“The most powerful predictor of student achievement is the quality of the relationships among the adults in the school.” Harvard Principals Center
Welcome to the blog post on the practices of a savvy school leader.
Let’s have a conversation on the school leader and developing relationships.
It has been my experience that, as proposed by the Harvard Principals Center, the relationships among the adults in a school has a great deal to do with the culture that exists within the school and the climate within the classrooms.. For the purpose of our conversation, when I speak of adult relationships, I am referring to all the individuals or groups that are related or impacted by the school. Wagner and Kegan, et. al. (2006) refers to relationships in schools as the quality of attitudes, feelings, and behaviors of various individuals and groups toward one another as they engage in the work of helping all students learn.
It is worth it for school leaders to invest in developing “soft skills”, that are helpful to building and nurturing healthy relationships with stakeholders (Sanfelippo & Sinanis, 2016). The principal must realize that these stakeholders make decisions that affect school culture. One of the characteristics of a change leader, as suggested by Michael Fullan (2001), he describes relationships, as being the hearts, souls and minds of adults in the school. Fullan (1997), says, that with so many inevitable battles within the role of principal, it is vital to seek alliances. He warns that it is foolhardy to continue to act fearlessly if you are not at the same time developing alliances.
Questions to Focus the Conversation
As you read through the text and reflect on the conversation, please keep the following questions in mind to maintain a focus on the school leaders creating relationships.
- Whys is it important for the school leader to develop relationships?
- What are the common relationship that exist among teachers in a school?
- What kinds of relationships does the school leader need to develop?
- How does a school leader develop and maintain collegial relationships in a school?
Taylor and Chanter (2016). The relationships to build are situational, but usually involve students, teachers, parents, member so of the community and important political officials
Leaders can benefit from establishing personal connections. That is going out of their way to make connections. Sanfellippo and Sinanis (2016) provide an example of a principal who dedicates his morning for making personal connections with staff. His goal is to see with each staff member at least once a month. Each day starts with him heading outside to greet students and parents dropping them off.
The school leader has responsibility for two forms of relationship building, that of promoting the building of relationships among and between others and in establishing their own relationship with others. When the school leader works to promote relationships among and between others, we should consider the work of Roland Barth (2006), founder and former director of the Harvard Principal’s Academy Dr. Barth has identified the most common relationships in school as:
Parallel Play, he describes, as a teacher in a self-contained classroom, with a piece of artwork over the door window. This teacher is not interested in the practices other teachers, has little contact with them. A member in one of my used the following example to show what they believed represents parallel play “Here, we all live in our separate caves.
Adversarial, Dr. Barth describes as purposely withholding information, blaming each other and pointing our weaknesses in fellow teachers to parents and others. He used an example given to him by a principal when he said, “I once heard a Boston school principal offer this sage observation: “We educators have drawn our wagons into a circle and trained our guns—on each other.”
Congenial, Barth describes this relationship as personal and friendly but not collaborative or professional. He offers the example of a school where a congenial relationship exist when, a principal gives a teacher a ride home so she can care for her sick child.
However, Roland Barth suggests that, in the most successful schools, there is a collegial relationship among the teachers and staff. He offers a quotation from the Famous baseball manager Casey Stengel once muttered, “Getting good players is easy. Getting ’em to play together is the hard part.” Schools are full of good players. Collegiality is about getting them to play together, about growing a professional learning community. Dr. Barth said that in the schools where he decided had a collegial relationship, he saw the following signs.
• Educators talking with one another about practice.
• Educators sharing their craft knowledge.
• Educators observing one another while they are engaged in practice.
• Educators rooting for one another’s success.
Now that you know the characteristics of the four most common relationships among adults in a school and that adult relationships have an impact on student achievement. How does a school leader promote a culture of collegiality within their school? Lambert (1998), suggests that school leaders promote relationship building by providing the opportunity for individuals to interact with one another and share work and responsibilities. The author believes these activities teachers will tend to listen and collaborate cross boundaries erected by disciplines, grade levels, expertise, authority, position, race, and gender.
Researcher Judith Warren Little (1990) suggests that school leaders can do the following to foster collegiality:
State expectations explicitly. For instance, “I expect all of us to work together this year, share our craft knowledge, and help one another in whatever ways we can.”
• Model collegiality. For instance, visibly join in cheering on others or have another principal observe a faculty meeting.
• Reward those who behave as colleagues. For instance, grant release time, recognition, space, materials, and funds to those who collaborate.
Protect those who engage in these collegial behaviors. A principal should not say, for instance, “Janet has a great idea that she wants to share with us today.” This sets Janet up for a possible harsh response. Rather, the principal might say, “I observed something in Janet’s classroom last week that blew my socks off, and I’ve asked her to share it with us.” In this way, leaders can run interference for other educators.
When we examine the responsibility for the school leader to build personal relationship, Lunenburg and Ornstein, (2012), use the term relational behavior. The authors suggest that a school leader exercises relational behavior engages in two-way communication provides socio-emotional support, “psychological strokes,” and “facilitating behaviors.”
The fourth principle identified in The Leader in Me, byCovey, Covey, Summers, and Hatch, D. K. (2014) encourages parental and community involvement. Cover suggests that by involving parents, families and community members is an essential part of a schools success. This involvement gives them a sense of ownership and pride over the school, which will make them want to participate in improving the school. Businesses, foundations and other organizations can all be sought out as part of the school improvement plan.
School leaders when making a decision need to consider how completing the task will impact the culture and relationships in the school. Gordon, Alston and Snowden, (2007), found that those managers who displayed relationship-oriented behavior concentrated not only on the task but also on their relationships with subordinates. The ideal is that a decision or proposal will both accomplish a beneficial task and enhance the relationships.
I have learned that in school leadership building a strong circuit of relationships is crucial to my success and effectiveness. These relationships need to be personal and built on a foundation of respect and trust. Trust has been referred to as the glue that holds any organization together. Schools and school districts are no exception. Trust is built through consistent and predictable actions. It is the responsibility of the school leader to reach out and initiate the relationship. Green (2010), provides a review of the literature that presents five approaches that have been found to be effective for school leaders in relationship building:
- Establishing trust
- Fostering effective communication
- Encouraging commitment
- Fostering collaboration
- Reaching closure on organizational issues
Several of the chapters in this book refer to maintaining and active two-way communication with others. As the school leader, you represent the school and the perception they have of the school is based on their relationship with you. Being visible around school, participating in community agencies and organizations, and always presenting your school, staff and students in a positive way, all help in forming the foundation for creating and maintaining relationships.
While serving my school and school district positions, I soon became aware of the importance of my duel roll of accomplishing a task and maintaining personal relationships. The relationships first need to be based on a common set of beliefs and upon the mission for the schools direction. In an earlier chapter we had discussed creating a mission for the school and the importance of involving representatives from all the school and community constituencies in its development.
One way I balanced the task and relationships is to have a check list of school and community constituencies. Each decision, program proposal and procedural change I considered, started with a review of how it would affect each of the constituencies and impact my and the school’s relationship with the individual or group. As a school leader, I knew the importance of balancing the benefits of a decision, program proposal or procedural change with the way it would be received by each stakeholder group. This does not mean, to make sure everyone has to be satisfied with a decision. However, it may be necessary to modify one or more of the aspects of the decision so as not to alienate someone or a group. We will discuss this further, in a future chapter on dealing with opposition and resistance. If after taking this list under consideration, the collateral damage to relationships is minimal or unavoidable, the decision needs to be rolled-out in a way to reduce the perception that it will adversely impact the person or groups. Of course this can be done, by both having already established an open relationship and credibility, so the school community has confidence in you and offers you the benefit of the doubt. When the members of a school community give you the benefit of the doubt, it is a sign that you have created and maintained a positive relationship with them.
Hank Rubin (2007) uses the term relationship management. Rubin says that relationship management is the purposeful exercise of behavior, communication, and organizational resources to affect the perspective beliefs, and behaviors of another person so as to influence that person’s relationship with you and your collaborative enterprise.
Because leaders’ relationships skills and emotional qualities have a profound effect on the communities they lead, administrators develop self-awareness in these areas and create plans to acquire or strengthen interpersonal and communication skills. As Roland Barth had presented, as school leaders is to lead the culture of the school toward a collegial relationship.
This can be done, first by leading by example and to provide school staff with the time and opportunity to establish relationships among each other and with their students, parents and others members of the school community. There are many ways to do this, but the important thing is in order to reach a collegial culture, a congenial relationship needs to be realized. The school community members need to respect and trust one another. Schools are right for this to happen, all the players have a common interest, the success of their students.
Faculty meetings need to be more focused on participative professional development, parent involvement must be welcomed and appreciated and school staff should be involved in the community agencies and organizations. In a later chapter we will have a conversation on how our relationship with the business community, community organizations and institutions of higher education can enhance learning opportunities for students.
Researchers have ascertained that a leader’s style consists primarily of two major types of behaviors: task and relationship. They indicate that the significance of this idea is not to be understated. That, whenever leadership occurs, the leader is acting out both task and relationship behaviors; the key to being and effective leader often rests on how the leader balances these two behaviors. Together they form the core of the leadership process. Northouse (2007)
” The three most important words in education are : relationships, relationships and relationships.” – Courdos (2015)
We have all heard the phrase, “It’s not what you know it’s who you know.” I have found that, who you know is crucial to being a successful school leader. The many relationships I have created with others and facilitated among and between others has greatly contributed to my effectiveness.
The school leader needs to balance the accomplishment of a task and the importance of maintaining relationships. We must continually ask ourselves, “Is this decision worth the collateral damage it could cause to my and the schools relationships.” We don’t need to make sure all constituencies are treated the same with a decision, just to understand how it will affect them. Heifetz and Linsky (2002) refer to relationships as capital for leaders, through them effective leaders can enact change. Without them, leaders will fail to elicit change but will fail in almost every endeavor.
“We need to remember that relationships come first, and are necessary to make change possible. ” Fullan (2001)
It makes the school leader’s job a lot easier, when positive relationships exist among members of the school community. Here the school leader can serve as a role model, so the school community sees how him or her creates and maintains relationships.
Being visible around school, participating in community agencies and organizations, and always presenting your school, staff and students in a positive way, all help in forming the foundation for creating and maintaining relationships. If people personally know you and have gained respect and trust in you, they are more likely to provide you with the benefit of the doubt on your decisions.
Esther Quintero in her article Elevating Relationships: How Collaboration Shapes Teaching and Learning, (2027) speaks of the interpersonal relationships being important to the effectiveness of a school. The author suggest that when schools prioritize strengthening the interpersonal aspects of teaching and learning, even schools serving low-income students can attract, develop and retain skilled and stable faculties and achieve good academic results.
A sign that you have established strong constituency groups is when it is said, “I know Walt always considers us when making a decision. I respect and trust him, so let’s support this decision, at least for now.”
It is my belief that developing relationships and promoting others to develop relationship is a practice needed to be performed by school leaders, in order to be successful in our high stakes, socially diverse and increasing challenging educational environment
Let’s end this post with a question for personal reflection, Have I balanced task and relationships in the decision I have made?
It is my hope that following our conversation, you have reason to reflect on how the school leader develops and maintains relationships.
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The Savvy School Leader Reflects on His or Her Practice:
Questions to Ask Ourselves for Professional and Personal Reflection
- Would my relationship with the teachers in my school be described as, parallel play, adversarial, congenial or collegial?
- Does my school represent a professional learning community?
- Is it common for my principal to see teachers in their classroom or his or her office?
- Do the teachers in my school take a collective responsibility for student achievement?
- Have I seen my school leader balance accomplishing a task and considering relationships?
- Do I trust my school leader and fellow teachers?
The Savvy School Leader Transforms Theory into Practice
Suggested Activities for Practical Application
- The culture of your school.
- The class is divided into groups.
- Each group creates examples of what each have seen among the teachers in their school who have exhibited:
- Parallel,
- Adversarial,
- Congenial and
- Collegial relationships.
- Each group identifies one example of each situation, then develops steps to move the situation from parallel play and adversarial to a collegial culture.
- The influence of relationship on the potential success of an activity, project or program.
- Groups are set up.
- Each group member is to reflect on an activity or project that occurred at their school that involved a wide range of stakeholders.
- With each brief presentation, the group members will identify how relationships promoted the success of the initiative.
- A representative of the group is to report out the results of the group assignment to the class.
- The principal as a role model for developing and sustaining relationships
- If you believe that your principal is effective at developing and sustaining relationships, explain why, providing three examples.
- If you believe that you principal is not effective at developing and sustaining relationships, based on the content of this chapter, provide three suggestions for him or her to improve.
Let’s Apply What We Now Know How the Savvy School Leader Develops Relationships to a Real-Life Case Study
Case Study Analysis
Upon arrival as the new principal of Atlantic Coast Middle School you encountered a toxic culture, that was very much adult centered. Students were looked upon as losers, and parents were the cause.
The PTA had been disbanded due to lack of interest and parent teacher conferences had been cancelled for the second consecutive year, due to teachers having called in sick on the scheduled day.
Teachers had construction paper blocking up the windows in their classroom doors, which were always kept closed even when not teaching. Small clichés of teachers ate lunch in each other’s classroom. The faculty room was used for storage.
The previous principal had given up on any type of collaboration and he had not even held a faculty meeting in three years.
Group Discussion:
- Describe how you will find out the causes for the current relationships existing in this school.
- Explain the steps you will take to move the culture of this school to be more collegial?
- Who are the key people, you can work with to turn around the culture of this school?
- Identify the characteristics of the savvy school leaders you will use to promote a more collaborative relationship among the teachers at Atlantic Coast Middle School.
BIBLOGRAPHY
Barth, R. S. (March 2006) Improving Relationships Within the School House. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development 63 (6), 8-13.
Couros, G. (2015). The Innovator’s Mindset: Empower Learning, Unleash Talent and Lead a Culture of Creativity. San Diego, CA: Dave Burgess Consulting Press.
Covey, S. R., Covey S., Summers, M and Hatch, D. K. (2014) The Leader in Me. New York, NY: Simon & Shuster.
Fullan, M. (1997). What’s Worth Fighting For in the Principalship? New York, NY: Teachers College Press
Fullan, M. (2001). Leading in a Culture of Change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Gordon, G., Alston, J. A., Snowden, P. (2007). School Leadership & Administration. McGraw Hill.
Green, L. R. (2010. The Four Dimensions of Principal Leadership” A Framework for Leading 21st Century Schools. Allyn & Bacon.
Heifetz, R. and Linsky, M. (2002). Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive Through the Dangers of Leading. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing.
Lambert, L. (1998). Building Leadership Capacity in Schools. Alexandra, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development:
Lunenburg, F. C., Ornstein, A. C. (2012). Educational Administration: Concepts and Practices. Wadsworth.
Northhouse, P. G. (2007) Leadership: Theory and Practice (4th ed.) Sage Publications
Rubin, H. (2007). Through Other’s Eyes: A Collaborative Model of Leadership. Corwin Press.
Sanfelippo, J. and Sinanis, T. (2016). Hacking Leadership: 10 Ways Great Leaders Inspire Learning That Teachers, Students and Parents Love. Cleveland. OH: Times 10 Publications.
Quintero, E. (Summer 17). (2017) Elevating Relationships: How Collaboration Shapes Teaching and Learning. American Educator. Vol. 41, No.2.
Taylor, R. T, Chanter, C. (2016). The Coaching Partnership: Tips for Improving Coach, Mentor, Teacher and Administrator Effectiveness. Rowman & Littlefield.
Wagner, T and Kegan, R. et. all (2006). Change Leadership: A Practical Guide to Transforming Our Schools. John Wiley & Sons.
Warren-Little, J. (1990). School Success and Staff Development in Urban Desegregated Schools. Education Research Journal
SUGGESTED READINGS
Fullan, M. (2001). Leading in a Culture of Change. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Taylor, R. T, Chanter, C. (2016). The Coaching Partnership: Tips for Improving Coach, Mentor, Teacher and Administrator Effectiveness. Rowman & Littlefield.