Becoming A Trustworthy Leader, By Megan Tschannen Moran

First published in 1987, The Leadership Challenge is a guide for becoming leader. The book received many awards and its above two million copies are internationally sold. The book teaches principles of leadership that apply whether the leader is running a sports team or a fortune 500 organization. The book includes stories and examples of many leaders from micro to macro level (Founders and Authors, 2013). The basic leadership principles can be adopted by anyone to challenge status quo and increase leader productivity multifold. The book tells about the flow and hierarchy of values too (Machedo, 2013). One can use the guide without an instructor to develop leadership traits.

The concept of effective leadership is a topic that has been widely debated by individuals and professional leaders in many societies. In Kevin Cashman’s book, Leadership from the Inside Out: Becoming a Leader for life, the author reveals that leadership is defined through a person’s understanding of their internal nature, rather than the values, beliefs, and morals a society claims that a leader should possess. Even though Cashman does acknowledge the importance of the societal view of leadership, he argues that true leadership is defined by an individual’s understanding of their internal essence. In each chapter Cashman strongly debates that leaders lead by virtue of who they are. He defines this outlook on leadership as the Inside-Out Leadership Method. This is a method that allows an authoritative figure to develop a strong understanding of their physical, mental, and spiritual essence to lead others towards a mutual goal.

The first three chapters of the book describe why trust in schools is important, define trust, and give ideas for cultivating trust. Then there are chapters on betrayal, revenge, teachers trusting one another, fostering trust with students and parents, and restoring trust. The final chapter outlines ideas for becoming a trustworthy leader. Appendix A has several surveys on trust. Each survey includes scoring directions and information about reliability and validity.

The importance of effective leadership and its impact on improving student achievement are evident in today’s schools (Leithwood, Louis, Anderson, and Wahlstrom, 2004). While the school principal is traditionally thought to be the school leader, Glickman (1989) proposes that “the principal of successful schools is not the instructional leader but the educational leader who mobilizes the expertise, talent, and care of others” (p. 8). Lumpkin, Claxton, and Wilson (2014) contend that helping “each school fulfill its mission and energize and expand the professionalism and professional contributions of teachers, the expertise of all teachers, especially teacher leaders, is needed” (p. 59). Teachers directly impact student learning, and

Week’s Work: This week was a discovery of my personality, strengths and weaknesses, and spiritual gifts. Before taking administering the various assessments, I spent a great deal of time reading on the importance of the emotional health of a leader by Peter Scazzero. Additionally, I performed the emotional assessment from both of Scazzero’s books, The Emotionally Healthy Church and The Emotionally Healthy Leader. Each assessment focused on the various aspects of emotional health. I was challenged by the results of the assessments. According to Scazzero’s assessments, I function as an emotional adolescent. However, in the area of embracing grief and loss, I am an emotional child. The finding forced me to evaluate how I handle

In any relationship, whether it is at home or work trust is essential for success. Trust is fundamental to all working relationships. Superintendents must be able to develop trust so that all members feel united in working toward a common goal. Many times, the demise of a Superintendent-School Board relationship can

Leaders are accountable to uphold a safe learning environment and uphold personal and professional values. They demonstrate and live these values, beliefs and attitudes to inspire others to higher levels of performance. Leaders expect others in the school community to demonstrate integrity and exercise ethical behavior. With high stakes accountability, leaders need to interpret and implement policies for the benefit of students, staff, community and themselves and do so with integrity.

Trust is the output of your behaviours and actions of you as a leader and it either builds or erodes over time. Ineffective leaders often don’t get this element of their personal accountability. Importantly, if you don’t build trust and mutual professional respect you cannot be an effective horizontal matrix leader. You must also assume good intent of your team and business partners rather than suspicion and derision so when something does happen (and it will) you are showing empathy in your own relationships by seeking to understand instead of becoming emotional and seeking to assign blame. This is something each of us need to make one of our personal management habits.

Rendon was discussing a teacher’s class that was in the meeting and reviewing the teachers data, noticed there were many students who had dropped on their last STAR reading test. She informed the teacher that she was concerned and ask her what she could do to help in the classroom. I was shocked that the new teacher wasn’t offended or embarrassed, and accepted the help. I then realized there was a great amount of trust that the teachers had with Mrs. Rendon. The teachers felt supported and understood when Mrs. Rendon asked what the teachers needed, she was genuinely concerned and wanted to help. Research on group processes in schools has shown that leaders who trust and believe in others and model these traits accomplish far more and develop devoted followers (Martin, Danzig, Wright, Flanary, & Brown,

In our school, the principal is the head of our organization and since she does not have an Assistant Principal, is the head all alone. She has been principal for 10+ years at the same establishment and loves every day. She stresses to her staff the importance of student safety, student achievement, parental

Leadership Implementation Quotient is a test performed to evaluate areas of strengths on a leadership position and to evaluate areas that should be improved. When I say leadership position does not mean a title. The book You Don’t Need to Have a Title to Be a Leader by Mark Sanborn has a very interesting and appropriated definition of the word leader. “Leaders are people that inspire and influence others, coordinate efforts and work with others to achieve goals, affect the quality of others experiences, and shape their life and careers” (Mark Sanborn, p.67, 2006). Leadership Implementation Quotient Quiz, helps a leader to self evaluate and have a better perspective about what can be modified and enhanced in their leadership, in order to improved

Trust is perhaps the most important element of an effective and efficient educational environment. I think creating a climate of trust requires us to explore two questions "how can we build trust as leaders in education, and how can we avoid losing it?" In order to build a truly

As stated by Kouzes and Posner (2012), "If you’re a manager in an organization, to your direct reports you are the most important leader in your organization. You are more likely than any other leader to influence their desire to stay or leave, the trajectory of their careers, their ethical behavior, their ability to perform at their best, their drive to wow customers, their satisfaction with their jobs, and their motivation to share the organization’s vision and values" (p. 332). Therefore, the first one to trust will be the leader. Leaders should ensure their member know their leader believe in them. Leaders believe in their

Without trust, an organization cannot function properly. Both personally and professionally, relationships will crumble between the trustees and the staff (if there is more than just a board of directors). Trustees must believe in their own competence, for confidence is key when it comes to being in a position of influence. If an individual is not comfortable asking questions or in confiding in their peers,

In order for interpersonal trustworthiness to exist in organizations, a leader-follower relationship must first exist between the parties involved (Caldwell et al., 2010, p. 500). Once that leader-follower relationship is established, leaders have to earn trust. Leaders earn trust by their respective actions, morals and virtues. Trust is can also be based on past history. If something was done in the past which questions a leader’s values, morals or judgment, it would be unlikely that the leader would be trusted in the future. One of the most important parts of being an effective leader is building and maintaining trust. Trust can further be defined as a “multi-dimensional construct comprising different dimensions of the trustee’s attributes that the trustor evaluates” (Ingenhoff and Sommer, 2010, p. 341).