Chapter 3: A Century’s Quest to Understand School Leadership

Chapter 3: A Century’s Quest to Understand School Leadership

Reference Murphy, Joseph and Louis, Karen Seashore (eds.). Handbook of Research on Educational Administration (2nd ed.), San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Chapter 3 Organization • Models of Contemporary Leadership Practice • Historical and Theoretical Sources of School Leadership Authority • Conclusions • Implications for Future Research and Theory

What is Leadership? • Is there a clear, agreed-upon definition of leadership? • It is neither feasible nor desirable at this point in the development of the discipline to attempt to resolve the controversies over the appropriate definition of leadership. Like all constructs in social sciences, the definition of leadership is arbitrary and very subjective. Some definitions are more useful than others, but there is no correct definition (p. 45).

Think About It…. Over 60% of the authors who have written about leadership since 1910 did not define the term.

Lofti Zadeh: The father of fuzzy logic • The Law of Incompatibility: As complexity rises, precise statements lose meaning and meaningful statements lose precision………………….(p. 46) Is it even necessary to define leadership???

Leaders in Education

Leaders • We can identify them, but are we able to consistently define those characteristics that make them leaders? Or, does it depend on the time, circumstance, and the individual? • Is “leader” a title or a character trait?

Models of Contemporary Leadership Practice • Consider the following journals: • Educational Administration Quarterly (EAQ) • Journal of School Leadership (JSL) • Journal of Educational Administration (JEA) • Educational Management and Administration (EMA)

Leadership Articles in 4 Journals from 1985-1995 (Table 3.1)

Models of Contemporary Leadership Practice • Instructional Leadership • Transformational Leadership • Moral Leadership • Participative Leadership • Managerial Leadership • Contingent Leadership/Leadership Styles

What is Instructional Leadership? • The behaviors of teachers as they engage in activities directly affecting the growth of students? • The way in which the principal defines the school mission, manages the instructional program, and promotes the school climate?

Instructional Leadership Related Terminology Pedagogical Leadership Strategic Instructional Leadership Direct/Indirect Instructional Leadership

Transformational Leadership • Charismatic, Visionary, Cultural, and Empowering concepts of leadership. • Focus is on the commitments and capacities of organizational members. • Represents the transcendence of self-interest by both leader and led. • The ability of a person to “reach the souls of others in a fashion which raises the human consciousness, builds meanings, and inspires human intent that is the source of power” (p. 49).

Transformational v. Transactional Leadership Relates to Power-As Relationships Transactional Leadership: Exchange of valued things, a bargaining process. Transformational Leadership: A change in purpose and resources “for the better”. An elevated sense of commitment to the goals.

Moral Leadership • Includes normative, political/democratic, and symbolic concepts of leadership. • Focuses on the values and ethics of a leader….”values constitute the essential problem of leadership. If there are no value conflicts, there is no need for leadership” (p. 50). • Duigan & MacPherson (1993): Moral leadership should be “educative leadership”, i.e.. Focusing on right and wrong, not attitudes, styles, or behaviors.

Moral Leadership • Reitzuig and Reeves (1992): Cultural leadership involves defining, strengthening, and articulating values, but leaders may manipulate culture to further their own ends. • Retinue (1994): Leadership is moral but only under certain conditions. • Lees (1995): Leadership entails a moral imperative to “promote democracy, empowerment, and social justice” (p. 50).

Participative Leadership • Stresses the Decision-Making Processes of the Group • Focuses on Group, Shared, or Teacher Leadership.

Participative Leadership • Participative Leadership is often associated with enhanced organizational effectiveness. • SBM is the most widely-used example of participative leadership. • Administrative-controlled SBM • Professional-controlled SBM • Community-controlled SBM • Equally-controlled SBM

Managerial Leadership • Also referred to as Organizational leadership. • Focuses on the functions, tasks, or behaviors of the leader. • Assumes that organizational members behave rationally. • Often contrasted with “visionary leadership”. • Management v. Leadership.

Managerial Leadership Ten Managerial Tasks or Functions

Contingent Leadership/ Leadership Styles • Focuses on how leaders respond to the unique organizational circumstances or problems they face. • Dimensions of Leadership style: • Task v. Relationships • Managerial v. Visionary • Initiating structure v. Consideration • Autocratic v. Facilitative

Contingent Leadership/ Leadership Styles • This model assumes that individuals providing leadership are capable of mastering a large repertoire of leadership practices. Their leadership depends on such mastery.

What is Authority? • The power to influence (Webster’s) • The power to make decisions that guide the actions of others (Herbert Simon) • The willingness of some to accept the power of another. That is, members of the organization acknowledge the legitimacy of the decisions made by some to control the decisions of others (Daniel Griffiths)

Types of Authority • Rational/Legal • Traditional • Charismatic • Knowledge • Expert

Historical Sources of Authority • Tradition Patriarchalism is by far the most important type of domination the legitimacy of which rests upon tradition. Patriarchalism means the authority of the father, the husband, the senior of the house, the sib elder over the members of the household and the sib; the rule of the master and patron over bondsmen, serfs, freed men….of the patrimonial lord and sovereign prince over the subjects (p. 56).

Tradition Is it rational or irrational?

Historical Sources of Authority • Religion • The role of the superintendent • Catholic schools • Psychology • Evaluation of students and teachers • Sociology • Organizational Change • Organizational Design

Historical Sources of Authority • Philosophy, Social Psychology, and Critical Theory • Interest in participative and democratic school leadership. • Study of cultural authority

The Nature of the Quest…… …..to understand school leadership: Chaos or Complexity?

We must view leadership in terms of: • Leaders and Followers • Organizations • Environment • Relationships

Implications for Future Research and Theory • What are the similarities and differences among the leadership categories in terms of key relationships? • What is the nature of the influence evident in these relationships? • What are the consequences of these key relationships for followers and the organization as a whole? • Which cultural values have different conceptions of leader capacities, motives, and practices?

Chapter 3: A Century’s Quest to Understand School Leadership