Five For Friday October 23-27, 2023
Hello Colleagues and welcome to another 5 for Friday episode of The Assistant Principal Podcast!
Today’s shout out goes to Matthew Downing, host of the DivingDeep EDU podcast. Matthew was recently promoted to the role of Supervisor of elementary Instructional Technology wih the Upper Darby School District in Pennsylvania. Matthew has also been having other great adventures and in the midst of all that was kind enough to have me on Episode 58 of the Diving Deep EDU podcast where we talked about the journey from urgent to strategic. I’ll put a link to the podcast in the show notes.
Today’s episode of Five for Friday recaps the strategic leadership emails for the week of October 16-20, 2023.
If leadership is influence, as leadership guru John Maxwell states, how do we influence people?
If you read this week’s emails, you already know the answer is power.
Embracing the power to lead is critical for several reasons:
- All forms of power are not created equal. You need to know the benefits and liabilities of each form.
- Because you hold power to influence others, you have an ethical obligation to use your power wisely and to care for those whom you influence with your power.
- Understanding the sources of your power allows you to cultivate and increase your power.
- Most forms of power are not hierarchical, meaning you can exert power – LEAD – regardless of your hierarchical position. You don’t need to wait to lead. Use your power to lead NOW.
Instead of recapping each day, I want to run through the forms of power and provide examples of how each one can be used by different members in your school.
Five forms of power:
- Legitimate
- T to S
- P to T
- S to P
- Leads to compliance “Because I said so”
- Informational
- T: information on college applications
- P: classroom and teaching assignments
- DO: rubric for the grant
- Some people withhold information as a way of keeping control which has a two-edged impact on their influence (increases and diminishes at the same time)
- Expert
- Chemistry teacher to future MD; reading teacher to future author
- AP who can teach others to ask engaging questions of students, OR ask reflective questions to teachers to get them to their own answers
- “You can help me get to where I want to go”
- Reward
- T to S: A, gold star, praise, note home
- AP to T: promotion, coveted teaching assignment, responsibilities, input/voice, sticky notes, social media recognition, Friday jeans day, donuts
- “Look at me”
- Coercive
- T to S: F, referral/write-up/detention, silent lunch, note/call home, expressing disappointment
- AP to T: Contractual hits, “write ups”, teaching assignments, scheduling, isolation, intimidation, threats
- “Do this or else!”
- Creates resentment
- Referent
- “My favorite teacher”
- Mentor
- Admire, respect, care for,
- Want to emulate and please
Not all power types are equal!
The takeaway:
- For all except legitimate:
- Students hold the same powers over teachers
- Teachers hold the same powers over admin
- Understanding the types of power, you can be intentional about cultivating it
That is this week’s Five for Friday rendition of The Assistant Principal Podcast.
Thank you for including me on your leadership journey.
I look forward to seeing you again next Tuesday when I review some elements of creating a positive classroom culture.
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You can find out more about me at https://www.frederickbuskey.com/
I love getting feedback, so please consider sending me an email or connecting with me on LinkedIn. Of course, all of those links are in the show notes.
I’m Frederick Buskey and thank you again for joining me on this episode of the Assistant Principal Podcast. Cheers!
DiveingDeepEDU Podcast link: https://divingdeepedu.libsyn.com/58-frederick-buskey
Frederick’s Links:
Website: https://www.frederickbuskey.com/
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