A Midyear Crisis

Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.

Peter Drucker (2008)

Only three weeks had passed since the winter break and Ana was telling me that she couldn't go on. “I'm not going to make it through the second semester,” she said, “They'll have to find a substitute principal for the rest of the year. I just wrote my letter of resignation.” Her neck was covered in hives, her eyes were puffy, and her desk was piled with papers, books, files, empty coffee cups and shriveled apple cores. “I'm a terrible principal, I haven't done any of the things I wanted to do for these kids; it was a mistake to take this position. I wasn't ready for it. Tell them you tried coaching me but I couldn't do it.” Someone knocked at the door. “Tell them to go away,” she said to me. “I can't do this.” She burst into tears.

Ana's administrative assistant stood outside the door, her eyes wandering behind me toward the slumped figure of her principal. “I think we're going to need a few uninterrupted hours,” I said to the older woman who had seen dozen of principals cycle through this high school.

I tossed out the trash, stacked up the books, and sat down opposite Ana. “I've let them down,” she sobbed. “Do you know how that feels? They know I'm from this community, they thought I could do something about all the problems, and now they see that I'm a failure.”

I let Ana talk for a while. I gave her space to cry and vent. Then I made a proposal: “I'm wondering if we could spend some time reviewing the work we've done together this year—going over the goals you established?”

“I haven't met those goals,” she said. “I'm miles away from them.”

“OK,” I said. “But I think we might be able to find some evidence that you're moving toward them. Let's just try it, OK? And then you can quit.” Ana smiled and nodded her head. Although I had been preparing for a midyear reflection, I was nervous that I wasn't quite ready. Oh well, I thought, sometimes you just have to trust that you're ready enough and it'll be OK. I knew this conversation needed to happen at that very moment if Ana was going to stop spiraling down.

Start out by celebrating the best in the situation because it allows us to fall in love with it, which connects us to our passion and emancipates the energy.

Dewitt Jones (2012)

Over three years have passed since this day. Ana has led her school through a transformation that no one believed could have been possible given her experience and the reality at the site when she took over. She often points to that January reflection in her first year as a principal as a pivotal moment in her career. This chapter describes what happened in that reflection and how a coach can use reflections to move coaching work forward. This chapter also explores how applying a systems lens approach can shift coaching from an individual professional development strategy to a transformational endeavor.

The Midyear and End-of-Year Reflection

There are times when a reflective process can be used as an intervention—as a cathartic, catalytic, and confrontational coaching strategy. This is how I used it with Ana on the day she was poised to turn in her resignation papers. But a midyear and end-of-year reflection can also serve many additional purposes: it can provide critical feedback for a coach on where a client is in her learning and how a coach needs to adjust her approach, it can help to redefine goals and actions plans for the subsequent period of work, and it can help to surface systemic questions that need to be addressed. This kind of a reflection is just good practice in the work of learning. By engaging our clients in it, we are modeling a practice that principals can do with their teachers and that teachers can do with students.

Following are the five basic steps to reaching a healthy and satisfying midyear or end-of-year reflection:

1. Review the work plan and coaching notes. The work plan (Chapter Three) is the starting point for these big reflections. A coach can prepare for this conversation by reviewing the client's SMARTE goals, the strategic activities that were intended to lead to meeting these goals, and the evidence and data that were identified as indicators of progress toward the goals.

   Throughout the months of coaching since this plan was created, the coach may have documented the journey in weekly or monthly reflections or reports. Ideally, the coach has a pile of notes that she can review to remember the details of what's happened and to look for indicators of growth. Exhibit 14.1 offers an example of a monthly report.

2. Reflect. As the coach reviews the work plan and coaching notes, the following questions can support reflection:
   • Which of the strategic activities did the coach and client do together? Which did the client and principal do alone?
   • What were the results of engaging in the strategic activities? How did they change the client's practice?
   • What evidence do we have of a change in practice?
   • Can we anticipate that the client will see evidence of these changes in practice? Is there evidence beyond what might be the client's self-reported belief that she's changed her practice?

• When has coaching felt most successful? When have we noticed the client experience a big “aha”? What does the coach think is the biggest “bright spot?”
• What's gotten in the way of coaching? What might need to be addressed, confronted, or dealt with in order for coaching to be more effective?
• What have we learned about how our client learns? About what changes her practice and which strategies are most effective? Do we tend to coach mostly through a cathartic or supportive approach? Do we engage mostly in activities—and if so, which kinds?
• In order for the client to meet her goal, does it seem like the same strategic activities need to be repeated? Do new activities need to be added? Are we spending enough time reflecting on the activities?
• Does the coach need to further scaffold the activities so that the client can engage in them alone? Are we ready to release more responsibility so that the client can be more autonomous in her learning?
• Which coaching strategies do we want to be sure to use regularly? Which ones do we want to try using more often?

It's important that as the coach reviews these questions and the data she's gathered, she is careful not to tumble into judgment or self-critical blame. It doesn't help if we start to beat ourselves up over what didn't happen, or if we get judgmental about what our client did or didn't do.

1. 3. Plan the coaching conversation. Once the coach has reviewed the plans and considered these questions, then she can design the conversation she'll have with her client. Although we spend time planning it, it's critical that this conversation is driven by the client. We might prepare some questions to pose and keep our reflections in mind, but then we'll let the client direct the conversation.

We'll come to the meeting with the work plan in hand and lay it out on the desk. We'll ask the client many of the same questions that we reflected on, but phrased slightly differently. These can include the following:

• Which of these strategic activities felt useful to you?
• What evidence would you cite that indicates a change in your practice? How do you know you're making progress toward your goals?
• What do you feel good about in terms of your growth this semester (or this year)? What learning do you feel has been most powerful? When have you felt a big “aha”?
• Which changes in practice or learnings do you feel have positively affected students? What do you think has made a big difference to them? How do you know that your learnings positively affected them?
• What's gotten in the way of doing some of these activities that we'd planned on doing? Are they activities that you'd still like to try? That you think would be helpful? Or are they activities we need to let go of? Are there other things you think we should do that would be helpful?
• What's been hard about engaging in coaching?
• What could I do that would make it more effective for you?
• Is there any feedback you'd like to give me about how I'm working with you?

As I plan this reflective conversation, I engage in the same kind of thinking and writing as I described in Chapter Thirteen: I consider where my client needs this conversation to go and who I need to be in it. I try to anticipate how she'll respond, what might come up for her, and how I'll react.

1. 4. Determine the when and where of the conversation. Ideally, it's best if the coach can make an agreement ahead of time with the client about when the midyear and end-of-year reflections will take place. This allows the client to ensure that the logistical factors are in place so that they won't be interrupted. Sometimes this conversation is nice to have outside of the regular meeting place—in a café, an outdoor setting, or just in another part of the school, but it's important that this conversation be private and not interrupted. Furthermore, if the client gets advance notice about the conversation, she'll often start to reflect on the work you've done together. Anticipating it will prime the client's mind.

Sometimes it's hard to find time for this conversation: everything else feels so urgent and there's so much to talk about. The coach or the client can subtly resist this stage in the coaching cycle—but the coach must insist. I've framed it this way: “Next week when we meet I'd like to discuss our work together so far this year. I want to look back at the goals we set and consider where we are in meeting them. This is a really important part of coaching and I think it will feel really satisfying to you—you'll recognize how much you've learned and grown this year. We're going to need a couple hours of uninterrupted time.” I want my clients to look forward to this conversation.

1. 5. Engage the client in the reflective conversation. Hopefully, most of the time we'll be prepared and we'll settle into a conversation which will yield insights, positive feelings, and ideas about where to go next. To illustrate how this conversation can flow, I'll go back to Ana, the principal who was quitting in late January when on the spur of the moment I decided to engage her in reflecting on our work. Fortunately, just the week before, I'd been reviewing our coaching in a conversation with my supervisor and I had a copy of the work plan in my bag.

Learning from experience is not inevitable. It must be intentional.

Roland Barth (2001, p. 65)

Ideally, a coach will have ample time to prepare for this conversation. A template for a midyear or end-of-year reflection can be found in Exhibit 14.2.

Midyear Reflection with Ana

I pulled out the work plan we'd developed in September and spread its five pages across Ana's desk. “Let's start with looking at the goals,” I said. I quickly drew circles with a yellow highlighter pen around the boxes with the goals. Ana had set goals in three areas; each goal had several components.

She was quiet for a few minutes. I stayed in the silence, refraining from asking questions. “Wow,” she said, shaking her head. “I sure set a lot of goals. What was I thinking?”

“Tell me more about that,” I said, hoping to invite Ana into a deeper reflection on where she was in the first month of her first year as a principal.

“Well, these were totally unrealistic. I was so naïve about what I was getting into. When I interviewed here, the superintendent told me this place had a toxic staff culture, I knew what the test scores were, and I was aware of the problems in the community. How did I imagine I could do all of this?”

“So what were you thinking?” I asked.

“I guess I wanted to set ambitious goals. I felt confident, I felt clear about what needed to happen, and I wanted to model that I wasn't going to be timid about taking on a major challenge.”

“Who needed to see or hear that from you? Who did you do that for?”

Ana's posture straightened, her shoulders dropped. “For me,” she said. “That's how I have always taken on big challenges. I tell myself I can do it, I set audacious goals, and then I communicate these intentions to others. So for me first. And then for my staff.”

I remembered that Ana had shared her leadership goals with her teachers in their first month of school. She'd wanted to model being a reflective practitioner who was engaged in her own learning. “What effect do you think that had on your staff when you shared those goals?” I asked.

Ana chuckled. “They had never seen anything like it. I think they thought I'd never make it. Maybe they were right.” She paused. We sat in silence for a minute. “But maybe not—I think it gave me a way to push when I met with each teacher for their goal-setting conference.”

“Ana, do you remember when we set these goals and I expressed some concern about how many you had and whether they were realistic?” She nodded. “Remember how we also prioritized them?” Again, she nodded. “Let's start with a close look at the one that was your top priority and consider which of the strategic actions we've engaged in.”

Ana's top priority was to address the staff's approach to discipline which resulted in the school having the highest suspension rates in the district. African American males were disproportionately suspended at rates of twice their counterparts. When Ana had visited the school the previous spring and spoken to the outgoing principal, she'd been told that teachers threw kids out of class for any minor reason. Ana knew that it would be impossible to improve student achievement if she didn't start with this issue.

“When you look at this goal and these activities that we determined might help you reach it, what do you think?” I asked.

“The first thing that comes to mind is that this was the right goal to prioritize. If there's one hill I am ready to die on, it's this one—you can't throw your kids out of class. I got a lot of push-back from staff on this, they have complained that I don't understand how hard the kids are, but I know I'm on the right track with this.”

“That's great,” I affirmed. “To recognize that you still feel your priority was the right one.”

“But I haven't been able to do all of these things,” Ana said as she marked checks and Xs next to the strategic actions.

As we reviewed what had and hadn't been done yet, Ana recognized that many of the barriers to getting the work done were beyond her control. The data was surprisingly hard to come by—the tracking systems were ineffective, incomplete, and hard to access. She'd only been able to convince two teachers to join the culture and climate team, and these two were anxious about playing a leadership role and possibly alienating their colleagues. There were fewer hours for professional development with teachers than Ana had anticipated—there were so many operational issues to address that time was always cut short.

Several of the strategic activities had been accomplished—a new referral form was in use in every classroom, we'd been able to share some data analysis with staff and they had been concerned about what they'd seen, and we'd visited some neighboring schools where restorative justice practices were in use and effective.

As we reflected on why some of the activities hadn't been done, Ana named a number of other leadership actions that she felt she'd been taking that we hadn't identified when we'd created her plan. “It's the conversations I have all the time with teachers and staff members that are so important,” she said. “I'm constantly listening to them and then pushing them to think about what they are doing and what they believe about students. I don't think that they were ever challenged in this way before, and I think that many of them are actually receptive to me.”

I agreed. I'd noticed Ana talking to her teachers on several occasions about how they could manage student disruptions in a way that deescalated the behavior and that ultimately kept kids in class. I shared my observations with Ana and she smiled, thanking me.

I wanted to keep pointing out what Ana had done well, how much she had done and the data that indicated that her leadership was resulting in teachers changing their practices and in changes for students. I knew that referral numbers had plummeted since the new system had gone into effect, that student attendance was improving and that other indicators showed that the school was moving in a positive direction. But I also knew that in this conversation Ana had to identify her actions and the positive indicators by herself. I knew that that was the only way she'd authentically feel ownership over her accomplishments.

Slowly we continued reflecting on the previous months of work—what had happened, what was the impact, what hadn't happened, why hadn't it happened. And then, what might need to happen next. I recognized that Ana was ready to engage in this part of the conversation when she started talking about wanting to share her midyear reflection with her staff. “I shared my goals with them in the beginning of the year, and I'm going to have midyear reflections with each teacher on their goal soon, so I guess I could move toward that by sharing my own midyear progress toward goals.”

I smiled and nodded my head.

“Well,” Ana said, as if anticipating my question, “I guess I'm not going to quit.” She stood and opened the blinds behind her desk. I hadn't seen them open in weeks and the low January sun streamed through the window. Her office looked out onto the corner of an intersection where three weeks before there had been a drive-by shooting. The sidewalk was still covered in melted wax from the dozens of candles that had burned in memory of the twenty-two-year-old who was killed. “I'm not going to be another person to give up on this community,” she said.

“So what do you want to do next?” I asked. “Where are we in this plan?”

“I still don't think these are too many goals,” she said. “But I think these goals are going to take me two or three years, realistically.”

“Ok, so what do you want to be absolutely sure you've done by June? What has to happen?” We spent a while determining what that should be—refining one goal, narrowing it, and identifying the indicators we could look for in the next few months that would reflect progress toward meeting the goal.

Throughout our conversation I'd been taking notes. “Before we finish, Ana, I want to go review what you have done this semester—what you've done well and which leadership actions you successfully took. Is that OK?”

“Sure,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. Ana was ambitious and energetic, and she also was uncomfortable with public appreciation or receiving praise.

I'd been compiling a list of actions that she'd named as effective and I read back my notes. “You began to share data that hadn't ever been explicitly shared with staff and you shared it in a way that made many curious and concerned. You engaged in daily conversations about how to help students to manage their behavior, stay in class and learn—and teachers are now coming to you for advice, recognizing you as a support. You inspired two teachers to take leadership and share your commitment to reversing this data trend …” I continued reflecting back what I'd heard. Ana nodded her head, looking at a distant point over my shoulder. When I finished the list, I added my own commentary, “And you are a first year principal! I know you've worked almost seven days a week, ninety hours a week, for six months! Can you own what you've done? Can you feel good about it?”

“There's so much more to do,” Ana said.

“I know. There will be so much more for a long time. But can you own your accomplishments?”

“Yes,” she said. “I can see how much I've done, how much has started to change.” Ana leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.

“Great.” I said. “Let's wrap up for today and then next week we'll take a few more steps forward in the direction you want to go.”

Even the smallest victory is never to be taken for granted. Each victory must be applauded.

Audre Lorde (1984)

As I left the school that day, the administrative assistant caught me in the hallway. “Is she quitting?,” she asked.

“No,” I responded. “She's just tired.”

“Oh, thank God,” said the elderly woman. “She's the best we've had in a long time. I don't want to see her go. I'll bring her lunch tomorrow; I know she never eats.”

“I'm sure she'd love that,” I said.

The Midyear Reflection

I've always found that the midyear reflection feels like it couldn't have happened any sooner, but also couldn't wait another week. It's a pivotal moment in a year—reflecting on what's gone well and adjusting our course of action. Even when the work hasn't gone where we want it to go or the reflective conversation is challenging, by the end the client and I are usually much clearer on what needs to happen next.

What gets measured gets done. What gets measured and fed back gets done well. What gets rewarded gets repeated.

John E. Jones (1996, p. 155)

It's not uncommon to discover that one or more of the goals we'd set hasn't been addressed at all or that another area of work has surfaced as a necessary focus. In such cases, we can cross out a goal and create a new one. Sometimes we discover that we'd articulated too many goals—which I usually frame as good news: the client had high expectations of herself. I want to make sure the client recognizes all the factors that detracted from focusing on the goals—there are always plenty of reasons why we had less time to do what we'd hoped.

The End-of-Year Reflection

At the end of the year, we engage our client in a similar reflective process. At this time we might be planning for the next year or wrapping up coaching work. You can follow the same process and use the same prompts as you did with the midyear. This can be another opportunity for reflection, and acknowledging growth and success.

At this point, a challenge that a coach might encounter is a client who has accomplished little of what he'd set out to accomplish and who somehow blames the coach. This is more common if the client did not willingly engage with the coach—perhaps he'd been mandated to work with a coach. He might try to turn some of the lack of success onto the coach, saying things like, “Oh, remember when you were going to come and do a model lesson for me and then it didn't happen? I couldn't teach that writing unit because you didn't do it for me.” A coach needs to be prepared for such a scenario and make sure she manages her own emotions. In this case, it's useful for the coach to have solid records on what happened in this coaching relationship—did the client cancel many appointments? Or cut them short? Did the client fail to undertake the actions he agreed to, which prevented the coach from taking others? The coach needs to be prepared to share this data in a way that shifts responsibility back to the client.

“According to my records,” the coach can say, “we were only able to meet twice in January, once in February, once in March, and not at all in April. In May we met twice but you wanted to talk about test-taking strategies. Our original agreement was that we'd meet weekly. I also noted that in April, when I was scheduled to model a lesson, you were absent. I think the reason we haven't met these coaching goals is because we haven't met enough. Do you see this another way?”

The coach can then continue using a confrontational approach to ask the client to respond to this data. “Coaching requires time. And I'm wondering if you'd rather not engage with coaching any more. If you do, you will need to make time for it.”

Data from the midyear and end-of-year reflections are sometimes shared with a client's supervisor—with permission, of course. What can be shared is the progress toward goals and the changes in practice. Principals want and need to know this information about those they supervise and it's important for them to receive reports when coaching is resulting in change. However, this can be tricky if the client has avoided coaching or is not making growth. In these cases, the coach needs to negotiate what is shared and how it is communicated; we also want to share the intervening factors that prevented coaching from progressing.