Shared Leadership and Ownership

Most schools in the United States have not yet been designed toward the purpose of developing individual, whole children, given their unique strengths and needs. Therefore, for most schools, designing toward a whole-child purpose will require transformation, not simply tinkering around the edges of existing systems. Research on school transformation shows that effective shared leadership and ownership facilitates this type of change in schools, as all staff are empowered to drive toward meaningful, shared goals.

The spirit of shared leadership and ownership goes beyond defined or formalized leadership roles in schools. It encompasses a mindset of collective responsibility and strives to build a collective sense of efficacy among all stakeholders through inclusive decision making and capacity building. No singular person or group can lead sustainable, effective change in isolation. When leaders attempt top-down, high-control models for change, especially those that exclude, they risk reproducing and reinforcing inequitable systems, structures and outcomes. Exclusionary leadership also fails to create the types of environments in which adults thrive as empowered, active agents in their own learning and development. Redesigning and leading whole-child change efforts in shared, inclusive ways interrupts historical patterns of power and control and mirrors the positive context we seek to create for students.

---Split---Effective shared leadership and ownership also honors the highly relational aspects of how change happens. Engaging in transformational change is different from the implementation of a program or adoption of a set of technical best practices. Improvement science’s rapid cycles of learning, planning, reflecting and doing require individuals to participate in highly relational activities (e.g., sharing resources, seeking out new ideas, having critical conversations, reflecting on mistakes, collaborating on challenges, leveraging the expertise of others, etc.). Essentially, adult learning and development is also integrated. One cannot separate the change effort from the people engaging in it. Therefore, as schools work toward achieving comprehensive, holistic student outcomes, trusting relationships among staff must be explicitly cultivated. Fostering a sense of belonging among adults not only buffers occupational stress, but also promotes job satisfaction, well-being and engagement in shared beliefs, mindsets and goals — all necessary conditions for engaging in continuous improvement efforts.

How Change Happens

The work of aligning with a whole-child purpose provides district and school leaders with a distinct opportunity to use improvement science as a tool for advancing equity in education. When leaders engage in effective shared leadership and ownership practices, they utilize the best of what we know from continuous improvement science while simultaneously acknowledging and disrupting patterns of oppression that often manifest in traditional, top-down change leadership and management practices. 

For example, research shows change is best facilitated through inclusive, iterative cycles of learning and improvement as opposed to rigid, linear implementation plans (Valdez et al., 2020; Park et al., 2013). For many leaders, this aspect of continuous improvement is different from the ways we were conditioned to think change happens or often encouraged to behave. 

Without an explicit commitment to equitable, inclusive processes for change, continuous improvement efforts are not inherently equitable (Valdez et al., 2020; Park et al., 2013) and can reproduce or perpetuate inequitable outcomes for students, families, communities, and teachers. 

While every whole-child aligned continuous improvement effort will depend on the unique context of the school community and no effort will follow perfect, linear steps, leaders engaging in this work can expect to spend time grounding in a shared understanding of whole-child design, identifying aligned improvement ideas, iterating on those improvement ideas, and looking back at successes and challenges to inform action in the future. 

In addition, as leaders take bite-sized action toward whole-child aligned change, they can engage in the following shared leadership and ownership practices to fortify their continuous improvement efforts: 

• Take frequent, repeated equity pauses 
• Include others in meaningful, authentic, ongoing ways 
• Intentionally build capacity for whole-child design over time 
• Center staff relationships and collaboration 

To get started, teams can surface their current understandings of what “continuous improvement” means and their existing mindsets about how change happens. They can identify what qualities of a continuous improvement effort could be used to promote or advance educational equity vs. reproduce or perpetuate inequitable outcomes for students, families, communities, and teachers. Finally, they can discuss commitments they can make in their own change initiatives to ensure that their continuous improvement efforts result in equitable outcomes. 

Key Takeaways:

Shared Leadership and Ownership is NOT:

• Defaulting to top-down, high-control models for change, even if the initiative is seen as high stakes, challenging or time consuming
• Reproducing inequitable structures and outcomes by hoarding decision-making power
• Providing tokenistic opportunities for input, feedback and participation in a change effort as opposed to partnering with others in authentic, inclusive, ongoing ways
• Using one-size-fits-all programs and initiatives, effectively erasing and ignoring the context, experience and expertise of others

Shared Leadership and Ownership IS:

• Supporting shared commitment to and responsibility for a whole-child purpose and goals
• Including and valuing the expertise, skills and experiences of others, especially those most proximal to the challenges and problems to be solved
• Embodying a continuous, multidirectional, multidimensional view of change
• Empowering others to make decisions, engage in collaborative problem solving, and engage in collective learning and development
• Creating environments for adults that are physically, emotionally and identity safe
• Fostering trust-filled relationships and a sense of belonging among adults