Page 8 - LeaderShift 2020: Chapter One -Who Really Needs Another Leadership Book!

LeaderShift 2020
With so much on our plates, it’s a challenge just to manage daily operations, let alone be proactive. But there’s more—much more. That’s just the management side. We’re also expected to be educational leaders. We’re the ones who are supposed to inspire our staff to seek excellence; the ones who help educators gain a clear vision of where the world is headed; the ones who lead teachers into positive changes that will better serve the needs of all of our students.
Sometimes it seems impossible to meet all these expectations. How can you possibly be an influential educational leader when you also have a thousand management priorities screaming for your attention every day?
You get to the point where you just don’t want to hear about a new program, initiative, or anything else that requires you to take the lead—a state of denial based on the mindset that what you don’t know can’t hurt you or your organization. Sociologist Robert K. Merton coined the term “goal displacement” to describe what happens when complying with bureaucratic processes become the objective rather than focusing on organizational goals and values. When that happens, systems take on a life of their own and seem immune to common sense. Thoughtless application of rules and procedures can stifle innovation, hamper adaptivity, and dash creativity. Wholesale disregard of rules and procedures, however, can be equally disastrous. (Reed, 2006).
LeaderShift 2020
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