I’m not much of a reader of books – unless they’re “business” oriented.\u00a0 Books I currently have on my shelf to read are “Think Like a Freak” by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J Dubner, “Start With Who” by Marcus Marsden, and “Best Practices are Stupid” by Stephen Shapiro.<\/p>\n
One particular book which has had a profound influence on me (in addition to other titles like “Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less” by Greg McKeown and “How the World Sees You” by Sally Hogshead) is “The Six Secrets of Change: What the Best Leaders Do to Help Their Organizations Survive and Thrive” by Michael Fullan.\u00a0 He’s also the author of “Change Leader” and “Leading in a Culture of Change.”<\/p>\n
As a school administrator, how would you answer these questions today:<\/p>\n
If you answered “yes” to both of these questions, this is a text for you.\u00a0 It was published in 2008 by Jossey-Bass, and is available at your local bookseller or Amazon.com.<\/p>\n
But since these Tetrahedronics articles are based on “pentelemental” (5 element) systems, I would say there are five secrets, with the sixth being the emergent principle of the system.<\/p>\n
What are these secrets?<\/p>\n
1) Love Your Employees<\/p>\n
2) Connect Peers With Purpose<\/p>\n
3) Capacity Building Prevails<\/p>\n
4) Learning Is the Work<\/p>\n
5) Transparency Rules<\/p>\n
Fullan says that the sixth secret is Systems Learn, but since the five elements create a system, it would seem that this is the\u00a0emergent property of the system created by the secrets numbered 1 through 5.<\/p>\n
Want to learn more about these secrets?\u00a0 After all, faith-based schools teach that we should love one another. \u00a0We also know\u00a0that learning is a\u00a0school’s raison d’etre<\/em>, and know that parents, school boards and finance councils want transparency.\u00a0 So what are elements 2 and 3 all about?<\/p>\n You’ll have to read the book for a complete explanation, but item 2 really speaks to how Marketing needs to connect with your school’s parent communities (current, future and past), alumni communities, and community\/business communities.<\/p>\n Item 3 speaks to “capacity,” which deals with “competencies, resources, and motivation.”<\/p>\n While item 2 deals with things outside the walls of the organization, item 3 deals with those inside – hiring the right people, making sure they have resources, and foster the proper motivating atmosphere.<\/p>\n For instance, when you think about criticizing an employee, is it because something is happening in their life, it is because you’re not providing them with what they need to succeed, or is it because something the organization has done to change its focus, and the employee is trying to adjust.<\/p>\n I’m reminded of an organization that was in growth mode, and therefore shifted its operational staffing to prepare for that growth.\u00a0 Unfortunately, the management wanted to maximize the value to their investors, changed leaders, and then shifted to staff for efficiency.\u00a0 Continued growth led to more and more work to be put on a leaner staff, and motivation deteriorated, affecting the service capacity of the organization.<\/p>\n There’s also the organization who took a consultant and made that person the head of a system of schools.\u00a0 He didn’t think twice about chastising an employee in public, driving the employee to tears, and ultimately, resigning.\u00a0 Then, rather than accepting responsibility, he blamed others for not being able to compile the information he needed for reporting to his superiors.\u00a0 Through all that, no one could understand why there was employee churn and declining enrollment.<\/p>\n Remember that this book was published in 2008 – the year the stock market tanked and the Great Recession began.\u00a0 11 years later, the world was beset by a pandemic.<\/p>\n Today, many would argue we’re living in an alternate reality with all that’s going on in geopolitical affairs.<\/p>\n Page 9 of its Preface is prophetic, stating, “Nothing is more important in the twenty-first century than learning to manage change.”<\/p>\n \u00a9 Michael V. Ziemski, SchoolAdvancement, 2012-2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m not much of a reader of books – unless they’re “business” oriented.\u00a0 Books I currently have on my shelf […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2309,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1892","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tetrahedronics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/Tetrahedronics.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2ggCS-uw","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1892","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1892"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1892\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8092,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1892\/revisions\/8092"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archangeladvancement.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}