{"id":9,"date":"2008-11-10T09:32:51","date_gmt":"2008-11-10T13:32:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sabusense.com\/?page_id=9"},"modified":"2010-12-04T12:32:34","modified_gmt":"2010-12-04T16:32:34","slug":"articles","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.sabusense.com\/?page_id=9","title":{"rendered":"Catching them doing something right"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cYou can see an awful lot by watching<\/em>\u201d – Yogi Berra<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A \u201cWorker-Lurker\u201d Learner<\/strong><\/p>\n

Through the confluence of a number of disconnected [1] events in 1998 I had a unique opportunity to play a role as an embedded learner in a major US school system as it began an unique journey of inside-out transformation.<\/p>\n

In 1998 the Montgomery County MD Public Schools (MCPS) hired a new superintendent. (I reside in that community.)\u00a0 Among his first major actions was the convening of a multi-dimensional planning group involving both internal and external stakeholders who were charged to develop a Call to Action<\/em> that would subsequently serve as the framework for the next twelve years of strategic and operational planning.<\/p>\n

I had recently retired the American Association of School Administrators (AASA)\u00a0but my work with the National Alliance for Business\u2019 Baldrige-in-Education<\/em> project and the AASA’s\u00a0Quality Schools Network<\/em> led to a role for me on the planning team.\u00a0 Here, the values of the embedded “lens” I brought to the task began to surface in my contributions to the thinking that began to shape the work.\u00a0 Afterwards, I was asked to continue to capture what I was \u201cseeing\u201d\u2019 through it in 20,000 ft. Memos<\/em> to some of the senior staff.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t immediately realize at the time that I was taking on a feedback role that was different from anything I had ever seen or personally experienced in education or research.\u00a0 We sometimes would refer to it as a worker\/lurker<\/em>, but more accurately it was as thinking partner<\/em>.\u00a0 It was a role that depended upon trust, and some degree of confidentiality, to maintain it and which as I discovered, because it was atypical was hard to explain to others.<\/p>\n

Soon, the superintendent invited me to sit in on his executive and leadership team meetings as well as any others I found relevant. Since that time, my 20,000 ft.<\/em> thinking partner role has occasionally extended to Board members, union presidents, Business Roundtable members, and staff throughout the central office. \u00a0The continuing value of my thoughts, I believe, came from their roots a different way-of-seeing<\/em> and understanding what was happening as the district did its “business.” \u00a0Generated by the picture it offered of how the common principles underlying both the individual’s and the systems work, it added new meaning to the \u201cwhite spaces\u201d between the boxes on the organization chart. \u00a0For me, it offered a way to catch them doing something right…systemicall<\/span>y. <\/em>For them, it <\/em>seemed to offer an opportunity to think about the critical issues they were working on from a different perspective.<\/p>\n

Many of those 20,000 ft.<\/a> <\/em>products are embedded throughout this website.<\/p>\n

In that role, I soon found that the lens offered a way for me to watch simultaneously what<\/em> they were learning and how<\/em> they were learning it as individuals and<\/strong> as a system. Then to use it as a criterion to back map or dig down to ask why<\/em> it was happening here, and how<\/em> other school systems could generate the same types of learning?<\/p>\n

Of most value, I found, was that it enabled me to “catch them doing something right<\/em>.” [2]<\/p>\n

And although I started out thinking I was catching them doing something \u201cright” in terms of the perspective my “lens” offered, I found it more important to recognize that I was “catching them doing something natural<\/em>.”\u00a0 These were things that the individually-embedded OS (Operating System) of the brain were driving.\u00a0 Things that people “wanted” to do because of a potential to have an “effect” and\/or “make a difference.” And which tapped their capacity to continually self-adjust based on the degree of their success.<\/p>\n

Then I began to notice that when these natural inclinations were aligned organizationally, the system was demonstrating the same characteristics.\u00a0 It was a natural “whole — an organization that “wanted” to have its intended “effects\/results” — to make a difference for all<\/span> children.\u00a0 And which was developing ways to continually improve its capacity to do it.<\/p>\n

Understanding the “Territory” backwards<\/strong><\/p>\n

John Dewey wrote:<\/p>\n

“really great theory should always be embedded in practice. It should focus on the most challenging difficulties that people are encountering in practical settings. And it has to be tested by the extent to which it actually offers people’s effectiveness in those practical settings.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Throughout my career working for foundation and government-supported \u00a0educational improvement initiatives focusing on research, development and dissemination, I sought to understand practices<\/em> through theories<\/em> that seem to explain them and answer “why” they should work.\u00a0 Instead, I now found myself using the different way-of-thinking the lens supported to turn that learning process around and use practice<\/em> to understand better the “why?” of theories<\/em>.\u00a0 Specifically to explore through this different lens a twelve-year base of on-the-ground, increasingly effective systemic<\/em> practices whose effects knowledgeable outside observers had deemed “miraculous” in their scope, nature, and capacity to improve achievement for all<\/strong> children. [3]<\/p>\n

These outside groups with a common interest in systemic reform had recognized that something unexpected was happening in this district and soon engaged in documenting MCPS’ what’s<\/em> and how’s<\/em> with the intention of distilling the principles that have made these possible so this “knowledge” could be transferred to others with similar and even more pressing needs.<\/p>\n

For that purpose, they have produced significant case studies, and benchmark reports that have effectively captured the what’s<\/em> and how’s (<\/em>several of these can be found under “Resources)\u00a0\u2026 but when recommending what others needed to do, something seemed to be missing.\u00a0 They had yet to find a \u201cWhy<\/em>\u201d — a theory that made coherent sense of those \u201cWhat’s<\/em>\u201d and \u201cHow’s<\/em>.” They were \u201cbenchmarking\u201d everything except how they think<\/em>\u2026and why they think that way…<\/em>and then how they were embedding that way-of-thinking in the culture of their work from classroom to boardroom.<\/p>\n

I wondered what also might be found about leadership’s role \u00a0by “understanding backwards” – back-mapping from the acknowledged “new and better individual and \u00a0organizational behaviors” to the thinking<\/em> that supported them? Then, to \u00a0the experiences from which that different thinking developed? Who or what was providing those experiences\u2026 and why?\u00a0 What then might we learn about what’s different about the system<\/em> leader\u2019s role?<\/p>\n

Some of the answers to those questions can be found in the story of the Montgomery County MD Public Schools woven throughout this site.\u00a0 It is purposefully a case-story<\/em>, not a case-study — an approach dictated by what I\u2019ve learned about why “What-Work”s case studies are seldom replicated and scaled up, as well as by the role that stories can play in transferring knowledge.<\/p>\n

(A general story of what I was “seeing” and learning as a consequence of asking those questions can be found in an article \u201cSystemic Learning and Acting: An up-close observer finds a Maryland school district behaving as if were a system<\/a>.\u201d \u00a0 Interestingly, its working title was \u201cIf the organization is the learner, who is the teacher?)<\/p>\n

The “Products” of Understanding Backwards<\/strong><\/p>\n

As new understandings began to develop they brought with them new questions. \u00a0Some of then were “old” question’s that always made theoretical<\/em> sense but were seldom asked because of beliefs that there were few practical <\/em>answers. \u00a0Now these question could be raised again informed by the knowledge that practical systemic<\/em> answers were emerging from the 12-year journey of the school system.<\/p>\n

They are presented in several forms that support the purpose of this website.\u00a0 \u2013<\/p>\n