ePortfolio Initiative-Strategy for Execution
Change is the process or act of becoming different. Becoming different can apply to various life situations from jobs, to school, to friends, to geographic location, to routines, to foods, and even clothing. In some instances, change can be exciting and exhilarating, but in many cases it makes us nervous and reluctant. Why would experiencing something new make us long for the old? It seems quite silly when you think about it, but people have been that way since the beginning of time. I believe the largest contributor to our innate hesitation is: change is hard! No one wants to struggle; we all long for life to be one long, smooth-sailing and happy adventure.
When it comes to the struggle for a harmonious environment, there are few others more important to an individual than their work setting. When things are humming along, there is nothing more alarming than finding that your supervisor wants to change things up. Why would they try to fix something that is going well? It doesn’t make any sense to some, but organizational leaders know that you can’t keep doing the same thing and expect a new result or growth to happen.
This is especially true with regard to the rapid advances in technology we have experienced over the last decade. The old paper and pencil methods are going away, and the world population is becoming paperless and digital in nature. The embracement of this digital movement is a necessary and vital component of future successes for people everywhere, but it can be difficult to find the time and energy to convert lifestyles and adopt change due to the “whirlwind” (Covey, 2012, p.24).
The Whirlwind is a significant factor in limiting strategy execution since it can be all-consuming at times. The daily obstacles we face as professionals in our organizations often overshadow our ultimate goals for change. As a teacher, the demands of planning, grading, managing student behavior, meetings or phone conversations with parents, testing, teacher evaluations, and staff meetings leave little time for the creation and setting of new goals for my classroom or my District. As a result, I often work in the evenings and on the weekends from home when trying to implement something new. In addition to the challenges I face on campus, I also have central office looking over my shoulder from an instructional perspective. This limits the amount of change I can make since I must adhere to District guidelines and expectations for curriculum design. As a result, new organizational initiatives must be facilitated very carefully.
4DX recommends “narrowing your focus” to compensate for the whirlwind (Covey, 2012, p.24). This means you must center on fewer goals beyond the realm of the daily requirements of your job to increase your opportunities to achieve the things you are envisioning for your organization. If a person has ten implementation plans on the table, he or she will be stretched too thin and achievement will be limited. Focusing on one specific “WIG” (Covey, 2012, p.24) allows those vested in the ideal to have a clear vision in sight when times allows for expansion on the idea.
Once you have this groundbreaking “WIG” in mind, what do you do next? How do you most effectively push this one “wildly important goal” out to your team and gain their support? Luckily, Sean Covey has devised a strategy to help those of us who are struggling to implement organizational change: The 4 Disciplines of Execution (2012). These disciplines are invaluable to the success of bringing change to your home-away-from-home; they are also ideals I will be leaning on to bring my ePortfolio initiative to Boerne ISD. But first, before I get into the nuts and bolts of 4DX, I want discuss the stages I expect my organization to move through as we work to change the processes for our instructional strategies.
The Five Stages of Change
1. Getting Clear--Recent discussions in the workplace regarding the implementation of my innovation plan have resulted in puzzled, what-the-heck looks. Fortunately, the "getting clear" (Covey, 2012) stage of change will allow me to both educate my employees and give them opportunities to weigh in on planning for the process. To get us well on our way, I am proposing we walk through the steps below as a team:
-
Introduce ePortfolios and train select staff (begin with secondary English) to build
their own during my summer technology B.L.A.S.T. presentation.
-
Recruit teachers from the PD session (at least one per campus) to participate in my
work session.
-
Develop one clear-cut WIG for the 2017-18 school year.
-
Determine lead and lag measures.
-
Design a scoreboard.
-
Hold regular WIG meetings to measure progress.
2. Launch--This part of the process will be the most exciting and fun to kick off if we play our cards right. We will push the ePortfolio initiative out to the classrooms using the following procedures:
-
We will roll out our ePortfolio initiative early in the year via a pilot group.
-
Student experts will be trained to help with peer technical issues.
-
Teacher support will be offered by our ePortfolio cadre and instructional technology staff.
-
Weekly cadre meetings will be held to discuss wins and area of opportunity.
3. Adoption--The adoption piece of pushing out the initiative will most likely be the most challenging of them all. During this phase, ongoing training, support, and follow through will be key. To help maintain our focus during this phase, I recommend the interventions listed below:
-
Identify struggling teachers and arrange for support during instructional hours.
-
Make classroom visits to check for compliance.
-
Identify reluctant teachers and arrange meetings to find ways to help them.
-
Track progress on the score board.
-
Conduct follow up training to answer questions and set new goals for implementation.
4. Optimization--During our weekly cadre meetings, the members will share success stories, new things they've learned, and scoreboard stats. Progress toward my innovations plan will be recognized and measured as follows:
-
Teachers who exemplify new innovative strategies or above average implementation success will showcase their achievements in the meetings, and offer helpful hints for others.
-
Once goals have been realized by certain teachers, their efforts will be recognized and rewarded.
5. Habits--In this stage of the change process, we should see and celebrate small victories as they take place. However, we are not going to give up and let our momentum down; new WIGs will be created and set when our initial WIG has evolved into a successful initiative.
-
Successful innovators will be recognized and celebrated at end-of-the-year campus luncheons.
-
Data from the first year of the ePortfolio initiative will be compiled and presented to all stakeholders at the last board meeting of the year.
-
Summer staff development will planned for both new teachers and those who struggled with implementation during the initial trial.
-
The ePortfolio cadre will hold an end-of-year meeting to create new WIGs for the next school year.
Installing 4DX in Boerne ISD
Our Scoreboard
The Partnership Between the Influencer Model and 4DX
After working through the Influencer Model (Grenny 2013) last week and the Four Disciplines of Execution during the current week, I now understand the importance of implementing both models when trying to make an organizational change. The Influencer Model focuses more on making connections with the teachers and getting them ready to make a change, whereas, the 4DX Model helps to outline a plan of attack for implementing the innovation plan. I don't see a way an organization could lean on one or the other because the influence side of things needs to addressed, or we won't have anything to measure. Our employees will need to buy in and receive training, or they won't have the necessary skills to implement the things we are asking them to facilitate in their classrooms. But after teacher training, comes the big question, "How are we going to roll out the changes?" The answers are found within 4DX. In conclusion, I believe these two books are the perfect marriage for organizations to follow as they try to innovate and recreate their organization. I wonder what would happen if the two authors worked together to compile their ideals within one cover. It might be the ultimate solution many businesses have been in search of.
References
Animated heaven. (n.d.). Plan [Think, plan, act]. Retrieved November, 2016, from https://pixabay.com/en/plan-do-act-check-system-workflow-1725510/
Bykst. (2015, October 12). Board [Old way, new way]. Retrieved May 6, 2017, from https://pixabay.com/en/board-arrow-shield-note-change-978179/
Caspar. (n.d.). Keep the Score. Retrieved from https://keepthescore.co/
Cliker Free Vector Images. (2014, July 29). Twister [Digital image]. Retrieved May 7, 2017, from https://pixabay.com/en/twister-tornado-typhoon-spiral-303892/
Geralt. (2017, January). Woman [Woman, clock, digital icons]. Retrieved from https://pixabay.com/en/woman-face-clock-city-%E2%80%8B%E2%80%8Bskyline-1829506/
Grenny, J. (2013). Influencer: The new science of leading change. New York: McGraw-Hill.
McChesney, C., Covey, S., & Huling, J. (2012). The 4 disciplines of execution: Achieving your wildly important goals. New York: Free Press.
PDPics. (2014, July 5). Strategy [Magnifying glass over dictionary]. Retrieved May 6, 2017, from https://pixabay.com/en/strategy-magnifier-magnifying-glass-390308/
Ricinator. (2017, January). Target [Digital image]. Retrieved May 7, 2017, from https://pixabay.com/en/target-bull-s-eye-archery-middle-1958651/
Westfallen, H. (2012, September 2). Hot air balloon [Digital image]. Retrieved from https://pixabay.com/en/hot-air-balloon-balloon-sky-1579135/