Focused Leadership

This timely and essential book provides a comprehensive guide for school leaders who desire to engage their school communities in transformative systemic change. Sharon I. Radd, Gretchen Givens Generett, Mark Anthony Gooden, and George Theoharis offer five practices to increase educational equity and eliminate marginalization based on race, disability, socioeconomics, language, gender and sexual identity, and religion. For each dimension of diversity, the authors provide background information for understanding the current realities in schools and beyond, and they suggest "disruptive practices" to replace the status quo in order to achieve full inclusion and educational excellence for every child. Assuming that leadership to create equity is a unique practice, the book offers * Clear explanations of foundational terms and concepts, such as equity, systemic inequity, paradigms and cognitive dissonance, and privilege; * Specific recommendations for how to build support and sustainability by engaging colleagues and other stakeholders in constructive dialogues with multiple perspectives; * Detailed descriptions of routines and roles for building effective equity-leadership teams; * Guidelines and tools for performing an equity audit, including environmental scans; * A change framework to skillfully transform your system; and * Reflection activities for self-discovery, understanding, and personal and professional growth. A call to action that is both passionate and practical, Five Practices for Equity-Focused School Leadership is an indispensable roadmap for educators undertaking the journey toward an education system that acknowledges and advances the worth and potential of all students.

FOCUSED LEADERSHIP is not your typical leadership book. It is an entertaining and anecdote-filled "What You Can Do Today to Become a Better Leader" book on leadership. FOCUSED LEADERSHIP is filled with stimulating and inspiring personal anecdotes which epitomize the leadership approach shaped, refined and utilized by Earl Cobb as he attained over thirty years of amazingly successful and rewarding results. The book clearly and uniquely articulates "what you can do," "what you will gain" and "what you will avoid" by incorporating Earl's nuggets of wisdom into your own leadership approach. Earl Cobb is an American "rags-to-riches" success story. Aggressively climbing the corporate ladder and volunteering to serve the communities in which he has lived, has afforded Earl the opportunity to accumulate trailblazing leadership experience, insights and success. His ability to reach deep within and his willingness to share his lessons learned with others is what make this book a unique treasure.

In an educational context where school and district performance is of increasing focus, it’s essential for leaders at all levels of the educational system to focus on improving student performance. This volume zeros in on a promising set of strategies and practices for all leaders to motivate, support, and sustain learning in contemporary schools. Learning-Focused Leadership in Action explores what it means for educational leadership to be "learning-focused," what this looks like in practice at both the school and district level, and how such leadership changes can be set in motion. Drawing on extensive case study research in schools and districts that are making progress on learning improvement, this volume explores how leaders at all levels of the educational system can productively seek to improve the quality of learning opportunities and student performance, no matter how challenging the circumstances.

Building-level and central office administrators must be both instructional and learning leaders. Instructional leadership means focusing on teacher behaviors that support student learning and helping teachers make good decisions about their own behaviors in the classroom. Learning leadership focuses on the learning itself—how students absorb, process, and retain information. This guide will assist administrators in their quest to be more effective at what they do; this is meant not as a prescriptive document, but rather a baseline from which to grow. This guide provides information about the intricacies of the teaching and learning process and how these elements are linked. Readers are encouraged to use the guide as a foundation, as a starting point to expand their own instructional and learning leadership. They should modify, add to, and personalize the guide as they challenge themselves to grow. The guide encompasses many components, all of which are important. It should help administrators to know what to look for during an observation, and, perhaps even more important, topics of conversations to have with teachers. Transformational leadership begins with understanding teaching and learning as well as having the ability to generate quality conversations.

Focused Leadership is a guidebook that your school system can use to improve student achievement--not by sweeping changes that don't stick, but by adapting the traditional roles of people involved in operating schools. From this book you can build a systemic, need-specific approach that is a collaborative effort between school board, administration, and teaching staff.

leadership evaluate progress along the way, as a leadership brand is created and implemented."--BOOK JACKET.

In an educational context where school and district performance is of increasing focus, it’s essential for leaders at all levels of the educational system to focus on improving student performance. This volume zeros in on a promising set of strategies and practices for all leaders to motivate, support, and sustain learning in contemporary schools. Learning-Focused Leadership in Action explores what it means for educational leadership to be "learning-focused," what this looks like in practice at both the school and district level, and how such leadership changes can be set in motion. Drawing on extensive case study research in schools and districts that are making progress on learning improvement, this volume explores how leaders at all levels of the educational system can productively seek to improve the quality of learning opportunities and student performance, no matter how challenging the circumstances.

What do the best leaders have in common? As president of MAP, John Manning should know. MAP has helped tens of thousands of top executives accelerate their leadership and management performance. Manning says the answer is one word: discipline. But for Manning, discipline has a very specific meaning. All leaders have scores of things they could do. But a disciplined leader is one who identifies and focuses on the Vital Few: the 20 percent of activities that will drive 80 percent of the results. And the results that are most important are those tied to the organization's most precious asset: its people. The Disciplined Leader offers fifty-two succinct lessons to help you home in on your own Vital Few in three critical areas: leading yourself, leading your team, and leading your organization. Each lesson comes with recommended tactics and practical “Take Action!” tips for implementing it, so there are literally hundreds of pieces of must-know, time-tested advice here. The chapters are self-contained, so you can read them in any order and come back to the ones that resonate with you—your own Vital Few! This is a hands-on, nuts-and-bolts guide to leadership practice that's built to inspire action, drive change, and achieve results.

Stay on top of your leadership game. Leadership isn't something you're born with or gifted as a reward for an abundance of charisma; true leadership stems from core skills that can be learned. Get more of the leadership ideas you want, from the authors you trust, with HBR's 10 Must Reads on Leadership (Vol. 2). We’ve combed through hundreds of Harvard Business Review articles and selected the most important ones to help you maximize your own and your organization's performance. With insights from leading experts including Michael D. Watkins, Herminia Ibarra, and Michael E. Porter, this book will inspire you to: Identify areas for personal growth Build trust with and among your employees Develop a more dynamic and sophisticated communication style Try out different leadership styles and behaviors to find the right approach for you--and your organization Transform yourself from a problem solver to an agenda setter Harness the power of connections Become an adaptive and strategic leader This collection of articles includes "Leadership Is a Conversation," by Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind; "How Managers Become Leaders: The Seven Seismic Shifts of Perspective and Responsibility," by Michael D. Watkins; "Strategic Leadership: The Essential Skills," by Paul J.H. Schoemaker, Steve Krupp, and Samantha Howland; "The Authenticity Paradox," by Herminia Ibarra; "'Both/And' Leadership," by Wendy K. Smith, Marianne W. Lewis, and Michael L. Tushman; "Are You a Collaborative Leader?" by Herminia Ibarra and Morten T. Hansen; "Cross-Silo Leadership," by Tiziana Casciaro, Amy C. Edmondson, and Sujin Jang; "How CEOs Manage Time," by Michael E. Porter and Nitin Nohria; "The Best Leaders Are Great Teachers," by Sydney Finkelstein; "Nimble Leadership," by Deborah Ancona, Elaine Backman, and Kate Isaacs; and "The Focused Leader," by Daniel Goleman.

A leadership playbook for making customer experience a core aspect of your business. In a rapidly changing world filled with uncertainties, one thing remains crystal clear: customers are increasingly fickle and no longer care about loyalty to any particular company. In addition, many well-intentioned companies are falling short of customer expectations, despite every organization’s potential for excellence. The truth is customer experience is not what it used to be. New technologies, values, generational expectations, economic instability, - and the rapid pace of change all must be considered as you forge ahead. How do you put the customer first in the face of all these emerging trends? Using cutting-edge research and interviewing top leaders across industries, customer experience futurist Blake Morgan has pulled together eight new laws that the best companies follow in terms of building and maintaining a focus on the customer. Customer experience is a decision leaders must make every day, and this book shows you how: C.reate a customer experience mindset. eX.ceed longterm profit expectations by focusing on both short term and long term profits. L.ay out your customer experience strategy creation and stick to it. E.mbark on your 90 day get started plan. A.nticipate the future by being a customer experience futurist. D.on’t forget that employees are customers too. E.valuate success and measure what can be measured. R.eaffirm the priority - keep CX front and center. Learn the laws, see how the best companies apply them, and build them into your organization to become a transformational customer experience leader!