How Would You Rather Spend Your Time?

Over the last year, I have been using a model to help schools solve complex educational issues utilizing the existing capacities and resources that they already have at their disposal in their buildings.  The premise behind the model is simple "We have no more time, and there is no more money coming, but we have tons of unused capacity, so let's get on with it!". It has been an interesting and iterative process, and through the help of critical friends, I have slowly been able to tweak the model so that it guides problem-solving in a repeatable and sustainable fashion. As a result, we are starting to see a higher frequency of unique solutions to problems that we have in schools, and perhaps more importantly, I am seeing a broader development of capacity at all levels of our organization to co-design solutions.

The LCD process is one that requires thoughtful planning on the front end, a commitment to truly understanding the needs of the learner and co-creating with them throughout, and a thirst for feedback and willingness to tinker on the back end, regardless of how we feel the solution was received. In other words, it takes effort, and it takes time. And in my experience, the moment that you tell someone that a process such as this is going to take effort and time, they often tend to lose interest.

As a school principal, there were so many parts of my job that I liked, such as working with students, parents and teachers, solving challenging problems, collaborating with colleagues, learning new things and trying different ideas.  (These were the 'brain candy' activities that I described in a previous post.).  There were also parts of being a principal that were less enjoyable: dealing with complaints from students, teachers and parents, disappointing people with decisions that I had made, and having to work through issues that happened in the school that I might not have directly triggered, but certainly became my responsibility as the principal of the school.  The activities that I enjoyed were mostly 'proactive', and the ones that I enjoyed less were often 'reactive'.

When I deconstruct the types of situations that led me to be reactive, there were some common pieces that tended to surface:

1. There were often issues around communication.  Often there was little or no communication about the issue, or the communication came at a time when it was too late to be usable or make a difference.
2. There was an assumption or series of assumptions made.
3. A decision was made independently of those who the decision would impact, often at the organizational level.
4. There was little or no follow-up or attempt to proactively collect feedback to determine whether the solution was satisfactory--the "no-news is good news" philosophy.

As a result of one or a combination of all of these factors, the time that I spent on the back end of these sorts of issues in 'reaction mode' was not only unpleasant, it often protracted over days, or even weeks or months!   

When we create assumption-based solutions independently of those who the solution will impact, and then fail to collect feedback on how the solution worked, we have become "organization-centered".   For example, if after a sparsely attended Parent-Teacher conference night, we spend some front-end time (FET) considering the issue, choose to change the times of the interviews from evenings to mornings because we assume that parents would rather come to meet with teachers before work, we have taken an organization-centered (OC) approach to this problem.  This might be represented like this, with each block representing the amount of time we spend

FET	Organization-Centric Solution

This can often be called "solution-itis", the affliction that we as educators contract when we move rapidly from problem to solution without involving the people in our school community in the process.  And while this approach takes much less time, and we might get lucky and hit a home-run by taking this sort of tack, the odds of creating a positive experience for people who are never involved in the solution are low, and the odds that we have developed any capacity for our community to help us solve future problems is zero.  And in terms of that 'reactive' time on the back end...well, get ready.  This situation could be represented this way.

FET

Organization-Centric Solution

Back-end (Reactive) Time

In 2013, the Alberta Teachers' Association and the Canadian Association of Principals conducted 40 focus groups with 500 principals from across Canada over the span of two years, and created a document called the "Future of the Principalship in Canada".  This document listed five 'ways forward' to overcome the challenges that take place in schools.  One of these 'ways forward' was "to collaborate and build professional capacities in school staff."  A second was to "build family and community relationships" through "finding new ways to connect with parents and communities".

So what if we took an LCD approach, where we truly appreciate where our learner (student, parent, educator) is at, co-create a vision of what it is that we want, ideate together to great possible solutions, iterate when we test these ideas with those who will live with the solution, and then proliferate the idea to other situations once we determine what makes the best experience for our learner?  "We would like to...but who has time?", we hear.  Well, if we represent the LCD process with blocks of time, it could be represented this way.

FET	LCD/Solution/ Feedback

which truthfully is much more time and effort than the organization-centric method.

FET	Organization-Centric Solution

until you factor in the reactive piece....

FET

Organization-Centric Solution

Back-end (Reactive) Time

But let's say that even with the back end time factored in, the LCD approach took longer, and even had some reactive time associated with it...

FET

Learner-Centered Design/Solution/Feedback

Back-end (Reactive) Time

the question is, where would you rather spend your time?  For me, as I said above, the parts of my job that I enjoyed less were dealing with complaints from students, teachers and parents, disappointing people with decisions that I had made, and having to work through issues that happened in the school that I might not have directly triggered, but certainly became my responsibility as the principal of the school. Having these types of experiences are more probable if I choose to solve a significant school issue solely from the perspective of the organization, or with the needs of the organization placed before the needs of the learner.  The parts most enjoyed as a Principal were working with students, parents and teachers, solving challenging problems, collaborating with colleagues, learning new things and trying different ideas. These sound a lot more like the pieces that would occur when we take an approach of appreciate, co-create, ideate, iterate, and proliferate like that in the Learner-Centered Design process.  Not only are the odds much higher that the collective school community will come up with a better solution, by involving our community in the co-design process, we will have developed our collective capacity in a way that connects all of us to our school.

I am pretty sure I know how I want to spend my time.

What Are The EXPERIENCES You Create?

In British Columbia, we are still basking in the sun of summer holidays, but in a very short couple of weeks, administrators will be locked in and lining up the schedule for start-up, teachers will be preparing for their new classes, and students and their parents will be getting ready for a new school year.  It's a very exciting time! 

For a number of our students and parents, this September will have represent some sort of 'first' in their educational journey.  A student may be moving from elementary school to a middle school or high school and having their first day with their peers in a new setting.  Alternatively, for a variety of reasons, the student may be moving to a different school in their district, or moving to an entirely new district altogether as their family has relocated to a new community.  Perhaps it is that most momentous of occasions, the first day that the little learner is ever going to school as a fresh and new kindergarten student (which my wife and I will be experiencing with our second child next month). Or it could simply just be the first day of another school year for a student as they move their way through the K-12 system.

Each of these 'firsts' is incredibly important, as are the 'firsts' that are going to happen for our students throughout the year...first impressions, first day activities, first assemblies, lessons, assignments, quizzes, report cards: the list is of 'firsts' is endless.  As providers in the education system, it is my belief that how we approach these 'firsts' is pivotal.  And it is also my belief that by asking ourselves a very targeted question, we can begin to articulate co-developed values that allow us to approach these 'firsts' in a consistent, student-centered, and innovative way that truly values our students and parents and costs us very little!  The targeted question is this:

"How can we make the EXPERIENCE that our __________ (students/parents) have when they ___________ (walk into our building/register at our school/go to our website, etc) SO POSITIVE that they want to communicate this experience with others?".

Whenever I think about this question, I remember an example of an experience that my daughter and I had last summer at one of my favorite hotels, The Four Seasons in Vancouver.  

I am not much of a camper.  I did a great deal of camping as a child, but for right now, if I am going to be out of my house for an evening, typically I would choose a hotel over a campsite.   Don't judge me, I am just telling it like it is.  Last year, my daughter had a great year in kindergarten, so I told her that I would take her on a date in Vancouver, which would include a trip to the aquarium, a dinner wherever she wanted, and a night at a downtown hotel, and as much swimming at the pool as she wanted.  We were both excited.  

I made a reservation at the Four Seasons, and let them know that my five year old daughter would be with me.  When we showed up at the hotel...

• we were welcomed as Mr. and Miss Birk, and the concierge made a point of asking my daughter whether this was her first visit to the city and to the Four Seasons, and what she hoped to do during her visit.  Paige was enchanted. 
• we went up to the room, and on the beds were two bathrobes laid out on the bed, one for Dad, and a miniature one for Paige, complete with a chocolate, moose-shaped lollipop on it.  Paige immediately put on her robe, and asked if we could just stay in!  
• we left the room and walked back to the lobby, the concierge called 'Miss Birk' over and asked if she enjoyed her moose-lollipop, and asked us what our plans were.  I said we were off to the aquarium, and without my asking, offered to call us a taxi.  He then asked if we had dinner plans, and Paige said she would like to go to Earl's Restaurant.  The concierge asked us what time, and then made a second call to the closest Earl's and made our reservation for us before we left for our outing.  

I could go on and on, because the service only got better that night and the following day.  And to top it all off, we received an email 24 hours after our visit asking if everything was to our satisfaction, and was there anything they could have improved on to make our visit even more enjoyable.  

The point is this--our EXPERIENCE was so amazing and felt so personalized that when anyone asks Paige or I about where we would stay in Vancouver, we don't just say "The Four Seasons", we tell the whole story of the service we received to anyone who will listen--we are instant, authentic advertising!  And while it is likely that there are 'nicer' hotels downtown, and there are certainly more expensive ones, because of the experience that we had, we tell our story for The Four Seasons and get absolutely nothing in return!  

Coming back to the context of schools, in my last post, I gave a starting definition of something that Simon Breakspear and I are working on-- 'frugal innovation in education'.

"frugal innovation is the co-creation of iterations of solutions to educational issues that contravene our co-developed values while embracing the 'immovable' parameters that impact our day-to-day operations"

By considering each of the different experiences that our students and parents have each day with our schools, we are actually beginning the process of frugal innovation.  From my last post, the initial steps to frugal innovation include

• developing a process to co-create their values with each of these partner groups
• determining basic rules for innovative solutions (sounds contrary, but actually essential)
• creating diverse and eclectic groups of thinkers within the greater school community

So how could we apply this to experiences in our schools?  We could begin by using the question stem posed above as the basis for a design challenge, and use an example like our websites for our students and parents.  It might look like this...

"How can we make the EXPERIENCE that our students and parents have when interact with our website so positive that they want to communicate this experience to others?".

I just think of how many other questions this type of challenge triggers for me:   How best might we answer this question?  Who should we have involved?  Who can we learn from?  Who are people that we have not thought of that might be able to help us with this challenge?  What would a process look like if we had a group of these different people together?  What might the norms or rules for innovation be? How can we best collect the information about this challenge from this diverse and eclectic group?  

And those are just a few questions in the first part of the process! 

It sounds like a lot of work, but think of the upside.  Imagine creating a website for your school that your parents and students raved about.  A website that was so dynamic and packed with stuff for students and parents that all of their questions were answered, their expectations were met, and when they were chatting with other parents or community members at the local Starbucks over coffee, they were telling them how informative and user-friendly your website was for them.

Now take that design challenge question and substitute 'website' for 'registration day', 'parent teacher interviews', or 'report cards' for your parents or students.  How could you think about those things in a different way?  A human-centered way?

Or, if you are a teacher, take that design challenge and make it into something like this:

"How can I make EXPERIENCE that my students have when they first walk into my classroom so positive that they want to communicate this experience to their fellow students, parents, and friends?".

Or, if you are an administrator, perhaps a challenge such as this is important:

"How can we make EXPERIENCE that our teachers have when they leave our first faculty meeting so positive that they want to communicate this experience to others?".

There are so many experiences that we can create that can truly transform the culture of our schools, but because there is no more time in our day, and no influx of money coming to education, being innovative in our approach to the 'firsts' for our students, parents and teachers can be a continuous challenge.  But we HAVE to get started, because we owe it to our students and our parents to take an innovative approach to all aspects of our schools for our learners.  And because we must embrace the parameters that we work with each day, the mindset of frugal innovation is one that we must adopt. And if the moral imperative is not enough, the ability for our students and parents to rapidly amplify their story about their 'firsts' and experiences through social media makes one thing absolutely certain:    

Whether our students or parents have an experience at our school that is positive OR negative, they WILL communicate that experience to others.

So, what are the the "Four Seasons"-style experiences that you can create in your school?