Episode 212: Strategic Planning with Dr. Frederick Buskey

Darrin Peppard (: 00:00

All right, my friends, welcome back into the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. This is episode 212, and today is a special episode, not just because of the topic and not just because I'm releasing this on a Tuesday, which is an odd release date for me, but because this is a collaboration between the Leaning Into Leadership podcast and the Assistant Principal podcast. My friend and colleague, Dr. Frederick Buskey, joins me for a conversation around building a truly strategic leadership plan for

the year ahead. And we're going to dig into the four phases of the leadership cycle, prepare, perform, refine, and renew, and offer you some actionable tools to help you lead with clarity, confidence, and purpose all year long. We also share details about the new leadership network we're launching together in partnership with North Carolina Mid-Level Educators Association, NCMLE.

So if you are a middle school leader in North Carolina in particular, you'll want to stay tuned until the end to hear how to join the Middle Ground Leadership Excellence Network through NCMLE. And if you're working on leadership team development or planning your next school convocation, don't forget, I'd love to support you. Reach out anytime at roadtowesome.net or shoot me a direct message on your favorite social media platform.

Let's get into this conversation with my friend, Dr. Frederick Busky.

Darrin Peppard (: 00:01

All right, everybody, welcome into the Leaning Into Leadership podcast.

Frederick (: 00:05

And welcome and welcome to the assistant principal podcast. I thought you were going to introduce mine and I was going to introduce yours.

Darrin Peppard (: 00:11

That's right. OK, we'll do that. All right, we'll try that again. OK, well, we can edit this piece off.

All right, everybody, welcome into the Assistant Principal Podcast.

Frederick (: 00:22

and welcome into the Leaning Into Leadership podcast.

Darrin Peppard (: 00:25

How about that? have, we have switched roles, Frederick. super, there we go. Absolutely. So, ⁓ folks, we are, we are really excited to put this episode together. This joint effort between the assistant principal podcast and the leaning into leadership podcast. ⁓ with my, my good friend, Dr. Frederick Busky, ⁓ as, as always, I'm Dr. Darren Peppered and we are here to talk about how we best.

Frederick (: 00:28

Yeah. So I say, you're my host and I'm your host.

Darrin Peppard (: 00:55

support school leaders and we're going to talk specifically about middle school leaders but this is going to apply to all of them don't you think?

Frederick (: 01:03

Yeah. And I'm excited to do it because now's the time a lot of us have been talking about strategic planning. And I know you and I are going to drive and dive into SWOT and stop, start, consider, continue at the end of this podcast. So it's a big planning time, but I know what we both see a lot of times is people start the year and they start with these great intentions. And then you get to the end of the year and it just all kind of dropped away. And so one of the

the things that we really want to do in this podcast is to help people set up the pieces so that when the year starts, you don't lose sight of your strategic goals.

Darrin Peppard (: 01:43

Right, absolutely. And more importantly, you won't necessarily miss those check-in times too. It isn't just losing sight of those goals. It's also putting those landmark times on the calendar so that you're checking in and holding yourself accountable, your team accountable to what this wonderful plan is that you're spending your summer putting together. think...

Frederick (: 02:09

Yeah.

Darrin Peppard (: 02:10

You know, I've had this conversation, Frederick, with probably six or seven district leaders over the last, I'd say the last 10 days and almost to an individual. It's the same thing. It's the biggest struggle that my building administrators have is they can build a plan. They know instruction, you know, they even know leadership, but what they run into is exactly what you're talking about.

The school year kicks off and the fur starts flying and before they know it, it's March. They haven't done anything that, maybe just one or two things that are in that great plan that they built. And then they feel defeated. They feel like at this point in time, I guess let's wait till next year. And that's not how we go about improving our schools.

Frederick (: 03:06

Yeah, yeah, amen. ⁓ You mentioned earlier that we're really kind of focusing, I content wise this is good for everybody, but you and I are leading a focus for middle level school leaders. And we're gonna talk in the end, I think about what we're doing in North Carolina. So if you're a North Carolina middle school leader, pay special attention and make sure you listen to the end. But.

I wanted to kind of frame middle school a little bit. And I know where we are in North Carolina and in South Carolina, where I do a lot, it's not, it's common for middle school principals to be pulled from either the elementary or the high school level, right? They're going to be their first principalship. So they drop them into the middle school and, and it can be a really different environment. And I just want to prime people.

to think about it this way. So elementary kids, they want you and they need you. And high school kids, in a way they don't want you and they don't need you, right? They're doing their own thing. Middle school kids are in that really unique place where they don't want you but they really need you. And so I think that's one of the fundamentally different things of being in a middle school is that you have kids that have

Darrin Peppard (: 04:22

Yeah.

Frederick (: 04:30

a lot of the needs that elementary school kids have, but then also a lot of the affectations and attitudes that high school kids have. And obviously that's a big simplification, but I think it's important to drive the message home. Like middle school is unique. It's not just high school minus a year.

Darrin Peppard (: 04:44

Yeah.

Right, exactly. Well, and I think this is where, and certainly you could make this argument in elementary with, you know, a kindergartner to a fifth grader, but emotionally, socially, developmentally, you get this amazing span from sixth grade to eighth grade. And it's only a couple of years, but wow, what a difference those couple of years make. And you have those kids in the same building.

I mean, most middle schools, not all, but most, they're structured as a sixth through eighth grade, you know, campus. And so you've got all those interesting dynamics and everything that you said, ⁓ I 100 % agree with. And I remember, you know, I taught middle school for five years. And as a middle school teacher, one of the things that I discovered was middle school kids, unlike high school kids, and I taught high school for six years.

middle school kids, they will run through a brick wall for you if they know you care about them. They are still teacher pleasers. Yeah. Like, like from elementary school, that teacher pleaser, they're still teacher pleasers. High school kids, they may love you and still not do anything. I mean, that's just how it goes. Right. You know, or they may work real hard and not like you. I mean, you just never know with, with high school kids, middle school kids, man, if they know

Frederick (: 05:55

Yeah, if you can flip that switch.

you

Darrin Peppard (: 06:18

that you care about them, whoo, man, they're gonna do everything they can to please you typically. And, you know, I think what you're saying about middle school leaders in North and South Carolina is something that we see all across the country, that so many middle school leaders become middle school leaders. And maybe the better way to say it is they end up as middle school leaders because that's the first opportunity that comes to them.

You know, that's that first building level administration role that they that they are successful, you know, sitting in the hot seat and getting the getting the offer. But that doesn't mean that they don't necessarily say, you know, hey, I can't wait to go back to elementary school. I can't wait to go back to high school. And I think one of the things that the project that you alluded to that we're doing together in North Carolina, I think one of the goals there is to encourage

those middle school administrators, especially those new ones to stay in middle school because those middle school kids do need you. You're right. And, here's something you didn't talk about, but let's be frank, middle school teachers are a little bit different too. ⁓ and I don't mean that in a negative way. I love middle school teachers, but elementary teachers are unique. You know, they, they have, they have their own idiosyncrasies.

Frederick (: 07:35

Hahaha

Darrin Peppard (: 07:47

High school teachers definitely have their idiosyncrasies. But man, there's something about those middle school teachers and they need those school leaders who are going to support them, who are going to care for them, who are going to love them, and who are going to allow them to do the absolute magic that they do every single day working with that interesting group of sixth through eighth grade kids that come in the door.

⁓ and do their best to learn each and every day. ⁓ there's just so many interesting things about middle school. And I think that's what I'm excited about talking about today on this podcast with you, ⁓ because I think it does lend itself to some really cool opportunities and to some things that a lot of people wouldn't necessarily think of when they think of school leadership. They think of, know, want to be a high school principal or want to be an elementary principal.

Not many people say, can't wait to be in a middle school principal? So, yeah.

Frederick (: 08:49

Yeah. If you get

there and you can under kind of crack the code of middle school kids and middle school teachers, it's just amazing. Cause there's so much energy. I think middle school teachers, they're highly collaborative, but they also can take a lot of autonomy and they will take great things and they want to run with it. And, and yeah, it's just a great opportunity. Hey, we should, we should probably get into the.

Darrin Peppard (: 09:15

Absolutely.

Frederick (: 09:18

the topics, you know, we had, we've been talking about how we develop that kind of wraparound support for a year of leadership. And we, we thought about things in four basic quarters, like there's the kind of summer early fall where we're really preparing that strategic plan and preparing our activities and what we're going to do. And then we hit the fall and

Darrin Peppard (: 09:18

Yeah, we probably should.

Frederick (: 09:45

September, October, November, we're in there, we're performing. Then we come back from Christmas and ideally there's this refinement period. And I think this is where the plan oftentimes really starts to break down, right? It kind of deteriorates in that performance phase in the fall. And then we hit January and you know, all the stuff that happens in January and February, but that should be the time that we're refining. And then as we hit

towards the end of the spring and getting into next summer, now we're renewing. So we've talked about this cycle and I think you and I wanted to dig into just a couple of the key points under each of those cycles of prepare, perform, refine and renew.

Darrin Peppard (: 10:34

Yeah, no, I think, I think that's a great format for, for this episode and folks, this is a great way to look at putting your plan together as well. And you know, in this first phase, this, this prepare phase, to me, the most important thing that you can do is gain a lot of clarity. You need to be really crystal clear about what it is that matters to you about what you're trying to accomplish about those things that genuinely are going to move the needle in your

coming school year. And, you know, I had this conversation just today, honestly, with a superintendent in Virginia, actually with his cabinet. And one of the things we were talking about was gaining that clarity with the full leadership team and starting with just a simple question, something like, what are two or three things that I want to see in every single classroom every single day?

If we start with that instructional focus and we really kind of lean into the non-negotiables in that space, that alone will help us get a lot of clarity about what it is that we want to focus on in the coming year. Now, within that clarity, honestly, there's a few other pieces that you should be focusing on in your plan. And in a lot of ways, they're kind of like the four PLC questions.

So if this is what I want to see in every classroom, then number one, how am I going to support that? Number two, how am I going to check in on that? What does that process look like? And number three, how do I coach it? And number four, how do I celebrate it? I think those are the things that if we can get that kind of clarity around the things we want to see in every single classroom.

that will start to set our plan up for success. But it's certainly more than that. I know there's other strategies we have to lean into.

Frederick (: 12:39

Yeah, I love that. And I think the next layer on that, that we have to make sure that we do in this preparation phase before we kick off the year, when we think about those critical questions of how do I support, how do I check in, how do I coach and how do I celebrate? I think one of the traps we can fall into is thinking that, ⁓ that's something I may do each week, one day a week or

We'll get to it during the month. And one of the things I like to do is to really distill these things down to daily practices. Right? So what is it that I need to do in my leadership every day? That's going to help us move forward on this goal. You you and I have both been focusing in our businesses on speaking and presenting. And I share with my listeners all the time. I got a goal of

times in: 2025

Darrin Peppard (: 14:01

Right

Frederick (: 14:06

Yeah. Spotlight for those of you that think it's easy to go out and be on the stage and, all kinds of fun. And it is, and there's work you have to do every day. So, so we're both committed to doing certain things, to writing and being creative and refining our message every day, to reaching out to connections and staying in touch with people every day, right? To staying on top of the trends and what's happening and what issues are burning with people.

Darrin Peppard (: 14:09

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Frederick (: 14:33

That's not stuff we do once a week or once a month. We have to do that every day. And if we do that every day, we know we'll be successful. And so it's the same thing. If I say I want to be an instructional leader, there are some things I need to be doing every day. So we get clear and then look at what are the daily strategies that we need to be focused and we need to be executing on.

Darrin Peppard (: 14:58

Yeah, absolutely. And one of those things that we should be doing every single day is leaning into and continuing to build and invest in relationships in our building. Whether that's building relationships with our classroom teachers, building relationships with our students, building relationships with the greater staff that we have, ⁓ custodians and bus drivers and the folks in the cafeteria and on and on.

And then also with just your greater community, know, something that again, we get down in the weeds and the year gets going and we don't stop and be really intentional about the things that we're talking about here. And relationships needs to be one of those. We need to be very, very intentional about, you know, finding time to go check in with teachers when they don't have kids in their classroom.

We know we're gonna be focusing on getting into classrooms when kids are there. We also need to get into classrooms that kids aren't there so that we're able to continue to invest in those relationships, get to know each other as humans. I heard something the other day that I think is the perfect way to wrap this little section up here. I was having a conversation with a county sheriff and we were talking about some leadership stuff and he said,

He said, you know, here's the thing, Darren, know, cops are cops and cops are going to think like cops. He said, and that's fine because law enforcement is procedure is policy and it's sticking to your training. He said, but leadership is human and that's the thing we can't lose sight of. And this was coming from somebody in the law enforcement space. It's the exact same thing for us in leadership. Leadership is human. We got to lean into those relationships.

Frederick (: 16:56

Yeah, and we're gonna look at barriers and some other things a little bit later, but one other thing about relationships, I think there's momentum, there's positive momentum and negative momentum that happens. And if I get too busy to go check in on all my beginning teachers and check in on the teacher who I know was trying out some big thing and all excited about it.

And I get too busy to check in and I'm too busy to check in on the kids that I know are going to struggle each day. get busier and busier if I'm not checking in on my people. And I think the reciprocal is true. If I'm really focused and I'm good and I maintain my discipline and my daily strategies of checking in with people, it seems there are a lot of tasks that either take care of themselves or I find out about an issue on the front end.

when it's a five minute issue versus a five hour issue. And so I think there's that spiral. I'm really curious what your thoughts are on that.

Darrin Peppard (: 17:59

Yeah, you know, for me, one of my biggest indicators when I was getting off the beaten path, when I was not focusing on the relationship stuff, when I was just too busy, is I would hear that specifically from my staff and one individual in particular. ⁓ She was, you know, my secretary was my right arm. So one of my social workers, Debbie,

who's just now retiring. I'm so excited for Debbie, but Debbie was my left arm. And when Debbie would say, when she would need to have a conversation with me and she would stop me in the hallway and say, Darren, I know you're busy, but when I heard that phrase, that was kind of a cue to me that, hey, I might need to take a little step back here. You know, I'm big on balcony leadership. I would...

I need to get over on the balcony and make sure that I check back in on the things that I say are important to me and certainly relationships are one of those things. So if your staff is telling you, you know, hey, I know you're really busy, then that means you're giving off busy energy. And even if you're doing a good job of disguising busy energy, man, if they're picking up on it, yeah, you need to take a little stop, take a little pause, get up on the balcony and

say wait a minute I need to check in on myself here.

Frederick (: 19:25

Darren, that's great. I'm gonna repeat what you just said, because I think listeners should really dial in on that. If someone says to you, know you're busy, then you're giving off busy energy. That's gold, right? That's a feedback that we need to pay attention to and think about. Wow.

Darrin Peppard (: 19:43

It is. is. Unfortunately,

it took me hearing that more times than I care to admit before it dawned on me. That's what it meant. You know, I mean, sometimes and I think leaders fall into the strap. ⁓ You'll wear that like a badge of honor. know, hey, they know I'm busy. Man, that's the last thing you want. Right. I mean, because that means you're not in control. And if you're not in control, they're not in control. There's no way. Right. ⁓ And

Frederick (: 19:53

Yeah.

Darrin Peppard (: 20:12

man, I can chase that in a hundred different directions. And I might loop back to it here in a couple of minutes, cause I know we're going to talk about culture when it comes back to me here in a second, let's, let's, let's maybe, let's, let's move forward. probably could have done four podcasts. Seriously, we could have done one for each of these, ⁓ these sections. So let's talk about perform. So now this is where we've kind of, we've made our way to that, to base camp one, if you will, if we think of it as like climbing a mountain.

Frederick (: 20:14

Hahaha

Okay.

Darrin Peppard (: 20:41

And at this point, so sometime in the fall, this is where, you know, we're really talking about perform. And there are some key things here that, again, we've gotten into the year. Things have started to happen in the year that could pull us away. And I know one of the most important things that I love how you talk about this is not just manage our time well, we really need to manage our priorities well. So, ⁓

Give me a couple strategies here for really staying focused on and managing my priorities well.

Frederick (: 21:17

Yeah, and I love this section because it's we get into September and our hands are rubbing. Everybody's excited and we're ready to go. And so a big part of that is what you're going to hit in a minute, which is that leading for instruction and building that culture. And those are exciting points. But I think there's a trap in there. Right. And so the first thing we need to do when we walk in is make sure we don't step in that trap. And the trap is I'm going to manage my time and I'm going to get everything done.

Darrin Peppard (: 21:24

Yeah.

Frederick (: 21:45

At cause that's not going to happen. There's more to get done than you can ever do. And we know we're going to get caught up in all those urgent tasks and urgent issues. And when we're running an urgent, what gets lost is the very thing that we were just talking about, which is relationships. The way to not step in that trap, Darren is to not focus on how am going to get my tasks done, but to focus on.

Darrin Peppard (: 21:47

Not HEP.

Frederick (: 22:12

What do I need to do to make sure I get my priorities done? So what is it that I need to put in place so that I make sure I am saving time that I can invest in people and not just spending time on my tasks? I think there's four really simple things that we can start with. The first is schedule blocking. So if I know related to my strategic goals, one of my daily strategic actions,

is to be in classrooms and check in. And maybe we want to really focus on our beginning teachers because we know we're going to have 10 beginning teachers in the building. have 10 second year teachers and a bunch of them are alternative entry. So I know that's going to be my focus. I need to schedule those times in my calendar ahead of time of when I'm going to be in the classrooms. And then there's some other things that go along with that with making sure that how that time is protected. But it begins with blocking that in our schedule.

and looking at what our priorities are and blocking those things. I think another important piece of this that complements is learning how to leverage help. What are the things that only I can do as an assistant principal or principal? One of the big ones is support and grow teachers. There's only a handful of people in your building that can support and grow teachers. So what are the things maybe that you're tempted to do or that you've been doing?

that lots of other people can do. And so how do you leverage the skills on your staff to get some of that stuff out? I just had last week, ⁓ Mark Schellinger on the podcast and he talked about the SAM technique and SAM stands for School Administrator Manager. And it's this whole program and technique around having somebody to manage the school administrator, specifically so the school administrator.

can be focused on those priorities and not getting derailed all the time. So leveraging help is really important. And then I think creating focus time because the reality is, yeah, there are emails. There are times when you maybe are gonna have to plan all kinds of adjustments around the testing schedule. And there are those tasks things that have to get done. They're quadrant two urgent and important.

but we can get more done if we create focus time instead of time that's constantly being interrupted. And so that's another thing I think sometimes administrators have trouble giving them permission, giving themselves permission to do that. It like, I wanna have an open door policy. I don't wanna keep anybody out. But then you're trying to do this 20 minute task and it takes you an hour and 20 because you keep getting interrupted. So yeah, creating that focus time is important. And then just not losing sight.

of this thing that we've been talking about. People are our priorities. So we need to take advantage any time that we have the opportunity to interact with someone, we need to capitalize on that. when we do that, then we can start talking about leading instruction and building culture.

Darrin Peppard (: 25:21

Yeah. And, and, and, know, it's, it's in that fall time of year when many, not all, but many school leaders start to stumble a little when it comes to spending the time in classrooms. And, and, and let me, let me be clear on this. Spending time in the classroom is not what gets the job done. I mean, you're just taking up space if that's all you're doing.

It's actually focusing on coaching and growing teachers like you said, Frederick. I mean, that's what it's really about. And that comes from one back to what we talked about at the beginning of this, the clarity piece of what is it you're looking for in every classroom every day. And then two, what are you gonna do to coach and support that? In other words, what type of feedback are you going to give?

What are the specific things that you are going to look for? And if you're part of a leadership team on your campus, you've got five assistant principals or you've got two assistant principals or an instructional coach or whomever it is that's part of that instructional leadership team, you guys need to all be focused on the same thing. Now that doesn't mean that you're focusing on pushing everybody to the same place because again,

You know, we should be differentiating for our teachers, just like we want our teachers to differentiate for our students. But those two or three things that you're saying, I want to see this every day, it doesn't matter where the teacher is. You should be able to get those things from everyone. So be really clear. Go ahead.

Frederick (: 26:59

Darren,

yeah, no, I just have to tell the story because what you're saying is so critical and I think it's easy for people to lose sight. We get so focused on giving the feedback that we sometimes lose sight of what feedback we should be giving. I was in a middle school a couple of years ago having a conversation, instructional coach, assistant principal, principal, all passionate instructional leaders. They'd all been out the week before and observed the same beginning teacher.

Darrin Peppard (: 27:03

got you fired up didn't I?

Frederick (: 27:29

So we came back, they're talking about the teacher and what they saw, and then they talked about what feedback they left, because we're always gonna leave, right, the grow and the glow. And so they talked about what they left as the suggestion for that teacher. Every one of them left a different suggestion.

So you've got this first year teacher just trying to survive and the assistant principal comes in and says, you should think about this. And then the instructional coach comes in and says, you should think about this other thing. And the principal comes in and says, you should think about that thing over there. It's so sad because everybody's trying to be helpful and support this teacher and yet probably had the opposite effect.

Darrin Peppard (: 27:47

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

Frederick (: 28:16

clarity.

Darrin Peppard (: 28:17

that's huge. It's huge. Well, and not only that, I mean, I think that brings up another, another interesting point with, with the instructional leadership stuff. I mean, yes, you've got to set the time aside. You've got to manage your priorities, you know, blocking that time to be in classrooms to give that feedback. But you also need to, when you're part of that team, you need to be aligning with each other, having regular conversations and regular meetings.

so that what you just described doesn't happen. And that doesn't mean that it's bad that three people went into one person's classroom in the course of a week. That's great. But if we're all looking for the same thing, then our feedback should be fairly similar. And I would add this little piece here too. And I think this is something that's very important. I do this with all of the leadership teams that I work with. We're gonna go out, we're gonna walk together.

And we're going to work on that what I call and I think it's actually the correct term for it. It's not what I coined, but iterator reliability. In other words, what I'm looking for, what Frederick is looking for, number one, those things are the same. Maybe we're looking for active learning in the classroom or we're looking for ⁓ collaborative activities or we're looking for student participation in terms of

you know, dialogue with kids. mean, whatever the thing is that you've collectively agreed to look at, well now, that iterative reliability is what I am saying we should be focusing on should align with what Frederick is saying we should be focusing on. And if you're not sitting down at a table with your instructional leadership team on a regular basis, talking that through consistently, but also talking about what are you seeing in the building, that's.

That's where you run into that man, that poor first year teacher. Cause you know that first year teacher is trying to, trying to please everybody. And now it's wow, focus on three different things and who, where do I start? Right? Make it easy for your teachers. Again, this, like I said, a little bit, a little bit ago, it's kind of like the four PLC questions, you know, what do you want them to, you know, what do you want them to, you know, learn, learn or know would be able to do, you know, how do you know?

Frederick (: 30:22

Yeah.

Darrin Peppard (: 30:37

What do do if they do? What do you do if they don't? Right? It should be the same thing for us as school leaders when it comes to that instructional leadership. That's the model we should be following. And, and I'll be honest with you, the next piece here in that fall piece is culture. And I can go about 40 different directions with culture, but, I want to stay right on the instructional piece with culture. If we're not focused on teaching and learning in our school, then what are we doing?

Right? mean, that's such a key part of culture. Another key part of culture is back to what Frederick said is managing the priorities, being really clear around how you're going to utilize your time. I had Nate Eklund on the podcast just a couple of days ago when this is releasing on June 2nd or on June 3rd.

Frederick (: 31:34

Dirt.

Darrin Peppard (: 31:36

Nate Eklund, my episode with him aired on June 1st and Nate said something during the podcast. At least I think he said it during the podcast. If not, it was before we hit the record button. One of the best things I've ever heard about culture. He said, you know, nothing impacts culture more. Nothing will more positively impact the morale of a school than a well run school. So, I mean, that goes back to the busy energy, right? When you're giving off busy energy, you're not running the school well.

Right? You're just running. And the same thing is true with your culture. And part of running a well-run school is staying focused on teaching and learning. Staying focused on the things that only you can do. You talked about that, Frederick, you know, and coaching and growing teachers is one of the things that you are uniquely capable of doing. So make sure you're staying focused on that. And at the last piece on culture that I will share,

because again, I can go a hundred directions with culture, but celebrate. Question number four, what do you do if they do? What if your teachers are doing what you want them to do? Celebrate it, right? Celebrate it. Make sure you're doing that.

Frederick (: 32:48

That's awesome. That's awesome.

Darrin Peppard (: 32:52

feel like I just delivered a sermon. It's been that, I mean, that's something that's really, really important to me and it's something I'm really, really passionate about. And you know that, and we both are, but folks, we really cannot lose sight of the teaching and learning because that is the reason we open our doors. So here's what's going to happen, right? So all of this stuff is going to be rolling along. And before we know it, we hit the holiday break.

Frederick (: 32:55

Hehehehe

Darrin Peppard (: 33:21

come back because the holiday break never is long enough and it's January but it's time for at that point to again adjust course take a look at where you are celebrate the progress you've made and and this is where we're really focused on refinement and I know there's some key elements in refinement one of which by this point in the year we will have found some barriers that have come up

Frederick (: 33:22

I just lost you.

I'm not sure if you can hear me on my end. You have frozen.

Darrin Peppard (: 33:51

in our plan, in our process. And I know you've got a few strategies for how we really lean into meeting those barriers head on.

Frederick (: 34:00

Yeah. And I want to harken back to earlier when we talked about managing priorities, I think again, the same trap that we can hit in the fall is even bigger when we hit into the spring because we can look at, look back and say, maybe I didn't get into the classrooms or we weren't meeting enough as an instructional team to actually talk about how we're coordinating our feedback and our observations with teachers. And we can go to the place of, we just need to work harder.

We just need to be more intentional and pay more attention to that. And I don't think that's the right approach. If you want to get into classrooms and you're not getting into classrooms, it's not because you're not working hard enough. Almost the opposite, you're working too hard. So we have to take some time to unpack in January what's stopping us, what's making it harder for us to do the things that we say are the most important.

Darrin Peppard (: 34:46

Yeah.

Frederick (: 34:59

and bringing people back to this whole show, right? Number one, start with clarity on what we wanna do and then identify those daily strategies and then plan for execution. And now when we get to this point, if that's happening, great, but if it's not happening, let's head on look at the barriers. And the first step to that is just asking why. I took a assistant principal through this about a month or so ago and he was saying,

Yeah, I was really good. And we came back from break. I was really good about getting into classrooms and boy, it's just dropped off. Why? Right. And then that opens the discussion. Well, this is happening. This has happened. This happened. Okay. Well, why does that stop you from getting in a classroom as well? Cause if I don't deal with this now, right. And, and so that starts to open things up. And a lot of times what we find Darren is it's not about effort. It's about systems. And so we're seeing.

places where our system is breaking down that's undermining the hard effort that we're putting in. And so the way to get into more classrooms is not just to try harder. The way to get into more classrooms might be going and looking at how our discipline system is working or how some other communication system is working. So I think that's a really important place to go. again, we're going to be doing this with some middle school principals this year. And this is a piece that I'm really excited for.

because I think this is the place where we're really going to be able to add value to them.

Darrin Peppard (: 36:28

Yeah.

school discipline. I did like: 2200

managed student behavior. And we had developed essentially a person centric system, where if anything happened in a classroom, it had to be dealt with by that assistant principal. And so literally everything that was happening from a fight to a kid who doesn't bring a pencil and everything in between had to be managed by me. So

What did I do all year? Non-stop discipline. The following year, the number one change we made to the system was putting in clear tiered behaviors that tier one behaviors are managed by the teacher in the classroom. And by the way, didn't bring a pencil to class, is managed by the teacher in the classroom. That didn't need to come to me. And by really getting that system, number one, clear,

outlined well, communicated well to the staff, and then holding firm to it. Because there were times where discipline referrals came to me that were like, no, this is you. And I just had to hand it back. you know, in my nicest way and with my biggest smile, this is a tier one behavior. You're going to have to manage this in your classroom. Now I can help you, but you have to manage that behavior. And that that's one of the barriers that easily could be coming up for people.

is that, you know, I worked with a principal not long ago who told me to my face, I can't go be in classrooms, Darren. I have to be in the office. What if something happens? Like, okay, ⁓ she needs a Sam, apparently. ⁓ But it's like, you've got to really take a look at those systems. And the discipline system is a really, really good example because we have this tendency to...

Send kids to the office, you here Frederick this kids broken you fix them I'm gonna do my thing here But if we look at those systems and I didn't want to go too long on that I've already gone longer than I wanted to there but that's an example of how when you put a good system in place Imagine a thousand less discipline referrals. Imagine how much time I got back

Frederick (: 39:22

And if you're staying in your office, stuff is going to happen. Right. You can go to it or it will come to you.

Darrin Peppard (: 39:27

Well, yeah, that's true. That is a good point.

Get out of the office. Yeah.

Frederick (: 39:33

Because

I'm a geek, I ran the numbers while you were talking. It's a really important point because we all know if we could get in and put in some systems and then we could work with teachers, we could get our discipline referrals down, but we can't ever get to that first step. But just to put this in context, Darren, if you had 2,200 discipline referrals, if every one of those took you 20 minutes, that is 44,000.

le to cut that in half to say: 1100

Darrin Peppard (: 40:09

I wonder why I was so tired that year.

Frederick (: 40:32

Anyway, somebody with a calculator out there, check me. It's like five hours a week, five hours a week by paying attention to your system.

Darrin Peppard (: 40:34

and still cut it in half. Yeah, right.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. And really if you can just put two hours a week into classrooms, that's way more than the average administrator is putting into classrooms right now. So yeah, just gaining that, it makes a tremendous difference with one system. And it's just one system, right? I mean, there's, there are plenty of ways. had Ray Huert on the show not long ago. She talked about an email system. You mentioned that, you know, with, with ways to manage and control your emails. So

Definitely lots of things that you can do to get those systems in place. And again, focus on the things only you can do. Delegate away as many other things as you possibly can. And then you gotta really make sure that you're taking time to reflect. I touched on this a little bit earlier, so I won't spend a lot of time here. But for me, again, it was the balcony. Literally, go stand for me. It was the balcony above the gymnasium.

because I was a basketball coach and in my mind's eye, I was putting my priorities on the floor, just like I would watch tape for a game, you know, or tape of a practice. I had to go check in on myself on a regular basis. So find the place that you can go and reflect. ⁓ I have, I'll put it in the show notes, folks. I have a ⁓ weekly principles planner tool that I created. It's part of one of my digital courses. Probably a lot of you've already downloaded it you're, if you're

Normally if you listen to Leaning Into Leadership, you probably already grabbed it, but I'll put it in the show notes and give it to you, Frederic, so can put it in your show notes. In that tool, not only is it five days of how to plan your time, how to block the specific times you've talked about, all of those things, but there's also key pieces in there for every single day reflection and reflection on the week. So when you reflect, that's when you grow. And if you don't take the time to reflect,

you're not going to improve the next week. You're going to do the same thing over and over and over. So reflection is huge and I could chase it for an hour.

Frederick (: 42:49

Yeah, well, and here's the other piece of that. If we know we grow from reflection, guess what? One of the best ways to grow our teachers is to create space for them to reflect. And I think that's the other thing that I wanted to add to this part about refinement is we need to remember the superpower that we have as leaders is not giving answers. The superpower is asking the right questions. So,

If we can be in there and we can reflect on our own practice and reflect on what's happening in the school, we can then develop the questions that we can go out and ask the people around us to reflect on. And that's, that's how we lead. That's how we pave the road so that we're able to lead from behind and not have to be out in front all the time.

Darrin Peppard (: 43:41

Absolutely. And if you're reflecting, you're modeling that reflection for them. It's just going to encourage them that much more to do that reflection. ⁓ Without question, I think that's really important. And I think that takes us to the renew portion of our plan and developing that time where, again, this is a huge reflection piece, but it's also evaluating

where we are getting reoriented, taking a look at different types of methods that we can use to get ourselves ready to go again for the next iteration of that plan. And I know one of your favorites is the SWOT analysis.

Frederick (: 44:29

Yeah, I love this SWOT tool because it's, I think it's simple enough that we can just sit down and do it and not have to take hours. But it also gives us this, this visual way to organize our thinking that then makes it easier to act on some of that. So the SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats and strengths and weaknesses.

are things that are within our school and the opportunities and threats are things that are kind of beyond our school, maybe a little bit more difficult to control. It's great because what it does when we walk through, we think about the strengths that we have. I like starting that way because a lot of times we spend time thinking about our weaknesses, right? But we don't always think about our strengths. And so making sure that we're clear and get those strengths down because

It's leveraging those strengths to build on our weaknesses, leveraging our strengths to take advantage of opportunities. That's really critical. So that strengths piece, and then we look at the weaknesses, which are things we know we could be doing better. And that invites us to go right back to where we were at the beginning, right? What are our priorities? What are the things that are going to move the needle? We can go back and look at how we did on those things. And then the opportunities are

the chances, the things that are happening outside of the school that we might be able to leverage and take advantage of to improve our school, to improve outcomes for kids. And then those threats are all the things that are happening in that external environment that we need to be mindful of. And we are living in a time of external threats, right? If the Department of Ed goes away, if all this federal funding gets cut,

We have this teacher crisis that we don't control. We can't fixate on those, but we need to be mindful of those. We need to know, right? And if we know that threat of how are we gonna recruit teachers and fill our math positions, and we are developing that awareness early on and then planning for that in advance, I think it's really helpful. So that's kind of the big picture tool, but I know you do a lot of work with a tool that I think

takes down maybe to a more individual level.

Darrin Peppard (: 47:02

Yeah, yeah, one of my favorites, and I love the SWOT analysis too. One of my favorite tools is the start, stop, continue, consider protocol. within that protocol, and you can use this for a hundred different things, but it's an opportunity to really reflect on your current practices. And that might be, hey, us collectively as a team, you know, what are we doing as a team? What is our focus? What is our focus as a building?

but it could also be as an individual. And I'll share really quick, I'll be using this as this episode is dropping, the very day that this thing drops, I'll be working with a fairly large leadership team at a school division in Virginia. And one of the protocols we're gonna use is gonna be start, stop, continue, consider, and we're gonna talk specifically about our practices around being the instructional leader.

One of the things I'll be asking of them is on Post-it notes and one item, one topic, one thought per Post-it note, what are some things as an individual you need to stop doing when it comes to that focus on my instructional leadership? As an individual, what do I need to stop doing? One of those things might be, I need to stop procrastinating. I need to stop not putting it on my calendar, right? Those kinds of things.

Then what do need to start doing? Again, one idea per post-it note. List as many as you think you need to. What do you need to start doing? The third one is what do you need to continue doing? Not everything you're doing needs to stop or start. Some of the things you're doing are really good. So what are you going to continue doing? Maybe you're somebody who's really good at starting your day somewhere else in the building every single morning.

If you do that, I would have that on my continue list. And then finally, what should I consider doing? It doesn't mean I need to start doing this right now. This is almost kind of like the parking lot, right? But maybe I need to consider taking one of my assistant principals with me. Maybe I need to consider walking with the instructional coach once a week, something like that.

When you have a group, and I'll have a group of close to 40, and everybody has done these, then you have them bring all the ones that say stop, and you put it on a big poster that says stop, and everybody puts their ideas up. So they have the opportunity to kind of see. And honestly, there's a lot of strength in numbers. A lot of people are probably gonna say, I need to stop procrastinating. And so it's not gonna just be me. I see, hey, several of my colleagues are doing the exact same thing. And the same thing is true with continue.

with start and with consider and just being able to do that and then doing kind of a gallery walk gives everybody the opportunity to see what's happening. ⁓ We've done this with initiative fatigue. When we have way too many things going on in a district, why don't we start, stop, continue and consider? We can go in a hundred different directions, but it's such a nice clean protocol and you know how I am.

I want everybody to feel seen, heard, valued, and trusted. This is a way for everybody's voice to be heard. It doesn't mean they're going to get their way, but everybody's voice gets heard because everybody is going to be putting things on.

we even did this with initiative fatigue where, you know, we had a whole lot of different initiatives in the air all at the same time. And it was a great way across the district to just sit down and say, okay, you know, what are the things we need to keep doing? What are the things we should stop doing? You know, what, what are the things that, you know, we need to start and then

you know, maybe what are some things we should consider as it relates to all these different initiatives that we have in the air. Great protocol. It's one of my all time favorites.

Frederick (: 53:39

I love it. And, and you can do that as individuals too, right? I think both you and I actually have gotten into habit of doing this. I don't like to about monthly or every six weeks. I, can I tell you a secret of what I've started doing? All right. So because I'm a person that chases shiny objects, I don't allow myself to put anything into the start box. I just do the stop, the continue.

Darrin Peppard (: 53:47

yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Frederick (: 54:09

and the consider, and then once I get everything in that consider box, I look at the stop box and I think, what am I stopping doing? And is that going to create the space then me for me to start doing something else? And then I pull it off my consider list. And that's been huge for me as an individual because the consider puts stuff on our radar. And so we're thinking about it, but we're not wasting a lot of energy, but it's

back there and we're thinking and I know what I find is I start, I actually do start some of those things, but I start them in an incremental way that tends to give me more immediate value for less effort.

Darrin Peppard (: 54:54

Yeah, no, I think that's, that's a great point. And yeah, I mean, it's a protocol I use with with my business quite frequently, where it's an opportunity for me to just take some stock and just say, okay, where am I? And I really like and appreciate that you shared that you don't put anything on the start list until until you've actually taken something off the stop list and or done something on the stop list and said, Okay, yeah, I'm really going to stop doing that. ⁓ And using that consider

as almost kind of that way station to you can get to the start once we've actually actually taken some steps. I think that's really, really, really big. So ⁓ definitely some things that people can do there. And the ultimate idea here is just to reorient your plan. ⁓ I think that's what it's all about because, you know, along the way, if you have these checkpoints built in, if you're

keeping an eye on that compelling vision that you have, then at the end of this cycle, number one, you're excited and you're fired up to see where you go from here because you've seen some progress. You've made some gains. You've got some wins in the win column.

That I think is what we want to try to accomplish in this work we're doing in North Carolina. I think we would be remiss to not talk a little bit about the work that we're very fortunate to be able to do with the North Carolina Middle School ⁓ Educator Association, NCMLE, and ⁓ super, super excited about that. I'll let you maybe talk a little bit about it and we can just kind of volley back and forth on it.

Frederick (: 56:47

Yeah. Well, we've talked a little bit about systems and structures and we can have all kinds of good intentions, but when we get into it, it's easy to lose track of that. And then that's one of the things that we wanted to do in partnering with North Carolina middle level educators association is to provide structure and wrap around support for middle school leaders and specifically for North Carolina that

you have these checkpoints built into your schedule. So we're going to be meeting with you in a series of virtual workshops. We're going to be meeting face to face at a fall conference. We're going to be then doing a conference within a conference, right, at the March NCMLE annual conference. So we're super excited about that. And then having again that spring virtual summit in order to help with that renew part. So we're actually

Darrin Peppard (: 57:36

Yeah.

Frederick (: 57:47

building this in so that you know you are going to have the check-in points and you're going to have advocates and Darren and I working for you and you're going to be in it with a whole bunch of other people so you're also going to have that kind of mutual accountability and people to lean on. So I'm super excited for this.

Darrin Peppard (: 58:02

Yeah.

Yeah, I'll be honest with you. ⁓ The system that we have developed the process that we have developed. I'm really excited about seeing it actually an action. But what I'm really fired up for is that cohort model. And for for North Carolina, middle school principals to build that network to to to find colleagues in job alike type situations that you can pick up the phone.

And sure, you can call Frederick, you can call me. But man, it's nice sometimes to have somebody who's right there in the arena with you in their own arena, but a very similar arena. And I know through the course of my career, I've definitely built, you know, those relationships with a lot of colleagues, whether when I was, you know, when I was a principal or when I was a superintendent. And now, honestly, the work we do now.

Just just being able to have a conversation with you or with I got together with Chad Dumas the other day. I mean just on and on right like just being able to have somebody who's going through what you're going through to build pick up the phone and a column and just say okay, I need your help with this or what are your thoughts about this or

Hey, can I run this by you? I've written in this email. just want to, you know, what do you think? Or even just my favorite. There's no way you're going to top this one. Sometimes we got to share those phone calls too, right? You know, the things that happen in your day that you're like, there is no way, there's no way. And you got to call, you got to phone a friend and say, Frederick, man, there's no way you can top this one.

Frederick (: 59:49

Yeah

Darrin Peppard (: 59:56

I gotta share with you what happened today in my day in, you know, in my role. So I'm excited about the work with North Carolina. I'm really excited about NCMLE and I can't say enough about the board. ⁓ David James, Kim Lynch, I mean, they have been absolutely stellar in this process. And honestly, they have been, they have been the ones who are like, you

We said something to Kim about it and Kim's like, I love it. And then Kim pulled David in and David said, okay, here we go. Let's go. David had a marketing plan in like five seconds because that's how he is. You know, he's somebody who's like, when we say go, we're going to go and you know, we're going to have, I don't know, 30, 40, 50, 60 middle school administrators who are going to be a part of this cohort this, this year.

working together, working with us, having the opportunity to work with either of us as a coach, if that's something that they want to do, ⁓ it's going to be really exciting. And again, the goal is to help those middle school principals really appreciate the role that they have, to keep them in the role that they have and to set them up for success so that their plan can actually go through this cycle and have some success at the end of the day.

Frederick (: 1:01:19

Yeah. Yeah. And so if you're a North Carolina middle level person, you got to go to the show notes and click the link or just go over to NCLME and MCMLE website and you'll, you'll find it there. It's the middle ground leadership excellence network. If you're not in North Carolina, Darren, I have a feeling we'll be revisiting this work and sharing out some of this through our podcasts and posts and things because it really is valuable. So stay tuned.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:01:44

Absolutely.

Frederick (: 1:01:49

Follow Darren, follow myself, and then talk to your middle level educational organization, because we would love to be able to take some of what we're developing here and support other states as well, and even get states to work together, right? So there's a lot of possibility. Darren, you talked about having someone to share those kind of big moments with. Can I share a big moment with you? All right.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:02:11

Yeah, absolutely, yeah.

Frederick (: 1:02:15

So we're recording on May 29th, it's 4.25 PM. And the assistant principal podcast just went to 100,000 downloads for the show. So excited and so thankful to everybody that's listening.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:02:27

that's so cool. ⁓ man, that's awesome. That is super exciting. Congratulations.

Frederick (: 1:02:35

Yeah, Darren, I want to give a thank you to you too, because I found your podcast a couple years ago. We started connect and you've just been such a wonderful human being and such a positive force in my life and connected me with so many other wonderful people. I honestly don't think the podcast would be where it is today without your support and friendship and just being a colleague and part of part of the team.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:03:02

I appreciate that man. really do. ⁓ You know, certainly my level of love and respect for you is off the charts. You know, in the couple of years we've gotten to know each other. ⁓ It's it's not just certainly, you know, doing some business together or anything like that. is a true friendship and and and a true brotherhood. And, you know, I said something to you last week ⁓ when when when we jumped on a call, I'm like, yep, I got to get my Frederick fix, you know, because because something you do

Frederick (: 1:03:29

Hahaha.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:03:31

And we should have opened the episode with this and I don't know why we didn't but I guess we're closing with it. You ask me every time we get together, what are you celebrating? And certainly I know you are celebrating 100,000 downloads for the assistant principal podcast, which is so amazing. And I'm happy for you and I'm proud of you brother.

Frederick (: 1:03:53

Thank you, thank you. And Darren, what are you celebrating?

Darrin Peppard (: 1:03:57

Man, I'll tell you what, that's a great question, but I am gonna tell you that, ⁓ okay, I know, I'll say this one. I am celebrating. ⁓

Yeah, I am celebrating ⁓ launching my next semester at Fort Hay State University. Just got ⁓ the course uploaded for summer school. ⁓ Making a change to the course. I've taught the course now for four semesters and you know each semester up to this point I have used Road to Awesome and Hacking School Discipline, ⁓ Maynard Weinstein's amazing, amazing book. ⁓

as my two books for the course. I'm making a change this summer. We're going to see how it goes. But instead of using those two awesome books, I'm going to use Culture First Classrooms, my new book with Katie Kinder and our mutual friends, Joshua Stamper and Charlie Peck's book, Language of Behavior is the other book I'm going to use in my course.

⁓ Absolutely love the course. The course is actually ⁓ advanced classroom management. I teach it as a classroom culture course, very much so. And so I think those two books are going to fit extremely well. lots of cool things that are happening, but that one's maybe away from the business. And I'll just say I'm celebrating kicking off another semester at Fort Hay State University.

Frederick (: 1:05:30

So awesome. Darren, this has been great.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:05:34

Yes, this has been so much fun. We've probably gone a lot longer than we needed to. Folks, I hope you have listened to with us all the way to the end, not only to hear Frederick's amazing news, but ⁓ simply to hear the reminder to get down in the show notes. If you're a North Carolina middle school administrator, hit that link. If you're an administrator or just somebody who wants to work on.

building their time. Remember that link is in there for the free download for the principal planning tool and a whole bunch of other really cool links that we'll have down there in the show notes. I will have a link to get you to Frederick's email list and Frederick will have one to get you to my email list so that you can also ⁓ partake in the newsletters and emails that we send on a regular basis just trying to help you.

Gain clarity, be intentional, and walk in your purpose as a leader.

Frederick (: 1:06:35

Darren, thanks so much.

Darrin Peppard (: 1:06:37

Yep, thank you. This was awesome.

All right, friends, I hope you found value in this particular episode. Frederick and I had a lot of fun shooting it. Certainly had a lot of thought that went into this. And to be honest with you, we talked about it at the end. The middle ground leadership excellence network that we are doing with North Carolina middle level educator association in CML is based on those four platforms that we just discussed. Prepare, perform, refine.

Darrin Peppard (: 02:01

and renew. Again, if I can do anything to help you, if Frederick can do anything to help you, make sure you reach out to us, regardless of which platform that you are listening to this show. Thank you so much for joining me here on the Leaning Into Leadership podcast and get out there. Have a road to awesome week.