Readers Advice - "Next Day"

In general, Sunday is advice day. The posts relate a piece of advice that for good or bad, made an impact. Last week, I invited you, the Lead Your School reader, to join in; to expand the collective memory and mine the nuggets of wisdom that that help guide our decision making when faced with novel or difficult situations. The invitation remains open. And, if I use your piece of advice, and you include a mailing address, I’ll send you a Lead Your School can koozie or coffee cup insulator. Here is the first Lead Your School guest advice columnist.

“The year before I became a principal, I went to work for a principal that could be best described as a "hands off, old-school" type of administrator. At first, I was not impressed and thought it would be a year in which I probably would not learn much about leadership. I was wrong. Even though our styles were very different, the principal was very wise and gave me lots of subtle, but sound advice over that year.

The piece of advice I have revisited in my mind many times is this:

“Sometimes when you need to have a ‘fierce conversation’ with a staff member, it works best to let that person know that you would like to meet with him or her the next day to discuss something of importance.”

This gives the person a chance to think about, or sweat about, what the conversation will be. The wait gives me a chance to collect my thoughts and have a more purposeful, professional, and authentic conversation. This approach is not called for in many situations, but in those rare cases, it is a good and effective plan.”

B. Fine

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...