Worried about keeping your top talent?

Desire to build on the talent you have?

This research article was shared with me from a mentor on why organization’s are losing their top talent.

In this quick lesson I share multiple solutions for any leader to begin building their High Performance Culture.

Click Here to Download the Article

Raising Your Awareness,

Dr. Tom

I believe what is appreciated appreciates. And in turn, was is depreciated, depreciates. 

Here is what I mean. 

One of the services my company provides is facilitating climate surveys and exit interviews for  schools.

I was reading through the notes from one school and saw this response from a departing teacher.   

“When I turned in my resignation letter no one from the administrative team came to talk to me. I felt devalued as an employee.”  

It made me think about my practices as a school leader. 

How do I treat people? Do they feel appreciated around me? Or depreciated? 

I know that I have definitely avoided many rooms and halls of staff who turned in their resignation or who have been told they are not coming back.  

I am definitely guilty of not engaging some staff. 

I come up with excuses in my head. They don't want to talk to me. I am just glad they came today...terrible right?

But then I started to notice...

I don't believe people quit organizations. 

I believe people quit people. 

Here are some examples of why I quit jobs in the past. 

When I was a teacher I did not see a path for professional advancement from my principal and district. So I left for a charter school that showed me a two year plan to be the Director of Exceptional Children during my interview as a Special Education teacher. 

When I was a Grants and Special Projects Leader at a University I wanted to travel to local school systems and assist principals and utilize my skills as a trainer, I left because the Dean shut down all travel and asked me to "just do research".

When I was a middle school director of a charter school I wanted to was not considered for the head of school position by my superintendent, I left to become a state wide consultant for the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) that provided me a platform to be more and do more. 

When I was at DPI after three years my boss said to...

Hello my friend, 

My grandmother recently turned 90 years old.

She was and still is such an integral part of my life. She practically raised me when my single Mom would work long hours when I was a child. 

In fact, I was telling my son Matthew that every summer, from five to eleven years old, I would fly down to Florida on my own and spend a month with my grandparents. I told them a story about this giant banana tree that every year I would get my picture taken in front of. I shared stories about swimming and fishing in the lake outback. And how my Grandfather loved to sit on the swing every night and watch the sunset. 

We would finish our summers by driving across the country with their pop-up camper. I got to see the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone National Park, Mount Rushmore and the Baseball Hall of Fame all before I was ten years old. 

Maybe this is why "Living like a tourist" is one of my five goals in life. 

I had not seen her for over a year due to...

Over the summer 30 teachers across the state participated in our Teacher Leadership Consortium, an eight week program focused on teachers learning how to become a greater influence in their school. The teachers learned how to best lead their peers through communication and connecting with people, the foundations of coaching, lead effective meetings, listening, and how to deal with difficult people. During one of the sessions I asked them about what are some of the challenges they face in regards to their school culture and their principal. I pulled out these four common complaints the teachers had. Be sure you don’t break these!

1. Cancel key meetings: Let’s be clear here, not all teachers hate when meetings are cancelled. However, when a key meeting is scheduled (i.e. school improvement meetings, critical professional development sessions and 1:1 conferences) and cancelled, they gradually lose interest in being part of these critical teams moving forward. Especially if...