Leadership in Education
Educational leadership essentially focuses on improving the quality of teaching, learning and educational outcomes and promoting the best thinking about teaching and learning. Everyone involved in teaching and learning is a leader and has a direct influence on the effectiveness of the teaching-learning relationship, both with students and with colleagues. Leaders may or may not carry positional power; their leadership may be formal or informal. Educational leaders create the conditions – the climate, culture, processes, and procedures – where teachers can teach and students can learn (Dinham, 2004). They lead the implementation of effective instructional practices; establish a focus on learning; build professional communities that value learning; forge relationships with key outside groups that can support student and teacher learning; distribute and share leadership broadly and motivate staff and students to take advantage of learning opportunities and create improved outcomes.
Websites
Leadership Audit Tool: A Participatory Management Checklist
This is a leadership audit tool. This checklist can help leaders take stock of their style and focus on participatory management skills and techniques that they would like to change or improve. After responding to the questions, click the ‘Graph My Responses’ button at the bottom of the page to see a graphic representation of your responses. The graph can be used to consider leadership areas that may need change.
UNSW Teaching and Learning Unit
University of NSW site that holds a number of online articles and resources for educational leadership
Publications
BOYATZIS R, McKee, A 2005, Resonant Leadership, Harvard Business School Press
Excellent new work that provides a framework for how leaders can create and sustain resonance in their relationships, teams and organizations. This is an indispensable guide to overcoming the vicious cycle of stress, sacrifice, and dissonance that afflicts many leaders.
COFFMAN, Curt W & Gonzalez-Molina. Gabriel 2002, Leadership Discussion Questions, Gallop Management Journal
Excellent leadership discussion questions that could be used for self reflection or during workshops and planning sessions as a basis for conversation and discussion.
CONCHIE, Barry 2004, The Seven Demands of Leadership - What separates great leaders from all the rest?, Gallop Management Journal
Excellent short article on the seven demands of leadership. Check out the Shaping Leadership Development: Key Questions at the end of the article for self reflection.
GOLEMAN, Daniel 2000, Leadership That Gets Results, Harvard Business Review
Drawing on research of more than 3,000 executives, Goleman explores which precise leadership behaviours yield positive results. He outlines six distinct leadership styles, each one springing from different components of emotional intelligence. Each style has a distinct effect on the working atmosphere of a company, division, or team.
FOSKETT, N & K, Lumby, J 2003, Leading and Managing Education, Sage Publications, London
This work examines some of the significant generic factors that underpin an understanding of international patterns in educational management and leadership. Specifically the book maps the international landscape of leadership and management in education, providing an overview of the range of approaches and practice and challenges some the ‘accepted’ norms and paradigms in educational leadership by providing a range of perspectives on key themes.
GOLEMAN, D, Boyatzis, R, & McKee, A, 2002 Primal Leadership, Harvard Business School Press
Seminal, inspirational work that explores leadership, the different styles of leadership and their impact, the role of emotional intelligence in leadership and how to create sustained leadership change.
LATCHEM, Colin & Hanna, Donald E 2001, Leadership for 21st Century Learning: Global Perspectives from Educational Innovators, Open and Distance Learning Series, London, Kogan Page
This book addresses the key leadership concepts and change strategies that face contemporary educators and trainers. Globally, education is changing in response to a more demand-driven market and increasing expectations of greater accessibility, flexibility, quality, relevance and efficiency. In addition, new information and communications technologies are transforming the delivery and content of education and training. This environment requires transformational leadership, both at the organisational and the operational level, to change work cultures and to create systems that are responsive and sustainable. The contributions in this book bring together the experience of 18 educational leaders and innovators from around the world.
LEITHWOOD, K, Jantzi, D & Steinbach, R 1999, Changing Leadership for Changing Times, Open University Press, Philadelphia, USA
This book offers a highly readable account of transformational leadership in restructuring contexts grounded in a substantial body of empirical evidence. Highly recommended chapters:
- Setting directions: visions, goals and high expectations
- Developing people: individualized support, intellectual stimulation and modelling
- Fostering teacher leadership
- Building teachers’ commitment to change
- Creating the conditions for growth in teachers’ professional knowledge and skill
ROOKE, David and Torbert, William R 2005, Seven Transformations of Leadership, Harvard Business Review
...what differentiates one leader from another is not so much philosophy of leadership, personality, or style of management. Rather, it's internal "action logic"--how a leader interprets the surroundings and reacts when his or her power or safety is challenged.
SCOTT, G 1999, Change Matters, Allen & Unwin, Australia
Highly recommended, particularly Chapter 5 which includes a profile of the effective leader in an education service.
WILLIAMS, C 2005, Becoming a Learning Campus: Moving from Rhetoric to Reality, Learning Abstracts
An excellent short American article on moving to the reality of a learning campus and includes good ideas for collaboration.
ZENGER, John H & Folkman, Joseph 2004, The Handbook for Leaders, McGraw-Hill
This is an excellent, short, concise, very readable compilation of 24 competencies and guidelines identified as essential for becoming an effective leader.
See also
A Leader's Role Conversation Exemplar | February eZine