Am I Asking Too Much?

At what point are we, as leaders,expecting or asking too much? I had a conversation a few weeks ago and this question seemed to be the propeller of the topic of the discussion. The person whom I had been talking to posed this thought and it stopped me in my tracks. I was a little flustered and frustrated with the question and at first I took offence. But this was the turning point and the push that I needed to jump off the ledge of comfort and into the imperative territory of discomfort. In fact, it set up my whole year for my own leadership as well as how I was going to build capacity within the teacher leaders within my school.

As a leadership team, we decided to go for a direction with the grade team leaders in our school that was unfamiliar to us. We co-constructed criteria on what was important in order to build an effective collaborative and supportive team. We then took Sandra Herbst’s work and chose one criteria that we wanted to help to set the direction of our goal for the year. The goal was not meant as another item to put on our to do list. It had to be a goal that had curriculum infusions but built on their team’s purpose and intention as well as develop their own leadership. In a nutshell, it was a leadership goal that required them to provide proof and evidence of moving learning in their team forward in some way. It required us to shine the flashlight forwards on our team but then back onto ourselves.

We did the goal setting as an admin team and we modeled our process with the team leaders. We showed them our goal that we had so far and the three action steps we had set. We talked about how we were already taking action and then gave them a snapshot of the success and struggles that we were experiencing along the way. Shining the flashlight on our team was an eye opener. We realized that we may have only been scratching the surface of the minds of the experts that were sitting at the table. This was when we decided the visioning and goal setting would be pivotal in slowing down to reflect in order to get some more traction to do the work we were meant to do. When I shone the flashlight back on myself, this initial question seemed to flash on high beams. Am I too much?

Everyone has so much to do in their jobs, their home lives, and with all of the extra activities that we place in our days. Thinking about each of the staff members, this was the area that I went to first. Next, I thought of the purpose and intention of our jobs and why we signed up as leaders in the first place. Were we all just here to be cogs in the wheel relaying information back to our team members? Or were we here to make a difference, build our own leadership skills, and support our teams in becoming the most effective group in order to achieve something incredible.

I realized that I may be too much for some. They may see my ideas as too lofty or confusing. Or maybe it wasn’t that I was too much but rather because it challenged them to move into unchartered territory as well. It pushed them to do the exact same thing that it did to me, to shine the flashlight back on themselves. It required them to reflect on the intention of what exactly they wanted their team to accomplish in order to move their team forward to make the most impact. It was more than the activities or “to do” lists that we tended to fill our meetings with. It challenged them to pause and think on how they would grow their own leadership skills through building capacity and purpose within their teams.

However, I may not be too much for other people in our leadership group. I think other team leads took the perspective of taking my vision and getting straight to work. They dug in a little deeper with the idea of setting a clearer path and developing intentional time for reflection.

At first, team leads were frustrated along the way because the activity was not telling them how to do it. When they shone the flashlight back on themselves, they realized that this was the purpose. It was to find their own direction and make it matter to them and their team. We, as leaders, cannot assume that we know what each person needs. We can only model, support, and set up a road map with suggestions for mile markers along the way. However, if we want to empower and build capacity in leaders within our environment we can’t do the work for them. They have to do it. They have to make sense of it all so that it moves their learning and ideas forward as a team. After all, the person who is working the hardest is the one who is learning the most. That was where I was stumbling as a leader. I was trying to do all the work. I wasn’t considering the learning that could be unlocked if I just took a moment to pause and think about my purpose and intention and stop trying to do it all for them.

Before doing this goal setting activity, my agenda consisted of getting things done and talking about things that could have been emailed. I gave them things to talk about but “the thing about the things I gave them” was that it really wasn’t anything that would move them forward personally as a leader or their team. It was just stuff to check off the list. Our first goal setting meeting was really hard. I struggled with direction and advice to give them but it was a meeting where I finally started to listen and I heard more voices rather than my own. I grew as a leader in that moment. I heard reflection, questioning, and people talking to each other. Conversations started to whirl outside of the meeting and emails were sent asking for some support or thoughts on what they had set so far. We were all uncomfortable. It was all a lot. But for the first time, we were really getting somewhere with our conversations and we were taking the time to think and pause.