Leading with Impact: Building Strong Cultures in K-12 Education

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This is true in any sector, and it's particularly true in the K 12 space. Within this space, you have multiple constraints that you're dealing with, and one of the major ones is funding. And when your funding is limited, it becomes critical that you do whatever you can to retain good employees. Today's conversation is on the topic of building a listening and action culture in the K through 12 space that drives engagement and retention.

nt achievement and community [: 00:01:00

Sean, welcome to the show.

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[00:01:04] Dr. Jim: I'm looking forward to having this chat with you. And especially because this is in your first rodeo.

So there's a lot of perspective that you bring to the table in terms of building a, high performing district and building strong cultures within district. So I'm looking forward to that conversation. But I think one of the first orders of business that's going to be useful for us is for you to map out some of those key events in your career that shaped your leadership philosophy.

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And so I think as I progressed into administration that really became, probably my focal point and strong point was making sure we had the right people on the bus. They understood what, roles [00:02:00] and responsibilities were but just that strong relationship was in P in place as a building principal.

Thank you. Obviously that's a key to ensuring that building initiatives, district initiatives are then carried forward. And, as we fast forward into the last 10, 12 years as a superintendent I think that's number one, still a focal point but even more important now than ever.

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[00:02:49] Shawn Holloway: I think staying with that analogy, probably The biggest piece is finding key members of your staff that, you need to get on board having individual conversations [00:03:00] with those folks trying to create buy in and then allowing them to do. Some of that down the road work with other staff members.

So again, if I'm relating it to to a football to a football staff I can't be offense coordinator, defensive coordinator and head coach all at the same time. And so it's creating buy in with those key people and then pushing that through the rest of your system or rest of your team.

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[00:03:41] Shawn Holloway: One of the strategies I use is called rounding conversations. And so it's just a conversation protocol. I do that with our directors director level. So some of my direct reports and really what that is it just allows me to be a really good listener. But then also, allows me to [00:04:00] have some skin in the game in that department we work through a problem that I can help with where I'm specifically helping with that.

I think that's been 1 procedural thing that is fairly tight in terms of. The way those conversations go, but then really for me, it's it's sitting down one on one with our people building trust that way, getting to know each other on a personal level.

I'm a real believer in. Change can happen before relationships. I think change is really hard before relationships are established because we need those relationships to be able to carry out that, that change order.

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So tell us a little bit about What your current district [00:05:00] looks like and what constraints that you needed to account for when you're trying to build that culture of coaching within that district that's different from when you were at a smaller district.

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We're very much a bedroom community suburban free and reduced count is very low. It's right around 20%. We really don't have A lot of excuses, right? In terms of student performance, but then really that is probably the the piece right now.

that we'll have also just in [: 00:06:00

[00:06:08] Dr. Jim: One of the interesting things about your answer was that when you look at the district landscape, there shouldn't be a lot of reasons why the district isn't performing at the highest of levels. Give me a better sense of some of the other observations that you had when you first started in the district that created some interesting opportunities for change.

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At Norwalk, the, they had a structure in place that at the cabinet level was more director level and that was, I think, very effective in some regards, but very early on last fall, what [00:07:00] I started to notice was we would have conversations the cabinet level that ultimately we're having an impact on our five school buildings.

And we'd have the conversation at cabinet, we would then have to turn around and have that same conversation or a similar conversation, or one of my cabinet members would have to have that conversation with building principles and it just, it became very apparent that. It's a bit like playing the game of telephone like we used to play when we were young that the original message doesn't always reach the intended audience in the same fashion that it was prior and so for me, it was.

Some of it was, I think, just what I was used to, right? I was used to making decisions with my building principals, but I think we're in a unique spot here in Norwalk.

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For any organization is connecting the dots from the executive suite, from the [00:08:00] strategy side to the execution side, and you're describing an element of that. So when you think about that particular observation, what were some of the things that you did to close the loop on that gap in understanding that was happening at the front lines?

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What were our building principles feeling like and I think that, it's maybe generally speaking, it was, Hey, we feel like we're, things are being done to us versus with us but then also, it's, I think also important to, again, honor the other folks in the room.

t think we, we want to leave [: 00:09:00

And quite honestly, we're. We're still trying to figure out the best course for us. But I think we're a lot further along than we were a year ago.

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What were the things that you did from a leadership perspective that leveled up your cabinet to have more effective conversations with the building principles so that there wasn't a communication gap at that layer as well. Tell us a little bit about some of the things that you did there.

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But I would say the number 1 theme was just trust within our organization, right? I'm new. I was new at the time, so I'm two, three months in, into the role. All of my district leaders were still trying to understand who I was and what I was about and, if I was going to follow through on my word and be committed to that process.

e're going to have good open [: 00:11:00

[00:11:00] Dr. Jim: So there's a lot there that I think is worth digging into. But one particular thing that I'm curious about is when you look at putting this into place during putting this into place, when you started you're trying to build this communication culture and listening culture, and you're bringing new people into the room.

How did you create the space for people to say, I don't understand what you're actually talking about, or I don't think this is the right idea in this particular instance, because you as the new guy. And as the new leader of the district have a certain level of power and influence where people who don't know you are going to be scared or gun shy to, fill you in on what they think they want to fly under the radar.

So what steps did you take to create the opportunity for them to speak up and really give an honest opinion on what's going on?

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Hey, I'm not sure I should have said that. I'm more of a, let's lay it out on the table type of person. And it was really important for me to have follow up conversations, I think, with individuals to let them know not all of our, not all of our cabinet level meetings are positive.

We get, we get down into the nitty gritty at times and we, we disagree with each other. But as long as we're being respectful in that conversation, then that's the dialogue we want. And, so I would have follow up conversations with individuals and even small groups.

And, you're trying to assess. People's feelings or emotions where they're at what they heard versus maybe what someone else heard and really just trying to bridge the gap maybe the relationship gap between some of the folks in the room.

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[00:13:11] Shawn Holloway: I think the first piece there was very quickly in that process, I think, some of my directors understood that I was going to give as much credence to what a building principal said is as anyone else in the room. And we had to establish that everyone's on equal footing but the buy in then at.

At the district level I think then allows our building principals to take that to their buildings in, in K 12 education we might use professional development as as the example, but then take that professional development initiative to their building and have their building leaders implement that with fidelity.

Throughout the rest of their staff,

rsations are maybe ahead of. [: 00:14:00

And so the conversations we have at our leadership table we want to have those same types of conversations throughout our system down through the building because to me, then the vice versus also in effect. We need our people in our buildings to be able to I think I think our district is one of, one of our greatest strengths is our people, right?

We have a tremendous teaching staff and, we've got a Understand that their leaders as much as anyone else. And so many times those good ideas are coming from from someone in our building. And, we've got to be able to maybe not think so highly of ourselves that we can't take really good suggestions from anyone in our organization,

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Were there any blind spots that you were able to uncover by having principals in the room that you didn't anticipate and the cabinet didn't anticipate?

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One elementary might have a pajama day on the same day. It's Favorite sports team day and versus having that, that be all as one now, that's a, that, that's a silly example, but we start talking curriculum, we start talking professional development initiatives. Then in, the world of education that gets pretty serious in a hurry.

number one thing I saw was. [: 00:16:00

And so just trying to capitalize on kind of that human resourced, to again, just make us a better working system.

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Let's take the isolation bit of it since that can be really damaging in terms of employee and teacher burnout. What were some of the steps that you took to. Remove those obstacles or those negative things and create a more cohesive district

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Just really sad example would be about this time last year, maybe even a couple of weeks. Further into summer, I really realized that my assistant principals had not sat down in the same room together for months, and something as, as simple as bringing all those people together and it was really fun the first time last summer when they all were in the same room because I just stepped back and you could hear really really good conversations happening, right?

that to the head principles [: 00:18:00

Making sure the right people are at the table to have those conversations, having the structure in place and we're still working on that for sure. It's I have a, we have a new associate superintendent for teaching and learning and it was interesting. She's been on the job for nine days and on Friday of last week she said, I don't know if I should say this or not, but I really feel like we were working in isolation from each other.

And I said, no, you're not wrong. That's exactly, that's exactly what's in place. And so again, for us it's still a work in progress. I mentioned achievement scores before and to me that's our number one driver towards making academic improvement is to make sure that we're thinking systematically and our people are working together.

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[00:19:01] Shawn Holloway: Outsourcing, LLC.

I would say that probably the some of the easier wins really were just showing value in all employees at all levels. I think if you would ask one of our custodians, if I would listen to an idea they'd have, they would say yes to that. I can give you specific examples of that, right?

And what, again, what's what's awesome about Norwalk is our people want to make us the best possible school district. But I think really just again it's filtering that trust all the way through your system. Being present for people and listening to what they have to say.

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If you're the type of person that would listen to a suggestion that came from them. It's interesting that you said that that's common in the district. Were you able to capitalize on that and implement something that made an impact in the district for the better?

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It's not centered. He said, the number of people comment on that. Is there anything we can do there? And I had walked in that door probably a hundred times, right? And never noticed it. But then, right away it's yeah, that, that's a problem. Now that you put it on my brain, it doesn't look great.

And we read it, redesign that that, that entryway that, that portion of it that will be installed later this summer. But, I don't think it's so much about The it is about the action of following through on that on that suggestion. But I think the larger piece is Roger knows he can come to me and we can have a conversation and, it's not that Roger is always going to get his way but he and I are going to have good open conversation and I'm going to listen to, what his ideas are and his opinions are and that doesn't, it doesn't matter what his position is, right?

t a person that wants what's [: 00:21:00

And I say they're the face of the building when parents walk in there. That's equally why it was so important to bring my principles into the fray of cabinet level like we have five buildings are each one fifth of our district and so I'm just honoring people honoring, all employees regardless what their title is, making sure that we're given a listening ear to that and respecting those folks are, I think are a key to being a successful leader.

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[00:22:09] Shawn Holloway: Number one, I think, is listen, right? That when I had my entry plan for Norwalk the biggest piece there was listen and lead, right? And the leading came from listening to our folks right away. To me that's probably the top priority, but then it becomes building relationships not only with your key leaders, but all the way through the system and being present.

When you're having conversations with folks and again, listening to what they have to say and what their story is then maybe that third step is maybe the most critical and that's carrying through with the action. And so again, for me last year, in the fall, that, that action step was bringing my principals into the cabinet level conversations to try to make us a more cohesive systematic approach to our system.

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[00:23:02] Shawn Holloway: I would say for me Twitter would be probably the social media I use the most, but I also have LinkedIn would be the two places.

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When I think about The conversation that we had, I opened the show with the concept of connecting the dots between strategy and execution. And what I like about what you described is that if that's the goal for you as a leader, there's a really nice process that you described. If you want to bridge that gap. You have to build structure and process so that people have a playbook that they can operate in, and part of that playbook needs to include you figuring out who needs to be in the room to impact this particular change that I'm trying to trying to And one of the biggest gaps that happens at the executive tier is that [00:24:00] you don't have line of sight into really what's going on in the front lines. So if you don't have the people in the room that are closest to the front lines, you're never going to have it. And The benefit of doing that, building that structure, building that process, making sure that people are in the room, is that you get visibility into the details that are being missed, and when you pay attention to the details of what's going on in the district and you work on changing those, however big or small, That's how you actually build a high performance organization.

So that story, that flow chart that you described really presents a formula that anybody can use to really make sure that they're driving change on a constant basis that's fueled by the input that you're getting from the frontline. So I really appreciate you sharing that for those of you who have been listening to this conversation.

then tune in next time where [: 00:25:00