My experiences of leadership prior to this subject formed my opinion of what I thought made a good leader (Wheeler, 2020, March 4). However these views have developed exponentially. My own anxieties about my personal leadership (Wheeler, 2020, April 5) have been addressed by the overall take away from this subject, which is that leaders don’t need to know everything! (Module 1 Forum) Phew! Instead my understanding which is grounded in Case Study 1 –Differentiating , Power, Control has developed and although I may not need to know it all, I have understood that I must know how to lead effectively to provide the best possible learning opportunities for students and teachers in the ever changing 21st Century learning environment. The impact of technology to 21st century learning is exciting but I have come to realise without proper implementation and leadership the changes can instead become lost opportunities. I discovered through Module 4.1 and 4.2 the importance of collaboration to leadership as a servant to staff. I identified that to meet recognised needs in the workplace I must, as TL, adopt a distributed leadership style and empower suitably qualified and capable staff by building their capacity. This transformational style of leadership is an area I know I will need to develop but one that I hope will bring the most reward.
Case Study 2 – Leadership, Communication, Relationships, further identified the importance of building capacity particularly in the “school environment which experiences ongoing change because it is closely connected to information which is changing all the time” (CSU, 2020). The response that Fleet et al (2016) advises to the complexity of change in the school environment, and its implications to the leadership of the TL, provides useful guidance on responding to change whether external or internal. Following the ideals identified highlights the way forward in my leadership as TL and involves ongoing critical reflection and analysis of any incremental changes that may occur.
The case study work in groups initially bought up feelings of apprehension but these eased somewhat as we attempted to form a collegial team in our first collaboration through Case Study 3 (Wheeler, 2020, April 9). What I discovered is that effective communication is essential when collaborating as a group. It highlighted that although I believe I am good communicator by default of the success of my profession as an educator, the online format created a barrier, and affirmed my preference of building relationships face to face. It took us a few days to find our feet as a group. One individual took on a servant leadership approach by offering ideas of how we could move forward and another used instructional leadership to offer suggestions of how we should organise and structure our responses. Although I was grateful to their leadership skills it articulated and uncovered a deeper issue of confidence and the need to work on my own servant and transformational leadership skills to build trust, respect and capacity to meet shared goals.
The collaboration that was required during Case Study 4 and Case Study 5 was put under some additional pressure due the impact that Covid-19 had on individuals and their work places. It meant communication became fractured and less frequent as both internal and external changes took their impact. The experience although stressful was positive in that it provided useful insights into how to lead through change and the importance of mitigating stress in the workplace (Wheeler, 2020, April 5).
References
CSU. (2020). Module 3.1. Change in Organisations. ETL504 Teacher Librarian as Leader. https://interact2.csu.edu.au
Voices of practitioner inquiry. Bloomsbury Publishing. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/csuau/reader.action?docID=4471164&ppg=17
Miller, S. (2020). Case Study 4. [Online discussion forum]. Interact 2 ETL504
Roberts, F. (2020). Case Study 5. [Online discussion forum]. Interact 2 ETL504
Wheeler, M. (2020, March 4). What I think I know about leadership. [Blog]. Interact 2 ETL504.
Wheeler, M. (2020, April 5). Conflict Resolution Questionnaire. [Blog]. Interact 2 ETL504.
Wheeler, M. (2020, April 9). Case Study 3 Group Collaboration. [Blog]. Interact 2 ETL504
Wheeler, M. (2020). Case Study 1. [Online discussion forum]. Interact 2 ETL504
Wheeler, M. (2020). Case Study 2. [Online discussion forum]. Interact 2 ETL504
Wheeler, M. (2020). Leadership approaches that would help mitigate stress in the workplace. [Blog]. Interact 2 ETL504.
Wheeler, M. (2020). Opportunity. Module 4.1 and 4.2. [Online discussion forum]. Interact2 ETL504
Wheeler, M. (2020). What is leadership? Module 1. [Online discussion forum]. Interact 2 ETL504