God has given your school a mission. You are committed to it, you want to achieve it, and you believe that achieving it will impact the world for Christ.

But it’s Tuesday morning, and you have to get a sub for a teacher who is out sick, you have just been asked to attend a meeting at 9:30 regarding a student who is struggling, you have to talk with a 7th grader from a dysfunctional home who has been acting out in class, you learn that the father of your 6th grade social studies teacher has cancer, and 237 emails are sitting in your inbox.

Stop. Breathe. And remember that while Christian education is about responding to crisis and the parable of the Good Samaritan, it’s more about stewarding the mission and the parable of the talents.

Consider making one or more commitments regarding stewarding your mission. Here are 5 options:

1. Commit to focusing on the mission and to responding to crises as a function of achieving your mission.
2. Commit to investing 5 or more minutes during each staff meeting in discussing and celebrating progress toward mission achievement.
3. Commit to investing 30 or more minutes each week in assessing progress toward mission achievement and planning next steps.
4. Commit to getting 100% of your staff to be able to explain the answers to 4 questions: What is our mission? What is our definition of mission achievement? What is our current level of mission achievement? What strategic steps are we taking to close the gap between targeted and current levels of mission achievement?
5. Commit to developing an attention-getting scoreboard that measures your current level of mission achievement and your progress on strategic steps you are taking.

If you make one or more commitments, consider ways to get the support, encouragement, and accountability you need to carry out your commitment(s).

Tags: Mission

The worldwide economic crises aren’t happening just “out there.” They directly affect every school and most parents and supporters. Although in such a convoluted situation it isn’t clear just which responses are best, what is clear is that one response is most unwise: fearfully ignoring the crises.

Skillful leadership in this economic environment begins with finding – and facing those emerging realities around us. As money tightens around us, it’s important for the school leader to develop an accurate picture, insofar as is possible, regarding the school’s ability to respond quickly to challenge that may present themselves in any of the following areas:

• Cash flow
• Available credit (including understanding of the status of the financial institution[s] with which we work)
• Philanthropic commitments

Cash flow

If your school’s two month revenue is below projections and your accounts receivable are already significantly higher than normal,  that could trigger a concern regarding the amount of cash you will have on hand to meet payroll particularly as you approach the last few months of your fiscal year.  Do a cash flow analysis to either put your mind at ease or to give you a 3-4 months to strategies how you can deal with this reality

Available credit

Many schools have a line of credit that helps them smooth cash flow needs over the twelve months of the calendar year.  As banks tighten their belts on lines of credit it’s wise to check with your bank long before your line of credit is up for renewal.   If you learn that your renewal may be at risk, you at least have some time to put a contingency plan together.

Philanthropy

Annual fund gifts continue to support our schools.  It may take a little more work to reach your goals but we are still hearing that annual funds are being supported.  Capital fund commitments seem to have been impacted by the recent down turn in the economy.   It’s not uncommon to have major donors borrowing monies to pay off commitments or asking schools to extend payment further into the future.  Don’t hesitate to send out those payment reminders to gain a more accurate picture on collectability of those pledges.

Perhaps as important is to ensure that you have your fingers on the emotional pulses of your parental and supporting communities. Their decisions will be based not only on economic facts but on their own feelings in response. You need to learn what concerns are primary for them, how anxious they are about those matters, and what are their deepest fears.

Once you are reasonably certain of your information, you will be in a better position to give leadership. Exercising thoughtful leadership in itself is likely to help create a more positive environment. Fearfully doing nothing simply adds to the negative environment.

Tags: Finances

Barriers

It’s tough for administrators to get developmental feedback – feedback that helps them improve on their current performance. Sometimes feedback they do get is vague, giving little direction. Or it’s hard to know if feedback represents the thinking of an individual or two, or that of multiple board members.

Four reasons (among a host of others) for lack of feedback or inadequate feedback are especially common.

Board members, whose job it is to provide feedback, often hesitate to give developmental feedback. Some resist because they dislike conflict (re-active, not proactive). Others feel little need to give feedback (laissez faire approach): “Hey, you’re doing okay. If we have a problem, we’ll let you know!” Still others focus on multiple minor matters but give little attention to more substantial matters (micro-managing).

Feedback may focus on personality traits (the administrator “is not warm enough”) – unrelated to the performance targets which the administrator is expected to hit.

“We just don’t have enough information” is the explanation from some boards. Getting reliable information can be difficult. Unless systematic data collection procedures are in place, appraisals tend to focus on a combination of what happened in the last month or so and memorable events (the anger of a couple parents last fall). Information that finds its way to the board may not represent the perspectives of the majority of parents or supporters.

Feedback forms can create problems, too. Rating numbers (typically 1-5) or phrases (from “unacceptable” to “outstanding”) easily become equivalents of school grades, A-F. Worse, raters use different standards; a “5” or “outstanding” from one may be closer to a “3” or “expected” from others. Inter-rater unreliability has long been documented.

New option

The single best antidote to these common flaws in appraisal is known as behaviorally anchored ratings (B.A.R.s). BARs are simple to describe but difficult to develop (CSI can provide samples that will reduce the difficulties). The format uses a table with these features.

• The header row identifies what the administrator is being held accountable for, followed by five brief categories of possible behavior.
• The remaining rows identify the area (column one), then describe specific behavior that is considered unacceptable, needs improvement, expected, superior, or outstanding. It is this description of behavior that makes it more likely that raters are using the same standard – and are focusing on what has been deemed important.

The following partial standard is from a “Conflict Management” rating form.

Notice that each column describes the behavior that qualifies for the rating in the heading.

Another valuable BARs feature is that each accountability area can be weighted. Weighting defines the relative importance of each area.

Distribute 100 points among the outstanding boxes (including all accountability areas). For each accountability area, “unacceptable” earns no points; “needs improvement” earns 25% of “outstanding”; “expected” earns 50%; and “superior” earns 75%.

A BARs format generates six especially valuable results for administrators.

1. It requires drafting of behaviorally oriented descriptions of five performance quality levels in multiple areas of accountability.
2. It allows for weighting the value of the different areas of accountability which helps the administrator know what to emphasize.
3. The behavioral descriptions increase inter-rater reliability. Use of these descriptions makes it far more likely that raters will focus on the same element with more similar judgments.
4. Burden of proof shifts from the rater to the dissatisfied administrator. If unhappy with an “expected” rating, the administrator should provide evidence of “superior” performance; raters need not defend their choice of an undefined number or phrase.
5. A BARs format provides implicit direction for performance improvement; the column to the right describes the needed improvement. Setting performance improvement targets is simplified.
6. Underlying the format is a challenge to think behaviorally, not abstractly. It forces designers and users to ask, “just what do I/we expect in this area?

This approach assumes, wrongly in some instances no doubt, that the board and administrator have identified the accountability areas and have set performance targets for each. Administrators may need to help the board identify the appropriate areas and set performance targets for each (and that’s another topic for future Leadership Insights issues!).

Consider sharing this posting with the board president. Feel free to contact CSI and one of its consultants, or me (Del Nykamp) for extensive additional information and procedures that will help administrators receive developmental performance appraisal.

Tags: Influence Relationship

Leadership pressures can be immense. You’re held accountable for things you can’t control. You’re an easy target when things go wrong. And of course you’re expected not to react emotionally: you’re supposed to be “on top of your game,” able to “roll with the punches,” no matter how sneaky or unwarranted the attacks may appear to be. Your reactions are likely to include emotion!

Emotions are a wonderful gift from God. They affect almost everything we do. They drive almost all decisions and communication, especially those that involve conflict. They make it easier (and/or harder) to see new options or to take (or avoid) risks that lead to major improvements.

Emotions can be dangerous. They can lead us to actions contrary to what God expects. They can reduce self control. They can blind us to what others want and need.

Because emotions show up on both the cost and benefit sides of the leadership ledger, they need to be channeled or managed. Our challenge is to use and enjoy them without letting them control us. If we don’t manage our emotions, they’ll manage us! If we maintain emotional control, we can avoid hostility and defensiveness or excessive adrenalin and exuberance. If we manage them patiently, with discipline, we’re more likely to come up with solutions we and others can accept.

Since emotions are always around, it is wise to look at three common ways leaders may convey or express emotion. Check to see how well they fit you and how well they fit into your school’s culture. Careful, though. There are significant traps hidden with two of them.

Pour it out!

If you feel it, show it! The 60s slogan – “let it all hang out!” – captures this option. If you’re angry, let it show. If you’re excited, let it permeate what you do. Display your feelings! Show them in muscle tension, narrowed or widened eyes, changes in voice patterns, or rapid breathing. I suspect you can come up with an example of this approach from your own reactions (or from an exchange or two with a board or staff member)!

A scholar who in the 70s had urged people to convey their feelings freely did a thorough review of psychology research studies on expressing anger. She found one consistent result from dumping feelings – there were even more feelings, and not all of them positive!

The bottom line should be obvious: this option, as appealing and satisfying as it may seem, is especially problematic when giving leadership. A helpful way to use this tactic is to add a request for “Time out!” That is, inform the other person that you’re developing strong feelings: “Jill, right now I’m getting more and more irritated!” Ask permission to stop the conversation now (don’t impose it). Be sure to set a time to pick it up again: “It would be wise if we held off until tomorrow to pick up it. Will that work for you?”

Convey feelings indirectly

Rather than express emotions, we can hide them but still let others know. We subtly or indirectly convey what we’re feeling. (After all, because we’re in leadership, people watch us closely so they’re especially likely to picking up on our signals.) “It’s a lousy day” sounds like a report about something outside us but the message we’re giving is, “I’m having a lousy day.” Or how we stand, sit, and move shows what we’re feeling. Or our voice’s pitch, rate, or intensity reveal what’s going on inside us.

This option may seem safe, but – frankly – it may be as dangerous as pouring out our feelings. In conflict situations, indirect emotions tend to aggravate others. They sense what we’re feeling but for the most part, can’t be sure. Our indirectness keeps them off balance, giving us an unfair advantage.

Report feelings

This tactic is simple, conceptually easy but it takes some practice and discipline to do it well. To report your feelings describe what you are experiencing. Just say, “I’m frustrated right. I can’t figure out a good solution,” or “This situation is difficult for me. I’m beginning to feel annoyed.” Describe your emotion as a reporter would an event. You need not pretend that you’re not having the feeling. Simply admit to yourself and others that you have the feeling.

Reporting feelings makes it easier for you and others to deal with feelings. There’s less chance that you or they will stoke the feelings or elicit them in others. You may also wish to combine reporting feelings with “Time out!” as described above. With some persons it may be wise to choose not to engage on a feeling level. But monitor the other’s response. If it is too costly, you may need to shift to other procedures.

Tags: Shared Leadership

Leadership after the heart and mind of God is leadership that takes every thought captive to Christ.  While this might sound daunting, a realistic and attainable discipline can be attained through daily reliance on God’s absolute truths and sovereign will. For example, while strategic planning is much needed, there must first be the seeking of God’s will for the Christian school.  Specifically, God’s will trumps personal wills manifested in either the head of the school or the school board’s wills.

When the Apostle Paul gave the imperative to take every thought captive (2 Corinthians 10:5) he was not writing his will but God’s.  This imperative to take every thought captive either transcends idealistic language and is to be heartily obeyed or is just a lofty ideal that we as Christian leaders can casually ignore.

Christian schools in the 21st century have been issued a clarion call for erudite and virtuous Christian leadership.  This begins with a proactive approach by school leaders to seek the heart and mind of God.  No longer can we get by with planning by school leaders that “runs ahead” and fails to wait on God’s sovereignty.  Leadership may often look Christian but yet fail to be truly Christian.  Such leadership is reactive often being characterized by the school board meeting being closed in prayer with the asking of God to “bless our plans.” Lordship of Christ leadership is just the opposite.

Seeking the heart and mind of God exponentially enhances true Christian leadership.  Furthermore, God’s will trumps our wills.  Therefore, as Christian school leaders, it is essential that we begin by first seeking every aspect of our planning to be under the authority of our Almighty God and His good, pleasing and perfect will.

Tags: Shared Leadership

Welcome to Leadership Insights

Leadership Insights will come across your computer screen every other month during the school year. It’s designed to stretch our thinking on the critical issues each of us deal with in the complex world of Christian school leadership. Our editor, Dr. Del Nykamp, has spent his entire career helping organizations unpack and make productive sense out of the multiple facets of our work. Del, with the assistance of the new CSI consultant team, will stimulate thought, draw us to helpful resources, and inform us of leadership development opportunities.

David J. Koetje, President/CEO

I’m delighted to communicate with you through this new CSI blog, trying to “stretch our thinking” and stimulate professional growth. For the past 40 years, I’ve been helping others provide leadership. My roles ranged from that of researcher and instructor (Calvin College, 1968-81), to internal coach (Pine Rest, 1979-86), to external coach, problem solver, and facilitator (1985-2006), to “old guy helping out” (2006-present).

One of the most important leadership insights from these four decades of experience is this: there is much to learn from people who are trying to do their jobs in the best way they can. It’s not that researchers and “thinkers” don’t contribute. They do. But God often gives profound insights to those busy carrying out his mandates in their hands-on, day-to-day work. Effective leadership taps their experience-driven insights.

A second, perhaps equally important, insight is linked to the power of ownership. Consider that you, as formal leader, need to choose between:

• an option you and your advisers created; you’re convinced it has a 90% probability of solving a vexing problem, and
• an option recommended by those who will do the work; you’re convinced it has at best a 65% probability of solving that vexing problem.

My advice? Take the 65% option! Here’s why. When inevitable difficulties occur, the people implementing the solution will say or think, “See! I knew that wasn’t the right solution! The leaders were wrong, again!” They sit back smugly to watch that 90% probability deteriorate! But when their 65% solution (ownership!) runs into trouble, their response will be, “Hey! Where did we mess up? How can we fix this?!” The 65% probability comes in with 85% success. The vaunted 90% probability plummets below 75%. Ownership goes a long way.

I invite you to join in ownership of this blog!

If you have a posting you’d like to submit, please send to Del Nykamp at optimizing@charter.net.
Del

To pursue God’s calling, you want to increasingly focus on your mission. Good.

Question: To increasingly focus on your mission, what do you need to keep doing, start doing, and stop doing?

Answer: What I need to keep doing is measuring progress and receive training that helps me carry out the mission. I need to start telling stories on progress about the mission. In order to have time to tell stories, I need to stop reading so many books.

Need some suggestions regarding what to keep/start/stop doing? Keep or start doing things like:

• Putting the mission statement on publications.
• Explicitly linking meeting agenda items to the mission.
• Requiring that proposals identify how they promote the achievement of the mission.
• Using a scorecard.
• Celebrating progress on achieving the mission.

Stop doing things like:

• Talking about everything but the mission.
• Thinking of the mission as a piece of art to be displayed on the wall.
• Leaving the accomplishment of the mission undefined.
• Focusing on other good things in addition to the mission.
• Leaving the mission for someone else to think about so you can get on with the real work.

Question: What are some other things you need to keep/start/stop doing?

Focus on your God-given mission. Identify what you need to keep/start/doing…today.

Tags: Mission

If you were to count the number of people trying to explain leadership, you might need a day or two to do it! Don’t even think of trying to read, much less understand, all their ideas.

“What’s the fuss?” you may be thinking. “‘Leadership’ is what leaders do — and what non-leaders don’t do!”

Hold on a second. It’s really not that easy. People not called “leader” often do things that look just like what leaders do. Some non-leaders get the same or better results than leaders do.

To help your school make optimum use of its leaders and leadership, you’ll need to see leadership as something broader than “what leaders do.” Asking “Who gives leadership?” is different from asking “Who’s the leader?”

As you try to refine your sense of leadership, play with two words: “relationship” and “influence.”

For years, I used this simple sentence to identify the core of leadership: “Leadership is a relationship.” It’s short and on point. The trouble is, it’s incomplete.

Think of a colleague at school – an administrator, a faculty person, a support staff person. If you work together you have “a relationship”; the two of you are linked.

Imagine an invisible cord between you (the relationship). Because of that cord, you can pull the other or resist his/her pull. He/she can do the same with you.

Does it make a difference which colleague is on the other end? Of course! If you see the other as wiser or stronger than you, you’ll hesitate to pull. If you know the other is “definitely not a morning person,” you know it would be silly to pull at 6:30 a.m.

When you focus on leadership as a relationship, attention goes away from you, your skills, or even your preferences. Your attention is on your relationship partner.

So far so good; but there’s another matter that needs attention. Leadership isn’t just any kind of relationship, not even any kind of a work relationship.

Leadership relationships have a common purpose – to have some impact on the other person. Leadership is an influence relationship. It is designed to help others see things differently, or to feel differently, or to act differently.

When you use these two lens (relationship, influence) to look at leadership, scads of items pop into view.

• What authorization do I have to influence others? Does it come from my position, from my qualifications, from my relationship with them?

• What kind of influence is best for this relationship, especially because it occurs within a Christian school context?
  • Should I emphasize information?
  • Should I include overt religious perspectives?
  • Should I be direct, even pressuring somewhat?
  • Are there some types of influence I shouldn’t use?
• Am I open to influence from the other(s)? What kind of influence works best with me?

Let us know what you think – we’re open to your influence!

Tags: Influence Relationship

“Now hear this!” symbolizes a traditional direct, and directive, approach from leaders. They asserted high control. To be a leader was to tell others what to do.

A shift

What you do as leader influences others. When you think about it, you also know that what everyone else does as “non-leaders” affects you and others. Neither you nor they can escape giving leadership, or being affected by it, as long as you’re part of the school. Leadership is “not for leaders only.” It’s for anyone who wants to make a difference.
 
 It’s convenient to attribute this shift in leadership to a culture change. Today, many people – including teachers – don’t  buy into “command and control.” True, some people don’t like being told what to do. Yet, others still accept orders gladly, either because that’s what they expect or because they don’t want the risk of making decisions.

Whether or not people like taking (or giving!) orders isn’t the key factor. When only “the boss” makes the decisions, only the boss has to think. A supervisor, challenged to reflect on his controlling management style that allowed no input from others, got it right when he gasped, with some anxiety, “Hey, the way I manage — I gotta be right all the time!” Better to involve others in that thinking, allowing them to exercise their God-given ability to make choices!

A troublesome shift
 
 A shift in leadership occurred in the late 50’s and early 60’s: leaders were expected to facilitate. They were taught to ensure that people had opportunity to express their thoughts and to help others make decisions. As one wag put it, the leader’s message was “There go my people! I must follow them — I am their leader!” As usual, the pendulum swung too far.

Helping people make decisions, as facilitator-leaders tried to do, has value in many situations but fails in others. Leaders who only help others reach decisions but withhold their own thoughts and decisions abdicate their responsibility. Effective leaders must assert their views, set boundaries, and establish requirements. On the other hand, leaders who expect others to follow them simply because they are leaders assume more personal wisdom than is warranted.

Helping others give leadership isn’t simple!

Being both a skillful facilitator and an insightful advocate and boundary-setter is difficult. This is why leadership is more demanding and difficult today than ever before. When more people try to figure out how best to get things done, they should do a better job. It takes time, insight, and skill to engage people in constructive leadership. What you call the process  — pick your favorite buzzword: “empowerment,” “involvement,” “participation,” and “self-directed work teams” — is unimportant. All these approaches to leadership can be effective. All can also cause serious problems. Many have tried these approaches — and failed badly.

It’s not “pulling back,” it’s sharing

A common mistake when involving others in leadership is to assume that such involvement requires leaders to back off, to give less (or less obvious) leadership. Not so. Formal leaders don’t give up authority. They’re still accountable. What’s different is that they share their authority with colleagues within clearly defined boundaries so that together, they can discover better ideas, have stronger commitment, and create more drive to make things work. When you share authority, you need to change systems, procedures, and people.
 
Should everybody give leadership?

No. Some people can’t; they can’t handle the risks or don’t want to learn what needs to be done. Others won’t, for all kinds of reasons. But you’ll get the most from people in your school if as many as possible take initiative appropriately within specified boundaries.

Notice the qualifiers — “appropriately” and “within specified boundaries.” People should take initiative when they have insight or skill, using acceptable methods, where they’ve been given permission to do so. More im¬por¬tant than who exerts leader¬ship is its quality and the degree to which it’s accept¬ed by others.

Tags: Shared Leadership