Leadership in (permanent) Crisis
The idea of leaders to step up in times of crisis to guide the school through difficult times is nothing unusual, the idea of having to do this on a daily basis, is.
Crisis seems an extreme term to describe as a daily event, but with the complexity of 5-6 mentors working in the same space and with the other daily relationships outside the habitat - it isn't too far off. Crisis is described as 'a difficult or dangerous situation that needs serious attention,' and when you relate this to relationships within our workplace -the 'relationship situation' can shift from difficult to dangerous regarding the impact it could have on future relationships. In many cases, these situations can lead to a lack of trust and be damaging for a very long time. Trust can takes months to build and a lot of work can be undone by not dealing with a situation effectively. Hearing the article describing our environment as having 'ongoing disruption' and how things will never return to normal, has in a bizarre way - made me feel better.
I have realigned my focus to deal with not my technical challenges;
Technical [or first order] challenges—problems that can be pretty clearly defined and can be addressed with known solutions or ones that can be developed by a few technical experts. No big impact on people here. An example might include moving to a new kind of computer, or teaching a different topic.
But with my 'adaptive challenges.'
Adaptive [or second-order] challenges—these require significant (and often painful) shifts in people’s habits, status, roles, identities, ways of thinking, etc. The impact on individuals is often significant, personal and emotional. An example might include moving to project-based learning, or a dispositional curriculum.
I was creating a plan of how to deal with my workload which was all technical challenges ie OTJ's, WoRM presentation, LIncED, but now I have changed it to dealing with primarily adaptive challenges which is based around the capacities to be adaptive.
Elephants in the room are named:
‘undiscussables’ are minimised so all members of an organisation are empowered to critique mindsets and practices; confront areas of complacency; and ask the questions that need to be asked.
The hardest capacity by far, especially as I have had experiences which have been catastrophic ie having to leave a school. This primarily based around the relationships I have with both my habitat team and the SLT. All are ongoing discussions and some are even daily. This highlighted why I am so stressed, particularly as Tony Burkin highlighted the impact of the stress of taking these conversations home and dwelling on them. I/we have dealt with some, but the constant daily stress of bringing them home is certainly beginning to take its toll. I will create an 'action plan' based around these discussions/relationships. By creating a plan may help me cope with the stress knowing there is a plan in place and they will be dealt with eventually.
The following two capacities are going very well.
Responsibility for the organisation is shared:
People look beyond their own immediate areas of responsibility to lend a hand or support others to advance the greater good.
Independent judgement is expected:
Decisions made by people are the ones that only they can make; all others are delegated to other people or team members to grow their decision-making capacity.
My Team have grown their leadership qualities so quickly in many ways and of course there are many areas we need to work on but they have been dealing with many situations that ‘look’ like my decisions - when I am not around. I can't describe how grateful and proud that they have done that. Which leads me to...
Leadership capacity is developed:
Everyone is considered a leader in some capacity, and this pipeline of leadership talent is always nurtured. This helps to grow the overall leadership capacity of the organisation at all levels.
Growing my team as leaders. Pipeline 2 leadership expectations is the daily norm for my team and it is my responsibility to coach my team through this expectation. Tony described this pipeline with domains which I want to explore and develop with them.
Team (colleagues hold each other to account) - Creating team culture - people can speak up, reflect
Dialogue - Discussion
Communication - Facilitate reflective conversations, Interview, Courageous conversations, Feedback, Facilitating meetings
Capability Development - Coaching, Mentoring, Delegating, Directing
Reflection and continuous learning are institutionalised:
Difficult reflective questions are asked; smart risk-taking is rewarded, and experimentation and prototyping is honoured.
We are beginning to do that for our teaching and learning, but are we doing that for our ‘Leadership Capacity?’
What next?
Create an action plan with support based around the 'Elephants in the Room' which includes support/coaching for my team based around Tony's domains.
