Educational Leadership has, for too long, depended upon generic leadership models which are not driven by the same sense of moral purpose which guides the educational leader, nor do these models take account of education's distinctive traits and idiosyncrasies which make educational leadership such a unique process. The Seven Sides of Educational Leadership sets out to provide the educational leader with a set of tools with which they can make sense of their complex world and then successfully lead educational change. The approach is founded upon the fact that people’s mental models, or personal theories, govern their practice. Most people represent these models through their personal choice of metaphor, e.g. leadership as war, politics, architecture, etc. The Seven Sides of Educational Leadership challenges some of these mental models by introducing a series of inter-connected metaphors thereby influencing the practice and effectiveness of the leader. The model seeks to enable the leader to create an educational community which harnesses the collective intelligence of all its members, in this way it challenges the traditional perspective of “…the leader thinks and the led act” By promoting the exchange of information between people at all levels it produces a very flexible organisation where people create, accept and adapt new ideas all geared towards improving practice and associated outcomes. changing the metaphor – changes the theory – changes the practice
Seven Sides of Educational Leadership © Don Ledingham 2006
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