Episode 242: Building the Bench - Leadership Growth with Dr. Dan Hornick

Darrin Peppard (: 00:00

Hey everybody, welcome into episode 242 of the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. Today's episode is honestly kind of a fun episode. I recorded this episode on location in Orange, Virginia. I was sitting down with my longtime friend, Dr. Dan Hornick, who is the superintendent of schools in Orange County Public Schools. We had a great conversation talking about leadership growth, about building that leadership bench, about how clarity and reflection and

coaching can really transform an organization from the inside out. Well, before we dive into that, I just got to share this exciting news. if you've been listening to the podcast regularly, you already know this, but just one more time, I want to share this. Road to Awesome has taken another step and we have another brand new home for incredible resources at Darrenpepper.com. This is the new hub for everything that I do.

from keynotes to workshops to corporate leadership training, all focused on helping leaders and teams lead with clarity and intentionality. While you're there, make sure you download the free, awesome Leadership Action Guide. It's simple, it's practical, and it is built around my awesome leadership framework. It's designed to help you reflect, to realign, and to take intentional action in your leadership, whether you're leading a school,

a company or a team of any size. Now, let's jump into this conversation with my buddy, Dr. Dan Hornick, and we're going to talk about how great leaders grow other great leaders. I'll catch you on the other side.

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All right, everybody, welcome back into the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. A bit of a unique episode today. I am on location. So very rarely do I get to record with somebody sitting with me. So this is gonna be kind of fun. I'm in Orange, Virginia at Orange County School District, sitting with Dr. Dan Hornick, the superintendent here in Orange County. And we're just, we're gonna have an awesome conversation about all kinds of great stuff. So Dan, welcome into the podcast.

Thanks a lot, Darren. We've known each other a long time, and I'm really excited to be here and talk about leadership and leadership development and executive coaching and anything else that comes up.

I have known each other since: 2008

here with Orange County. So before we dive into all of that kind of stuff, maybe just share with our audience, both those listening to the podcast and then also those watching on YouTube, just a little bit about you and kind of what has led you to where you are right now in your professional journey.

Absolutely. So I'm originally from Pennsylvania and moved to Virginia to start my teaching career. And so I spent time in the classroom as a high school social studies teacher, which I enjoyed tremendously. And then moved into a principal intern role, which was basically a teacher on administrative assignment. Did that for a year. And then from there became assistant principal and then principal.

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moved right from the principal ship into the superintendency and learned pretty quickly all the things that I thought that I knew that I don't know. The more time you spend in the role I think you figure out more and more of the things you don't know. But I think to where we have been today one of the things that's really clear is we need to develop the next group of leaders.

much is talked about in education for grow your own teachers and I think it's sometimes forgotten that you know the applicant pools that we're seeing we're required to grow our our next set of leaders as well and it's really for me it's really difficult in the job I do and and even for the members of my cabinet to be that level of executive coach.

for our leaders and the people that aspire to be assistant principals, principals, central office administrators. And I think that's one of the biggest things that I have learned is how much of responsibility we have to grow and build and create the next leaders in education.

Absolutely, know, when this was probably a few years ago, but I was having a conversation with someone and and by happenstance a mutual friend, your one of your mentors, Dr. Tom Nichols, and I were having a conversation about that exact same thing. And I've used this phrase dozens of times, but it was Tom Nichols who said this that

Right now, the leadership pipeline isn't empty, but people are moving through it at such a rapid rate. And I would imagine that you probably see that. You probably saw that when you were with Stafford schools and then certainly now here at Orange. What do you see as one of the big challenges with those people who are eager to jump into those leadership roles? So I guess, let me back up just a bit and then I'll build on that question. One, do you feel like,

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you have people who are wanting to jump into that leadership pipeline. And two, what are maybe some of the challenges that they will face compared to what you and I did when we made the transition into leadership?

that's a great question. We definitely have people who are interested in getting into that part of the profession in education, leadership across the board, whatever it might be, teacher leadership, building level leadership, division leadership. I think what we can't do is just kind of continue to kind of steal from division to division and just

kind of recycling folks because we're really growing the applicant pool. It's just kind of trading people back and forth. What I think is probably, definitely gonna be different for today's leaders is how incredibly interconnected the world is with social media and everything else. Things that happen in schools and buildings are now broadcast to the world.

Many folks, I believe, make judgments about a school or a division or education by a video that is seen where there's catching, you know, students or teachers, it may be one of their not their finer moments. And then that's kind of used to judge with a broad stroke education as a whole. so I think knowing that reality and truly everybody that has a phone.

is a recorder, your media is different. It's not print and traditional news. People get their information from different sources. even sources, of course, aren't necessarily super valid and reliable. And so I think that's just something that aspiring leaders just need to recognize is the importance of staying above board and that everybody's a recorder.

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Many folks are quick to judgment. have to know that and be prepared for it and have thick skin and also just know that it's really important to be consistent. I think that's just a major difference. As far as standards and teaching, mean, good teaching will always be good teaching and helping develop teachers and working in PLCs. I think it's more of that outside pressure, the increased scrutiny.

whether it's from politicians or just from communities as a whole. think a lot of it truly stems from social media and increased video presence. Everybody has a camera. And so I think that's just something really to be aware of.

Right. You know, it's been interesting to watch and I like that you went there. Not too long ago, I had Dr. Zach Bowermaster on the podcast and Zach, those who don't like know Zach directly, probably know Zach as the guy who went viral with, you know, millions of views of his high fives and fist bumps and that kind of stuff in the hallway. And what I really I mean, I love so many things about Zach as a leader, but

he was really, really smart about leveraging those cameras. Here's another way I can tell the story of what's happening in my school. And is everything perfect at Zach's school? No, and he would tell you it's not. But he's like, hey, you know what? This is an opportunity for me to share.

here's what's happening inside my school. It just happened to end up being a viral video. It certainly wasn't what he was striving for. But boy, if you're gonna have a viral video from your school, wouldn't you rather it was one of your principal's fist bumping a kid as opposed to one of those not so good moments that you were referring to? So I'm kind of curious about this. So you and I both made the move from high school principal direct to superintendent. So jumping all over all those other potential roles.

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at the district level, which isn't, I don't think that's really the norm. I think maybe that's a little bit more unique. So I'm curious, one, and I know this is your fourth year now as the superintendent here in Orange, what are maybe some things that you learned about yourself when you stepped into this role or maybe that you've learned over the last three plus years? And there's a reason for this question. I'm certain there are people listening.

who maybe are in a principalship or they're assistant superintendents or something and they're thinking right now, hey, I think this is my year to go land that superintendent role. Looking back a few years, what have you learned about yourself?

I'm going to say the first thing I've learned about myself is that it is okay to not be the expert on every single topic and to, for me, being a type A personality and wanting to really strive for greatness and be excellent, that was something that I had to come to.

I'm sure that was a struggle for you.

I had to come to grips with it and to also recognize that that also isn't a negative part of me or my leadership, etc. And so letting go and recognizing that leadership is as much learning as it is leading and really, of course you have the quote, they're indispensable to one another. And so that was something that I definitely...

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learned. Another thing is you

I've learned that you really have to know your why, so to speak, and know what your compass and your values are because they are going to be tested in many unexpected ways. And knowing and being comfortable with your values to help make the significantly difficult decisions that oftentimes

people in these roles face, those are really, that's imperative. And so I really believe that those two things in particular, not having to be the all-knowing soothsayer on all things in the division and education, and then really come in the terms of being comfortable in your own skin and knowing your values and your compass to

to help you guide through the difficult decisions, because you get tested and you get tested frequently. so I think those are two messages that I would give to anybody that's aspiring. And I don't believe that's just unique to a superintendent position. think those are important for leadership as a whole. So you know your why and be okay knowing that

Yes, you need to always continue to develop and improve, but that doesn't mean you are always gonna be a complete maestro of every single thing that exists in education.

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Yeah, so I just had a question kind of pop into my mind. So here recently, I have had a lot of conversations with superintendents and was having a conversation with a brand new superintendent, actually somebody who I cut my teeth with as a rookie high school assistant principal. And now this individual has just stepped into his first superintendent role. And one of the things he was sharing with me that has been this

big eye-opener for him. And he was somebody who was a high school principal, but then he was at the district level. He was that assistant superintendent over HR and those types of things. I mean, he's got a lot of great experience, but he said one of the interesting things for him was this dichotomy of leading the whole organization versus leading your board because

And I'll let you just kind of run with this. Leading your board, your board is your boss. You have a five headed boss. Some people have a seven, some have nine. Man, five's plenty. I had seven. It's not just that you listen to them and follow their direction. You have a responsibility to educate and lead them as well. So

for him or any other new superintendents, how have you balanced that dichotomy of leadership?

So from the beginning I made a concerted effort to build as much trust and open lines of communication in particular. I'll go from the board end. I did this in both areas, in both venues of course. But I think the most important thing that a superintendent can do with their board is to be overly open, transparent, take time to meet individually, find out.

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what the priorities of each particular individual are, how each individual board member prefers to be communicated with, to understand what their inner workings are, what their background is. And I think as you can close the gap, any gap that exists with respect to trust and openness and transparency, the more you close those, think you can...

make more inroads and board members feel comfortable knowing and trusting that you have the best interests of the entire division in mind. They understand that and trust that as a superintendent you're going to work between the banks on the river that they have established. And then you carry that message and you be that very genuine leader with

the people in the division as well. So again, transparency, accessibility, open lines of communication, very much being present. Cannot do this job or any leadership job from in an office or behind a desk. You have to be willing to be out and to engage. I think those are some of the strategies that I have found success with. When I've also had, of course, the opportunity to onboard

new school board members coming onto the board after an election. And I believe that is a critical time to build the relationships. I like to have those folks in some capacity meet with all members of my cabinet as well so they get to understand each individual, see what their strengths are, what they bring to the table. So I always, when I have a chance to speak to aspiring superintendents,

at various programs and opportunities. just remind them of that is such a golden opportunity to begin the process of building trust, camaraderie, knowing, getting an idea of where they're coming from, learning what the collective vision and what their values are and the things they would like to see from leadership and from the school division. And the more that you can bring the topic back to

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student progress, student outcomes, student achievement, because that's ultimately what we're here for. The more that board meeting minutes have information about topics of student performance, improvement, recognition, you're definitely moving in the right direction. it comes from open lines of communication, trust, transparency, visibility, and accessibility.

Absolutely, yeah, no, I think that all of that is really, really important and it all comes back to relationships. Yes. I mean, whether that's a board member or a custodian or a classroom teacher, a principal, whatever role a person plays, whatever their stakeholder position is, the more as a superintendent you can do to build those relationships, the better. So let's maybe shift gears just a little bit.

I mean, this is fantastic. We could just keep going and going and going. But you had mentioned it a little bit earlier, so I kind of want to go there. You talked about coaching and, you know, certainly I'm here on site because I have spent the last couple of days here in the district. It's not my first stop in the district. been here quite a bit. Let's maybe talk about your perspective of that. How we coach and grow leaders.

And I think you know this about me. I chased my superintendent job because I thought, man, here's an opportunity to coach and grow even more leaders. And the reality is, you don't have time for that, do you? Yeah. So maybe talk about your philosophy and your belief around that coaching piece, the building the bench. I've heard you use that phrase a lot over the handful of years that I've known you. But I'll just maybe just leave that hanging and let you take it wherever you want to go.

Correct.

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I think that's awesome. Yeah, it's, you get into various leadership roles and you think it's going to work out one way or it's going to go a particular way. you know, certainly I can do a lot of modeling and I can set expectations, but to really truly on the ground, boots level, executive coaching to build leadership capacity, I don't have the time, correct?

And many times in smaller to smallerish divisions where you have people that are wearing multiple hats, they also don't have the time. As much as I would love for my executive directors and directors to be able to do that, I also know how that rolls. And to an extent, as a building principal, you feel the same way, that you're pulled in many directions and don't get to...

get to the level. Yes, of course you're always developing people in particular by modeling what you want to see and laying expectations, but as far as getting down to true executive coaching, leadership coaching, that really needs to be done consistently through a dedicated process and I just believe that sometimes it's better to look outside, plus looking outside also

can give you another set of eyes. Somebody can come in and learn, okay, what are you trying to accomplish? And simply by asking the right questions can get you to think differently about your clarity, your intentionality. How clear do you think people are about your vision? How do you articulate your vision? How do you publicize your vision? What do you want to see in a classroom?

How are you gonna know they know it? How do you know if people know your vision, if they're buying into it, et cetera? And again, going back to grow your own.

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Of course, people are still applying for leadership positions. it's not as the applicant pool isn't as deep as it once was. And I wonder if, I'm sure there's many different reasons for that and things to go on. And some of the discussions about education and how education is portrayed may lead some people to say, you know, that's just not for me.

Again, I just know and believe that our next principals likely aren't going to come from elsewhere. I want our next principals to be our current assistant principals. And I would love for our next assistant principals to be the cream of the crop teachers who have worked through, had opportunities to lead, whether it's a PLC group, a department, a grade level.

professional development activities. They've had those opportunities and now they are getting the chance to expand their horizons and that just, going back to building the bench, this is work, I know you'll remember the work that we did at North Stafford as far as what you pressed our administrative team at the time was to kind of map out all of the teachers and who's engaged and who are you using and.

Do you go to the well all the time and go to the same two or three or four people to get various activities or events or things that need to be done, reports, et cetera, and who are you missing? And you need to have that bench of people that are engaged at multiple different levels because if every time somebody leaves, have to, if you aren't reloading, if you're kind of starting again, that's definitely a problem.

You don't want it to be a completely new beginning every single time. You don't want it to be a restart. We don't want it to be a rebuild. It's almost like we want to be able to reload, in a sense, with somebody with similar levels of experience, competency, that have had opportunities to lead. Because if there's that clean break, and it's always like you feel like you're starting from the beginning.

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That's not how you build a successful organization.

Well yeah, mean in that, in a lot of ways that kind of gets to your culture, right? I mean you're building that culture of we grow our own leaders, we grow that next wave of assistant principals, principals and so forth. And I know you and I were just standing in the boardroom as we wrapped up today's professional development and you were saying exactly that.

our future principals are right here in this room. And one of the things that I really value about working with you and working with your division is it isn't just let's focus on the principal. It's, you know, like as example, working with a couple of schools in particular, it's the whole team. And those team members, assistant principal, a principal, whatever,

all have that equal access to just reach out to me and say, I a little help on this or I need a little support or hey, what do you think about this? So let's maybe talk about what you've seen in terms of benefit. Like what are you seeing coming out of that for those individuals? Like what are, I guess, are some of the fruits of the labor, if you will, of having them working with somebody from the outside?

What I see is an exponentially greater level of confidence. I see a commitment to student engagement and learning. I see assistant principals, in this case in particular, who are learning how not to get stuck in the trap of always this

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running around and discipline duty before school, after school, days over, make phone calls, know, task it out and done. And when we're having conversations with them, I'm hearing them talk with intentionality about how things they may need to develop, steps that they have taken, things that they are improving upon. And then I hear

I literally hear them speaking and bringing back topics of discussion at these professional development opportunities and specifically how they're implementing them into their day-to-day work and how that is making a difference for them in their day-to-day work. Hey, I wasn't sure how I was going to approach this particular situation. I reached out to Darren or I spoke with my principal and we talked about

you know, how we had this conversation with Darren in his case in the summer. And we were able to implement a strategy, a plan and get it done. And I think that is just tremendously invaluable. just the confidence is really, I would say, probably the biggest factor. They're confident in their ability to be able to respond effectively as opposed to reacting, right, to every situation responding effectively to.

situations and the confidence to do so is a has been a big big win for this school division in particular.

Absolutely. Well, I really value when I'm with them, whether I'm here in person or I'm on a Zoom with them or we're just going back and forth using Marco Polo, just real quick conversations, back and forth kind of asynchronously, that some of that language that I've been really intentional with them. And you even have used the words here in our conversation, that clarity and intentionality. And clarity is one I heard

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I probably heard it 40 or 50 times today. And it wasn't like, you know, like in jest or, we'll say clarity because Darren's here. No, it's just part of their vocabulary now.

And I'm seeing that when I go into the buildings and you're asked, how are things going? Where do you guys stand? How have you been addressing this? How are your teachers doing? Do you have any concerns? And the discussions that you're hearing back are also with that targeted vocabulary. So we've built a common vocabulary and a common understanding about what are some of the foundational things that the administrators want to see.

happening in their schools and in their classrooms each day. And once you have that foundation and you have that consistency and everybody on the leadership team has a common understanding, it is at that point then that you can really bring it down and you get it to your teachers and your staff. But if that core leadership team doesn't have it, from the division level to the buildings, if that alignment's missing,

you're not going to get the results you want. You're going to be crisscrossing synapses and signals somewhere. So that's really what, again, going back, that has made a tremendous difference because folks are able to talk even now across buildings in different realities with different sets of students and teachers and communities, but talk back and forth with how they're handling

and various situations or how they are setting expectations using a common language and framework which that just elevates the whole division.

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Yeah, absolutely. And I think just to maybe pull that all together, a lot of it goes back to what you talked about at the beginning when I was asking you about that dichotomy, the level of trust and buy-in and belief and just ownership that that leadership team has in what your vision is for Orange County Public Schools is fantastic.

without that leadership from the top. So definitely kudos to you. mean, the work you've done in three plus years, and it isn't just you, certainly your executive cabinet has done a brilliant job. mean, whew, wow. But they also, even just the two that I work closest with, Judy and Renee, talk so much about...

their own level of clarity and their own intentionality with very specific things. So definitely kudos to the team. So man, our time is just flying by. So I wanna go ahead and get to the question that I ask everybody here on the show. So this is the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. So Dan, how are you leaning into leadership right now?

I'm leaning into leadership by trying to be as frequently in a state of reflection, quite honestly, as possible. And being willing to take a step back and ask my cabinet members, you how am I doing? How do you think I approach these when we're going through?

the activities that you led us through today. When we come back as a cabinet next week, I'm gonna ask people, where do you think I stand? Walk me through how I can lead you better. It has led me to build leadership development, just short activities even into our cabinet meeting so it just doesn't become, know, let's get through the 14 or 15 bullet points that we have. And so obviously that's how I'm leaning in is being reflective.

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for how I can continue to improve, but again, not to improve for myself, how I can improve to help make it better for the folks who work with me every day. And I think that's how I lean in the leadership.

Yeah, I love that so much. if people want to get in touch with you, if they want to get connected with you, what are some of the avenues that they can take?

Absolutely. So LinkedIn and X are the primary at Dan Hornick and love to connect. Orange County Schools is on LinkedIn now as well. We're spending a lot of time to build that pipeline and look forward to any discussions that anybody would like to have. Yeah, absolutely.

And we'll make sure we put all that stuff in the show notes so that it's really easy for you to go and find all that stuff. Dan does a wonderful job sharing what's happening here in Orange County Public Schools on LinkedIn, on X. So make sure that you check it out. So, Dan, thanks so much for this. Thanks, Dan. It was a blast. Yeah, you bet.

Appreciate you my friend.

All right, everybody, just such an incredible conversation. I so appreciate Dr. Hornick joining me here on the Leading Into Leadership podcast. Just, you know, I'll be honest with you, a wonderful district there in Orange County, Virginia.

the work that Dr. Hornick is leading, and the leaders that he has on that team are just absolutely fantastic human beings. So it's an honor for me to have been working with them now for about six months and as we continue into the foreseeable future. Make sure you get down on the show notes, check out all the awesome stuff that they're doing there in Orange County, Virginia, and make sure you get connected with Dr. Dan Hornick. And now it's time for a pep talk. So while we're talking about or having an episode,

Darrin Peppard (: 02:25

that was filmed on location. I'll tell you that if you're watching on YouTube, you'll notice that the intro and the outro of this episode, I also recorded on location. So right now I'm in Las Vegas, Nevada. I work with the district that's just a little bit north of here and I have for a couple of years. While I was here this particular week, I had a number of conversations about perception. So many of the different leaders that I worked with this week.

talked about the perception that they may have of their new superintendent. And it's all positive, don't misunderstand that, but it made me think about perception in general and how we as individuals will often have a perception of another person, especially when that person is connected to change as it relates to our role in the organization. I worked for three different superintendents. Certainly,

One of them was the one who hired me, but the other two, when the new person came in, it's natural to make some assumptions of what that person might do or the agenda that they might have. In the case of my friends here in Nevada, a lot of the conversation that we had this week centered around not making the assumption that somebody else is thinking they want to go in this direction or that direction.

but rather that they're just simply wanting to listen, wanting to learn, and wanting to take ownership of all of the schools, not just the school that they used to be principal of. The pep talk today is designed just simply for this. We need to sometimes check our assumptions. We need to take a little bit of a step back, maybe get up on the balcony, and instead of checking in on our leadership, let's check in on our assumptions. Let's take a look at

What is it that we are assuming to be true versus what might actually be true? It's those assumptions sometimes that can get us in so much trouble because they set us up for failure because we're thinking something that may or may not be true. Do yourself a favor. If you're in a new situation, if you have a new leader in your situation, don't assume the negatives. Make sure you give yourself the opportunity and that other person.

Darrin Peppard (: 04:48

the opportunity to truly develop a relationship together and to lead together. Hey, that's what I got for you this week, folks. Thank you so much for joining me here on the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. Until next time, get out there, have a road to awesome week.