Principal Matters!

Everything doesn’t have to run through you. Do you know how exhausting that is? (You probably do!)

Here’s a framework for leading logistics at your school that keeps you from doing everything but leads to outcomes that you are pleased with.

This week, a principal shared with me about her leadership style that “I’m not a micromanager, but I am particular.”

Your name is on everything that happens at the school so you have all of the reasons to be particular. But, too many things are constantly happening for you to be in charge of them all yourself.

Consider October and November. Red Ribbon Week, Veterans Day, Homecoming (maybe), Book Fair (possibly), Halloween, Fall Festival and more. Throw in a full moon and a time change (maybe you’ll go home when it gets dark this week!) and you’ve got… a lot. Your school can thrive in these busy times, but not if every part of every thing has to come through you.

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Three Things That Might Change Your Life

If you already know these, your life is already better. If not, please take note:

• Establish a standard of excellence for activities and events at your school. Send an email to your faculty (with plenty of notice) inviting anyone who has an interest in this project (establishing a standard of excellence for… at your school) to meet at a specific day and time. Model what you would hope they might establish (like greeting people, having music playing, snacks, etc..). DON’T establish this standard on your own and then tell people to do it; if you want it to work and you want it to stick, INVOLVE OTHERS in its creation. Facilitate the brainstorming session and get everyone’s ideas out on the table (use think-pair-share, sticky notes and chart paper, etc… to get everyone talking, thinking, and sharing. (People who create later implement!) What you’ll develop is a picture of what things ought to be like (decorations, tablecloths, cleanliness, everything). With this in force, YOU don’t have to be the one and only to protect the brand; EVERYONE is a part of it now.
• Ask for PAIRS of teachers to head up events, assemblies, etc… on a one-year basis. Here are two big things keep people from volunteering: 1). not wanting to be stuck with doing it forever; and 2) not having any help. Voila! All at once, you can open the door for more people. Begin by asking your people what project they’d like to lead and with whom. For example, for Veterans Day , two teachers volunteer to head it up. They will get others beyond the two of them to work with them, but it’s theirs to plan and produce. (One year at a time… they can renew but they can also retire from it!). You do this for Fall Festival and Farm Day, for Faculty Tailgate and for Honors and Awards. Make a list of all of the things (on a spreadsheet) and have spots for two people each for all of them. If you are currently the person in charge of all of the events, you need to start one event at a time dispersing those duties. You’ll burn out if you don’t. NOTE: You’ll still go to events, help with events, and take roles at events; you just won’t be in charge of getting the ice from the cafeteria, taking out the trash liners, and locking all the doors at the end of every thing that happens. List of things— spread out. With pairs of volunteers.
• Plan, Brief, Implement, Debrief. Teach your people who are in charge of things this simple system and they’ll be less afraid of being in charge of something. Here are the steps: Plan is the period when the pair in charge create, well, a plan, of all of the things and people needed to hold the event. (Hint: Visualize the event taking place. Note everything you see, writing it all down. Example, there’s a flag being raised, and someone singing the national anthem, and chairs brought in from somewhere opened up on the gym floor). You make a punch list of everything and everybody that will be there when it’s happening and now the duo in charge (and their team as applicable) begin to line up the things and people for the event. Depending on the size of the event and the number of moving parts (particularly when those parts are not at the school daily) your planning time may begin a month to several months in advance. For example, back to Veteran’s Day… you want to begin planning for that at least three months ahead to contact community members in adequate time. Two weeks before the event those two will host a briefing. It’s likely that you as the principal will be invited to come, but don’t take their meeting over! We want to spread the management around, so let them run their briefing, at which everyone at the school who has a role to play comes together. It’s a short meeting, mostly for them to review the timing of the event chronologically AND for everyone to confirm that they’ve got their part taken care of. Some events deserve an additional briefing a week before (graduation comes to mind) for safety’s sake. Implementation is when your event happens and the Debrief is just like the brief… but after. Same people, but now it’s an after-action meeting to take notes for next year. What’d we forget? What would make it better? What went well? If you don’t do it same day or AT LEAST day after, you’re pushing it. It’s best done when it’s fresh for everyone, when we take notes and those notes are put in the sheet protector (and Google Doc) for the next year’s planners to use.