LEADING THROUGH LISTENING

There's that age old saying that there is no 'I' in 'TEAM'. More often than not in today's society we find individuals who are a part of a team making statements like, "I'm just going to do my thing because it's easier." Of course this is the most extreme example, but with all of our teams in life there is an increasing number of people who seem to be in it for themselves rather than the good of the team or for the purpose of the team. I often wonder why there are so many individuals on a team. After all, a great, well functioning team is comprised of individuals who all know their role and execute it well. So this leaves me thinking, the reason that teams become this way and that there are so many 'I's' on a team is leadership. We need to make sure that everyone understands the role and purpose of everything that the team does, then maybe there are less 'I's' and more 'WE's'. While there is no 'I...

One day this past week while driving home, while watching the snow flurries fall, I wondered how people of the past figured out weather patterns and what to expect with regard to weather. 500 years ago, human beings were dealing with extreme weather and the changing of the seasons and at one point, people just believed that it was the Gods that controlled these things. At some point in time though, someone had the courage to ask the question, "WHY?" Three little letters that can completely ignite the learning experience and change the world. If you really think about the world we live in today, all of our luxuries are because an individual asked this simple little question, "why?" Why does it have to be that way? Why did you determine that was the answer? Why do we have to do it that way? So now the question is, why is it so bad to ask the question, "why?" More often than not people become defensive and agitated if you question them about why something...

Once upon a time, when we all began our careers or started a new position/school, we had dreams. Dreams of what we wanted to accomplish, dreams we wanted to see our students accomplish, dreams we wanted to see our school communities achieve. Throughout my travels though, I have seen more adults tell students that should lower their expectations and downsize their dreams. Unfortunately, I would say that the ratio of adults encouraging students and adults discouraging students is close to 1:1 in my career. I ask, would you be where you are today without someone throughout your educational life encouraging you to pursue your dreams? As with many things in our schools, we need to focus on the positives that are happening and capitalize on them. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream for our country, and while his dream was related to equal rights and oppression, his intended message of having a dream and working tirelessly to achieve it can be applied universally in society. Recently, ...

Recently, I had the opportunity to do a needs assessment survey with my staff which is always an eye opening experience. One of my favorite questions to ask my staff in these surveys is, "What do you remember about your LEAST favorite teacher in school?" Not ironically, the responses were a perfect list of everything that you are asked NOT to do when sitting in professional developments. Also, each time I've done this type of survey, regardless of the staff or school, the responses are the same. When we were students, we didn't enjoy lecture, sarcasm, rigidity, worksheets, playing favorites, bias, and inconsistency. However, fast forward to today and how many classrooms can you think of where these same characteristics can be found? So, I ask you, are you THAT teacher? When you think about the things that you enjoyed least about school, are you doing anything on that list? Or when you see the items that I listed previously, do you do any of those activities in you...

Over the course of this holiday season, I realized that so many of us look forward to the New Year with goals and agendas that make the previous year seem like a virtual waste of time. The traditional New Year's change is a diet or exercise for most and we all know the running joke for that, they rarely last. People make resolutions and statements of grandeur about the upcoming year being better than the previous year. Yes, we all have had tough times and negative situations in the past year. It would be tough to find a human being that had the "perfect year", but is that really cause to dismiss the events of a previous year and act as if just because it's a New Year, you can be a different person. I'm sorry if I'm a little jaded here, I've just grown tired of people thinking that because it's a new year, they can magically be different. With that being said... I challenge you to make a resolution that matters. Not to you, but to others in your lif...