As a school leader our days can be flooded with a variety of things that demand our attention – parent concerns, student discipline, budgeting, meetings, phone calls, emails, and the list goes on. With all of these competing needs, its no wonder that topics like “productivity” and “efficiency” are prominent in most leaders’ reading lists. How can we get more efficient at tackling the things we need to do? Simultaneously, leaders are beginning to dive deeply into the concept of innovation in learning. It seems surprising that this would be a new concept. After all, we expect (and demand) constant innovation in all other areas of our life. Don’t believe me? Take a look at your cellphone. Are you using a cellphone from five years ago? Two years ago? Last year? My guess is, probably not. And yet, we often see no need to change or innovate with regards to our instructional practices. As the world moves forward all around us, our schools stand still. Worse yet, our inability to adapt is tantamount to moving backwards.
And even now I can hear the cries: “That’s a nice idea, but it isn’t realistic – there isn’t TIME for innovation!” As a school leader I can certainly relate to this feeling. However, I would also say that we can’t afford NOT to devote our time to the work of innovating in our schools. In fact, I would posit that we can even continue to do the work of running our schools, while simultaneously pushing for disruptive innovation, if we are brave enough to make just one change: Ditch the Principal’s Office.
This year will mark the first year that my school won’t have a Principal’s Office. Here’s how I did it, and why I think you ought to do it as well. . .
Closing your office to open doors
Before we talk about how to go “office free,” let’s start with why such a change can make all the difference in your efforts to achieve real, innovative change at your school site. Here are six reasons why I believe leaving the office behind helps you (and your school) get ahead.
1. Leaving the office reduces unnecessary work
One of the biggest problems with an administration office is that people know where to find you. Don’t get me wrong, I am not advocating for administrators to “hide” from the work inherent in their job. On the contrary, this is about being more present and available. However, people often seek out administrators for things that they don’t need support with. Think about it, how often are the people who visit your office there to simply socialize, or complain about something, or try to get you to take care of some problem or challenge that they can easily solve on their own? When you leave your office behind a natural separation of tasks takes place. Since administrators aren’t readily available, the person seeking them out – teacher, staff, parent – needs to determine whether they can handle the situation themselves or whether they really need to seek you out for support. If they can handle it themselves, they won’t feel the need to take time tracking you down on campus. As a result, the problem will likely be addressed more quickly, and the person will likely feel more empowered by working through the solution themselves. If the problem really is something that needs the attention of the administrator, they can easily reach you (more on that later). The overall result is that fewer management tasks fall at the feet of the administrator, creating more time for more impactful tasks. Likewise, the members of your team have an opportunity to engage in a new dynamic of shared leadership and to view themselves as catalysts for change.
2. Leaving the office improves your connection to the realities of teaching/learning
If you really want to know what the experience is for your students, I encourage you to spend the whole day shadowing them. Follow them from class to class, and engage in the activities they are doing. Notice how long you sit quietly in one place. Notice how little you get to talk. Notice how void of context many of the things are that you are working on. If you want to innovate the experience of teaching/learning, you need to know what the current reality is. There’s no other way around it.
3. Leaving the office reduces discipline and increases positive character
Spending your days entirely “out on campus” also has the ability to reduce discipline significantly. Being present in classrooms has a natural effect on student behavior in class (after all, you are the Principal). More importantly though, being out on campus changes the dynamic of your interactions with students. When a student does something wrong at school they are often sent to the principal’s office. The process of going to the office has serious implications and stigma for students. Students see this experience as an embarrassing process where they are singled-out, punished, and then sent back to class (or home). If the goal of discipline in schools is to bring about a change in behavior, and to develop positive character attributes in students, consequences alone won’t work. However, the simple act of eliminating the “principal’s office” can have a powerful impact on your interactions with students. Conversations – even one-on-one in the hallways – become opportunities to build relationships and coach students towards better behavior. These coaching sessions then, in turn, help students change direction before they have a major infraction.
4. Leaving the office encourages better teaching
Teachers everywhere, almost universally, dread an administrator coming into their classroom. I’m convinced that the only reason for this is because teachers typically only sees administrators in class when they are coming to complete a formal evaluation. When administrators aren’t regularly present in classrooms it becomes only natural for the students and the teacher to assume that they are there because somebody did something wrong. However, when administrators spend the vast majority of their time in classrooms, even if much of that time is spent working on emails and other tasks in the back of the room, their presence becomes less threatening – they become an expected part of the learning environment, rather than an intruder. If they take opportunities to engage with students, support teachers, and participate in the lesson, they have a powerful opportunity to increase the efficacy of that teaching by serving as another “teacher” in the room.
5. Leaving the office allows you to be the master of your story
Face it, there is a story being told about your school, and most of that story is happening online. I sometimes encounter principals who question why social media is necessary for them to engage with in order to be effective. In truth, you can be an absolutely amazing principal without ever sharing a tweet. But, you should also understand that there will be a narrative regarding your school. If you are not actively telling the story of your school, someone else will tell the story for you – and you may not like the story they have to tell. In other words, we have the potential to frame the dialogue about our schools around the amazing, powerful learning that students are doing. If we don’t consistently take advantage of that opportunity we allow for the focus to be elsewhere. When we leave behind the office and embed with teachers and students we have ample opportunity to capture video, pictures and anecdotes of authentic learning, and we can easily share those with hundreds or even thousands of people with a quick tweet or Instagram post. While twitter and other social media platforms are not the only way we tell our story, they are quickly becoming the primary way that students (and parents) connect with their school. As George Curous notes: “If you aren’t engaging in social media, you are increasingly becoming illiterate.” So, get out in your school community. Capture the great things that are happening. Post. Repeat.
6. Leaving the office allows you to model disruption
Disruption in education seems to have a very negative connotation. When we talk about disruption in school we immediately think about the loud student who is always off-task, creating discipline problems for the staff. Fortunately, we aren’t talking about that type of disruption (though disruptive leadership may make a huge impact on your disruptive students as well). What we are talking about is intentionally pushing ourselves, and others, outside of their comfort zone to disrupt routine. When we intentionally disrupt our routine we open the door for innovation to follow. Disrupting the norm doesn’t guarantee innovation mind you, but it does provide room for it. Many administrators are great at pushing their team and challenging them to consider instruction in new and innovative ways. Some administrators even do a great job of providing teachers freedom and autonomy as they innovate. Yet all too often we struggle with doing ourselves what we ask of those around us. Do you want to be a leader of an innovative school? Start by modeling disruption yourself. The easiest thing for an administrator to do is to sit in his/her office, behind the safety of the desk, and tackle tasks as they come. Move out of your physical comfort zone, disrupt your routine, and you might actually innovate who you are as a leader. At the very least you will show teachers that you don’t expect anything from them that you won’t try yourself.
Tools of the trade
So how do I go about doing this in real life? For the most part it is actually quite easy. With a smartphone and a wifi connection most administrators could ditch their office tomorrow and still be able to effectively tackle 90% of their work on the go. Tack on a laptop or tablet with a keyboard, and I think you can totally eliminate the need for your office all together. In case you are wondering, here is what I utilize to maximize my workflow while I’m out in the field.
Tools:
I utilize an iPad Pro (with Apple Pencil), Logitech keyboard and iPhone. The iPad allows me, with a few handy apps, to manage all my work tasks without the need for a full-fledged work station. The pencil is handy for annotating and diagraming what I see in classrooms for debrief later. My iPhone allows me to take calls, send texts, and take photo/video.
Apps & Software:
One of the key apps that I utilize is Google Hangouts. It is an easy way for people to stay in contact with me regardless of what device I have in hand (either my iPad or Phone), it can handle texts, voice and video calls, and it integrates nicely with GAFE. In addition, I find the following apps handy to help with my workflow:
- Notability – Great app for writing, annotating, and collecting information (audio, video, text)
- Fantastical 2 – Excellent calendar app that provides a great deal of integration and handy features.
- Email – This is actually the name of the app. As the name implies, it does email, but so much more.
- Wunderlist – I utilize this for prioritizing tasks, but there are many other apps out there that do the same thing.
- PDF Office – Helps me create, annotate and rework PDF files.
- WPS Office – Lets me create and edit Microsoft files . . . Because most people still use them.
- Documents 5 – Similar to google drive, but it seems to integrate with more apps more effectively so I can share/send files easily.
- Pocket – I use this to save articles, webpages and other items for later viewing.
- Google Apps – Docs, Slides, Drive, you name it. Just don’t forget hangouts.
- Instagram, Facebook, Twitter – Not everyone uses the same platform to follow your school’s story, so redundancy is key
A.Nelson 