28 May, 2023
Memorandum for: Local Boards of Education (all 13,452 of them)
Subject: Fix your Education Organizations
1. “Education is the wellspring from which a nation ascends … or the quagmire into which it sinks. Education is everything.” Michael Russell
The U.S. is becoming increasingly more functionally illiterate. Covid was a setback in terms of the numbers of K-12 students who are not proficient in various disciplines; but results from Covid are an anomaly in an ongoing national education crisis.
2.THESIS: “Education” is an organization. Organizations have a “product.” General Motors makes automobiles, that’s their product. The U.S. Army is an organization, their product is trained leaders and combat ready units. The product of education in the U.S. is a high school graduate who is proficient in all areas of study to the extent that they are qualified and capable of extending their education in college or to be fully competitive in the work force.
If 20% of General Motor’s vehicles don’t run, they have two alternatives; build better automobiles or go out of business. If 20% of the U.S. Army’s leaders are incompetent and the majority of units are not combat ready, the organization needs a complete top-to-bottom do-over. If 20% of U.S. teens do not graduate from high school and a significant number of those who do graduate are in fact functionally illiterate, we need to seriously rethink the entire organization and fix it. To do so we first need to define the problem.
3.DEFINING THE U.S. EDUCATION PROBLEM: Facts bearing on the problem:
20% of U.S. students do not graduate high school.
Almost 2,000 high schools across the US graduate less than 60% of their students. Those “dropout factories” account for over 50% of the students who leave school every year. One in six students attend a dropout factory. One in three minority students (32%) attend a dropout factory compared to 8% of white students.
In the U.S., high school dropouts commit about 75% of crimes.
Of those graduating high school, over 20% are unable to pass the test to enter the U.S. military because they are functionally illiterate.
On average, 7,000 students across the country drop out of school every school day thereby creating a linkage to a life of crime and/or welfare. About 70% of prison inmates do not have a high school diploma. Why do they drop out? The main reason is they got behind in K-5, further behind in Middle School and eventually became frustrated, disenchanted and just gave up.
In 2021, Oregon passed a low reducing the standards for eligibility to graduate from high school. This will eventually result in a higher graduation rate and an increase in the number of functionally illiterate graduates joining the work force. There are zero measures of progress in approving education results with this kind of nonsensical law.
Average U.S. annual spending per public school student is over $14,000 in 2023. That is about 34% higher than the average of the other 37 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries. Currently our number one “solution” to improving education results in the U.S. is for the feds to throw money at the problem. It’s not working.
In 2021, multiple California school districts dropped D and F grades calling it, “competency-based” learning. Learning, really?
Schools across the country are banning homework. More psychobabble reasoning.
So, let’s be honest and get to the heart of the problem with this question. What is and is not going on in the classrooms in terms of standards and measured results?
The best way to nail down a definition of the education problem is to look at data from the reputable National Assessment of Education Progress, NAEP, also referred to as America’s Report Card.
NAEP is the largest national representative of continuing assessment of what America’s students know and can do in civics, economics, geography, mathematics, reading, science, U.S. history, and writing.
NAEP results provide educators, policymakers, elected officials, and parents with invaluable information regarding how our children are doing in school. NAEP measures the academic performance of the nation’s students by testing 4th and 8th grade students every 2 years (testing canceled in 2020 due to the pandemic) and 12th grade every 4 years.
NAEP reports on student achievement/capability in three categories: Basic, Proficient and Advanced.
Students performing at NAEP Basic level have only partial mastery of fundamentals. These students are failing.
Students performing at the NAEP Proficient level have demonstrated some competency over challenging subject matter.
Students performing at the NAEP Advanced level have shown superior performance.
To avoid getting drowned in data, let’s just look at student achievement in two fundamental disciplines, math and reading; 2022 testing involved 446,700 students in 10,970 schools across all states.
4.NAEP RESULTS ACROSS THE U.S.:
4th grade, 67% are below Proficiency level and almost 1/3 of them are even below Basic level.
8th grade, 75% are below Proficiency level and more than half are even below Basic level.
12th grade, 76% are below Proficiency level and more than half are even below Basic level.
In 4th grade, fewer than 3 out of 5 students can tell whether whole numbers are even or odd. Only 51 percent understand that subtraction is the inverse of addition and just over 1 in 10 can identify numbers that can divide into another number without a remainder (e.g., 10 divided by 1 or 2 or 5).
READING:
4th grade, 68% are below Proficient level and more than half are even below Basic level.
8th grade, 71% are below Proficient level and about 1 of every 2.5 are even below Basic level.
12th grade, 63% are below Proficiency level (2019 pre-coved) and about half are even below Basic level.
By the way: NAEP data released May 2023; 87% of 8th graders are below Proficient level in U.S. history; 78% of 8th graders are below Proficient level in civics.
This low proficiency in civics is not a new problem. To illustrate, only 47% of U.S. adults can name all three branches government, about 25% can name only one of the branches and about 20% can not name any of them.
5.CONCLUSIONS FROM THE NAEP DATA:
Our nation is in serious trouble. The U.S. is currently getting an F in education results.
The high percentages below Proficiency level in 4th grade do not appreciably increase through middle and high school.
At the base of this crisis is the education process in K-4th grades; call it basic training. As in most organizations, deficient basic level training puts everything that follows in the to-hard box. As this applies to the Education Organization, if we can fix K-4 and institutionalize those standards we will be on the way to fixing grades 5-12 performance levels.
All we are doing for education at the local, state and national levels is throwing money and bad ideas (no homework, no Ds and Fs, lower standards) at a broken organization and all the while the “product” remains totally unsatisfactory. Education will not get fixed by the federal or state governments’ bureaucratic masses and top-down over-regulation.
There is a better way:
6. FIXING THE ORGANIZATION CAN LEAD DIRECTLY TO AN IMPROVED PRODUCT.
We have to change the Education Organization and change is hard. But there is so much wisdom in the old saying, “If we always do what we have always done we will always get what we always got”. Change or die. We have to move education to a new and better place. If you are not afraid of where the current Education Organization is headed, you haven’t been paying attention.
We cannot fix the Education Organization from the top down, bureaucracies are designed to last, not adapt. If a business fails, they are gone; if a government agency fails, we give them more taxpayer money.
What follows is a game plan for individual school districts to execute, all 13,452 of them. All school districts essentially have the same organizational structure with the standard three levels of leadership.
How do successful organizations deal with change? First, the leaders have to know where their organization is now. Secondly, know where they want to take the organization. Three, have a vehicle to get them there. And finally, know how to lead organizations. What follows is a discussion of Underpinnings and Framework for Action that will guide you through the process of dealing with organizational change.
7.TOOLS FOR SUCCESS IN EVERY ORGANIZATION:
There are two elements that must be in place, monitored, maintained and enforced on a daily basis. They are Organizational Underpinnings and a Framework for Action. The Underpinnings and the accompanying Framework for Action set an organization up for success for every problem at every level by every leader every day.
Thesis: An organization that understands and embraces leadership underpinnings and has a framework for problem solving will out-think and out-perform the competition.
8.ORGANIZATIONAL UNDERPINNINGS:
Organizational underpinnings are what someone sees and feels about an organization. Critical to any organization’s success are foundational elements such as Organizational Structure, Culture, Delegation and Empowerment, Leader Development, Organizing for Action, After-action Review, Character and Dealing with the 21st \Century Environment. Understanding them and knowing how to use them are enablers for success.
9.ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE, THE THREE LEVELS OF LEADERSHIP:
Thesis: A leader is someone who is taking the organization elsewhere. Leaders are planners, that’s what they do. Change is inevitable; progress is optional.
First Line Leaders: These are the teachers; leaders in the classroom. First line leaders are always at the point of execution. They are leading the education triad; teacher/student/parents. This is where basic training takes place, the center of gravity. Failure here leads directly to overall organizational failure. First line leaders who can not or will not execute the above should be replaced.
Operational Leaders: These are the school Principals, the vice presidents of the school district, responsible for strict adherence by every first line leader to a set of defined standards. An organization without standards is a failed organization. Operational leaders orchestrate the horizontal integration of everything that happens in the school house, train and mentor first line leaders, constantly inspect first line leader actions and results, rate their first line leaders, reward the best first line leaders and discipline first line leaders who can not produce students who are at the proficient and superior performance levels. Operational leaders who cannot or will not perform these functions should be replaced.
Strategic Leaders: This is the school district’s Superintendent, the CEO, responsible for establishing and sustaining the organizational underpinnings, setting the standards for the organization and operations on a day-to-day basis that are part of a long-range strategic phased plan of action. Strategic leaders who can not or will not perform these functions should be replaced.
Board of Directors: This is the elected school board who answer to We the People. They ensure that sufficient facilities and funding are available and that the best strategic and operational leaders are on the job. And, most importantly, ensure an organizational leadership system that is based on a culture of accountability, trust and respect. What do politics have to do with the responsibilities of the three levels of leadership outlined above? Absolutely nothing. Board members who are consistently politically motivated and/or do not understand their responsibilities to the Education Organization should be voted out of office.
It is essential to recognize that all leaders in an organization do not perform the same functions differently; leaders at different levels perform different functions.
10.CULURE, a preeminent organizational underpinning:
Culture is a powerful and pervasive force in every organization no matter how large or small. Culture is the organization’s personality; it might be described as good, or evil, self-serving, compassionate, entrepreneurial, caring, wasteful, hateful, whatever. Every organization has a culture and it needs to be defined.
True story to illustrate the power of culture: After retiring from the military, I built a two-person consulting company dealing with leading organizations and long-range strategic planning. One client, who shall remain nameless, was a worldwide leader in their business with about 50,000 employees. There were three elements to the business and we were consulting with the one which operated oversees with about 16,000 employees in 120 countries. We had already been working with that group of operational leaders for about a year at their locations overseas. In 2004, we were asked to do a refresher discussion on culture at their regularly scheduled six-month meeting in New York City. The question the president of the overseas division wanted me to address was the culture of the entire 50,000-person organization from the CEO on down.
There were about thirty executives in the room as I began to work the problem with a simple question; can you describe for me the culture of the entire 50,000-person organization you are a part of. As is usually the case, they were giving me some one-word positive answers that I dutifully recorded on the white-board; entrepreneurial, caring, family oriented, etc. After a few minutes I gave them the time-out sign and suggested that they were not living in a perfect business world; are there any negatives associated with the company’s culture? Long silence. Finally, Mike sort of raised his hand. I acknowledged him and he said, “The overwhelming culture of this entire organization is white-hot fear.” There it was, a brave sole had finally said out loud what everyone in the room was living every day at work, white-hot fear. That broke the dam and immediately everyone wanted to offer up examples, discuss the issue and look for change.
The white-hot fear culture generally stemmed from a business model wherein every subordinate executive had to make a quarterly number; sales, revenue, profit, etc. If they came up short there was a blood-letting by the corporate CEO and his staff. There was no over-arching long-range strategic plan in place. Ninety days was as far ahead as anyone could see which is a formula for failure in any organization.
I say again, a culture exists in every organization and it is a powerful and pervasive force.
Once an organization builds, puts in place and embraces a long-range phased plan, everything changes; leader development for the long-haul becomes a critical requirement. Delegation becomes the norm which drives bottom-up change, initiative, inspiration, ingenuity. A culture of trust, respect and accountability begins to define the work-place environment at every leadership level. Character of the organization becomes all-important.
Those executives departed that meeting a couple days later with determination, an enlightened attitude, energy and commitment to the phased long-range strategic plans my colleague and I had helped them build while meeting with them individually at their overseas headquarters during the previous year.
A footnote; most of them were able to accelerate their 4-year plans and by the end of the third year that organization had increased annual revenue from $16 billion to $28 billion with the same products, same 16,000 work force operating in the same 120 countries.
For a leader, there are four questions that have to be asked and answered when considering the culture of their organization: One, can you define your current culture? The answer is yes but it takes some work and honest introspection. Two, once defined, is it what you want it to be? Usually, it is not. Three, if not, what do you want it to be? And four, how do you institutionalize it and keep it working for you?
Culture is a lot of work but when an organization gets it right the culture (for example, a culture of accountability, trust and respect) becomes engrained in everything else that happens.
11.DELEGATION AND EMPOWERMENT UNDERPINNING:
When an organization is working from a blueprint (Framework for Action) that everyone is aware of and understands, delegation and empowerment thrives within every leadership level because everyone understands where the organization is going (change or die), why it must go there, they understand and adhere to day-to-day operating standards and they feel comfortable looking for new and better ways to accomplish their mission. The bottom line is that delegation and empowerment can become a powerful force in any organization and should be a principle underpinning.
Empowerment is something one feels; it is a feeling of freedom and expectation to achieve excellence. Leaders who fail to empower subordinates are withholding the concept of be-all-you-can-be.
12. LEADER DEVELOPMENT:
Jim has an unforeseen family crisis and quits his job effective immediately. Susan gets married and moves away. Someone else has a long-term illness. It happens every day in every organization. Leader development is a continuous process of building a bench of ready, willing, qualified, in-house replacements. Without a standing bench of replacements at every level who are ready to step in and take over, an organization can flounder, lose momentum and even fail.
Leader development takes many forms: On-the-spot performance feedback to subordinates; regularly scheduled performance reviews; continuous mentoring; horizontal reassignments to broaden a subordinate’s knowledge of the organization’s inner workings; training outside the organization; changing job description to include more responsibility; temporarily fill in for absent senior leaders; assignment as your assistant.
Leader development is all of the above. Leader development energizes, excites and fulfills subordinates. An organization that does not develop subordinate leaders is missing a foundational corner stone, is aimless, short-sighted and almost doomed to be less successful than it should be.
Bottom line, leader development is the second most important leader responsibility. The payoff is loyalty and stability. It’s all about building a bench.
13.ORGANIZING FOR ACTION:
At every leadership level it is not unusual to occasionally feel lonely at the top but you do not need to feel alone. Successful leaders built a team around themselves. Some examples:
At the operational and strategic levels, the leader should have a chief of staff, one of the most important positions in an organization. The leader personally selects the Chief, who becomes the leader’s alter ego. The Chief creates synergism, can “read” the boss and anticipate what is coming. The Chief creates an organizational rhythm. He/she is the organizational integrator. Invaluable.
Inside the organization there are some subordinates in whom the leader has a special trust and confidence. They seem more aware of the big picture, will speak out in the presence of the boss and are readily available. When a particularly difficult, time-sensitive issue arises the leader needs to have a small group (3 or 4) who can be called in at a moment’s notice to hear a problem and offer some immediate advice and assistance. All the leader needs to do is say, “Chief, get the War Council in here.”
The concept of a “Kitchen Cabinet” began with President Andrew Jackson who regularly met with some close confidants in the White House kitchen to discuss big issues. This unofficial circle of unpaid discreet advisors from outside the organization have a wide range of experience and know the leader intimately. They willingly advise the leader when he/she asks for an opinion and even when he/she does not ask.
Leaders can sometimes get so caught up on the positive nature of an undertaking that they ignore the possibility of a down-side. Have an official or unofficial Red Team in place that will play the role of the opposition (media, public opinion, in-side resistance, competition) and lay out the unintended negative consequences of a pending issue or decision. Don’t shoot the messenger just because you don’t want to hear the bad news.
Sometimes a leader just needs a Coach; someone who has been in their shoes, knows the job and the environment from personal experience.
The bottom line for organizing for action is this; one brain is not enough. Swallow your pride and get help.
14.AFTER-ACTION REVIEW, AAR:
What readily comes to mind with that caption, AAR, is a voluminous, detailed After Action Report prepared at the completion of a large project. The report is habitually very long, perhaps hundreds of pages, rarely read and generally gathers dust on the shelf. An After-Action Review is completely different. It is current, dynamic, extraordinarily useful, impactful and brings life to the day-to-day events of an organization. It is simply a short discussion among the participants immediately after the event. The discussion consists of answering three simple questions. One, what did we do good? Second, what should/could we have done better? An AAR does not play the blame game. It is an opportunity for individuals to fess-up with, “I could/should have……..” That happens a lot when the organization is living a culture of accountability. The final question is, how can we institutionalize the fix going forward? AAR is an unbelievably effective tool to make the organization continuously better from every event.
AAR has been institutionalized by the U.S. Army and is highly praised as pointed out in the Harvard Business Review: “An organization that doesn’t merely extract lessons from experience but actually learns them can adapt more quickly and effectively than its rivals and it is less likely to repeat the errors that gnaw away at stakeholder value. It’s important to correct things; but it is more important to correct thinking.”
Hundreds of AARs are conducted inside the U.S. Army every day. The cardinal rule is, an event is not complete until the AAR is concluded. A culture of AAR is a game changer for organizations that use it every day at every level for every event. AAR is an opportunity to measure just how good we are, as opposed to how good we think we are. In a nut-shell AAR is exploring good-better-how. A powerful tool available to every leader at every level; a force multiplier; never if, always when.
15.DEALING WITH THE 21ST CENTURY ENVIRONMENT:
The increase in societal change so far in this century is unprecedented and with Artificial Intelligence about to be unleashed there is no letup in sight. Daily news includes headlines, stories, editorials and data about Counter Culture, Wokism, Critical Race Theory, Transgender issues, Revisionist history, Diversity/Equity/Inclusion, Race Relations etc. etc. All of this can be communicated instantly to every segment of the population. The Education Organization must consider taking a hard stand on social issues discussions during valuable class time. Why?
One, teachers need all the time available to produce proficient students.
Two, has to do with parental responsibilities and rights. Having a discussion with a youngster about sex and transgenderism for example is 100% within the purview of the parents. Teachers have zero right to infringe on that parental responsibility and to engagement with students on those type social issues is completely out of their lane.
Three, there is no way to regulate “some is ok” or “a little bit shouldn’t hurt.” Education Organizations must therefore have a firm, uncompromising stand that social issues discussions in the classroom are forbidden.
16. CHARACTER:
Honesty, integrity and morality are a cornerstone of every successful organization. They are especially important in the school house where every “product” is influenced every day by the character of their teachers and the school administrators’ decisions.
People will allways make honest mistakes, occasionally have an error in judgement but a breach of honesty and integrity is all-together different. There should never be a three-and-out policy on character violations. The policy of one-and-done, zero tolerance, is the only way to protect character of an organization.
The above Underpinnings paragraphs 10-16 are some of the foundational elements of successful organizations and are especially applicable to education. Without them in place, success in education will be somewhere between difficult and impossible.
Thesis: An organization that understands and embraces leadership underpinnings and has a framework for problem solving will out-think and out-perform the competition. That leads us to the second part of fixing the organization.
17.FRAMEWORK FOR ACTION, FFA:
This document will come from the CEO, in this case the Superintendent.
Let’s begin with a quick look at common characteristics of successful organizations:
- Leaders organize their thoughts.
- Leaders use common terminology.
- Leaders are linked and aligned.
- Subordinates are empowered.
- Junior leaders are “inside” their leaders’ heads.
- All leaders hold themselves accountable.
- Leaders have continuous situational awareness.
- All leaders focus on the end state.
- There are no “gaps” in the problem-solving equation.
- There is continuous performance improvement.
When those factors are all in-play, there is a forcing issue involved. That is what the Framework for Action, FFA, does. The point being if you are going to effectively and efficiently build a house you need a blueprint. Simply stated, the FFA is a blueprint, a game plan. It should not be a manuscript; it may only be a couple pages in length. All we are trying to do is answer six questions, who, what, when, where, why and how.
There are three defined pieces to a Framework for Action; Charting a Course, Declaring Expectations and Creating Conditions for Success.
18.CHARTING A COURSE: two elements, Vision (where) and Strategy (how):
VISION: Planning must always begin at the end with a simple, understandable vision of the end state. This is a critical step because of the truth in the old saying, “if you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.”
Vision gives us the answer to the WHERE in the six questions. It should be a sentence, not a paragraph. Everyone in the organization should be aware of what it is. It comes from the strategic leader. There should be a lot of thought, some discussions, perhaps some research before publishing the vision statement because there is sometimes a fine line between vision and hallucinations. For example, if we are dealing with a school system that has about 20% of its 8th graders who are below basic level and 75% below proficient level in math, the end state should not be that 100% will be at or above the proficient level in the next two years. That leader is hallucinating.
Example: The VISION for this strategic plan is to systematically significantly improve proficiency levels every year throughout our school system with the goal that the current 5th grade class will attain a high school completion rate with at least of ___% of the graduates proficient in all subjects.
Yes, there are frequently a couple fuzzy, nonspecific phrases in the vision statement such as “significantly improve.” But, that’s OK; at this point in strategic planning, we just need to understand WHERE we are going.
The percentage you fill into the vision statement may not be based on facts at this point. But, based on discussions with the Board of Directors, the Kitchen Cabinet, Coaches, etc. it should feel about right given what we know at this point in the planning process; it should seem to be within the art of the possible given the viability of this campaign.
Do not fill in the blanks with “100%”; we do not live in a perfect world. Some will argue that you have to set goals high to motivate people. First, that is not the way you motivate people and secondly, if the goal is set at perfection, all you do is set the organization up for failure.
STRATEGY: the second piece of Charting a Course, is the alignment of assets to their greatest advantage.
The most difficult part of any strategic plan is HOW we are going to proceed; how, in general terms, we are going to get to the end state. Strategy is the long pole in the tent. Without a solid strategy, all we have is empty rhetoric. Unfortunately, many times, in Congress for example, the strategy is left completely out of the planning process and without the “how” the process just flounders and ultimately fails. Additionally, too often a law passed in Congress is no more than an idea that is then turned over to government bureaucrats who, in too many cases, will produce thousands of pages of regulations and implementing instructions that in no way resemble a plan of any kind.
There are three rules for strategy: the first rule is to have one. That is, understand the external operating environment, e.g., what does the public want, what will they accept, what will they not permit? Understand your internal operating environment. That is, do not create expectations that are not within the art of the possible for your organization. Spend some time doing an analysis of alternatives; there is usually more than one way to skin a cat. Debate these alternatives with the help of your War Council, Kitchen Cabinet, Red Team and Coaches.
The second rule for strategy is to keep it simple. That is, use as a rule of thumb, that you can describe it to someone on the elevator ride to the tenth floor? For example, “Our strategy is to shoot the wolf nearest the sled; that is, we are going to tear apart our basic training program for K through 4th grade, re-think it and re-build it so that our students do not get behind in proficiency as they progress from grade to grade. Having done that, we can carry on with those same principles in middle and high school.
Also, at this point in developing the strategy, do a first draft of the phasing for the plan. Is it a 3-month plan, a 5-year plan? When do we begin and what is to be accomplished in the first phase?
The third rule for strategy is, if it is working, do not change it. “Mission creep” are the two ugliest words that can be uttered in an organization.
Remember, there are three defined pieces to a Framework for Action; Charting a Course, Declaring Expectations and Creating Conditions for Success. Having charted a course with vision and strategy it is time for the leader to declare to the entire organization the who, what, when, and why of the plan.
19.DECLARING EXPECTATIONS: three elements, Mission (what we all are going to do), Intent (who, when, where, why) and Boss’ Guidance.
MISSION, the first element of declaring Expectations. This is what we in the Education Organization are all collectively going to do. Measurers of merit of a mission statement are clarity and brevity; it is a sentence or two, never a paragraph. The mission statement is public information; it should reach everyone in the organization.
In most organizations it is important and essential that the mission gets restated as it moves into the operational and first-line leader levels of leadership. Here is a quick example to illustrate mission restatement:
The CEO of a successful regional business decides to expand the entire operation nation-wide. That is the overall mission, “Expand operations across the nation.” But at the operational level the Chief Financial Officer will restate the mission for his/her organization to, “Raise $100 million to finance the nation-wide expansion.” Marketing, “Develop and sustain a multi-faceted national ad campaign.” HR, “Hire and train a national sales force” etc. You get the picture.
The Superintendent’s strategic level mission statement might look something like this:
The mission in School District X is to systematically look inside every aspect of our operations, evaluate them, expand or delete as necessary, initially place special emphasis on sustained proficiency for every student during the basic training grades, K-4, and, by training to standards, eventually and dramatically increase the proficiency levels of every student in every subject K-12.
The Principals’ mission statement at the operational level:
Our mission at Public School 123 is to create a safe and secure environment for learning, use every tool available to ensure that students do not get behind and attain proficiency in every grade and every course.
The first-line leader mission statement:
My mission is to stay in my lane; to repetitively teach-test and know that no student is getting behind and is proficient at all times; to engage the parents and make them an essential part of the teacher/student/parent team; inspire students to be all they can be.
Finally, mission is such a valuable tool, leaders at every level will cause a task analysis to take place. That is, simply listing all the tasks that must be performed. The tasks can fall into three categories:
Specified Tasks come right from the mission statement; “tear it apart and rebuild it.” Here is an analogy; you just purchased a hundred-year-old house; it looks great from the outside. But you gut it, upgrade the electrical and plumbing, add air conditioning and install a modern kitchen. When completed it may look the same on the exterior but inside is dramatically different.
Essential Tasks are make or break issues, e.g., raise proficiency levels and do a better job during “basic training.”
Implied Tasks include anything and everything that might contribute to mission accomplishment. The Superintendent should immediately contact his/her War Council and perhaps the Kitchen Cabinet to brain-storm what issues should be included in the Implied Task List. The list should include but not be limited to the following: Standards, multi-year teacher/student classes, uniforms, charter school proficiency, meritocracy, institutionalized internal tutoring program, lesson plans, the student/teacher/parent function, teach-test-teach-test agenda, teach U.S. History and civics and inspirational teachers.
When the initial list of implied tasks is complete the Superintendent could immediately pull selected teachers and principals off summer vacation, form up a team for each issue and charge them to research and report out on their subject. The reports should include a one or two-page summary of their work to include definition of the issue, pros, cons, conclusions and recommendations along with backup material. Additionally, the team will be prepared to brief the Board of Education.
The above paragraph begins with mentioning the “initial” list…….” The point being that a huge part of building a long-range strategic plan is discovery, which means we are always faced with the DKDK factor. That is, at any given point in time, especially in the early phases, we Don’t Know what we Don’t Know. Planning is about uncovering a lot of rocks and we don’t know what is under there until we get to that point. By the time we finish Phase 1 we may have many new issues to deal with in Phase 2.
What follows is some elaboration on the starter list of Implied Tasks:
STANDARDS:
An organization without standards is a failed organization. The Superintendent should pull together some teams to immediately get to work on standards for every discipline taught in their school system.
What does a “standard” look like for education? A simple example for math is that at some point every student will have memorized, for immediate recall, multiplication tables from 1×1 to 12×12; and that point in time will be listed in the teachers’ lesson plans. For comparison here is a portion of the North Carolina, “Standard for elementary math. 1) Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. 2) Reason abstractly and quantitatively. 3) Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. 4) Model with mathematics. 5) Use appropriate tools strategically.” There is more but you get the picture. How can this type of psychobabble get translated into lesson plans that lead to specific standards and eventually to student proficiency?
Developing standards could work like this: Three outstanding kindergarten teachers and three elementary school principals meet to define the end state of the kindergarten year of instruction. They will specify the standards for proficiency. They will lay out the flow of what is taught. After a couple days of work, they will identify an end state that kindergarten teachers will use to produce their lesson plans for the year.
Three selected first-grade teachers will have set in and observed the session with the kindergarten teachers and will have a clear understanding of what the students will have achieved upon graduation from kindergarten. On the next day they will follow the same scenario to define the standards for end of year, first grade; again with three 2nd grade teachers listening.
This scenario will be repeated through grade 4 so that in just a couple weeks the elementary student standards can be set for basic training, K-4.
The 5th grade, middle school and high school standards for individual subjects (math, science, English, civics, geography, history, etc.) will be worked in the same manner, each beginning by understanding the end state from the previous grade.
TEACHER CONTINUITY: The second multi-year task list issue for a research team has to do with the concept of multi-year teacher/student relationship. That is, having a teacher stay with a particular class group throughout the basic training years. This concept has the potential to enhance the teacher/student/parent triad.
UNIFORMS:
There are numerous studies that point out the pros and cons of student uniforms on learning and discipline. Put a team on this subject.
CHARTER/PRIVATE SCHOOLS:
There is evidence that students in the 38,000 charter and private schools perform better academically than in the 91,000 public schools. Find answers to what the charters and privates are doing or not doing as compared to public schools. Find best-practices and share them.
MERITOCRACY:
Our nation, the greatest in history, has been built and sustained on a concept of meritocracy. The current movement towards Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in so many ways inhibit meritocracy. Make meritocracy a hallmark of the school system.
INSTITUTIONALIZED TUTORING:
Even if all of the recommendations in this concept paper are adopted and adhered to, we do not live in a perfect world and some students will get behind and not be in a proficient status. The system should have on hand at all times a volunteer staff of retirees who can help out when the school day is over mid-afternoon. Tens of thousands of Americans retire every day and many are looking for some meaningful thing to do. This is a win-win concept.
STANDARDS FOR LESSON PLANS.
Once the achievement standards are established for every grade/subject, it then falls on the teacher to produce a series of documents that will systematically achieve the end state. They cannot be allowed to just “wing-it”. Lesson plan standards must be published, all lesson plans must be approved by the principal and must be available to the principal and his/her staff as they sit in on classes every day. Leaders are planners; that’s what they do. A lesson plan is the product of the first-line leaders’ planning process.
THE STUDENT/TEACHER/PARENT TRIAD:
There must be continuous emphasis on this by every Principal every day. Teaching and learning is a team effort. The Superintendent should have a small group work up a list of critical elements for a successful student/teacher/parent team. For example, teachers and parents meet before the school year begins. The parents should understand the end-of-year proficiency standards. Parents should be aware that there will be homework assignments; how much, how often, is it graded, consequences of students not complying, etc. How will the parents be informed if classroom testing results indicate their child has fallen behind and what are their responsibilities in getting the student caught up. Etc.
TEACH-TEST, TEACH-TEST;
Teach-test must become a standard operating procedure. That is, end of semester or end of year testing to determine if the student “got it” is an unacceptable course of action. What can be done with those who got behind and are in a not-proficient category? It’s too late to fix it. The student will likely continue on getting further behind leading to one of two possibilities. One the system just keeps passing them on until they graduate high school functionally illiterate. Or, at some point they will be so far behind, frustrated, ridiculed by peers and despondent that they will join the other 7000 kids in the same circumstance who drop out every school day; likely facing a dim future. Teach-test, teach-test, know when a student gets behind and fix it before it is too late.
TEACH HISTORY AND CIVICS:
We already have entire generations of Americans who are U.S. history and U.S. civics dummies. It shouldn’t be; fix it by teaching civics and real history, not revisionist history nonsense.
INSPIRATIONAL TEACHERS: Teachers who habitually turn out poor performing students will tell you, “I can teach them but I can’t make them learn.”; a feeble excuse. At the other end of the teacher competency spectrum are the teachers who inspire their students to want to learn. Get some smart folks together and figure that one out.
CONCLUSIONS ON “MISSION”:
Mission must be published, talked about and understood at every level of leadership. Everything flows from mission; it is what we all are going to do.
Each level of leadership, strategic (Superintendent), operational (Principals) and first-line leaders (teachers) must develop a mission essential task list consisting of specified, essential and implied tasks. That’s what good-to-great leaders do.
Declaring expectation consists of three elements, mission, intent and boss’ guidance.
INTENT:
Intent is the most powerful tool available to a leader. Why? Leaders, especially at the strategic and operational levels, cannot be expected to personally interact with every subordinate in their span of control on a daily basis. In the absence of your leader, you and your team will continue to perform based on what you understand your leader intends for you to do. It is the FFA tool that binds the continuum together in a commonly understood cause or endeavor. Intent is published by leaders in four short paragraphs. For example, in the Education Organization the Principals’ intent might look like this:
Paragraph one is a confirmation that we are committed to achieving the next higher leader’s end state goals. For example: My intent is for this school to achieve the stated end state of this school district which is to achieve the highest possible proficiency level for every student.
The second paragraph is a brief description of the operation. For example: I intend for us to operate with a culture of accountability trust and respect and for every teacher to use our best practices in every classroom every day.
Third, explain why we are doing this. For example: We are doing this because we owe every student and their parents a high school graduate who is proficient in all of the disciplines we teach.
Finally: The keys to success are to establish a strong student/teacher/parent team effort, not allow a student get behind by teach-test, teach-test, institute best practices and stay in your lane with the subject matter.
CONCLUSIONS ON INTENT:
Intent provides clarity of purpose, is relevant at every level and binds the organization together.
Innovation is the lifeblood of our country. Innovation follows entitlement. Every subordinate should feel that they can innovate and be all they can be as long as they are operating within the bounds of their leaders’ intent.
Moving on from Mission and Intent to the third element of Declaring Expectations which is Boss’ Guidance. Good leaders anticipate their subordinates’ questions and use this piece of the Framework for Action to fill in some blanks. For example, prioritize actions; comment on special considerations; set a timetable; clearly fix responsibility; explain the plan’s phasing, etc.
CONCLUSIONS ON DECLARING EXPECTATION:
Mission, Intent, and Boss’ Guidance fill the gap between vision/strategy and execution.
To make sure you are not lost on the Framework for Action outline; the leader determined that the best way to attack a big problem in the organization was by creating a long-range strategic plan. That plan would contain three parts, Charting a Course (vision and strategy), Declaring Expectations (mission, intent and boss’ guidance). Now it is time to:
20.CREATE CONDITIONS FOR SUCCESS:
Why create conditions for success? Because hope is not a process. The operative word is “create.” We can break this initiative into at least four parts.
One, LEADER BACKBRIEFS:
Leaders will always be wondering; did the subordinates all get it? (”Jim, some time today stop by and give me an update on the XYZ project.”) Are they on the right track? Do they need more guidance or resources? One way to find out is to routinely schedule IPRs, in-progress reviews. It can be a simple stand-up oral briefing that just takes a few minutes. It is an invaluable tool because it also sustains both leader-to-leader communications and situational awareness.
Situational awareness provides leaders the information they need to make decisions as to how and when to move to the next phase of the campaign plan. Knowing when to move to the next phase is a key and difficult decision and will not always be intuitively obvious. Having all leaders operating in an environment of constantly updated situational awareness is another force multiplier in the journey from vision to execution.
Two, CENTERS OF GRAVITY: A place, person, thing, belief, circumstance or condition that is central to success or could possibly cause failure. The boss should pull in a few advisors and brainstorm Centers of Gravity and then make sure all subordinates are aware of them. Keep the list short, perhaps 3 or 4 per operational phase. Then track them frequently, perhaps ask about them during each IPR briefing.
Also note that the Centers of Gravity for Phase 1 may be completely irrelevant for Phase 2. Never begin a new phase without creating the new Centers of Gravity list.
Three, CRITICAL INFORMATION REQUIREMENTS: A short list of issues the boss has determined to be critical to success or can cause failure if not quickly identified and acted on. All subordinates must understand that upon discovery of a critical piece that is on the list they must immediately get it passed to a leader who can deal with the information. Crisis management before the fact.
Four, SHAPING THE BATTLESPACE: Every problem has a defined battlespace (operating environment) and every battlespace is configured such that you either have the advantage or are in a disadvantaged position.
For example, the Board of Education should let the local media know their intent and all the steps they are taking in their vision to execution agenda. Every school should have regularly scheduled Parent Teacher Association sessions open to the public for discussion of the vision to execution agenda.
21. PHASE THE PLAN:
Phase one, of course is planning with a lot of specificity. Inside that is the development of the end of year standards for every grade and subject. Define the culture and begin discussions about how to institutionalize it. The Superintendent should form up the study teams to research and build point-papers on uniforms, tutoring, the student-teacher-triad, lesson plans, meritocracy, teach-test and other change issues that will be in play. Phase 1 may take a couple months of the summer break.
Then move on to generally define the timelines for all succeeding phases which will reach out to the end-state. Don’t forget, as you approach the beginning of a new phase, define the centers of gravity.
22.BOTTOM LINE:
I began this essay with the thesis that organizations can transform themselves into something better while recognizing that change is difficult. To do so one needs tools and a game plan to explore new horizons. A leader is someone who is taking the organization elsewhere.
The game plan articulated above will transform the Education Organization and improve their “product”, better educated students. It will work because of the totality of the effort; getting inside every aspect of the education process, evaluating it, changing it where necessary all the while focused on a single definable end state, more proficient high school graduates.
THE TOOLS AVAILABLE TO A LEADER: Recognizing and optimizing the three levels of leadership, developing organizational underpinnings, culture, delegation, empowerment, leader development, kitchen cabinet, war council, coaches, red teams, after-action reviews daily throughout the organization, character development, dealing with the 21st century environment, a framework for action, charting a course, vision, end state, strategy, declaring expectation at every level, mission, restated missions, task lists, intent, institutionalized tutoring, lesson plans, standards-based instruction, teach-test methodology, no-student-gets-behind ideology, student/teacher/parent triad, creating conditions for success, centers of gravity, leader backbriefs, situational understanding by all leaders at all levels at all times, critical information requirements and shaping of the battlespace.
With all of these elements simultaneously in-play, there is a synergistic affect; that is the interaction of elements that when combined produce a total effect that is greater than the sum of the individual elements; 2+2 equals 5.
Getting from vision to execution is not rocket-science. Vision to execution is clearly within the art of the possible for every Education Organization in America.
When this vision to execution process is in-play, what we find happening routinely in the Education Organization is bottom-up innovation, readily accepted best-practices, enhanced meritocracy, inspired teachers, increased communications among the three levels of leadership, enthusiasm, acceptance of change, synergism, and daily after-action reviews at all levels which strengthen the culture of accountability, trust and respect. Bottom line, the school house becomes a great place to work.
While keeping the Board of Directors (the elected Board of Education) fully informed, now is the time for Education Organizations’ CEOs (Superintendents) to command the present, advance ideas and shape the future. Meet the challenges of the 21st Century head on with a new tool kit, take your organization elsewhere and make 2+2 equal 5 every day.
Marvin L. Covault, Lt Gen US Army, retired, is the author of VISION TO EXECUTION, a book for leaders, and a new book May 2022, FIX THE SYSTEMS, TRANSFORM AMERICA as well as the author of a blog WeThePeopleSpeaking.com.
Author’s note: This essay is a summary of a concept of operations contained in a book entitled VISION TO EXECUTION. If you want more detail on every issue covered above, the book is available on Amazon.