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Lessons in Leadership
by Leslie Wilson


I learned two disheartening stories this past week. In one, a turnaround expert was planning to help a district turnaround (reach Adequate Yearly Progress under No Child Left Behind). In the other, a district was seeking to initiate a one-to-one program. In each case, circumstances around leadership, maybe commitment, loomed large in contributing to the failure to reach ground level goals.
In the turnaround case, there is an excellent expert hired to facilitate the district’s progress. After careful examination, the expert learned not only how the district originally became a failing site but why they would continue to struggle and likely fail. It appears that the district hired a new superintendent who has stars in her eyes regarding her future career goals. She articulated to the turnaround agent that her work in this failing place is a stepping stone to what is next for her. 
This superintendent was given an enormous amount of state school improvement funds to help the turnaround effort. Her board’s directives were to increase the number of student enrollees while increasing student achievement. To those ends, she purchased many laptops and publicized the creation of a one-to-one program with a high school student population. She spent a lot on marketing the program – glitzy ads for the surrounding community – aimed at increasing parents’/caregivers’ desires to send their children to her schools. 
A third party recommended that a group come in to support the one-to-one work in the district. The group came in and found 1) no infrastructure – hence – no ability for students or teachers to ‘use’ the laptops, and 2) no money, resources or plans for teachers’ professional learning. It turned out that the superintendent wanted the sexy book cover to tell the district’s great success story which turned out to be complete fantasy. The only light at the end of this tunnel is a cadre of teachers in one of the schools that very much wants to create a successful learning environment. The turnaround expert is focusing efforts with this group.
In a second situation, a large, urban district reached out for help in the design and rollout of a district-wide one-to-one program. Numerous other partners, with open pocketbooks, were on-board. One district employee was appointed the ‘head’ of the effort. He was told by the superintendent to ‘make it happen’.  This committed employee has spent a lot of time researching, planning, communicating and designing a 360 degree plan. He is passionate about the work. He has accumulated many resources, ideas and potential strategies. But he hasn’t been given the green light to launch.
The troubling circumstance around this effort is that the employee cannot get a straight answer or clear path strategy from the superintendent or the cabinet team. In order to rollout a district-wide robust tech program, there is serious need to ramp up the infrastructure. The powers that be, it seems, think this is a power grab by the tech department. There is not an understanding of what is needed for the initiative to be successful. Nor does there seem to be an attempt to understand.
At the most recent meeting, the superintendent threw a curve ball. The session was held to discuss next steps in the one-to-one implementation. Instead, the superintendent talked about becoming a ‘virtual’ education site – with a foundation perhaps being one-to-one programming. Everyone sort of looked around and thought, ‘what does that mean?’; and ‘what does this mean regarding the district-wide one-to-one effort?’. No answers have yet emerged. But, again, the effort is thwarted. And there also looms the possibility that the appointed ‘point’ person for the project is seeking employment elsewhere.
Two leadership points here: 1) clear vision, messaging, engagement and buy-in of stakeholders is important-the ever-shifting targets, ideas, etc., create confusion, distraction and, possibly, the dead-ending of the original plan; 2) committed, long term leadership is required to create a vision, strategic action plans and then take them to fruition.
We have witnessed the widely successful settings where the leaders come together for the good of an organization and are committed to the vision, strategies and stakeholders’ buy-in. They view it as their mission to move the project to success and sustainability.
Conversely, we have witnessed efforts such as the two examples cited above-where leaders take on a key role for personal gain such as future career positioning, notoriety, etc., lacking passion and commitment to the current community of learners; and where the leader has not articulated a clear and sustained vision that employees can band around and help make a reality.
This is not to say that career goals are selfish or that continuing to work with a vision is a sign of infidelity to a plan. It is to say that with education so much on the front burner of our lives, economy and global success; we cannot afford leadership that snakes away at our reaching the simplest important goals. There is a selflessness required for servant leadership. We need much more of it.
Leslie A. Wilson
CEO, One-to-One Institute, www.one-to-oneinstitute.org
Co-author, Project RED, www.projectred.org
lesliew@1two1.org
 

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