Sound Decision Making (Day 5)

Day 5 of my month of blog-a-day (Spilling Ink http://tinyurl.com/nc7gg3) continues with answering the following job application question: Describe the knowledge, skills, and qualities one should embody to be an effective educational leader.

... Of the dozens of skills used in any given week by the leader of a school there are three main categories that will make that leader more effective.

•  Sound Decision Making
•  Regular, Two-way Communication
•  Fostering Relationships

An effective educational leader needs to keep two principles in mind while making decisions. First, the process used to make any decision needs to be based on an explicit, usually inclusive, process. It helps to tell the staff exactly what kind of decision the leader is about to make: the principal could be delegating or facilitating or collaborating on a staff driven decision, the principal could be consulting before a decision is reached or testing a preliminary decision, finally, the principal must sometimes directly make a decision with little or no input. This structure of decision making (and associated staff roles) is one that I use with the staff when working on a large decision for the school. I have a chart posted in my office and bring a copy to the Faculty Advisory Committee meetings. I seek to make very few decisions without an explicit, inclusive process. ...


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5 down, 25 to go.