The Leaders’ Corner (Managers, Principals & Superintendents)

Students of history will remember, no doubt, Churchill’s call to the nation to set out in any craft available to do their part to rescue, at great personal risk, the stricken army on the beaches of France – and how the country responded to save over a third of a million soldiers from annihilation in what is now called the miracle of Dunkirk.  Half a generation on a cold but sunny day in January of 1961 John F. Kennedy, in his ringing inaugural address, called upon America in a broader but less dangerous framework: “Ask not what your country can do for you.  Ask what you can do for your country.”

In calling upon the people they were charged to lead, both were doing what the great 19th century psychologist and philosopher, William James, dubbed “the art of energizing”.   Both Churchill and Kennedy were masters of “the art of energizing”.

Is there any more important quality in leadership than doing just that?  Probably not – but then the next question is:  How?  At any level in the education sector the chief task of a leader is to find a way of energizing staff to accomplish, together, a goal that furthers the mission of the organization – to ensure that the education of the youngsters for whom the system was set up, will receive the best possible education.

Let’s look at five qualities of leadership that are the necessary ingredients for “energizing” a staff.  Three come, also, from the past – from a study in leadership by Leonard Sayles in Managerial Behavior.  The other two come from more general sources and personal experience.

1. Direction:  An effective leader needs to have or to foster a sense of direction, not necessarily one established alone by him or her (though having some direction to begin with is a reasonable expectation of leaders).  It’s safe to say that staff expect some guidance in this area but then also expect they will have some role to play in massaging that vision until it becomes a meaningful one in terms of their willingness to participate in its realization.
2. Representation:  Leaders will always be in a position to represent their organization and what it stands for.  In a public forum it is a way of increasing the “capital” of the organization – what it will need to support its initiatives – externally and internally.  One form of capital is legitimacy, the degree to which the organization and its vision are seen as worthy of support internally and externally.

External capital is perhaps easier to define.  If a leader is looking to increase her/his budget or a district is seeking to increase educational taxes or raise a public bond, the people who are in control of that decision (e.g. senior staff, the board, the rate payers) and the initiatives that require support in terms of additional financial or human resources must be seen by the decision makers as presenting a legitimate request that will improve product or services.  An organization cannot appeal for more if its basic legitimacy is under question.  And it cannot appeal for more if the new initiatives are not seen as legitimate.  What this means for the leader then, is that he/she must frame the request in the context of what is “good” for the stakeholders.  As this blogger can attest, simply making an appeal on the basis of logic or common sense will not be enough.  The representation must come in the form of both a rational appeal and an affective appeal.  The brain and the heart have to be engaged through the representation.

Internal capital in this case refers to the value those within the organization attach to the organization, its initiatives and to the person in the leadership position.  This may be, in the end, the most important capital of all because this has direct application to what James (above) said with regard to “the art of energizing”.   It is incumbent on a leader to build his/her internal capital within the organization to ensure his/her ability to align the energy, expertise and drive of the employees to make the vision a reality.  A leader cannot do this on his/her own.

This blogger was privy to information from a senior executive who, upon leaving the organization, received the following note from an employee:

“I think that your best characteristic as a leader was your ability to make us not only believe in what you wanted us to do but to believe in it so strongly that we felt we wanted too as well.”

There is no better statement than this one about the relationship between the presence of internal capital and the capacity to “energize people”.   How to build that internal capital is the subject of the next entry in this three-part series.

Dr. Dan

Look for more ideas in our “The Art of Teaching Creatively” series!