Favorite Quote: “Putting in 1,001 hours to someone else’s 1,000 isn’t going to tip the scale in your favor”

Honorable mention 1: “If it’s easier for workers to claim a Sunday than for life to borrow a Thursday, there ain’t no balance!”

Honorable mention 2: “The best Companies aren’t families, they’re supporters of families.”

In most situations, an immediate response is an unreasonable expectation.  Just because someone can get in touch with you quickly doesn’t mean you have to reciprocate.  The content of the message dictates your response.  This is a nice reminder and links to Steven Covey’s ‘4-Square.’ Deciding what is “urgent, but not important” is up to you, not the person initiating the communication.

Teachers should be busy teaching, yet they often share that too much time is spent reading and sending e-mails.  As a building leader, don’t be part of that problem. Send summary e-mails as ONE single e-mail with important information rather than a non-stop drip throughout the day (basecamp refers to them as “heartbeats.”).

Work on projects consistently for 6 weeks at a time, then take two weeks off to decompress and explore other ideas.  This creative time is critical for future success.  Also, plan your projects with the seasons of the school year.  The most important ones shouldn’t be started or finishing in September & June.

School offices are full of motivational posters with penguins, jets or sunsets with catchy lines.  But in the end, we control our school community, and can only do what’s best for kids at that moment in time. Set out to do good work, support students and families, and leave a lasting positive impression on kids- not on changing the world.

Employee time & attention is expensive.  A meeting also pulls teachers away from planning, assessing and interpreting student work.  We spend quite a bit of time in meetings someone else called, so being intentional about the time of staff meetings and their frequency is key.  I like this video I recently saw on 15-minute, stand up meetings. Another idea that Jason & David share in the book is to use small groups for meetings.  Rather than the large-scale meeting style, use groups of three people.

Great decisions do not need 100% consensus.  But they do need 100% commitment.  Establish a culture where disagreement is ok, but not committing is completely off limits.  You can do this by allowing all voices to be heard, picking someone who will make the ultimate decision and then explain the reasoning behind the decision. Jason & David refer to this as “Decide, explain and go.”

School leaders should have more than an “open door” policy.  They should be involved in the day to day and fully understand the victories and struggles staff face.  That’s why we must extend the phrase “Every Kid, Every Day,” to everyone, every day.  Check-in frequently, ask the tough questions -What’s something nobody dares talk about?  Are you afraid of anything at work? What do you think we could have done differently to help ______ succeed?  What advice would you give before we start on the next big project?