9 Principles for Implementation: The Big Shift

Every blog, conversation, Ustream and conference session I engage in I always hear the same questions asked over and over-- How do we do this? It seems we know what and we know why- but PLEASE someone help us with the how!

Some would argue that the tension and irritation between "why" and "how" is by design. That these shifts are creating a permissive framework in education where there are no clear answers (Turner, 2004). And that in a changing educational environment the needed changes in education should be negotiated from a why approach rather than a how approach.

When we focus on the how, it prepares us for a linear, prescriptive learning experience. We determine what's missing? What do I want my students to learn that they do not know now? Yet, what is more appropriate when preparing students for their future is to realize we do not know what the "end" is. We can't be prescriptive in determining what is missing from our conception of what we want the end state of the student's learning to be, especially when we have no idea what is coming. Rather in an era that is not about precision or predetermined ways of doing things- we need to adopt a anticipative approach, not  a prescriptive approach.The great thing about this shift is that even if we get some of it wrong-- (and we surely will) that those wrong approximations in and of themselves will help to create climate to support the needed shifts.

Screaming for Something Concrete to Hold on To

Yet, even knowing this is not "business as usual, but business as unusual" and that we have to unlearn and relearn- our inner teacher screams out for the concreteness of How. Give me the 10 simple steps to mastering the changes needed in education and I am there. Oh, if only it were that simple.

But in an effort to share "lessons learned" from the change management projects I find myself immersed in through my work with the ABPC 21st Century Learners project and Powerful Learning Practice (the work I do with Will Richardson) I am going to attempt to give you principles (not how to prescriptive steps)  by which to guide your why approach to managing the needed changes in your schools and school systems.

Principles for Managing Change

Long-term transformational change has four primary aspects: scale (the change affects all or most of the school), magnitude (the degree to which it challenges the status quo), duration (the change is incremental at first and then moves to exponential), and strategic importance (how ready the culture is for adapting to change). Yet schools will only see significant change when the change occurs first at the level of the individual educational leader- be that principal, superintendent, or teacher. Real change, transformational change happens when there is personal ownership of the new technologies and concepts. Today's new economy is all about human capital, which starts with the educators in a school and then extends outward to all members of the school community.

1. People before Things (or test scores)

Any significant educational transformation creates “people issues.” Teachers will be asked to challenge the status quo, engage in mutual accountability, changed job descriptions, development of new skills and capabilities, and in general school staff will be unsettled and resistant to these changes. A shared approach for managing the change through learning communities — beginning with the leadership team and then engaging key stakeholders and teacher leaders — should be developed early, and utilized often as the change moves through the school or district. Trust will be developed overtime within the local community under an effective community leader. Once that happens, the community will become self-directed in how they help others through the change, and the leadership in the learning community will become shared. Working in teams ensures that individual issues are addressed without putting speed of adoption, morale, and results at risk. Teachers will need to perform and use action research to inform the reasons change is needed. Together, teams of teachers should embark in data collection and analysis discovering why a redesign of strategy, systems, or processes is needed in the 21st Century. The result-- champion building, as these teacher researchers become the biggest advocates for the change initiative and key to helping implement the ideals throughout the school.

2. Start at the Top

Because change is inherently unsettling for people at all levels of any organization and especially schools, when rumors of change begin to surface, all eyes will turn to the principal and other members of the school's leadership team for strength, support, and direction. Which means- the leaders must do more than talk a good game. They themselves must embrace the new approaches first, both to challenge and to motivate the rest of the faculty. They develop their own online voice and model the desired behaviors.Which means that superintendents, principals and teacher leaders will also be going through a learning curve and need to be supported. My personal experience in helping schools and school systems through change has been that the most successful stories come only after the leadership team went through the process of aligning and committing to the change initiative. Remember- change is caught- not taught.

3. Everyone is a Player in the Change Game

Transformational change in a school needs to include everyone. That means all staff, from the custodian to the secretary and even the lunch room staff. As you plan for change by defining your strategy and setting targets for design and implementation, remember to include all levels of the organization. At each layer of your school, create professional learning teams with leaders who have a shared vision and are motivated to make change happen and understand how the change relates to their area of influence and control.

4. Garner Buy-in

Teachers are inherently rational and reasonable folk and will question to what extent the change is needed, whether the principal is headed in the right direction, and whether they want to commit personally to making change happen. They will look to the leadership for answers. The articulation of a formal case for change and the creation of a modified, shared vision statement are invaluable opportunities to create or compel buy-in. Teachers and leaders who champion the change need to be able to articulate why and what they believe, as well as why it is in the best interest of children.

5. Can't Give Away What You Do Not Own

To truly be successful at implementation of 21st Century change there must be ownership by those  willing to accept responsibility for making change happen in all their areas of influence. Ownership is often best created by involving people in identifying potential problems and crafting solutions- which happens naturally in a community of practice. Willingness to "own it" can be reinforced by incentives and rewards. These can be extrinsic or intrinsic (for example, camaraderie and a sense of shared destiny will go a long way when accomplishments are recognized by school boards and in district publications).

6. Communicate and Often

Too often, those involved in the change make the mistake of believing that others understand the issues, feel the need to change, and see the new direction as clearly as they do. The best change programs reinforce core messages through regular, timely advice that is both inspirational and practical. Often this will require overcommunication through multiple, redundant channels. I am continually amazed at those who still act as though they are hearing the goals of a project for the first time - even with countless streams of communication about what the plan was for the project. Web 2.0 tools provide the perfect megaphone needed to communicate the emergent and evolving messages in a conversational way. The community needs to develop a collective plan for how they will "roll out" the communication of the change project and how they will keep the communications coming as a way to celebrate success and share concerns.

7. Know Your Culture and Predict Possible Impact

21st Century change tends to pick up speed and intensity as it cascades and spirals through a school environment, making it critically important that leaders understand and account for culture and behaviors at each level. Participatory media has a tendency to create viral change and scale fairly quickly and if cultural impacts are not planned for- the result can become less than desirable.

Educational leaders often make the mistake of assessing culture either too late or not at all. Ask yourself, do you know your school's readiness factor in terms of accepting change? Does your school already have strategies in place for how to bring major problems to the surface, identify conflicts, and negotiate outcomes? Do learning teams, and ultimately your learning community know how to identify the core values, beliefs, behaviors, and perceptions that must be taken into account for successful change to occur? Asking these hard questions before starting to implement a 21st Century change initiative can serve as the common baseline for designing essential change elements, such as embedding 21st Century skills into the core curriculum or determining what new literacies your students will need to know and how delivery of curriculum will need to change in order for students to be successful in mastery.

8. Expect the Unexpected

21st Century change is by design emergent and organic in nature. Implementation from my experience never goes completely according to plan. People react in unexpected ways; areas of anticipated resistance fall away; and the external environment shifts etc. To manage the needed shifts in your school, the community will need to continually reassess. This is why ownership is so important. Each wave of adoption of the transformational change process will have its own tensions and unexpected outcomes. Data driven decision-making will help inform your strategies somewhat, but realize along the way that much of this is so new- that we do not know what we do not know. We are often "building this airplane while we are flying it."

9. As the Individual Grows so Will the Collective Wisdom of the Community

Change is both an institutional journey and a very personal one. Educators spend many hours each week at school; many think of their colleagues as a second family- and as their community away from home. Individuals (or teams of individuals) yearn to know how their work will change, what is expected of them during and after the change, how they will be measured, and what success or failure will mean for them and those around them.  But the truth is- so much of this change is emergent that we simply do not know how to answer these important questions. To quote Peter Vaill,"... it as if we are all in constant whitewater."

As you contemplate the needed change in your schools, make it your mantra to chant "people matter." It is all too tempting to dwell on the tasks at hand and the rationale behind what you are trying to accomplish rather than deal with the more difficult and more critical "people issues." But in the 21st Century, bottom line is that relationships are all that matter. It is no longer about information management and prescriptive outcomes, but rather about building capacity- in ourselves, our faculty, our staff and in our students and then being able to contextualize the collective wisdom we gain through those relationships to making the world a better place.

Resources:

Turner, D. (2004). Privatisation, decentralisation and education in the united kingdom: The role of the state. International Review of Education. 50,11,pp. 347-357(11).

Comments

[Karyn Romeis]

Good post, Sheryl - and not just relevant to schools!

[Susan]

Yes, just what I needed...you always come up with the words I need to say:) Thanks.

[Anne Jolly]

You absolutely, totally, and completely nailed it, Sheryl! This is as good a summary of the influences that drive change as anything I've ever seen . . . and I've seen plenty!

Interestingly, each of these "how to" components leads to more "how to's." For example, in #1,"A shared approach for managing the change through learning communities . . . should be developed early, and utilized often as the change moves through the school or district." Think of all the "how to's" that involves!

There's really no end to "how to". . . only ongoing learning. As usual, however, you've made a significant contribution here! Thank you!

[Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach]

Thanks for stopping by Anne. So nice to see a familiar face.

What I was trying to say was that we shouldn't focus on the "how to" but rather global, broad guiding principles. 21st Century change is so emergent that I do not think we are even close to understanding "how to" and actually with these shifts we are creating a permissive framework in education where there are no clear answers.

Also, that in a changing educational environment the needed changes in education should be negotiated from a "why" approach rather than a "how" approach- or we risk becoming paralyzed and ineffective.

We need to come to terms with it being OK not to know how. And that part of our role as teachers is to have a researcher's mind and to start gathering data that later down the road will point to development of the how. (right before everything shifts again!)

Does that make sense? I believe that students should help us discover the how to. That we simply need to approach the change from a why perspective and run with it.

Any of that strike a chord with you?

[Angela]

Cheryl--this is excellent. Much of what I confront in my own work is very similar, and transforming the ambiguous concept of change into something those who are immersed in it can wrap their heads around is important, I think. Teachers would do well to read this post, because it validates so much of what they feel and experience while providing reassurance that this is exactly what is to be expected....that's what they need to move forward, many times. And I agree, this is true of so much more than learning and education.

[Pat Schettini]

Great ideas you have posed. It is all about the personal relationships. What is critical is that the individuals build and possess a common vision ... a vision based in 21st Century Skills.

[Anne Jolly]

Ah - great points, Sheryl. Now, think about four or five teachers who have never collaborated sitting together facing each other and thinking in terms of global, guiding principals. They know the vision for teacher collaboration, or for using collaborative technology. They have a goal. They know the rationale. Maybe they even buy into the rational for collaboration up front. Now, what do they do next? Where do they start? That's where I see some know-how coming into play. The most productive "how to" involves offering tools/advice/tips that start people in the direction of coming up with their own solutions. Effective "how to" is not prescriptive . . . it stimulates reflection. You actually start down the "how to" road in the ideas you posted (See #5, for example.)

Or, maybe "how to" has a lot of different definitions? Fun topic to explore!

[Michelle]

Sheryl,

I really like the ideas you've got here - they have a broad application to all areas of education. As a newbie to the ideas of 21 Century Skills, I'm finding that I have a hard time articulating what these skills are to other teachers. I'm beginning to explore many new technologies which are exciting and get me thinking about new ways of teaching, but its still difficult to articulate the philosophy behind the phrase "21st Century Skills". I still don't think I can define it easily. Any help there?

[sbetts]

Sheryl,
I found myself asking how confident I was about each step personally as I read. A good "how to" for all of us trying to spread the word. Thanks for putting these points in black and white.
Sharon

[Cindy Linn]

Sheryl,
The order of your principles is as significant as their content..people first and it is number one. You have skillfully followed with 2-9 and each of those has people first and foremost. Thank you for your insights and the reminder of who, not what, is important!

[Artichoke]

Hi Sheryl,
Have been rereading that start up primer for technology change mediators Larry Cuban’s Teachers and Machines – The classroom use of technology since 1920 on the flight back to Auckland last night – there is a piece on p108 that helps here

With so much written about change and its consequences, I find it striking that fundamental propositions about change easily shared by most informed observers and professionals remain in the shadows, even amidst periodic surges of fervor for designing changes. In the years following World War II anthropologist Edward Spicer and a number of colleagues studied the impact of change upon varied cultures. They collected a number of case studies of pre industrial and industrial cultures coming to grips with change. In Human Problems in Technological Change he extracted from these and other studies a series of statements that today sound like clichés:

People resist changes that appear to threaten basic securities
People resist proposed changes they do not understand
People resist being forced to change
Changes generated in one subculture where science and technology are highly valued, if they are to be accepted in another subculture, must be made understandable and given clear value.

These generalisations produce little disagreement among policy makers and well intentioned reformers. Yet, as Harry Wolcott has observed, “the lessons are recited rather than learned”.

I also think Carolyn Marvin's
When Old Technologies Were New: Thinking About Electric Communication in the Late Nineteenth Century (Paperback) is a must read here

[AllanahK]

Another very meaningful post- I mirrored it on my blog- everything you say carries such wisdom and eloquence.

Thank you

[Nitin Julka]

Sheryl,

I love that you are writing about change management. This post from John Halamka also has great material on the topic.

[TeachMoore]

As one of your perpetual lurkers, I had to come out on this one. These principles are not only valuable to those of us trying to make changes in reference to our use of technology, but in many other applications. The faculty at my community college is undergoing major paradigm shift and these couldn't have come at a better time. Many thanks.

[Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach]

Michelle,

You are right, 21st Century Skills is a vague term and really only applicable within a contextual frame isn't it?

When I refer to 21st Century Skills I am referring to the Partnership for 21st C Skills definition. http://www.21stcenturyskills.org/

I am also referring to the new litercies that will be needed within each core content area, such as what NCTE has begun to explore: http://www.ncte.org/announce/129117.htm

Or the new literacies themselves that are needed as a result of the barriers that social media has taken down, like - visual literacies, creative literacies, network literacies, digital literacies and so on.

Hope that helps.

[Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach]

Cindy Lynn,

I hadn't really given the order much thought- but you are right. And people before things was my mantra in raising four children very close in age too. I remember when they were 1,2,4,and 5 years old and there was so much work to do--folks would show up at my cluttered house and I would shrug and say--people before things.

I chanted it in a more panicked way when they were 16, 17, 19, 20- hahaha. And now that they are all graduating from college I am seeing it still applies.

How have you seen "people first" as an important concept in your work or play?

[Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach]

Artichoke!

I am thrilled to see you. You quoted, "...These generalisations produce little disagreement among policy makers and well intentioned reformers. Yet, as Harry Wolcott has observed, “the lessons are recited rather than learned”.

I couldn't agree more. I use to think that the reason we went in and changed the key terms in education periodically to new verbs and such was so that a new group of scholars could come into power. You know what I mean- when an educational concept from 20 years ago is recycled and those new to education think it is all the rage and those of us who have been here a minute recognize it for what it use to be called. For example, Outcome based edc was a popular term in the United States during the 1980s and early 1990s. But it raised a lot of eyebrows until they called it standards-based education reform, mastery education, performance-based education, and other names.

But after your quote I am thinking maybe too it is done because phrases/descriptors are overused and as a result become vague in meaning.

What do you think? How do we inspire folks to action? How do we motivate those in a place of decision making to roll up their sleeves and get to work?

[Kathy Schwalbe]

I am moved to weigh in on your People Before Things item. Yes, yes and yes! The part of this section that resonates deeply with me is the trust factor. To deny the building of trust in order for the strong working relationships to emerge is the death knell for many projects, programs and schools. In my experience, building trust takes time; however, as individuals and groups, we begin by establishing rapport and that is something we can do face to face and virtually, I believe. Rapport can be instantaneous and each instance serves as a building block for long-lasting trust. I dream of faculty development opportunities where the adult learners focus on the rehearsals for establishing rapport with one another and with their students! There is no substitute for this foundational work within any organization. And, yes, the prize is self-directness and cultures rich in professional dialogue and creativity. Let's hear it for environments where all learners feel safe enough to explore and take risks.
Thanks, Sheryl, for your sharing your expertise and insight!

[Patrick]

Sheryl,

Thanks for rounding out these ideas. We are immersed in a rather transformative undertaking in my district, and it's refreshing to see some of the guidelines we are using appear here on your list.

[lhuff]

I just found this post--at a time I dearly needed it. Throughout the week, all on different days, I've met with our district curriculum coordinator, our district technology coordinator, and my high school principal, sharing with them my desire to start a small learning team to begin real change in our high school--to explore the concept of 21st Century Learning and the digital tools that help us communicate, collaborate, create, publish... Today, my principal and I agreed, it is imperative we get everyone on the same page, sharing the same vision, working together to create a plan of action. He's scheduled a meeting to get the powers that be together and asked me to present my vision. I'll be working feverishly this weekend and throughout next week to try to synthesize the ton of ideas and resources ricocheting in my head to create a presentation. I would love--when I finish--to have you give me feedback. I'm just an English teacher, feeling a bit intimidated and overwhelmed about tackling a project of this proportion. At the same time, I'm giddy about the prospect of igniting a spark.

[Nicole Rummel]

Sheryl,
You are so right, there is nothing that can replace having everyone involved and communication. I am very lucky in that my staff gets excited about change and moving forward. They also let me know immediately if they feel communication is slacking.

On another note...An article I read recently, I believe in Educational Leadership, talked about how connected children are at home. Yet, when they come to school we expect them leave all technology at the door.

[Susan Smith]

Sheryl,

Great post. I am sharing this with members of my community who will be taking a leadership role on a very exciting project that involves change.

My entire professional career has been about changing environments to make things better, from engineer to project manager to Director of Technology. All of the principals yu outlined need to be considered. Thank you for this.

[Dennis Harter]

This is a gem.

Right to the delicious tags.

Thanks, Sheryl.

[Jane Nicholls]

This is a timely posting Sheryl for those of us in NZ working along the implementation phase of a new curriculum. The values in our new curriculum can only be adopted following principles such as the ones you have so eloquently laid out above. Definitely people first! This is a curriculum to allow teachers to 'own' the learning and teaching in their classrooms and for schools to own their curriculum to make a difference for their students and for this to happen it needs to be 'owned' by all involved, leaders, teachers, parents, students... I have long been using your quote "You've got to own it before you can give it away" and now I will add a new one to my repertoire, "change is caught not taught". As always you not only affirm my thinking but challenge my thinking and through challenge comes growth and change.

[Pat]

This was a great post. Everything you said is so true but I hope many administrators and school board members read this too. I think this would make for an interesting discussion during a professional development session.