A Bit More on Urgency and Coaching

Building on my previous post, I would like to add some thoughts after completing the book, A Sense of Urgency, by John Kotter. As someone who works in a lot of schools, I believe that Kotter's book is very relevant to the work of administrators and teacher leaders. In particular, I believe that instructional coaches can begin to light this fire of urgency in a school. In partnership with the principal, this force of urgency could be relentless and unstoppable. Kotter talks about four tactics in the book which lead to a true sense of urgency in the organization. In this case, of course, I am talking about secondary schools. What I like about this is that it seems very doable - it is simple. One of the paradoxes of change that Jim Knight often talks about is that the strategies must be easy AND powerful. Kotter also refers to the idea that these four tactics are behaviors that can go on every day. They are "ways of acting and thinking" that both coaches and principals can adopt to begin to spread through a school.

The four tactics that John Cotter refers to are...

• Bringing the Outside In - Instead of remaining in a cacoon, it is important for schools to look at what is going on in the outside world. Whether it is data from comparable schools or new ideas; whether it is retrieved on the internet or brought back from a meeting; whether it is about instruction or assessment - nothing is off limits.
• Act with Urgency Every Day - There are no "days off" when it comes to urgency. It is a mindset. I believe that true urgency is comparable to Stephen Covey's "urgent & important" quadrant of behaviors. Probably some of the behaviors from "not urgent & important" would fit here, too. The opposite is a false sense of urgency which I believe is comparable to Covey's quadrant "urgent & not important." When we get into a sense of frenetic, fast-paced activitiy with little or no thinking being done, we are in a non-productive place!
• Find Opportunities in Crisis - Sometimes a crisis can be a call to action. Crisis gets peoples' attention. Instead of fearing crisis, look for what can be made of them. Use them to your advantage to move urgency forward.
• Deal with the NoNos - This is the only tactic that looks much different in education than business and other organizations. NoNos are those staff members (teachers, principals, other school staff) who reject new ideas and want everyone else to reject them. Kotter reports these individuals as being detrimental when trying to move people towards realizing this feeling of urgency. He calls them "urgency killers." These are not the skeptics - people who want to know more before making a decision. These are people who actively sabotage change and crave the status quo. Kotter talks about 5 ways that NoNos are usually dealt with. Two of the five rarely work according to Kotter. Those two are the two I've used or tried to use most of the time! This was really eye-opening. Co-opting the Nono (having them be part of the leadership group) or ignoring the NoNo can be very dangerous when trying to develop urgency. He says these two methods usually do not work. He does describe three tactics which are more successful. In a nutshell, they are distraction, elimination (firing which isn't practical in education), or exposing the NoNo are the strategies that have more likelihood of success.

I thought that overall the book was very insightful and full of lots of practical ideas. Coaches can be the healthy virus that spreads this sense of urgency through conversations and interactions with teachers and others in the school. According to Kotter, developing this sense of urgency and need to change is the first step when thinking about motivating people to do something different.

I'd love to hear your thoughts about the book or the ideas I talk about above.