COLLEGE OF EDUCATION & HUMAN SCIENCES
Preparing Collaborative Leaders
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• Are rarely the charismatic saviors
• Get the right people in place before anything else
• Confront the facts without losing faith
• Stay focused on goals, and demand that of others
• Combine discipline with creative ethic
• Use technology carefully
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• Collaborative leadership is the intentional and skillful management of relationships that enables others to succeed individually while accomplishing a collective outcome.
• Collaboration is NOT the outcome or goal. Collaborations are processes that, when successful, align people’s actions to accomplish a goal or solve a problem.
• Collaborative leaders ably facilitate the involvement of two or more people in a group working toward a shared outcome in a manner that reflects collective ownership, authorship, use, or responsibility.
• Collaborative leaders possess knowledge, skills, and dispositions that enable them to carry out leaderful actions such as optimizing assets, seeking new solutions, sustaining focus, promoting trust, or setting and monitoring goals and progress.
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• Public professions are too complex for any one individual to manage
• Collaborative Leadership balances individual and collective needs
• Educators manage relationships every day!
• Educational leaders are catalysts for improvement
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Is collaborative leadership different from other forms of leadership?
• “Who decides” shifts from one to many
• Achieves diverse outcomes not easily measured
• Mirrors the social complexity of public sector improvements
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Coercion: No choice, no voice, no commitment
Participation:
I’m along for the ride
Cooperation:
I’ll work on your goal
Collaboration:
We’re committed to our goal
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Rubin (2002)
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Effective Collaborative Leaders:
Good Followers
• Understand your role
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Commit to a successful team
• Practice active followership
• You don’t have to be in charge!

• Do not give your power away by remaining passive
• Communicate your needs
• Ask questions
• Use names and personal pronouns to make communication specific
• Do not issue ultimatums or create inflexible situations
• Follow the 3Ps: Prompt, Prepared, Polite
• Confront but don’t complain
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• Knowledge
– Systems, relationships, effective collaboration practices
• Skills
– Verbal and non-verbal communication, relationship management, implementing effective practices
• Dispositions
– Trust, integrity, inclination toward shared solutions . . .
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• Effective Teams
• Systems thinking
• Effective practices
• Change processes
• “Followership”
• Communication
• Leadership styles
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Mickey Kolis
FIRST TIER:
• Disagree politely
• Add more information
• Listen without judging
• Inviting participation
• Acknowledging points of view
• Acknowledging feelings
• Acknowledging pride
• Taking turns
• Elaborating – extending other’s answers
• Help without giving answers
• Ask questions
• Check for understanding
• Criticize the idea – not the person
• Summarize
• Clarify what you think was said
• Referencing the vision
SECOND TIER
• Saying names
• Keeping track of time
• Ignoring distractions
• Invite the group back to work
• Respond to ideas
• Check for agreement
• Share feelings
• Encourage others
• Praise
• Give ideas
VERBAL SKILLS:
• Close-ended questions
• Open-ended questions
• Confirmatory paraphrase
• Empathy statements
• Supporting statements
• Nonjudgmental approval statements
• Problem-solving inquiries
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– Strives for shared understanding
– Seeks beneficial solutions
– Accepts responsibility for self and others
– Displays perseverance for projects and interpersonal relationship management
– Demonstrates a passion for excellence
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• You are a collaborative leader once you have accepted responsibility for building—or helping to ensure the success of—a heterogeneous team to accomplish a shared purpose.
• The ability to convene and sustain relationships that influence individuals and institutions—and the ability to find and sustain common self-interests in the diverse missions and goals of independent actors—defines the
effective collaborative leader.
• Rubin , H. (2006) Through Others’ Eyes: A Collaborative Model of Leadership” The Heart, Mind, and Soul of
Educational Leadership: Volume 2, Out of the box leadership, Paul Houston and Robert Cole (editors), Corwin Press,
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The end . . . .

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Functional and Dysfunctional Teams
Lencioni, P. (2002). The FIVE Dysfunctions of a TEAM: A Leadership Fable
Results
Accountability
Commitment
Conflict
Trust
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Trusting Teams
• Admit weaknesses and errors and ask for help
• Apologies are O.K.
• Accept questions about tasks
• Grant the benefit of the doubt
• Take risks in interactions
• Express appreciation for others talents and skills
• Focus on issues, not politics
• Look forward to meetings
Teams Without Trust
• Conceal weaknesses and errors, rarely ask for help
• Don’t extend offers of help
• Jump to conclusions before clarifying
• Fail to recognize others’ talents
• Waste time and energy on politics
• Hold grudges
• Avoid meetings or group work
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Teams that Engage in Conflict
• Meetings are lively
• Make use of everyone’s ideas
• Solve real problems – quickly
• Minimize politics
• Voice critical issues
Teams that Avoid Conflict
• Boring meetings
• Behind-the-back politics are the norm
• Ignore the real barriers to success
• Miss many good ideas from members
• Waste time and energy on posturing
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A committed team
• Creates and enjoys clarity
• Aligns efforts
• Learns from errors
• Is flexible and nimble
• Makes progress
• Changes without guilt
A team that fails to commit
• Creates ambiguity about purpose and priorities
• Fails to make timely progress
• Breeds lack of confidence
• Revisits decisions over and over
• Encourages secondguessing
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Teams that hold each other accountable
• Improve the performance of members
• Identifies problems quickly
• Establishes shared respect and expectations
• Avoids excessive bureaucracy
Teams that avoid accountability
• Foster resentment when standards differ
• Encourage or accept mediocrity
• Miss deadlines and opportunities
• Overtaxes leaders as sole source of authority
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A team that focuses . . . A team that doesn’t focus . . .
• Maintains success orientation
• Minimizes individualistic behaviors
• Celebrates successes and suffers failures acutely
• Benefits from members who put the big goal first
• Stays focused
• Stagnates, waffles, fails to achieve goals
• Loses focus and respect
• Loses good people
• Encourages self-serving attitudes and behaviors
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