Leading From Where You Are
Walking with intention, connection and direction can help everyone in our schools move from point A to B

Joe Sanfelippo, superintendent in Fall Creek, Wis., is the author of Lead from Where You Are: Building Intention, Connection and Direction in Our Schools. PHOTO COURTESY OF FALL CREEK, WIS., SCHOOL DISTRICT

The advice that you get when you are appointed as the fifth superintendent in six years tends to be two-fold: good luck and rent.

I took the first piece of advice, but the second I decided to go in exactly the opposite direction, purchasing the house right across the street from school, literally 89 steps from door to door. That decision came with a number of positives, such as the ability to get done with a school board meeting at 9:30 p.m. and be in my house by 9:35, but also some negatives such as when my then 10-year-old tied my 5-year-old to a tree and one of the kindergarten teachers took a photo from her classroom and texted it to me with the caption, “How is your behavior management program working at home?”

Every Interaction

As is the case in most small towns, the school is the hub of the community. Games, concerts, meetings and seemingly any event happening in the village takes place at the school because it is the only place in town with the space to accommodate larger groups. The interesting thing about living across the street from school was that it lent itself to more interactions with people in the village.

The concept that was embedded very early in the process was that every one of those interactions mattered because every one of those interactions had the potential to be the one that people talked about for the rest of their lives. Though I don’t love that concept, I acknowledge that it’s true. When I acknowledge it’s true, then I treat conversations differently because I know that whatever is being talked about, how it is being talked about and my actions while it’s being talked about could be the discussion with someone else long past the time of the actual interaction.

The decision to live in the village was intentional and became the catalyst for how I took on the superintendency. There are only so many hours in the day and so many days in the year, and there often are times we blink and discover another school year has passed.

Leading with intention provides more meaningful opportunities for you as the leader in moving a group forward. The only behavior we can control is ours and leading with intention puts us in a much better space to impact the group we lead. So the question becomes what does it look like?

»Focus on the start.

Leading with intention starts with making sure we are in the right mindset to lead. Think about the first 10 things you do when you start your day at the office. Write those things down now. As you look at the list, think about how many of those things bring you joy and where they are on the list.

When I did an audit of how I started my day, I found that I was getting to work, turning my computer on, opening e-mail, responding to e-mail, signing some forms and looking at my meeting schedule before I got out of my office to see anyone in the school district. What I also found was that none of those things brought me any joy so when I did get out to see people, I wasn’t in the right mindset to see the great things that were happening. Being intentional about starting our day helps put us in the right mindset to lead, but just as importantly, lends itself to making connections that are so vital to success in the superintendency.

Connection is the ability to make sure you are not leading in isolation. You are the one in that chair. You are the one who answers to five, seven or nine school board members who don’t work in the schools but determine whether you are doing a good job. You are the one who answers to the community. That gets isolating. Creating the capacity to lead helps develop momentum to address the isolation that comes with the job.

Connection is the opportunity to take intention to the next level and enhance the relationships with the people you serve in multiple capacities. One of the things we know as administrators is that when people don’t know what you do as the leader in the school district, then they make up what you do as the leader in the district. Just as with every interaction being the one that they could talk about for the rest of their lives, I don’t love the concept that when people don’t know what you do they make up what you do, but I acknowledge it’s real. So the question again is “What does it look like?”

»Break the script.

I am a creature of habit so the connections I was making with our staff tended to be on my terms, not theirs. Connection usually works best when paired with intention. We discussed the first 10 things to start your day. Thinking about how we connect, when we connect and with whom we connect is an important perspective to have as the leader in the district.

At my worst, I wasn’t making connections with anyone, but closely ahead of that was only making connections with few people and only on my timeline. The concept came to a head when I thought I was doing a great job of connecting with our group because every day I would walk hallways and get into classrooms. On paper that sounds fantastic until I realized I was always walking the hallways at the same time, which meant I was seeing the same things and having conversations with the same people because their planning time was at the same time I was walking. 

Joe Sanfelippo (left) says leading with intention as superintendent helps everyone who works for the school system. PHOTO COURTESY OF FALL CREEK, WIS., SCHOOL DISTRICT

It hit me when those doors that were open during planning time started to close. I thought I was doing a great job of connecting but was taking up someone’s prep time just to check a box to say I made it around school.

When I was intentional about the time I connected and with whom I connected, I felt like I could serve in a much more constructive manner and enhanced the third component of increasing leadership capacity: leading with direction.

The direction of the group will only be as strong as what you have built through intention and connection. If you try to direct people while not being intentional about building capacity and connections, then the group will do what is asked because they were told to do so, but never own the process of moving the organization forward. Direction is about believing that everyone is doing the best they know how and ensuring that everyone in the organization feels value. Everyone’s point A to B is different, but rarely will people move to their B if we don’t value where they start at point A. Again, the question becomes how do we do it.

Direction starts with knowing who your group is and what they value individually. Being intentional and creating the connections make it easier to direct people toward a common goal, as well as helping them self-direct as they move through their career. An organization needs to consider multiple perspectives throughout, and this is made much easier by investing in all areas. We are not trying to create a carbon-copied organization of staff members. We want people to demonstrate their individual strengths while also helping those around them grow and succeed.

Direction brings intention and connection together to create collective efficacy for the group. We protect what we build and protect it more when we have a say in how it’s built and what materials are used to build it. People always feel better about the situation and the leadership when they have choice and voice in the process.

How much choice and voice are you offering in your current schedule and in the development of those you lead? Allowing choice in mentors for new teachers gives people an opportunity to find someone they can connect to and were going to anyway. Allowing time for self-reflection (and choice in how they do that) develops trust and keeps people grounded when things get tough.

Finally, don’t overschedule professional development days. If you have an environment where trust is at the core, people will fill in the time gaps with what they need, not what you think they need. So the final question is “What does it look like?”

»Value everyone’s A to B.

Building collective efficacy with your group often starts with creating self-efficacy for the individual. When people know their work has value, they are willing to move from a point A to B mentality.

We can speed this up by knowing what they need to consider their day a success. We had our staff write down three things they could control that would have to happen throughout the course of the day to make their day successful. We asked them to leave that list by their workstation so when we walked through the room, we were able to see what they value in the day. This allows us to leave some positive feedback on one of those three items. Often, we’ll make sure the comment we leave also connects to the mission of the school or district so they know how their work impacts everyone.

We also can impact value by making sure the great things that are happening in our schools don’t go unnoticed. Think about your administrative or cabinet team meetings. Often people will start meetings by sharing a positive thing happening in school. While this is a great practice, it still only impacts the people at the table. What if everyone at the table made a commitment to reach out to the person who was being talked about, just to let them know they were being talked about. This not only supports our staff member in doing great things, but also supports the administrator who was willing to share.

Intention, connection and direction allow us as administrators to define our own purpose as leaders and provide an opportunity for everyone we serve to grow. Part of our job as leaders in the district is to create more leaders. This job can get isolating. When it gets isolating, it gets lonely. Creating capacity to lead ensures that you will never lead alone. Walking with intention, connection and direction truly can help in moving everyone from A to B — even you.

JOE SANFELIPPO is superintendent of the Fall Creek School District in Fall Creek, Wis. Twitter: @Joe_Sanfelippo. He is the author of Lead from Where You Are: Building Intention, Connection and Direction in Our Schools.