Problems of Leadership Reflections

3 September, 2023

Strategic Direction 

"You never need permission to lead" -  Effective leaders are able to identify "problems" and find solutions to causes rather than symptoms. Leaders collaborate with various parties in order to find the root of challenges and facilitate changes in order to support the community they lead. 

In order to ensure that leaders are involving all parties in the decision making process it is vital that strategic directions are set. This will ensure that all parties are working towards a common goal and have a common understanding of the purpose of the organization. All decisions should align with a common goal/purpose. Common strategic direction additionally ensures accountability. If everyone is working towards the same goal, leaders and their teams are able to hold each other accountable towards a common understanding of purpose. 

In order for leaders to effectively lead it is vital to build strong positive relationships with all stakeholders within a team. Cultivating a culture of trust and understanding is key to fostering effectiveness and efficiency of the common goal/purpose. 

4 September, 2023

Hidden Traps in Decision Making

"Good decisions come from experience, experience comes from making bad decisions" - Mark Twain

I was born into a culture of Asian parents where perfection was demanded. Making mistakes was a sign of weakness. I will never forget the overwhelming anxiety of my mother sending me into the supermarket to purchase tomatoes she needed to prepare our dinner. The eight year old me stood in front of a tower of tomatoes in the produce section, staring at the overwhelming options of tomatoes in various stages of ripeness. The questions and thoughts running through my head informed my feverishly scanning eyes of which shade of red, combined with texture of squishiness and size as I stuffed the exact amount she asked for in a clear plastic produce bag. 

Thinking back on this, my ability to sift through information, consideration of purpose and a general sense of logic has greatly impacted how I make decisions. Although my background has influenced my decision making process, or heuristics, it is vital for me to utilize both my experience as well as my understanding of my own mental traps in order to make better decisions. 

 Hidden Traps in Decision Making:

1. The Anchoring Trap: Framing information influences decision making (e.g. making a customer feel like they're getting a better deal when items are "marked down")

2. The Status-Quo Trap: Confronting bias and being afraid of change

3. The Sunk-Cost Trap: Making decisions that justify past choices

4. The Confirming - Evidence Trap: Seeking evidence that supports our existing instinct.

5. The Framing Trap: Framing questions can be dangerous as framing establishes status-quo. 

6. The Estimating & Forecasting Trap: Basing decisions on overconfident or overly cautious estimates. 

5 September, 2023

Participatory Decision Making 

Leading teams within a school can be particularly challenging as schools function as communities. In order for the organization to be successful and for there to be progress a certain level of democracy must take place in order for all stakeholders to have bought-in to any particular decision that is being made. Participatory decision making is a vital tool for school leaders to utilize in order to make decisions that are based on reliable data and are realistic. There are multiple factors that one must take into consideration when using a participatory decision making model:

• Ensure that the right people are influencing the decision
• Ensure that a common purpose or vision is established and understood
• Ensure that data collected is interrogated, questioned, verified and challenged if need be
• Ensure that all participants are aware of their level of participation as well as their level of decision making power. (not all participatory decision making processes require equal decision making power)

When listening to the stories/reflections of everyone's example of good leadership, I realized that the common thread was that every individual felt heard and understood by their leader. When making decisions, it is important to involve relevant stakeholders and actively listen and consider and their contributions in order to develop the best possible solution.

6 September, 2023

The Congruence Model

Aligns all systems in schools around the vision statement

1. Perform root cause analysis

e.g. If Jon had to ask for a loan, you would first ask various questions before making a decision. Why does he need it? Why doesn't he have it?

Symptoms vs. Root Cause

Symptoms - result or outcome of the problem // what you see as a problem (usually obvious)

The Problem - Gap from goal or standard

Causes- System below the surface, bringing about the problem

The systemic issue

Example: A problem I have been facing at school is teachers inability to follow an indoor playground schedule. Teaching Early Childhood in Qatar summer months comes with its own challenges, where students are not permitted to play outdoors when temperatures rise to a certain degree. The school has provided an indoor soft gym/playground for PreK- KG2 students to use during this time. This means that over a 5 hour school day, 11 classes sign up for 30 minute playground slots in order to provide students with a space to develop gross motor skills. The schedule is sent out as a shared document at the beginning of the school year and teachers schedule their classes into the specified time-slots.

Recently, teachers have been complaining that some classes have not been following the schedule which has resulted in certain classes missing their time slots for the day. This has caused tension between teachers and grade-level teams.

Possible symptom:

1. Teachers do not want to follow the schedule

2. Teachers do not want to schedule playground time first thing in the morning

3. Teachers are using the playground as a brain break, not structured time to develop gross motor skills

4. Teachers sign up for 30 minute slots, maybe the time can be reduced

Root Cause:

There is only one indoor playground for 11 classes in a 5 hour day. The allocated space does not match the capacity of students and classes who utilize it.

Root causes will always deal with systemic issues

2. Check for organizational alignment

5 building blocks, - all the blocks need to work together to perform

a) critical tasks and interdependence: what work is being done in the building

is the right material being taught with the right pedagogy in the right sequence.

b) culture: norms, values and beliefs of the people in the organization

c) structure & systems: roles, responsibilities, formal reporting structure etc.

Do the structures at my school (space of building, schedule, data systems etc)

e) capabilities: skills, capacities and attitudes of people who carry out the organization's critical tasks

Are the capabilities of staff aligned with the work that is being done? Do they have the skills?

f) leadership: style and competencies

The above work as a system, all components need to be aligned

Lack of alignment degrades the whole system.

7 September, 2023

Kidder's Ethical Checkpoints

1. Recognize that there is a problem
- Try to avoid black and white thinking, consider the nuances of a specific situation.
- Avoid ONLY thinking in the gray area, "what battles do I fight?"
- Care vs. Flex
- What is evil? the intention AND effect of causing harm or destruction, usually the perception of violating a moral code
- Consider the moral implications of doing nothing
- Understand that we are constantly engaged in moral decisions
- "Muted" organizational reality (its the system, what can I do?)
- Harm can be caused consciously or unconsciously. Regardless, evil is evil

2. Determine the "actors"
- ask, "who's dilemma is this?"
- ask, whether we are involved but whether we are responsible - whether I am morally obligated and empowered to do anything in the face of the moral issues
- sometimes the ethical dilemma can be "right/right", do I show mercy and compassion?
- Am i ethically responsible for the outcome of this decision? what is your impact on the outcome?

3. Gather facts
- check against common decision making errors
- give yourself time

4. Test for right-versus-wrong issues
- Determine if it is a right vs wrong issue, if so, then it should stop there
- Moral relativism: a view that rejects the existence of any objective, absolute or universal moral truths that govern our morality (e.g. If you sit with anything long enough, you can learn to justify it)