Can You Get New Leadership without New Leaders?
By Rosabeth Moss Kanter
© Copyright 2005 by Rosabeth Moss Kanter
rkanter@hbs.edu.

Leaders who let people down have a hard time pulling them up. That's one of many reasons why turnarounds, whether of declining businesses or low-performing schools, often start by replacing the people in charge. New leaders untainted by the sins or politics of the past and uninfected by the resentments and negativity often associated with losing streaks can bring a fresh perspective. As the saying goes, it takes a new broom to sweep clean.

Significant change generally requires new leadership. Even when managers who presided over a period of decline admit mistakes and embrace new ways, it's nearly impossible for them to stir up the organizational energy needed for a turnaround. And even the most effective leaders can stay too long, becoming rigid and complacent.
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The Messy Middles of Change: Mired in the Familiar
By Dr. Lois Adams-Rodgers
Deputy Executive Director of Leadership Services, Council of Chief State School Officers
Education leaders at all system levels are bombarded with the latest myriad of "hot topics" - reforming high schools, adequate yearly progress, 21st century skills and schools, leading for the future, reducing the achievement gap, and many more.

The reform "elephant" has clearly entered classrooms, principals' offices, school district central offices, and the state education agency. But, where does the work begin, and how do professionals change their system to something they have never seen nor experienced before?
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Put Knowledge to Work: Cohorts, Open Your Toolkits!
By J. W. Good and Cheryl Reynolds, Associate Professors of Educational Leadership Georgia College & State University

As educational leadership faculty at Georgia College & State University (GC&SU), we were introduced to the IBM's Reinventing Education Change Management Toolkit during Spring 2004 because of the vision of the Georgia Leadership Institute for School Improvement (GLISI) to include university professors in Toolkit training seminars with P-12 educators. At GC&SU, we use team teaching and facilitation through a cohort model with a focus on leadership for school improvement. All technological applications in the cohorts are taught by leadership professors. Three cohorts of 42 students, the first graduate students at GC&SU to use the Toolkit, will complete degree requirements during Summer 2005.
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Change Toolkit Tool of the Month
By Heidi Kraemer, Change Toolkit Project Manager and IBM Corporate Community Relations manager

Common Themes, Shared Vision - Diagnostic
The first of the 10 'spokes' of Rosabeth Moss Kanters' Change Wheel is "Common Themes, Shared Vision." Think of a 'vision' as a clearly stated, achievable, even optimistic organizational aspiration. For any systemic change effort, a vision needs to be in place to orient and motivate people towards the major tasks of change. But crafting and writing down the vision is not enough! The vision for change, and its supporting themes, needs to be widely shared and understood throughout your school, district, or organization (and its partners).

Interested in hearing from your own staff (or even your partners) about whether you have common themes, shared vision in place? Create a project and have people fill out the "Do we have common themes, shared vision?"

How do I find this tool?
1. Log in to the Change Toolkit website .
2. Move your mouse to 'Get Tools' and click on 'Change Wheel.'
3. Click on 'Common Themes, Shared Vision.'
4. Click on the 'Diagnostic' tab.

Leadership pulse check
A monthly poll of the readership of the Education Leadership Newsletter

This Month's Poll:

When you are hiring, what is the most important quality in an EMERGING leader?

• Job competency
  
• Ability to see the big picture
  
• Ability to inspire peers and be a team player
  
• Ability to multitask
  
• Ability to make tough decisions
  
• Ability to implement change effectively
  
• Other ______________________________

	3%	Collaboration is encouraged and rewarded in my work environment
	22%	Lack of common theme/shared vision makes collaboration nearly impossible
	13%	Lack of quality partners with which to collaborate
	28%	My environment doesn't support collaboration.
	6%	My work is too individual in nature, or the broad scope of my work makes it difficult to collaborate
	22%	It takes too much time to set up a successful collaboration, I get it done faster if I do it myself
	6%	Others