Most of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to get their work done.
— Peter Drucker
Workshop Description
The focus of this workshop is to help administrators learn to carry their authority in a way that lifts rather than lowers the conversational capacity of the people they manage. This is harder than it sounds.
A Management Competence
“No job is more vital to our society than that of the manager,” said management and strategy expert Henry Mintzberg. “It is the manager who determines whether our social institutions serve us well or whether they squander our talents and resources.”
It is for this reason that carrying one’s authority competently is a pivotal competence for an effective manager. Although we don’t call principals, district administrators, or superintendents managers, this is exactly the important role they play.
Harvard’s Joan Magretta says that management’s business is building organizations that work. In this way, a superintendent’s job can be seen as building a district that works, and a principal’s job is building a school that works. If an administrator behaves in a way – intentionally or unintentionally – that limits the ability of their people to bring their best ideas and work to the institution, they are, by definition, not doing their job as effectively as they could be.
A Leadership Competence
“An organization is a community of discourse,” said psychologist Robert Kegan. “Leadership is about shaping the nature of the discourse.” This is an essential workshop for district administrators, principals, and assistant principals who want to do a better job of carrying their authority in a way that makes their staff smarter, stronger, and more purpose-driven.
Learning Objectives:
Participants will learn to help their people and teams bring their A-game to their schools and district in a consistent way. They’ll do this by
- Identifying the sins of omission that make it difficult for people to remain candid and curious in their presence.
- Identifying the sins of commission that have the same counterproductive effect.
- Adopting practices that help the people who report them bring their best thinking and biggest concerns to the table – even in high-pressure circumstances that conspire against it.
- Performing their management role in a more curious, humble, and purposeful way.
- Learning to wield their authority in a way that builds their own conversational capacity and that of the people they manage.
- Updating their personal and application plans to help sustain the learning and practice beyond the workshop.
Prerequisite: Conversational Capacity for Educational Professionals
Length: Customized to fit your training schedule
