Leadership for Change: Building a Vision and Encouraging Shared Responsibility

Jennifer Rowan, Director of Technology at Jefferson County Schools

It seems like for the last few years, society has been living in constant change and dissonance in educational matters, civil matters, and domestic matters. These changes have caused some good people to walk away from the education profession, citing new skill sets and challenges that have been too much for them to handle. Nevertheless, problems of educational practice consistently persist, and it is imperative that leaders come together to find ways to build upon strong foundations.

Leaders of education, including educational technologists, have an obligation to help others enact innovation for the better through their work with their colleagues in the classroom. However, this obligation must not come in the form of an edict but rather as inspiration to those who can have a direct effect on student achievement: teachers. To achieve this, leaders need to articulate a vision and hold those accountable for change while encouraging continuous feedback for real-time adjustments.

Leaders: Curb your Expectations

When presenting solutions to problems in practice, leaders should expect staff mindsets to fall on a change bell curve. In other words, leaders should not expect everyone to have blind allegiance to a change in practice. In fact, staff will take on specific roles for any change based on their lived experiences and expertise. Therefore, leaders should curb personal expectations that everyone will want to do something new and exciting. If a new practice is going to take hold, it is going to take strategy, adjustment, encouragement, and persistent patience.

In fact, many researchers focus on the element of change. In 1969, Kübler-Ross wrote about change in the form of stages (Hewitt, 2021). When faced with change, individuals may become shocked and deny the need for change at first. Next, there is the disruption that is causing anger and fear due to the proposed change. In the third stage, individuals may experience exploration and acceptance of the given solution. Lastly, individuals will enter a stage of rebuilding and commitment.

“Leaders should curb personal expectations that everyone will want to do something new and exciting. If a new practice is going to take hold, it is going to take strategy, adjustment, encouragement, and persistent patience.”

However, these stages do not exist concurrently for all parties involved. Specifically for educational technology change, Rogers (1962) wrote of five different groups that fit on the innovation-adoption curve: innovators, early adopters, the early majority, the late majority, and laggards. These groups will either take hold of the change quickly and alter their practice or need extra support to find success. Each group relies on the successful integration of the  plan because when enacting change to address a problem in practice, those who will need to do something differently may have adverse reactions to the plan. How then do leaders hold those accountable without inciting fear or anger when a change is desperately needed? Because, let’s face it, leaders cannot afford to have more teachers leave this profession, but society at large cannot afford for educators to keep problems of practice in circulation without causing harm to the next generation.

In general, teachers want to do what is best for their students, but they are burned out and simply tired. Therefore, leaders must be selective in defining a local problem of practice and providing pathways for addressing those issues. Leaders who are successful in bringing about transformative change typically do so through a distributive technique where there is shared leadership among those who have expertise and/or shared interests.

By developing distributive leadership within a staff or community, leaders can articulate the vision (the why) while others develop the concrete plan (the how). When there is shared project management and understanding, others are equally invested in the outcome. Those who may not traditionally have leadership roles are given authority and autonomy to create a greater good within their local community.

Conclusion

Problems of practice continue to exist even amid unrelenting changes and challenges. However, leaders cannot be afraid to create meaningful transformation to provide viable solutions. To do this successfully, one must provide the vision, develop a team to enact that vision, and provide support along the way to full adoption. Change takes time and unrelenting persistence. Keep going.

Project Management

Educational Technology