. I am in my 40’s, my body has done well so far getting me here, it has helped grow and feed a little one, it has carried my over active mind around and tolerated the abuse of stress at times pretty well too. Seems bizarre to not appreciate it, with all the associated lumps and bumps.

And you see, when I think about the threat of posing in my bikini for all the FB world to see, I think that the years of bombardment through the media of what a beautiful body looks like has got me thinking I don’t measure up. And I don’t. Mind you when you start to delve into it, neither do most of the people in the glossly magazines either!  A few years ago I had a little bit to do with EDEN (Eating Disorders Education Network) and did a course with them around body image and critical media literacy which was a real eye opener to be honest. Even the models and actresses/actors that are hailed for their good looks are enhanced routinely in the photo-editing suite, and that is after the fitness/diet gurus, the hair and make up gurus and photographic geniuses have had their turn.

Seemingly innocent images when put under the microscope make you take a step back and start to wonder… I now can’t look at an image without asking, has this been enhanced? And so when I opened up a flyer that arrived for a pharmacy I think and saw this image I was amused… just doesn’t look right when you look at the shoulders, the shape of the back, the position of the arms including length… well not right if ‘perfection’ is what is being aimed for! 

And check out this one. It is one I have used quite a lot and appeared in Jezebel.com originally I think. It is great to have the original beside the enhanced cover photo. When you just look at the cover photo, it looks fine, she is beautiful as she should be, all is well in the world. But then if you look a little closer do you not think her front arm looks a little long? And what about her neck and waist? Compare the original with the enhanced image and it starts to look a little alien! 

Now some people suggest that as we know many images are enhanced we should accept it as the way the world works, inlcuding one industry editor who claimed that 'photoshopping is an industry standard' and that they photoshopped one celebrity so she was shown at her 'personal best'! (For more click here for an interesting article). It would seem that the advice is that we just move on because this is normal but I don’t think that resolves the issues. I knew that many photos were enhanced but until I sat down and was made really aware I just didn’t realise how subtle it was and how skewed my perception of ‘normal’ or ‘beautiful’ was when glancing at these images. So what could this be doing to young minds who are wrangling through the first awkward steps of defining who they are?  

Now I don't have all the answers but I do have a couple of suggestions: 

• this isn't just a girls issue, images of men are being manipulated with equal lack of consideration 
• there are some great folk out there challenging this photoshopped 'ideal' image mania, please see a couple below as examples that you could look at yourself and share with your friends. 
• we need to be educating our friends, colleagues and children about what is actually being done, how we are being duped so they are able to make informed decisions about the media they are viewing 
• be a positive body image role model... if you 'hate' your belly (and why would you as it is like the most amazing fuel processing machine ever!) please don't say this in front of your children... they look up to you (I also know this can be a little tricky at times when your favourite jeans won't do up at the end of the 'hibernating' season!) 
• be aware, notice how you feel and what you say to yourself when viewing other people's bodies in magazines, on the screen or in real life... if it is one of judgement about them or about yourself you might like to challenge some of that commentary to create a healthier respect for the diversity of the human body? 

In closing, I did consider putting a photo of me in my bikini in here as a challenge to the industry of falsified perfection but it is winter, it's jolly cold, and bikini's in winter are just plain silly, unless of course you are travelling somewhere warm! So in the spirit of sensibility I have opted instead to share the following videos. 

References and images: 

For image of Faith Hill http://www.fitsugar.com/Speak-Up-Photoshopped-Faith-Hill-419860
Jezebel.com for more info re. Faith Hill photo:  http://jezebel.com/278919/heres-our-winner-redbook-shatters-our-faith-in-well-not-publishing-but-maybe-god
For some interesting statistics: http://www.raderprograms.com/causes-statistics/media-eating-disorders.html
For some indepth discussion about media and body image: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1n3d88_killing-us-softly-4_news
Also check out EDANZ for information about services in NZ for disordered eating if this is a concern for you. http://www.ed.org.nz/ 
And there is a plethora of other material! 

What would you do for a sticker? Some thoughts on behaviour management and motivation.

Do you love stickers? I do, I have a huge collection of them! But they are problematic for me.

Over the years of working in schools I have heard some concerning statements from students, and staff talking about their classes. Things like when I have thanked a five year old for sitting on the mat when asked and her response is "do I get a sticker?" or secondary students who before undertaking a task or participating in a lesson ask "do we credits for this?"

The problem for me is that in both of these examples (and many like them) the students are looking for external motivation to participate in the learning opportunity or do what they know is the right thing. So what happens if there is no sticker or credit or shiny reward to be given? Do they give it less of an effort or switch off completely or decide to ignore instructions from now on? And if so, is giving the stickers and rewards really working out the way we would like them to?

I see that the use of external rewards is a strategy to help students manage their behaviour in order to get more from the learning opportunity. But I also see that it can become a bit of a game at times, a power play in the classroom. If we are working with students with difficult behaviours we may use external rewards to help them identify when they are demonstrating appropriate behaviour, and as a short term strategy this might work but I feel that long term reliance on external motivators is a risk.

The risk I feel is that if we keep strengthening the pathways for external reward/motivation and ignoring the need to enhance internal motivation we may be affecting the individual's sense of self efficacy, their sense of can-do-ness, and this may impact on their levels of resiliency. How will they cope when there are no stickers or when they think they have done enough for a sticker but it goes unrewarded? If I feel incapable without external validation then how will I cope when other things go wrong, when I have a bad hair day, when I fail an exam, when I don't get that job I apply for?

So should we be changing our approach to behaviour modification in the classroom?
Or should we expect our children to work it out?
Or should we look at our whole approach to teaching?
Or do we continue with our current system and keep on buying stickers?

John Shackleton in a presentation to school leaders talked about changing behaviour (he was talking about staff) and suggested in order to meet goals we need to have consequences both for if we meet the goal and if we don't meet it. I figure that there are some aspects from goal setting theory here that could work for our students...

1. Find out for individuals what switches them on and what switches them off... what they love and what they don't like. If there is an opportunity to get more of what they love then that is likely to be motivating and they are in charge of whether they get more of it because they choose the behaviour (largely!) As Nigel Latta says "how can we make it their problem and not ours?"
2. How clear are we about expectations and who owns these expectations? Is it us imposing something or can we find a way to share the ownership?
3. Is there a way that we can use consequences that are individualised rather than one size fits all? For those children who need support to manage their behaviour then we set up an approach that works for them, for others who don't by all means keep recognising it and praising as need be, after all they are being super role models for their fellow students, but again make sure it is appropriate.
4. How are we constructing our lessons, our daily routines and planning to best reflect the needs and motivations of the individuals that make up our classes? Does our school timetable allow for any flexibility? If it does, how can we best use it?

See, I think that behaviour modification is just one part of all of this. I wonder if some of what we see with behaviour relates to the needs of our digital natives and that if they go unmet then they will react. There are certainly a whole lot of factors that influence behaviour like diet, sleep, emotional wellbeing, illness, homelife, personal history etc. I don't mean to sound flippant, it can be extremely complex, so please consider this as a suggestion of one factor that we may be able to address when there are so many we are up against.

Clearly I am talking about more than just stickers, and I am not suggesting that we do not offer praise or reward or recognition when earned or needed. Timely, appropriate feedback is really useful for learners (old and young). What I am suggesting is it could be useful to review our behaviour management systems to ensure that what we are hoping to achieve is reflected in what we are seeing in our classrooms and that we are thinking about the big picture, rather than just the short term fix.


Below is a video of a summary of John Shackleton's presentation- there are a lot of really great gems in here for everyone and that's well worth the seven minutes viewing I reckon.

For more of John's videos check out his YouTube Channel here.