Leadership Lessons: The Liberator

Source: Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter-Liz Wiseman and Greg McKeown

Leaders who are liberators:

• Put other people on the stage
• Identify hard opinions vs. soft opinions-soft opinions are for others to discuss and think about for themselves
• Understand that formal hierarchies can suppress voices and ideas of those at the bottom.
• Operate as a peer or create an environment of freedom to express you view
• Create an intense environment

Positive Culture Created by a Liberator

• Ideas are generated with ease.
• People learn rapidly and adapt to new environments.
• People work collaboratively.
• Complex problems get solved.
• Difficult tasks get accomplished.

Three Practices of a Liberator

1. Create Space

• Listen more/Talk Less
• Be consistent and predictable-allows other to know when they can contribute and creates safety
• Level the Playing Field
• Stay out of the details

2. Demand People's Best Work

• Hold people to their best work, not outcomes (can't control outcomes-causes unnecessary stress)

3. Generate Rapid Learning Cycles

• Give permission to make mistakes.
• Admit and share personal mistakes.
• Insist on learning from mistakes.

Label Opinions

Hard-Where you have a clear and potentially emphatic point

Soft-Where you have a perspective to offer and ideas for someone else to consider

Leadership Lesson: The Talent Magnet

Source: Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter-Liz Wiseman and Greg McKeown

"I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow".
-Woodrow Wilson

4 Practices of the Talent Magnet

1. Look for talent everywhere
2. Find people's native genius
3. Utilize people at their fullest
4. Remove the blockers

Talent is Everywhere

Talent Magnets see talents everywhere and know that everyone brings something different to the table. Talent magnets do not limit people to their defined job description. They find people's talent and put them to work.

Native Genius

• What do they do better that anything else they do?
• What do they do better than the people around them?
• What do they do without effort?
• What do they do without being asked?

1. Identify Genius
2. Test Genius-Ask the individual what they think they are good at to test your hypothesis.
3. Work It-give roles beyond the formal job expectations

Utilize People

Find the native genius then publicly label it.

Be specific in praise

Get people resources

Remove Blockers

Leave your ego at the door-Work as a team

Get out of the way-"Nothing grows under a banyan tree."

Leadership Lesson: Multipliers

Source: Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter-Liz Wiseman and Greg McKeown

What is a Multiplier?

A multiplier brings out the most in other people's talents.

5 Disciplines of the Multiplier

1. Talent Magnet-Attract and optimize talent.
2. The Liberator-Create intensity that requires best thinking.
3. The Challenger-Extend challenges. Defines opportunities that cause people to stretch.
4. The Debate Maker-Debate Decisions.
5. The Investor-Instill ownership and accountability-Gives others the ownership for results and invests in their success

Building Others

Great leaders bring out the most in others.

"It has been said that after meeting with the great British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, you left feeling he was the smartest person in the world, but after meeting with his rival Benjamin Disraeli, you left thinking you were the smartest person." -Bono

Expanding Genius

"It isn't how much you know that matters.  What matters is how much access you have to what other people know.  It isn't just how intelligent your team members are; it is how much of that intelligence you can draw out and put to use."

"Multipliers are leaders who look beyond their own genius and focus their energy on extracting and extending the genius of others, they get more from their people.  They don't get a little more; they get vastly more."

Some leaders seem to drain intelligence by focusing on their own intelligence.  They are so focused on being the smartest person in the room, everyone else's role is diminished.

How Multipliers Lead

1. Engage people's genius.
2. Speak less.

Benefits of Being or Becoming a Multiplier:

People who work for multipliers don't hold back.

"Multipliers not only access people's current capability, they stretch it.  They get more from people than they knew they had to give.  People reported actually getting smarter around multipliers.  The implication is that intelligence itself can grow."

Multipliers Believe:

1. Most people in organizations are underutilized.
2. All capability can be leveraged with the right kind of leadership.
3. Therefore, intelligence and capability can be multiplied without requiring a bigger investment.

Multipliers believe that genius is all around.  Intelligence is continually growing. They have a growth mindset. They believe that people are smart and will figure it out. 

Multipliers extend hard challenges and then give space to others to figure it out.

Multipliers Traits

• Multipliers challenge people.  They are NOT feel good managers.
• Multipliers have a sense of humor-they don't take themselves to seriously.

School Reform Taken to College Football

Just as reading and math are the cornerstone and foundation of education, in football, the ability to move the football is a fundamental to success.  You can move the ball by passing and by running.  Therefore, to assess a football team's success, it is as simple as measuring the team's ability to run and pass.

A team is not successful unless they are successful in all of the subsets of statistics within relation to a team's offense.  Therefore, a team is "not met" if they do not meet the criteria in both rushing and passing.  Team's must all be the best by 2014 but since it is not yet 2014 teams must just meet progress towards this goal.  There are 2 fundamental ways that we can become successful.  We can truly improve and have every team meet every single goal or we can lower the standard.  To keep high standards, the cut line is based on what it would take to be in the top 70 in each category in order to determine who is successful.  If teams are not successful, then corrective action must take place.  Corrective actions must include (1) A different offense must be implemented, (2) the staff must change, or  (3) create a longer practice season. If problems persist in low achieving football teams, then they must restructure.  Some teams will be taken over by private companies that do not require any knowledge of football but do have a good understanding of the free market approach to football.  Other teams will restructure the governance of the team.

Success stories under this legislation
Baylor-#2 in passing and #12 in rushing
Oklahoma State-#5 in passing and #21 in rushing
Louisiana Tech-#8 in passing and #22 in rushing
Arizona-#17 in passing and #14 in rushing
Nevada-#49 in passing and #8 in rushing

Not Met Teams

• Alabama-while 16th in rushing, they are "not met" in passing as they are under the cutline at 72nd.
• Notre Dame (this actually doesn't matter because they are a private school)-39th in rushing and 87th in passing 
• Florida 34th in rushing and not met in passing (118th)
• Kansas State-3rd in rushing and not met in passing (83rd)

Some say that this data is not all that matters.  Officials at Alabama say that they provide a great opportunity for their football players and it just can't all be measured by these data points.  Many in the public feel that Alabama is hiding behind a system that has not adequately prepared their athletes to meet proficiency in these data points.  The coaches are just being lazy and don't want to be pointed out publicly for their shortcomings.

The rest of the story

The success stories have a combined 40-24 record and none of the teams were rated as of Jan 1st.

The not met teams are all in the top 5 nationally.

This isn't a fair comparison

Well, first of all, this isn't meant to be a perfect comparison.  Clearly, I don't account for defense in my football analogy.  However,  school reformers don't take into account:  Art, Music, Physcial Education, Science, Social Studies, computer skills, character education, etc.  What makes a school great is hard to quantify.

Data Informed vs. Data Driven

While this data could be useful for Alabama or Notre Dame as they begin to recruit and prepare for the future, it should not be used to punish them.  The same is true for schools.  Data can be very helpful and useful in informing decisions.  However, creating fear based on often faulty data can be very dangerous and can end up punishing the very people that it was intended to help.

What's the Big Deal About Twitter

Why use twitter for educators?

Professional Development

Twitter is basically a big classroom if that is what you make it.  It's a whole bunch of people sitting around reading journals, articles, blogs, books, etc.  Then, when someone finds something worth reading, they share it with you by posting a link to that article.  

Get involved in a conversation

Some hashtags are set up so that everyone gets together at the same time and talks.  On Saturdays, for example, you can sit in your living room and have a conversation with other school administrators from around the country (and the world) at 6:30 am using #satchat.  The moderator has a list of questions that are asked one at a time.  You respond using the hashtag #satchat at the end of each of your tweets.  You can then read the entire conversation that you are having with others in this chat.  You can find these kinds of chats for different groups of teachers such as social studies (#sschat) or Nebraska educators (#nebedchat #nebedu #namle_ms).   

On your own time
You don't have to make a big deal out of being on twitter.  Sometimes people think that a person who tweets several times a day is spending way too much time on twitter.  The reality is that it takes the same amount of time to tweet as it does to send a text.  Sometimes less time.  As I am reading a book on my kindle app on my iPad, I simply highlight  a section and press share.  In that case, I never even got on twitter but anyone who follows me now gets to read a quote that I shared.  As you follow someone, that may spark an idea for the next book you want to read.  Sometimes I'm reading an article online.  Just copy the link and bam, you have another tweet.  You might even throw on a hashtag so others with common interests will see that article.

Follow a topic (hashtag)

I might search #cpchat to see what some principals are talking about.  By following a hashtag, I limit everything to just what I am looking for.  If I want articles related to Nebraska education, I check the hashtag #nebedchat or #nebedu.  You figure out overtime different hashtags.  You can also simply search for education and find information.  As you read the tweets, you can see which hashtags you might be interested in following as they same one appear repeatedly. As you read tweets by following hashtags, you also begin to figure out what people you should be following.

Easy to use
It's as easy as a text message.  Once you get used to the # (which link you to a topic) or @ (which sends messages to a person) it is very easy.  Twitter automatically shortens the links you put into the tweet.  That means you can easily insert links into your messages and stay under 140 characters.

Entertaining and Informing
Sometimes you might be bored.  Pull out your phone and read the latest tweets.  Not only do I read tweets from education, but I also follow hashtags related to my favorite sports teams or if a hashtag is up during a TV show, you can follow that hashtag.

The Power of Twitter
All the sudden, you are reading more education articles.  It doesn't require you to subscribe to a journal or go find a book at the library.  The books, articles, etc. are all right in the palm of your hand.

Democratic and Public
Everyone gets a say.  Nobody edits out or limits what you can find.  You are the editor, you are in control of the information.  Most people have their accounts public.  You are accountable for what you say.  As long as you are using good digital citizenship, you have nothing to worry about.  Now, you have the opportunity to learn from everyone and make decisions on what you want follow.

Dream Big, Fail Big

"Dream big, fail big."  I don't think this is an original statement and I know for sure that it's not my original statement.  When Andy Farber came to Arlington to be the High School principal, this is what he told our staff.  This mentality is needed to do great things.  It is the acceptance that not everything will be perfect the first time.  It is permission to try something big.  Without big ideas, nothing would get done, nothing would ever change.

Creating an environment where innovation is valued is important and freeing to the staff.  It's the idea that even when we aren't 100% sure it (whatever it is) will work, we still try.  We still innovate.  We still take risks.

Dream big, fail big and support each other in ideas that attempt to do what is right for kids.

Positive Interaction Challenge

I want school to be a positive place for kids to come and learn.  I want excitement and joy to be associated with school.  I want teachers who want to be around kids and enjoy their jobs.  This has to be an everyday part of the school culture.

It's easy to get stuck in the negative.  It's easy to only make a call home because we have to address a negative.  What if every parent received a call from the school? What if this time, the call was about how great their child did on an assignment or how well behaved the student is in class?  What if the call was about improvement? What if the call was simply to say I enjoy have your daughter in class.

My challenge to begin the next semester

• Find a positive in every kid and let them know about it  
• Voluntary to participate-with the challenge to get all teachers to participate
• Record the positive contact in a google doc for all teachers to see

Nothing earth shattering. Nothing that hasn't been done before.  Hopefully something that will connect the school and home in a positive way.