"This book is right on target with its thought-provoking ideas and concepts on the characteristics of successful educational leaders." -Thomas F. Leahy, Consultant, Executive Search Department, Illinois Association of School Boards "Our best teachers obtain great results by building positive relationships with their students. Gray and Streshly show how our best principals do the same thing and how these behaviors can be learned and practiced." -Kevin Singer, Superintendent, Topeka Public Schools, KS Build your capacity to lead your school to greatness! Great leaders are made, not born. Written by the authors of From Good Schools to Great Schools, this sequel shows how great school leaders can be developed and how leaders can acquire the powerful personal leadership characteristics that the best administrators use to lead their schools to greatness. Based on sound strategies and the work of Jim Collins, Susan Penny Gray and William A. Streshly tackle how to build relationships, communicate effectively, exercise your personal will with humility, face brutal facts, get faculty on board, and build a school culture of self-discipline. Chapters include: Case studies that provide an ongoing context for professional learning Self-assessments that reveal your inherent leadership dispositions Interviews and tips from exceptional principals in the field Strategies for developing specific leadership qualities Application exercises that reinforce how to put the strategies into action Reflection activities that encourage professional growth Appropriate for both individual and group professional development, Leading Good Schools to Greatness reveals how leadership skills can be learned and used to take your school to the next level.
"This book will challenge, enlighten, and transform. The authors invite us to re-examine our core values as educational leaders, reconsider our priorities, and place the humanity of children at the center of our work." -Nancy Skerritt, Assistant Superintendent,Tahoma School District, Maple Valley, WA "By their analysis, Lumby and English expose the power of language to shape meaning. By their skill, they illustrate the power of language to engage and enrich. Their work is an important contribution to how we understand and practice leadership in all fields." -Steven R. Thompson, Coordinator, School Leadership Program, Miami University An imaginative approach to rethinking and revitalizing your leadership practice! Research has shown that metaphors inspire leaders to reflect on their mind-sets, behaviors, practices, and approaches, leading to new perspectives on their roles. Using such thought-provoking and unexpected metaphors as "leadership as war" and "leadership as lunacy," the authors draw readers through historical perspectives and cognitive possibilities that inspire, resolve, confuse, and provoke reflection on the state of leadership in education. This book examines the current discourse on educational leadership models, behaviors, and roles, and helps school and district leaders: Understand the power of metaphor and how metaphors have been used to define leadership Develop a deeper connection to their roles and their approaches Initiate change in themselves and in others By inspiring creative thinking and critical reflection, Leadership as Lunacy helps leaders achieve personal and professional growth and invigorate their professional relationships!
Progress: the focus of a new perspective on leadership Weaving together original research, novel strategies and tactics, and stories of successful leaders, this book provides insight into how to become a progress-making leader. Written by an academic and a business executive, the book provides actionable ideas grounded in sound research and tested in real organizations. Find out more! 1. Click on the Features/New to this Edition tab above for more information about the book. 2. Visit the authors' website for teaching and learning resources: 3. Watch the video! A video touching on some of the issues covered in the book is available on YouTube. This video is a great resource that can be used in the classroom to launch discussion about the nature of leadership.
Progress: the focus of a new perspective on leadership Weaving together original research, novel strategies and tactics, and stories of successful leaders, this book provides insight into how to become a progress-making leader. Written by an academic and a business executive, the book provides actionable ideas grounded in sound research and tested in real organizations. Find out more! 1. Click on the Features/New to this Edition tab above for more information about the book. 2. Visit the authors' website for teaching and learning resources: 3. Watch the video! A video touching on some of the issues covered in the book is available on YouTube. This video is a great resource that can be used in the classroom to launch discussion about the nature of leadership.
'A leader's job is not to have all of the right answers, but to ask the right questions. Not only does this book address self-inquiry for school leaders, it offers tools and learning support for leaders committed to improving and refining their inquiry-based leadership' - Betty Burks, Deputy Superintendent, San Antonio ISD, TX, USA 'This is an invaluable handbook for those eager to listen differently to people, enter into dialogue about sensitive topics, and structure opportunities for people to talk constructively'-Joellen Killion, Deputy Executive Director, National Staff Development Council 'Walsh and Sattes have captured the essence of one of the key features of a good leader: the ability to coach others. Their quality questioning framework helps school leaders understand that the way they structure a question can be the key to building organizational capacity' - Yvonne V. Thayer, Certified Professional Coach Senior Director, Making Middle Grades Work, Southern Regional Education Board, GA, USA 'A must-read for all school leaders. This practical guide on how to create an inquiry-oriented approach to decision making enables adult learners in the school to sustain school improvement' - Betsy Rogers, School Improvement Specialist, Jefferson County School District, AL, USA 'The Leading through Quality Questioning Framework is a clear and concise way to get the big picture of how questioning can be used to foster a culture of continuous improvement. The chapters that follow allow the reader to put the meat on the bones of the framework' - Christopher Corallo, Director of Staff Development Henrico County Public Schools, Richmond, VA, USA Quality questioning is a process for engaging individuals in reflection, critical thinking, and collaboration. The authors demonstrate how questions, not answers, drive school improvement and growth for a learning community. This handbook for school and council leaders applies the principles of the best-selling book Quality Questioning to four critical leadership functions: - Maximizing individual and organizational capacity - Mobilizing individuals and groups to build ownership and commitment across a community - Mediating conflict by helping individuals find common ground and focus on shared purpose - Monitoring progress toward identified goals
Critiquing the command-and-control style of leadership derived from the gladiator concept of male invulnerability, this title demonstrates how traditional feminine skills and values - such as inclusion, empathy, a holistic perspective, relationship skills, and emotional strength - can be applied to empower people.
"Offers a set of extremely useful heuristics, mental models, and organizational checklists with which future and practicing school leaders can analyze leadership situations and take positive, focused action to improve school conditions. The author's gift for narration brings the reader into the case studies and allows you to almost be sitting alongside experienced educational leaders as they ponder about and make decisions concerning critical educational issues. This is highly insightful and helpful for the reader just learning about the complexity of educational leadership and a critical gift for their own future decision making." -Dan W. Butin, Assistant Dean of Educational Leadership Cambridge College "The vignettes, cases, and stories provide insights into what an educational leader at the school level can face each day. These examples lend themselves to professional book study with practicing principals as well as those who aspire to take on that role." -Michelle Gayle, Principal Griffin Middle School, Tallahassee, FL Diagnose your school's critical challenges and apply specific differentiated leadership strategies for improvement! Whether yours is an urban or a rural school, every setting faces unique types of challenges requiring an appropriate and differentiated response. This book introduces the qualities of differentiated leadership and stresses the importance of understanding that different schools can face very distinct sets of challenges. The author provides principals with an overview of "organizational diagnostics" with guidelines for identifying critical issues and demonstrates how to apply differentiated leadership to four high-level priorities: Preventing school decline Turning around a low-performing school Sustaining improvements Designing a new school
Recognizing and responding to change is the oxygen of life for an organization, and leadership is fundamentally about focusing organizations on these new realities. Leadership and Change Management provides the reader with a practical, real-world understanding of several dimensions of leadership that are usually neglected in management textbooks, such as the nature of new realities and how managers can improve their insight into them, and how leaders can identify and overcome resistance to change. Drawing on a wide range of insightful, global real-life case studies to capture the imagination, the topics covered include critical systems thinking, philosophies of leadership, group dynamics, authority, ethics, personal character and the psychology of leadership. This comprehensive text will be of interest to anyone looking for a more thoughtful engagement with the key issues in leadership and change management.
