Navigating the Course of Change

Navigating the Course of Change Overview of the Change Process

“And the day came when the risk toremain the same was greater than the risk to change …It is, after all, the only hope for the cocoon to become the butterfly.”

Establish the need for change Consider the type of change needed Match response using appropriate leadership skills Consider the process of change Suggestions for leadership Realities for consideration Presentation Overview

AEIS DEC on Demand DEC on Schedule Bilingual Audit Corrective Action Review PAS DAS FIRST Compensatory Education Accreditation Pressure Points for Change (Texas)

General public school critics–failing in higher order skills, declining test scores, increased drop-out rates Concerned parents Special interest groups Community interest groups School boards Superintendents Principals Students Pressure Points for Change (Local)

Jensen: Teaching with the Brain in Mind Caine & Caine: Making Connections Gardner: Multiple Intelligences Lazear: Eight Ways of Knowing Shinsky: Students with Special Needs Wiggins and McTighe: Understanding by Design Pressure Points for Change (Student Learning)

First Order Change Second Order Change Types of Change Examples:

First Order Change Requires Transactional Leadership Second Order Change Requires Transformational Leadership See Fullan, Mathew Miles, Phillip Schlecty, Thomas Sergiovanni, James McGregor Burns. Types of Change

Why Is Change Difficult? • Personal Resistance • Loss • Challenge to Competence • Confusion • Conflict Change we want in others is called “growth.” Change others want in us is called “loss.”

Why is Change Difficult? • Organizational Resistance • Culture of the school • Psychological security • People grow more conservative with age • Designed to maintain the status quo

Other Organizational or Personal Inhibitors • Readiness and resistance • A mature faculty • Midlife issues • Mid-career issues

Newtonian Physics The world is an ordered place, events have a cause and an effect, linear laws, everything can be understood provided enough information is available. Quantum Physics The world is composed of relationships, fields of influence, ideas and culture, open systems that continue to adapt to their environment. See Margaret Wheatley: Leadership and the New Science Leadership Assumptions

Tasks of Change

Tasks of Change (cont’d) Robert Evans The Human Side of School Change

Continuum of Growth and Performance High Growth No Growth Key Member Contributor Stable and Stagnant Deadwood See Phillip Schlecty Inventing Better Schools and Robert Evans The Human Side of School Change

Tools We Can Use • Develop Purpose and Followership • Consider Transactional and Transformational Leadership • Bartering • Building – moral authority based upon values • Bonding – ways to fulfill higher order needs • Banking – “Servant Leadership” of followers See Burns and Sergiovanni

Leadership Imperatives • Trust • Authentic (True-to-Yourself) Leadership • Firm personal ethical standards (Integrity) • Build on your core values • Bring your experiences to the job • Establish clarity and focus • Model • Use Top Down and Bottom Up • Gain optimal participation • Use recognition • Use some confrontation

Vaill’s Envelope of Optimal Realism Region of instant gratification and “too much too soon” Ideal Region of realistic progress; envelope of optimal realism Performance Region of “business as usual”, “gradualism” Current Now 5-10 years Time See Vaill Managing as a Performing Art

Personal and Organizational Myths • People act first in the best interests of the organization. • People want to understand the what and why of organizational change. • People engage in change because of the merits of the change. • People opt to be architects of the change affecting them. 5. Organizations are rationally functioning systems.

Personal and Organizational Myths (cont’d) • Organizations are wired to assimilate systemic change. • Organizations operate from a value-driven orientation. • Organizations can affect long-term, systemic change even with short-term leadership. • Organizations can achieve systemic change without creating conflict in the system. See Jerry Patterson’s Coming Clean About Organizational Change

Realities about People 1. Most people act first in their own self-interest, not in the interests of the organization. 2. Most people don’t want to genuinely understand the what and why of organizational change. 3. Most people engage in organizational change because of their own pain, not because of the merits of the change. 4. Most people expect to be viewed as having good intentions, even though they view with suspicion the intentions of those initiating organizational change. 5. Most people opt to be victims of change rather than architects of change.

Realities about Organizations 6. Most organizations operate non-rationally rather than rationally. 7. Most organizations are wired to protect the status quo. 8. Most organizations initiate change with an event-driven rather than value-driven mentality. 9. Most organizations engage in long-term change with short-term leadership. 10. Most organizations expect the greatest amount of change with the least amount of conflict.

Realities about People and Organizations 11. Most people and organizations deny that the other ten realities are, in fact, their own realities. 12. Most people and organizations do have the capacity to develop resilience in the face of the other 11 realities

Take Care of Yourself • To maintain followership, a leader must extend … • Caring, • Clarity, • Choice, • And hope … within the organization.

Take Care of Yourself • Leadership is sometimes painful. • Head pain Thinking through what is best for the organization Loneliness gets worse • Back pain Being blindsided with surprises External influences you did not recognize • Heart pain Bringing pain to others Knowing that pain within your organization will increase if you don’t do your job

Take Care of Yourself

Take Care of Yourself (cont’d)

Navigating the Course of Change