This document summarizes Michael Fullan's ideas about leadership and educational change. It discusses that leadership is about cultivating other leaders and maintaining continuity of direction. Change is a complex process that cannot be understood simply as cause and effect. Fullan believes leaders should be committed to values but flexible in their approaches. Key elements of successful change involve developing relationships, building capacity through collaboration, and focusing on culture change and shared understanding. Leaders must understand the change process, engage moral purpose, and develop cultures that support learning.

1. Leadership: The Ideas of Michael Fullan Presented by William Allan Kritsonis, PhD Professor PhD Program in Educational Leadership Prairie View A&M University Texas A&M University System EDUL 7043 Organizational Development and Change Spring 2010

2. Leadership Is… Strategy of the decade. About the number of other leaders you cultivate and remain after you leave. A matter of building trust amidst high expectations. Good succession planning--- “not turnover, but discontinuity of direction is the problem.”

3. The Change Puzzle…

4. Why Is Change Complex…? Fullan sees complex change as a process that cannot be understood and handled simply in terms of cause and effect. Instead of managing such situations by applying local fixes, we should go with a developed and refined process. For those complex changes, the leader should “be committed to certain values, but uncertain to pathways.”

5. What is Change…? New Materials New Behaviors/Practices New Beliefs and Understandings

6. New Insights… Fullan is a proponent of mentoring. He believes that mentors gain as much from their protégés as their protégés do from them. He believes that thinking outside of the box is sometimes difficult because of overload and vulnerability but a new mindset on new insights can help a person truly lead.

7. Brain Barriers Failure to See Failure to Move Failure to Finish

8. Failure to See The comprehensiveness mistake The “I get it” mistake Illuminate the right thing

9. Failure to Move The clearer the new vision, the more immobilized people become.

10. Right Thing Poorly The clearer the new vision, the easier it is for people to see all the specific ways in which they will be incompetent and look stupid. Many prefer to be competent at the wrong thing than incompetent at the right thing.

11. Failure to Finish People get tired. People get lost.

12. Ways to Break Through Barriers Conceive Believe Achieve

13. Eight Elements of Sustainability Sustainability is the capacity of the system to engage in the complexities of continuous improvement with values of deep human purpose (Fullan, 2005).

14. 1. Public service with moral purpose. Raise the bar & close the gap of student learning Be respectful Improve the social environment

15. 2. Commitment to changing context at all levels Mandatory initiatives such as NCLB only change a tiny slice of the context. In order for transformational change to occur, it must motivate or give people the ability to succeed.

16. 3. Lateral capacity building through networks Collaboration rather than competition Link the ineffective with the effective

17. 4. Vertical and co-development relationships. Vertical relationships (state/district, district/school, etc.) must be strengthened through… SUPPORT & RESOURCES

18. 5. Deep learning Learn from your actions. Fail intelligently. Exchange of ideas fosters the cohesiveness of a group.

19. 6. Dual commitment to short-term and long-term results Ascertain long-term results while committing to short-term objectives

20. 7. Cyclical energizing Sustainability is cyclical and continuous. Energy (physical, emotional, mental, spiritual) is required. Time and ingenuity are required for the next breakthrough.

21. 8. The long lever of leadership Long term impact: EMPOWER OTHERS To LEAD

22. Relationship Building as a Change Agent Successful principals reach out to their parents and community and work hard to expand the professional capacity of the teachers to develop a coherent professional community.

23. Professional Learning Communities Foster the conditions required for school growth Develop a commitment to a mutual purpose Shared belief in ongoing common actions Develop school capacity

24. The New Meaning of Educational Change Create conditions to develop the capacity to learn for individuals and the organization as a whole. Focus on changing the culture of classrooms and schools Emphasize relationship building and values

25. Develop Shared Meaning All learning is a continual process of making meaning Share and sustain ideas within the organization Avoid the imposition of top-down reform Teacher and schools should be seen as moral change agents Make democratic communities possible

26. Change and the Pedagogy of Constructivism Always involve your teachers in the process! Never innovate the most. You can’t just have the best ideas. Appreciate the implementation dip. Involve those that resist you and transform culture.

27. Key Players of Change: School Principals- Teachers- Schools School Principals- Gatekeeper of change. Teachers- It depends on what each individual thinks and do! Teachers’ skills and dispositions are important to the success of the organization. Schools - Must build professional learning communities, have program coherence, and technical resources.

28. Key Words Extinction Moral purpose Understanding change Developing relationships Knowledge building Coherence making

29. Dr. Fullan’s Beliefs “ Leadership, then, is not mobilizing others to solve problems we already know how to solve, but to help them confront problems that have never yet been successfully addressed.” Moral purpose cannot just be stated, it must be accompanied by strategies for realizing it, and those strategies are the leadership actions that energize people to pursue a desired goal. Leading in a culture of change is judged by what leadership you produce in others.

30. Causes of Ineffective Change Leaders not guided by moral purpose. Leaders that do not fully understand the change process, but may have moral purpose. Leaders that innovate the most and do not improve relationships. Leaders who think that it is enough to have the best ideas. Leaders who do not appreciate early difficulties when trying something new. Leaders who do not redefine resistance as a potential positive force and never re-culture.

31. Main Agent of Change in Schools “ The single most important factor ensuring that all students meet performance goals at the site level is the leadership of the principal.” Michael Fullan

32. Leadership for Change Engage people’s moral purpose Build capacity Understand the change process Develop cultures for learning Develop cultures of evaluation Focus on leadership for change Foster coherence making Cultivate tri-level development

33. On Going Journey to Better Schools Reform in schools through cultural change and school capacity is the key to success Component 1- teacher’s knowledge and skills Component 2- professional community Component 3- program coherence Component 4- teacher resources Component 5- principal leadership

34. Recommendations for the Future There must be a moral purpose Understand the change process Build relationships Knowledge building Coherence making

35. Summary Leadership building and knowledge building will continue to be the twin buzzwords for the future.