Planning for Leadership

"Well that went off without a hitch" commented one of the parents today as we were finishing our first attempt at an afternoon with community and students being together. "Community Day" was a great success as 50 community members joined 100 of our students for an afternoon of games, activities and cookie decorating followed by a talent show with many of our student showing off their many talents. It was a great afternoon, to be sure, but it was so great because the group of teachers organizing the event were prepared. They had planned the various events and activities and then planned for the unexpected. The cookies were a hit, as were the puzzles, games, reading and, of course, the talent show.

This was in contrast to the 7 - 9 track meet that was held just three days earlier that was somewhat disorganized and difficult to follow. No one was really sure where they were suppose to be or where to go at the start. Now, the person organizing had most of the essentials put in order but had not thought about some of the finer details or planned for any unexpected problems. This caused delays and resulted in a few parents missing their children's events because the timetable was not followed. Some parents were a bit upset by this and, at various times, I was told that we really needed to start a track program so that students were encouraged to take part. I thanked parents for their input and suggestions and we'll talk about this later and examine what we might need to do to make this work a bit better.

As an educational leader, we must plan for successes and take the time to examine and plan for unexpected events that might come along. One things that I keep reminding myself is that no matter how much planning I do, I must be flexible in what happens otherwise I won't be able to accommodate those unexpected events that come along.

When I began my principalship, I was able to find a guide that has helped me to plan while still remaining flexible. I found this plan in "A Significant Journey: A Saskatchewan Resource for the Principalship"
Now, I shouldn't say it is a plan. It is more like a series of questions and open ended stem that allow me to see and look at what is going on from a variety of perspectives.

At it's center is the Planning for Leadership idea. From this main point radiates 7 different things that one should/might consider when doing planning.

Now, I've used this for the planning I do within the school proper - staff meetings, parent meetings or meetings that deal with any type of disciplinary reason. I have found that when I look at the web and spend time planning for these events, there are fewer unexpected things that happen and when something unexpected does happen, it usually fits somewhere within the areas that I have looked at. In doing this, I have reduced the amount of time we spend on "information" at our staff meetings. We now spend more time looking at program development and important events within the school. In this way, we have reduced the time our staff meetings take which makes for a much happier staff:)

As I have grown as an administrator, I realize that although I might have some pretty good ideas, if I don't take the time to plan how they look and what they will mean to the people that are involved, I won't have the support that I will have if I take the time to plan, looking at all the different ways this might impact not just students and teachers but the community and the division. Thus, when we did our beautification project in the U area at the school, we involved the caretaker, the division grounds manager, parents, teachers, students and staff. By doing this, we were able to head off some hard feelings and get ideas for overcoming some of the things that, at the start, we had not thought about like grass cutting, watering of plants, access by the handicapped and lighting at night. By considering all the areas outlined in the web, we were very successful and were able to accomplish more than we had originally planned.

On the other hand, I didn't follow this model when we implemented the use of the AR Reading program. Now, teachers thought it was a good idea but we didn't take the time to include enough people. Although we are now seeing success, it has taken us longer than we estimated because we didn't plan well. Thus, we have had to reevaluate our action plan for our reading goals. Not the end of the world but it was something that we could have avoided.

Planning. Something that, as teachers, we know is critical to our success in the classroom. As we use different technologies, we are seeing teachers using new tools to plan like wikis. Many teachers now use electronic planners and are becoming more comfortable with using new tools. With the increased use of digital tools, planning becomes even more important for teachers as they must be aware that what they plan may not be doable because of access issues or technical problems.

Planning. For administrators it is vital in all areas of our work. Whether it be educational leadership, supervision, mentoring, teaching or planning a meeting, we must demonstrate to the people with whom we work that planning is important. One might be able to do a presentation off the cuff if needed but for a successful presentation that has the impact we would like it to have, administrators must plan.

This does not mean that spontaneous actions be avoided - like teachable moments they can sometimes be the best time to make a point or gather some information. As I've discovered, however, in order to use my time to its best advantage, I must plan what I will do while being ever cognisant that my plans may be trashed by any number of reasons. That is why I don't overplan my day. In fact, I've learned that particular times of the day are best for certain things because there isn't usually too many distractions. Usually. I've also found this to be true when it comes to my own learning. If I leave it to chance encounters with books or magazines, the chance is I won't do anything. If, however, I plan my learning, even small at small intervals, I know that there is a good chance that it will happen.

As a leader, I've come to realize that my time is very valuable to many people for many reasons. In order to be available for those people, I need to be at my best which means that running around in a frazzle isn't the best way to get things done. By no means do my days flow along to a schedule but, by planning parts of them and being realistic at what I can do and when I will most likely be able to do it, I have become more successful at achieving my goals. By using the planning web, I've allowed for much more input which has created even greater opportunities than I had envisioned and brought about partnerships that I wouldn't have been able to create on my own.