Balanced Leadership Framework

 

 

Information for this page was taken primarily from the monograph The Balanced Leadership Framework: Connecting Vision with Action, authored by Tim Waters, Ed.D, & Greg Cameron, M.A. (2007, McREL)

 

What is the Balanced Leadership Framework?

Over the past several years, McREL (Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning) has complegted multiple meta-analytic studies on teh practices of effective schools, teachers, and principals. These studeies provide general guidance for what school leaders can do to increase student achievement. Knowing what do do however, is often not enough to transform schools and classrooms. Leaders must also know why certain practices are important, when they should be used and how to apply them skillfully in their own schools and classrooms.

 

The Balanced Leadership Framework helps school leaders apply the findings from the McREL research. It assists leaders in connecting vision (i.e., knowing what to do and why do do it) with action (i.e., knowing how to do it).

 

The findings, conclusions, and technical notesw from the meta-analsysis reserach have been published in School Leadership that Works: From Research to Results (Marzano, Waters, & McNulty, 2005, ASCD). The research produced three major findings:

 

• A statistically significant correlation exists between school level leadership and student achievement. Leadership makes a difference.
• 21 leadership responsibilities with statistically significant correlations to student achievement were identified, along with 66 practices for fullfilling those responsibilities. A well-defined set of research-based leadership responsibilities correlated with gains in students achievement now exits.
• Surprisingly, the stufy also found that not all strong leaders have a positive impact on student achievement. There were a number of students in which principals were rated by teachers as strong leaders in schools with below average achievement.

 

The 21 leadership responsibilities and associated practices can be viewed by clicking on this link. McREL21LeaderRespon.pdf

 

The graphic below presents a non-linguistic presentation of the Balanced Leadership Framework. The 21 leadership responsibilities are grouped into an organizing structure that includes: leadership, focus, magnitude of change, and purposeful community.

 

 

 

Leadership

Leadership is the foundation component in the framework. It is placed within the framework strategically as the interface between "Focus," "Magnitude," and "Purposeful Community." It is McREL's view that leaders are continually engaged in focusing the work of the school, leading change with varying orders or magnitude, and developing purposeful community both within the school and in the larger community. The dotted lines between leadership and the other three framework components are intended to reflect permeable, rather than hardened or rigid, boundaries between leadership and school and classroom practices, students, change, and the community.

 

To guide the use of these findings, McREL placed combinations of the 21 responsibilities in the three framework components, Focus, Magnitude of Change, and Purposeful Community as shown in the graphic below.

 

 

Focus of Leadership

The focus of a leader's improvement initiatives is critical. McREL's research reported a variance in the findings - some of the studies found a negative correlation between leadership and student achievement. The reseachers explain those findings by examining the focus of a leader's improvement efforts and the magnitude of change associated with those improvement efforts. A principal might focus attention on improving school practices that are already well developed and effectively implement. As a result focusing on those practices is not likely to produce measurable impace on student and school performance. Likewise, a principal might focus attention on school and classroom practices for which the staff lacks the knowledge and skill to implement effectively. That effort would result in marginal implementation, lacking quality, fidelity, consistency and intensity - and likely resulting in less impact on achievement. A principal could also focus his or her school on practices with weak relationships to student achievement. The superficial or trendy changes that neglect the real problems wouldn't result in better performance either.

 

The researchers identified seven of the 21 leadership responsibilities that can be used to focus their schools on reserach-based classroom and school practices that have statistically signficant effects on student achievement. A chart of the leadership responsibilities used to focus schools is listed below:

 

 

 

Magnitude of Change

A second explanation for what McREL calls the "differential impact of leadership", or the explanation for why some strong leaders actually hurt student achievement, is based on an understanding of the nature of change, the implecations of change, the change process, and the leadership of change. McREL asserts that strong leaders, even when focusing their change initiaties on the "right" school and classroom practices, can have a negative impact on achievement if they fail to understand the implications for stakeholders. The "magnitude of change" lies in the eye of the beholder. Whether stakeholders perceive a change as first-order or second-order has less to do with the change itself than it does with their own knowledge, experience, values, and flexibility. As a result, few changes are of the same magnitude for all stakeholders. Some changes can be perceived as first-order change for some stakeholders and second-order change for others.

 

A chart describing the perception of a change, and categorizing that perception as first or second order, is listed below:

 

In order to avoid the “differential impact of leadership”, principals must understand and accurately estimate the order of magnitude of their improvement initiatives for all stakeholders. Moreover, they must also understand the change process — that is, they must understand which leadership responsibilities to emphasize and how to emphasize them when working with stakeholders for whom the change may have different implications. The chart below shows seven leadership responsibilities that are positively correlated with second-order change.

 

 

 

Phases of Change

Effective change leadership requires a deep understanding of the change process, which is complex, non-linear, and recursive. This makes it difficult for leaders to have a clear understanding of where they are in the process. In an effort to support a leader’s understanding of the change process, the diagram listed below presents a simplified diagram illustrating McREL’s theory of change, comprised of four phases: Create Demand, Implement, Manage Personal Transitions, and Monitor and Evaluate.

 

There are several important characteristics of the process of change illustrated in this figure. First, they are highly inter-dependent. For example, successful implementation requires effective management of personal transitions, which is based on close monitoring of the implementation of a change. Monitoring and evaluating the quality, fidelity, consistency, and intensity of implementation may increase or decrease demand for change.

 

Second, the phases of change are not sequential; they are recursive. For example, at the implementation phase, it is likely that leaders continue to create demand as a means to revitalize change initiatives that are losing ground.

 

Third, the change process is substantially different for change perceived as first-order from change perceived as second-order. For example, as shown in the exhibit, the phase "Manage Personal Transitions" is related only to change perceived as second-order. Because first-order change is perceived as an extension of the past and consistent with stakeholders' accepted ways of doing things, leaders do not typically need to manage the personal transitions that accompany change perceived as first-order.

 

However, because the change process is dynamic and complex, it is possible that for a change perceived as first-order for most members of an organization there may be some stakeholders for whom change will be second-order. This means that leaders must be highly attuned to their staff, their organization, their community, the magnitude of change implied by their improvement initiatives, and the phases of change.

 

 

Create Demand

Little change occurs in an organization or community that is satisfied with the status quo. If a change is to be initiated, it is generally the result of one of two possibilities. The first is the emergence of a shared vision that challenges the current reality. In this case, the vision is attractive and compel-ling enough that individuals or groups are willing to accept changes required to realize the vision, in spite of risk and discomfort that might be associated with it.

 

The second possibility is that the current reality is so un¬pleasant that individuals or groups are willing to accept the risk and discomfort associated with changing the status quo, hoping that a new reality will ultimately be less painful than the current one. In both cases, the tension between the current reality and a preferred future develops sufficient energy and motivation to move individuals or groups away from the status quo.

 

The chart listed below shows the leadership responsibilities associated with creating demand:

 

 

Implement

Once leaders have created demand for change, the challenge becomes implementing appropriate research-based practices effectively. To sustain the tension that was created in the previous phase and to guide teachers and others through this phase of the change process requires principals to maintain a relentless focus on the quality, fidelity, consistency, and intensity of implementation. All too often, change initiatives fail at this phase because leaders assume that the demand created in the initial phase will carry the initiative forward.

 

The chart listed below shows the leadership responsibilities associated with implementing change:

 

 

 

Manage Personal Transitions

Often, changes in programs and practices, which represent a gain for students, schools, or school districts, can be perceived as a loss for teachers or principals - especially, when they must gain new knowledge, develop new approaches and procedures, redefine relationships, and re-examine their norms and values. School improvement initiatives often require stakeholders to undergo personal transitions, which they often respond to by resisting change.

 

It is important to note that managing personal transitions created by second-order change is not the same as managing change. Bridges (1991) makes the distinction between change and transition by describing the former as external and the latter as internal (p. 3). Personal transitions, according to Bridges, are internal, personal, psychological processes that are often the result of external changes.

 

For principals, managing personal transitions created by second-order change, and understanding individual responses and managing them effectively is imperative to successful change leadership. Because personal transitions vary between individuals and groups, principals must fulfill the leadership responsibility Flexibility. That is, they must be flexible in their approach to leadership and differentiate their leadership behaviors by being directive or non-directive as the situation warrants.

 

This flexibility includes understanding when to use authority to direct resources and to answer questions, as well as knowing when to step back, frame strategic questions, and encourage others to help find answers. Principals must find the balance between setting direction for the school with listening to beliefs and opinions contrary to their own. Finally, principals themselves must be comfortable with major changes in how things are done. Often, principals may need to lead changes that are for themselves second-order. This requires that principals engage in reflective practice and maintain an awareness of the implications of change for themselves as well as others.

 

Finally, it is important to remember that poorly managed personal transitions are likely to exacerbate the feeling of loss that people may experience when engaged in what they view as second-order change. When people feel like they are losing something, they may look for someone to blame for their loss. The easiest person to blame in any organization is the one responsible for the change itself: the principal. For precisely this reason, change leadership can be a high-stakes proposition.

 

The chart listed below shows the leadership responsibilities associated with managing personal transitions:

 

 

Monitor &  Evaluate

Monitoring the implementation of research-based improvement initiatives requires that principals fulfill the responsibility monitor and evaluate (see Exhibit 13). They do this by

 

• collecting and analyzing data on the quality, fidelity, consistency, and intensity of implementation
• assessing the impact of implementation on student achievement.
• determining the impact of implementation on implementers.

By monitoring the impact of change on those who are responsible for implementing it, principals will know how accurately they estimated the order of magnitude of change implied by their improvement initiatives and thus, be able to adjust their leadership behaviors accordingly.

 

The chart listed below shows the leadership responsibilities associated with monitoring & evaluating change:

 

 

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Balanced Leadership Framework Resources

Click the links below to access documents that Sweet Home administrators have used to build understanding with the Balanced Leadership Framework: