My View
Two Lessons Extracted From My Root Canal
By NICHOLAS I. CLEMENT/School Administrator, May 2017

In my superintendent days, a favorite analogy for a task I despised doing was having a root canal. I often noted I’d rather endure a painful dental procedure any day than lobby state legislators for adequate school funding (which routinely led to the same tired response: Do more with less).

After a recent root canal, I no longer can link this dental work with things I loathe. I was so impressed with the treatment performed by my endodontist and family dentist. I now will use the root canal as an analogy for my vision of effective leadership.

In particular, I will drill down to  two lessons learned that are crucial to keeping both schools and teeth healthy: (1) creating a client-centered culture and (2) providing cutting-edge tools and technology.

Client-Based Culture
On Thanksgiving, after scoring my first soccer goal against my grandkids, I felt a pulsating ache in my molar. By Saturday morning, I was curled up in a fetal position. My wife tried to call a dentist. I mumbled the odds of finding one on a holiday weekend were about the same as winning the lottery. We bought a ticket that night! Dr. Larsen answered his phone and saw me immediately.

Although it was challenging to do without his office assistants, Dr. Larsen conducted a full exam. He indicated my problem could be complex and might require a root canal. He provided pain relief medication and told me to return early Monday.

Monday morning he determined I needed a root canal. He had his staff call multiple endodontists to see if they could get me an appointment. I am thinking the chances of getting a same-day appointment with an endodontist today would be way beyond lottery odds, more like the legislature fully funding school odds. I wish I was back in the superintendency because next year schools are getting a raise. Dr. Larsen’s assistant got me an appointment with Dr. Hobeich.

As I rushed into the endodontist’s office, his assistant greeted me, “We were expecting you.” Dr. Hobeich treated me with kindness and expert skill that saved the tooth.

This led to Leadership Lesson No. 1: School leaders must strive to create a client-centered culture. This is more than a focus on improving customer service. It requires a mindset that our clients are the center of the school universe and a collective action plan to meet their immediate and long-term needs.

For example, a client-centered approach means all parents are treated with kindness and respect when they call and/or visit a school. Client-centered means every high school senior, top 10 percent or bottom 10 percent, has equal face time with a counselor as he or she develops college and career plans. Client-centered means we collaborate and cooperate with other educational institutions, including our competitors, when it is in the best interest of the student.

Cutting-Edge Tools
Doctors Larsen’s and Hobeich’s dental offices resembled nothing like that of my first dentist. I still remember the funky burnt smell of my tooth being drilled by a device run by a series of whirring rubber belts. Did I mention the enamel shrapnel going up my nostrils?

I asked my new dentistry friends about the new technology that makes the pain disappear. They talked about digital radiography, intraoral cameras, curing lights, state-of-the-art composites and high-speed drills and lasers.

I went away with Leadership Lesson No. 2: Although schools have made progress, leaders must never stop upgrading classrooms with cutting-edge technology and tools to promote high-level learning.

Unfortunately, too many of today’s classrooms look and smell like my 1960s’ dental office.

Besides making me feel infinitely better, my dentists unknowingly threw down a challenge: Transform our schools to be experienced more like getting a root canal — with a client-centered approach where students and teachers use state-of-the-art technology to save the future.

Nic Clement is the McFarland Citizen’s Chair in Education at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Ariz. E-mail: nicholas.clement@nau.edu. Twitter: @brainonschool