Cultivating Leadership in Educational Leaders

Over the past few years, I've had the opportunity to offer and support administratively teachers as they assume leadership roles for a range of academic initiatives. When I began this work, I became cognizant of a recurring theme in education (and beyond): securing "buy-in."

The idea is simple. A school has a philosophy, a goal, a plan, and getting teachers to buy into all this facilitates them as they assume leadership roles. Without that critical buy-in, the whole enterprise might crumble.

Working with a talented group of teachers, I quickly came to a realization that the concept of "buy-in" is flawed. The reason is simple but speaks to a powerful truth: the problem with buy-in is that it is hierarchical. It's a statement from above and a request to support that statement, both philosophically and practically. While that approach may work well in some professional contexts - and may even be essential - it is counterproductive in education, particularly when we are nurturing the development of faculty as leaders. This is certainly not a new idea I'm generating, but rather it's a reflection of experiential learning on my part.

Rather than trying to rouse the team to generate buy-in, I found a much more effective, and enjoyable, approach was to grant ownership to emerging leaders. As an administrator, it was important to articulate broad goals and even drill down to the tasks at hand, but all that was really an invitation to a group of faculty to take ownership of the process in the new and emerging roles as leaders. Meetings turned into productive and energized brainstorming sessions; collaboration across members of the group blossomed, and each leader took on their work with a sense of purpose. They had room to discover points of entry into complex issues that were comfortable and stimulating for them, and they could find their own way into making things happen. And with this type of ownership, they could also grant ownership to the faculty that they were leading.

What was especially rewarding about this discovery was the chance to witness and appreciate the creativity each faculty leader could bring to tasks, and the professional pride they took in their work. And, of course, the work of the group as a whole was enhanced as a result.

In education, we talk about providing opportunities for our students to learn 21st-century skills like collaboration and innovation, and we strive to provide contexts and opportunities to support that. Discovering that we should provide faculty leaders with that same type of supportive environment was a good lesson for myself.