Leadership Philosophy

Adam Braun began working summers at hedge funds when he was just 16 years old, sprinting down the path to a successful Wall Street career. But while traveling as a college student, he met a young boy begging on the streets of India. When Braun asked the boy what he wanted most in the world, he simply answered, "A pencil." This small request became the inspiration for Pencils of Promise, the organization Braun would leave a prestigious job at Bain & Company to start with just $25 at the age of 24.

Comprehensive in scope, this book demands that educators and school leaders come together to bolster student achievement in the 21st century. Through emphasizing a collaborative process, Lyn Sharratt’s design demonstrates how shared knowledge and expertise can make every classroom more impactful and every teacher more effective.

In Hacking Leadership, award-winning school administrators Joe Sanfelippo and Tony Sinanis demonstrate how to increase learning by leaving the office and engaging directly with all teachers and learners. They identify 10 problems with school leadership and provide dynamic, right-now solutions.

This practical resource offers the foundational skills and tools needed by new coaching educators, as well as presenting an overview of the knowledge and theory base behind the practice. Established coaches will find numerous ways to deepen and refine their coaching practice. Principals and others who incorporate coaching strategies into their work will also find a wealth of resources. Aguilar offers a model for transformational coaching which could be implemented as professional development in schools or districts anywhere.

En El arte de la guerra, Sun Tzu hace análisis detallados y recomendaciones útiles sobre trece temas principales de la estrategia militar: la planeación, el reto, el ataque, el posicionamiento, la dirección, fuerzas y debilidades, las maniobras, la implementación de las tácticas, el avance, el terreno, las fases de una campaña, las armas y el uso de información.

Average schools don't inspire greatness - and greatness is what our world needs if we are going to produce world-changing learners. In Culturize, author and education leader Jimmy Casas shares insights into what it takes to cultivate a community of learners who embody the innately human traits our world desperately needs, such as kindness, honesty, and compassion. His stories reveal how these "soft skills" can be honed while meeting and exceeding academic standards of 21st-century learning.

If initiative overload and fragmentation are keeping your best plans from becoming reality, it’s time to lead with coherence. Using the right drivers as your foundation, you’ll bring people and ideas together—and implement the kind of lasting change that maximizes results. The key to success is the Coherence Framework, a dynamic, customizable road map.

Hamish Brewer (aka the Tattooed Skateboarding Principal) grew up in a home disrupted by poverty, addiction, and family dysfunction. He understands the feelings of fear, lostness, and desperation that overwhelm too many children today - because that was his life. That experience is what drives him to work relentlessly to empower people living in the toughest areas to envision and create a better future for themselves. Disrupt the norm. That is the challenge Hamish, a Nationally Distinguished Principal, calls educators, students, families, and communities to accept.

The Art of Coaching Teams is the manual you never received when you signed on to lead a team. Being a great teacher is one thing, but leading a team, or team development, is an entirely different dynamic. Your successes are public, but so are your failures-and there's no specific rubric or curriculum to give you direction. Team development is an art form, and this book is your how-to guide to doing it effectively. You'll learn the administrative tasks that keep your team on track.

Daily observation of classroom teaching can significantly impact the quality of teaching and learning. Organized into 21 chapters designed to be read over a period of 21 school days, Now We're Talking! presents a results-driven approach that far surpasses traditional walkthrough models of feedback for teachers. School leaders will complete two cycles of teacher evaluations while reading the book and establish the necessary foundation for subsequent visits.

In a world with an endless hunger for innovation, why is it so hard to create audacious change? According to thought leader Seth Goldenberg, the answer to this question stems from how we, as a society, view questions themselves. In Radical Curiosity, Goldenberg argues that because we value knowing above learning and prioritize doing over thinking, curiosity has become an endangered species.

A written leadership philosophy, which we call The Leader's Compass, achieves the same thing on a personal level; it lets people know what you expect, what you value, how you'll act, and how you'll measure performance, with the additional benefits of making the workplace less stressful and more productive. And, like a compass, it helps to keep you, the leader, on course.

What does Elon Musk know that you don’t? Would you like to achieve even a fraction of his success? Now you can. Serial entrepreneur and best-selling author, Randy Kirk, exposes 16 secret principles that guide Elon Musk in his entrepreneurial decisions.

If there were a code you could learn that would lead you to become a great teacher wouldn't you want to learn it? The Essential 55 is a collection of the amazingly effective rules that Ron Clark used to become an extraordinary teacher. Through trial and error, this teacher has distilled 55 ideas that have helped him take apathetic students in some of the country's most challenging areas and transform them into award-winning scholars.

What type of leadership do you practice? Many of us rely on transformational and instructional leadership. But there are advantages in applying a holistic angle including all stakeholders—an approach known as collaborative leadership. Peter DeWitt unpacks six factors framed through John Hattie’s research while painting a powerful scheme: meet stakeholders where they are, motivate stakeholders to strive for improvement, model how to do it.

In 2003, Diane Tavenner cofounded the first school in what would soon become one of America’s most innovative public-school networks. Summit Public Schools has since won national recognition for its exceptional outcomes: Ninety-nine percent of students are accepted to a four-year college, and they graduate from college at twice the national average.

Leadership in Higher Education explains the fundamental principles that support these practices and provides case examples of people in higher education who demonstrate each one. Drawing on the same pioneering research that formed the foundation of their classic best seller The Leadership Challenge, James Kouzes and Barry Posner offer a set of leadership skills and practices that will make a significant difference in every area of higher education - faculty, administration, library services, career counseling, auxiliary services, campus safety, and more.

Renowned business author David Magee fuses both the interesting history and philosophy of one of America's most well-known companies in this entertaining aid for business management. While other American businesses are crumbling under low-cost foreign competition, John Deere Company thrives by maintaining such ideas as building the best product, being open to change and innovation, listening rather than leading, and keeping virtuous business practices.

Pirates are on a constant quest for riches, but pirate leaders seek even greater rewards: Amazing schools, engaged students, and empowered educators who know they are making a difference. In Lead Like a Pirate, education leaders Shelley Burgess and Beth Houf map out the character traits necessary to captain a school or district. You'll learn where to find the treasure that's already in your classrooms and schools - and how to bring out the very best in your educators.

School leadership is hard, and it’s hard on school leaders.More and more school leaders are struggling with the ever-expanding expectations and associated stressors of the role. In School Leadership from A to Z, Bradley James Davies hopes to turn the tide and bring more joy and wellness back to the principal’s office.