Health & Education

Response to Stella’s Competency Conversation of Implementation

all posts, Health & Education, ldrs501, Post 8.1, response post
\

Original post found here:

https//create.twu.ca/stellapetersldrs501/2018/11/22/stellas-strategic-competencies-blog-8-1/

Thank you for continuing to provide insights into the educational world, Stella, which reveals the intricate nature of relational decisions in every day functioning.  As I read through your post a few times, I wondered how an administrator achieves balance between the need for strategic decisions for growth and the need to build up staff members who are the conduits for delivering the program requirements.

Your own growth as an administrator is evident through your readiness to immediately implement aspects of strategic leadership studied each week!  As teachers, we know the best way to incorporate innovative practices is to immediately use one new strategy the next class day.  If we lay it aside, we will most likely carry on in our current practice. The steps addicts go through to change their entrenched habits (Lepsinger, 2010, pp. 141-145) is akin to educators reinventing their teaching practices.  Changing pedagogical perspectives is asking people to change themselves—thoughts, communications with parents, contributions to staff initiatives, personal practice—to align more closely with their reorganized MVV focus.  What scaffolding rubric do you provide for your staff to see concrete alignment with new goals in their own practice as well as in departmental changes?

Growth is exciting and painful at times.  You talk about the 50%growth in your school these past two years and how it is exciting yet tiring for everyone (Peters, 2018, para.1).  Do you have a goal for your growth?  What measures do you have in place to determine when your increase has matched your capacity for delivery of quality education?  Some schools in which I worked, the administration continued to accept registrations beyond the capacity for the school’s physical functioning according to the District Building Plan; the school has doubled its enrollment due to population drift and new housing developments.  There are still only the few washrooms there were when half as many students needed to use them.  There are high needs in our school and we no longer have meeting rooms for itinerant counselors, the Child and Youth Care Worker, the Speech and Language consultants, the Health Nurse who comes to assess our students with Health categories, the OT/PTs, or quiet spaces for highly anxious or sever behaviour meltdowns.  We’re hopping!!  While growth in numbers might look good in a numerical, how do we now deliver quality education?  As you mentioned, “we must be strategic in how we use our resources, space, an how to refine our programs” (Peters, 2018, para. 1).  When is enough, enough?

Your astute observation regarding acting systemically in your workplace, Stella (Peters, 2018, para. 2).  Without knowing the backstory of an organization, it is easy to dismiss the hard work that has gone on before by long-serving staff members.  This can create resistance even when strategic planning is sound and necessary.  The pre-existing conditions can skew the results of progressive thinking, even in seemingly simple decisions.  Listening is a necessary TSL skill to learn more about the people affected by decisions.  “Transformational leadership can help followers and colleagues smooth the tensions of disengagement, disidentification with the old situation, disenchantment with the new arrangements, and disorientation without anchors to the past or the future” (Bass & Riggio, 2006, p. 71). What is an appropriate timeline for observation and consultation for a new administrator before instituting changes?  How do you develop measures by which you determine when to move past the resistance to the new goal or consider the resistance a sign that the decision may not be pertinent in the moment?

Being in a position of leadership, Stella, you can provide actionable intelligence for how strategic leaders operate in education systems which are cumbersome to navigate.  I appreciate your openness and detailed insights into the day-to-day realities of requiring change from yourself as well as your followers.  God bless your efforts to serve as a faithful leader!

References

Bass, B. & Riggio, R. (2006).  Transformational leadership. New York, NY: Psychology Press.

Lepsinger, R. (2010). Closing the execution gap: How great leaders and their companies get results. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons.

Peters, S. (November 22, 2018). Stella’s strategic competencies || Blog 8.1. [Blog post] Retrieved from

https//create.twu.ca/stellapetersldrs501/2018/11/22/stellas-strategic-competencies-blog-8-1/

♫♪♫♪♪ These are a Few of My Favourite Things ♫♪♫♪♪ (8.1 competencies)

all posts, Health & Education, ldrs501, Post 8.1
\

COMPETENCIES

Becoming a Strategic Leader (Hughes, Beatty, & Dinwoodie, 2014, p. 268-269) identifies 11 competencies necessary for strategic leader development.  While I am not currently in a position of formal leadership, I have worked for numerous leaders with varying styles who always influence their employees.  Both effective and ineffective leadership examples have influenced my own career decisions so awareness of the powerful effect of strategic leadership infiltrates my workplace decisions. The three most immediate competencies required in my career include strategic planning, acting systemically, and building collaborative relationships.

Building Collaborative Relationships

Education is a career about people.  Investing in the strong teaching ability of my colleagues has no down side. Supporting, encouraging, assisting them in developing better practices in their own classroom and in broader school involvement reaps great reward for their students, the parent community, and our school’s peaceful functioning.  A positive work environment benefits everyone.

Having a strategic premise in thinking, acting, and influencing my work environment involves my relationship with my administrator.  Strengthening collaborative relationship also strengthens our administrator’s ability to fulfill their diverse leadership responsibilities; our school of 300 students has one 80% administrator and no vice principal with whom to share the leadership responsibilities. My colleagues and I need to develop a cohesive unit to best enable short-term leadership decisions which foster our long term MVV mandate and goals (Hughes et al., 2014, p. 249).  It is easy to criticize decisions without full knowledge of the factors involved and many staff members do this from the comfortable position of knowing they have no accountability.

Strategic Planning

Strategic Planning is necessary on both a personal level as well as a professional level.

Personally – “Behaviour change can be tough” according to Hughes et al. (2014, p. 269) which includes monitoring our own behavioural tendencies and not just our employees’ behaviours.  Wong (2018, para. 3), in his response to Kunal’s post, reflected on the need for self-management and self-regulation when developing any strategic leadership competencies.  Kunal was not as optimistic about the benefits of self-management in his organization (Kunal, 2018, para. 4).  The starting point for change is with me; I must model the changes and behaviours I hope to develop in others.

Professionally – The beginning of influencing others is consistency with positive results.  Most people want to fell valued (Lepsinger, 2010, p. 57), effective, and included in decision-making at work (Zhang, 2018, para. 11).  “Supporting individuals in changing the behaviours that will strengthen their leadership effectiveness is establishing an active learning and developmental support network” (Hughes et al., 2014, p. 269).

Acting Systemically

Since our new curriculum shift mandated by the BC Ministry of Education, I have witnessed an intense increase of complexities in decision-making at the school level.  Continual downloading of responsibility from the ministry to districts to schools demands strategic thinking for both short-term and long-term efficiency.  Decisions are interconnected which creates large impacts for even seemingly small changes in directions (Atha, 2018, para. 11).  A domino effect can easily occur if adherence to the MVV is disregarded; recovery is often slow as well as costly.  ‘Act in haste, repent at leisure’.  A vision for systemic growth or enhancement is connected to a broader understanding than the myopic view we often have of remedying our immediate discomfort.

Less Relevant Right Now

I agree with my course colleagues that a business perspective is not a particularly relevant competency in an educational setting (Seabreeze, 2018, para 12; Warkentin, 2018, para. 12).  The public schools have individual personas, but there is no real brand to promote, profits to consider, or market profitability to consider.  Independent institutions may need to consider the business perspective more closely due to the tuition and donation responsibilities which is a situation not in my immediate requirement.

Organizational decision-making is not even possible in my employee position right now, so this competency does not merit any immediate consideration. More information would be needed if I were to attempt real organizational involvement.  I intend to be more strategic in the decisions I do make to better prepare for the possibility of influencing organizational change.

Image result for domino images

Image retrieved from https://ninaamir.com/monday-inspiration-create-a-domino-effect/

3 IMPORTANT PRINCIPLES

Building up others.  Our greatest resource in schools are the people.  Teachers, educational assistants, administrators, parents, and students rely on us to rise above our self-serving tendencies to go beyond for their success.  Empowering others is essential for life-long learning, strong decision-making, and truly impacting the world beyond our school walls (Lepsinger, 2010, p. 102).

Personal management. Expecting top performance from others means it must be evident in my own life first; why would anyone want to take my lead if I don’t hold my self accountable?  “It means quite simple, that expectations matter” (Lepsinger, 2010, p. 55).  Five of my grandchildren were staying at our house this past summer when I was taking LDRS 503.  My oldest grandson asked me, “Does everyone have to study and work this hard when you grow up?”  I told him everyone has to work but not everyone has to do as much work as I have been doing.  I explained to him that this was the only way to achieve some of my goals and I have high expectations for my learning; he thought taking more school when you didn’t have to was crazy. He is 10. Managing self is a full-time job and is important for both leaders and employees (Ungerer et al., 2017, p. 366).

Balancing cooperation and competition (Lepsinger, 2010, p. 176). When everyone is not fighting to survive or trying to be heard (Zhang, 2018, para.11), there is more cooperation to work toward commonly held goals and expectations.  The human struggle for dominance can be disguised in many ways in the workplace and seems to come out when stress increases.  Interdependence (Galbraith, 2014, p. 9) seems obvious in any organization; success is more likely when synergy is created through common visions (Galbraith, 2014, p. 255).  Competition is healthy when it spurs me on to improve my own game; the same competitive spirit is detrimental when it causes employees to malign colleagues and usurp opportunities simply for personal gain.  Recognizing better strategic thinking and planning happens when I remove myself from possible competitive situations and support the success of others (Lepsinger, 2010, p. 59).

3 LEAST IMPORTANT PRINCIPLES

Strategic leadership is a series of skills which need to work in unison to varying degrees. It is not wise to lay aside any of the principles since I have learned to expect the unexpected: what you think is least likely to happen will most likely happen when you least expect it or are least prepared to deal with it.  While I understand the interconnectedness of strategic consciousness (thinking, planning, acting, influencing) and the danger of disregarding some principles, the following three principles are less applicable to my current organizational situation.

Involving the right people for the right decision. I have no control over choosing people nor am I in a position to allocate responsibilities or opportunities for my colleagues. People often have latent skills or talents which are not readily evident in the day-to-day functions of work, so it is important to keep an open mind about who may be the right person in any work situations.  Maintain a positive perspective about the possible contributions of others (Lepsinger, 2010, p. 111).

Establishing a reward system.  There are very few rewards in education beyond a compliment or card.  The idea of financial bonuses or job promotions as rewards for a job well done (Galbraith, 2014, p. 45) is foreign to education.  Paying for and completing course work may bring a kind of reward but it is self-acknowledged reward.

Staff rotations. Moving staff among the various grade levels or staff positions (Galbraith, 2018, p. 145) is not easily done or allowed in education.  While it may increase our understanding of the continuum of learning and child development, being adept at one or two grade levels or subject specialities is important for the strength of a program.  This principle is not as necessary as it might be in a business environment.

TEXTBOOK CONTEXT  

The more business-oriented texts of Galbraith and Ungerer, Ungerer, & Herholdt were challenging to decipher, embrace, and apply.  Galbraith was the most difficult to adapt to education.  Reading all the business examples did not translate well into the educational setting since we have much different data to consider for documenting our growth and success.

Ungerer et al. was challenging due to the online version being the only accessible text.  The search features of online texts, highlighting, and bookmarking are great tools to use.  When referring to text pages our team had to be clear about the content of the pages between online texts and hardcopies.  At least with Strategic Possibilities we were literally all on the same page.  Although uncomfortable, using the one digital textbook expanded my skills and made me aware of the work of learning many people encounter in new environments.  Empathy acquired.  I also became more familiar with WhatsApp, Zoom, and blogging as we used these communication tools to develop teamwork and synergistic focus.

References

Atha, D. (2018). Systems thinking: A systems thinking primer: Seeing organizations in action. [Course notes]. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/ldrs501/unit-3-learning-activities/

Galbraith, J. R. (2014). Designing organizations: Strategy, structure, and process at the business unit and enterprise levels. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Hughes, R., Beatty, K. & Dinwoodie, D. (2014). Becoming a strategic leader: Your role in your organization’s enduring success. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Lepsinger, R. (2010). Closing the execution gap: How great leaders and their companies get results. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons

Singla, K. (2018). Strategic leadership competencies. [Blog post] Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/ldrs501/2018/11/20/strategic-leadership-compoetencies/

Seabreeze. (2018). Blog 8.1 strategic competencies at work. [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/seabreeze/2018/11/21/blog-8-1-strategic-competencies-at-work/

Warkentin, M. (2018). Contextualizing. [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/ldrs501/2018/11/22/contextualizing/

Wong, S. (2018). The importance of building personal competency for success. [Blog post] Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/chiefanalyerofthings/2018/11/22/the-importance-of-building-personal-competency-for-success/

Zhang, L. (2018). Cooperation in a national company of China: Seems effective, yet conflicts lie underneath. [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/ldrs501/2018/11/12/cooperation-in-a-national-company-of-china-seems-effective-yet-conflicts-lie-underneath/

Response to SeaBreeze’s Strategic Competencies at Work

ET1-MSSL, Health & Education, ldrs501, Post 8.1
\

Original post found here: https://create.twu.ca/seabreeze/2018/11/21/blog-8-1-strategic-competencies-at-work/

Thank you, Seabreeze, for once again posting a detailed description of strategic leadership in an educational setting with all the tangents that are required in a public school.  You have revealed many of the everyday realities we teachers face as we try to deliver and education that prepares students for their opportunity to participate in the world beyond school campuses.

Competencies

Strategic Planning is a definite necessity moving forward in my career also as you mentioned it will be incorporated into your teaching (Seabreeze, 2018, para. 2).  As I read the various texts and tried to apply the information to our academic setting, I realized I have had this mini strategic plan for my own career.  Moving from my former district was difficult because I knew administrators would provide opportunities for me to pursue my goals; they cared about my career, how I was doing personally, and met with me regularly to help me continue to grow as an educator. As an overall district strategy, I can see now that they “hire[d] for fit, train[ed] for skills” (Galbraith, 2014, 54). Transferring to new district involved an entirely new strategic plan because as one thoughtful administrator told me, “We don’t know you, so we don’t owe you.”  This caused me to re-evaluate my approach and learn more about my contract, my union, the district and its practices, and lately, our pension.  Armed with this newly acquired understanding of my profession, I now invest and educate my colleagues who may not understand the cost of being a union member or the protocols of the district.  Teachers may be part of an organization, but they are also creators of their own career strategy. “Crafting strategy is more of a discovery process than it is a determination process or a process of choosing among a limited set of possibilities” (Hughes, Beatty, & Dinwoodie, 2014, p. 28).

Image result for images for vision

Your second competency revolved around your commitment to employ vision throughout your career.  As Lepsinger (2010) promotes, vision is the connection between strategy and action (p. 35).  While I know I am not a visionary (Ungerer et al. 2016, p. 91) nor do I have a greater vision than my colleagues for where my school might need some strategic planning for effectiveness, I am never shy of ideas to try that seem to fit the needs.  I have come to realize that crafting a vision can be learned and is very necessary to develop purpose, direction, and culture within a school. Ungerer, Ungerer, & Herholdt contend that vision clarifies priorities (2016, p. 63).  This kind of vision is possible for me.

My idea of vision is always rooted in my values and your third competency speaks to that as well (SeaBreeze, 2018, para. 4).  Consistent in practice and in faith is a necessity for me as I teach in the public system.  This requires vigilance to one’s own practice as well as to the external factors that can create tension between vision and reality (Ungerer et al., 2016, p. 63).  I appreciated your reminder of Ungerer et al.’s description to virtuous leadership and the requirement that leadership maintain a strong moral base (2016, pp. 41-42).  Although leading in a virtuous way does not guarantee more success, it must certainly mitigate the gap between plans and action while ensuring each decision is in balance with personal values and organizational vision.  I take encouragement from Lepsinger’s acknowledgment that “it’s reassuring to know that no matter what your current capability, with practice you can reach a high level of competence (2010, p. 208).

How do you see your career changing with your commitment to strategic planning, applying vision, and filtering decisions through your values in the public system?  What benefits or drawbacks do you expect to experience using your strategic competencies even though your organization may not adhere to the same focus of strategic thinking?

References

Galbraith, J. R. (2014). Designing organizations: Strategy, structure, and process at the business unit and enterprise levels. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Hughes, R., Beatty, K. & Dinwoodie, D. (2014). Becoming a strategic leader: Your role in your organization’s enduring success. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Lepsinger, R. (2010). Closing the execution gap: How great leaders and their companies get results. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons.

SeaBreeze. (November 20, 2018). Blog 8.1: strategic competencies at work. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/seabreeze/2018/11/21/blog-8-1-strategic-competencies-at-work/

Response to Cooperation in a National Company of China: Seems Effective, yet Conflicts Lie Underneath

ET1-MSSL, Health & Education, health and education, ldrs501, Post 7.1
\

Read the original post from Layla here:  https://create.twu.ca/ldrs501/2018/11/12/cooperation-in-a-national-company-of-china-seems-effective-yet-conflicts-lie-underneath/

Reading through your post, Layla, I was struck by how easy it would be to confuse compliance with cooperation.  State Grid sounds like a large company with many departments who need to coordinate with each other.  Your role in training and educating employees must be critical to ensuring alignment with the company’s MVV.  When you mention that you must include the Communist ideal of “working for the collective goals, yielding in conflicts, and teamwork” (Zhang, 2018, para. 2), I wondered how closely that aligns with strategic teams where “trust and strong relationships must also exist between the team and other key teams in the organization” (Hughes et al., 2014, p. 210)?  Is this more of an ideology of obedience for greater uniformity or are these ideals to truly have employees at all levels think in alignment with the MVV and thus produce more innovative and creative solutions to the company’s issues?

It is difficult for me to grasp the day-to-day functioning in a business world since I have been in the classroom several decades.  Systems of rewards for quality work and company allegiance do not exist in my workplace.  Years ago I discovered the odd truth in education that those who need little assistance and are hard-working, innovative thinkers usually get more work and more challenging classes; teachers who are less efficient, take all their sick days, or lament a great deal tend to receive more assistance or grace:  “those who do, do more and those who don’t, get help” seems to be the mantra.  I do not think this model would work well in your company or in many businesses, do you?

Integrity.  You mentioned integrity is a core value for your company (Zhang, 2018, para. 1).  Who is to show integrity and how is this core value modelled by the leaders?  “Leading with integrity is one of the great challenges of leadership” (Suggs, 2012, para. 1).  Since leading with integrity means to lead completely (Sugg, para. 4) and TSL leaders seek to build up their followers, leaders with integrity should put others first.  Is this exemplified in the leaders of your company?  Galbraith (2014) discusses that training in an organization needs to be continuous and targeted at cross-unit participants because it builds relationships which adds to the network (p. 145). Do you also train leaders, Layla, or do you train staff according to the changing needs of the organization and the vision of its leaders?

At the end of your post you discuss some of the conflicts that occur in your company more frequently at the lower level, and, to female workers.  The inability for their voices to be heard by leaders at higher levels must create inequities among employees.  How can this be addressed in your company?  Is this a problem for which people are seeking a solution or is this just an inevitable condition of a large company?  Hughes et al. say that often “too little attention is paid to the human element of strategy” and yet “organizations need to be as intentional about leadership strategy as they are about business strategy” (2014, p. 12).  Is the company growing in its awareness of the human emotions, needs, and beliefs that can impact their efficiency in maintaining alignment with their core values?

References

Galbraith, J. R. (2014). Designing organizations: Strategy, structure, and process at the business unit and enterprise levels. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Hughes, R., Beatty, K. & Dinwoodie, D. (2014). Becoming a strategic leader: Your role in your organization’s enduring success. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Suggs, D. (2012) Leading with integrity. Retrieved from http://www.delsuggs.com/articles/Leading%20with%20Integrity.pdf

Zhang, L. (2018). Cooperation in a national company of china: Seems effective, yet conflicts lie underneath [Blog Post].  Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/ldrs501/2018/11/12/cooperation-in-a-national-company-of-china-seems-effective-yet-conflicts-lie-underneath/