EPISODE #348

Hey, Builders. Before we begin today's episode, I wanna tell you about Coaching Week. Coaching week starts Sunday, January 25th. So in just a few days, if you're listening to this in real time, and I wanna tell you why, you need to be there, we are doing something in coaching week that we've never done before. We're gonna be helping you get a vision. So I will be there live every single night, not only teaching you how to create your own 100% vision, but coaching you individually. So everybody that comes will get some time for me to help them create their 100% vision. This is something that we usually only do inside of Buildership University. And now we are making it available for one time only just so that we can help you get your 100% vision.

And here's what changes. When you get your 100% vision, all of a sudden you have clarity. All of a sudden you have a way to make decisions that feels right. You're not going on gut and vibes. You're not going off of what everybody else is trying to get you to do. Instead, you can make good decisions and feel really good about making those decisions. And when you have your 100% vision, your school stands out. You're not the generic school that everybody else is. You're different. So all you need to do is go to buildershipuniversity.com coaching week and sign up now.

It's $37 because we only want people who are serious. That's $37 is not. In no way it's going to cover the expense of everything. You get a workbook that's like almost 40 pages long that you get to keep. You're getting all kinds of stuff. So it's not. It's. The $37 is for people who are serious. Because I want you to show up. I want you to show up every single night and do the work. It's four days, so it's going to go Sunday to Wednesday, one hour a day. And by the end of that, you are going to have your 100% vision again. Buildershipuniversity.com coachingweek and now on with the show.

You're listening to the School Leadership Reimagined podcast, episode 348. How do builders like us make a dramatic difference in the lives of our students in spite of all the obstacles we face? How do you keep your vision for your school from being held hostage by resistant teachers, uncooperative parents, ridiculous district policies, or a lack of time, money or resources? If you're facing those challenges right now. Here is where you'll find the answers, strategies, and actionable tips you need to overcome any obstacle you face. You don't have to wait to make a difference in the lives of the people you serve. You can turn your school into a success story right now with the people and resources you already have. Let's get started. Hey, builders.

Welcome to another episode of the School Leadership Reimagined podcast. 

I'm your host, Robin Jackson, and today I want to talk about a question that a lot of people have been asking me lately. And I get it. So let's talk about it. And the question is this. What's the big deal about having a vision? Now you hear me talk all the time about vision, and it's not sexy. You know, when I talk about PLCs, everybody's like, oh, yeah, give me some of that. When I talk about tier one instruction, everybody's like, yeah, give me some of that. When I talk about vision. Crickets.

And I used to get really, really frustrated by this, because vision is everything, right? I almost feel kind of crazy talking about vision sometimes because it's such a game changer, and I'm so passionate about it because I have seen it change hundreds of schools when you get your 100% vision and everything changes. So sometimes I feel funny about even talking about vision because people don't care. Everybody thinks they have a vision. And so I want to talk about that today and why that is and what is really the big deal about vision? Why am I talking about vision so much? Don't tune out. I promise you, if you stay tuned and hear this episode, you're going to hear some. Because I've been thinking about this a lot.

You'll hear some reasons that maybe I haven't even shared before, but they're really, really important. So let's talk about it. So the first. The first thing that happens is that when I talk about 100% visions, a lot of people think they have one or think that they can just take some random goal that their district set for them and put 100% in front of it, and now they have 100% vision. So people will say things like, you know, oh, yeah, well, I have a hundred. I have a vision. I have a vision. But let me ask you a question. If you were to read your school's vision, and then you would just go look up three other schools like yours and read their vision statements, could you tell the difference between yours and theirs? And I'm guessing if you don't have a true 100% vision. The answer is no, right? Because most vision, as I talked about in the last episode, most visions are borrowed.

They're borrowed from what the district wants. They're borrowed from some training you've gone to. They've borrowed from a committee. They're not really your vision. They're not yours, right? The first reason why 100% vision is such a big deal is because it takes your school from being generic to being unique, different. It helps you and your school to stand out, right? If you look around, most people's vision statements stay the same. I used to talk about playing vision statement bingo. You know, all of the catchphrases that are going to be in the vision, all the edgy babble that's going to be in the vision. One of the things we're going to be doing during coaching week is we have an edgy babble detector to help you kind of of get the edgy babble out of your vision.

And one of the bonus resources that I just created for the book is a way to translate edubabble. So when you say 21st century skills, what does that really mean? When you say rigor, what does that really mean? When you say sel, what does that really mean? Because we're throwing around a lot of words that we assume people know what they mean and they don't. Everybody walks in with a different meaning. Like, I challenge you right now. Ask three different people on your staff, what is rigor or what is SEL or what is 21st century skills? Or, you know, all the things that we say. Take one of those terms. Ask three different people, and I guarantee you, you're going to get varying definitions of it.

I used to do this all the time when I did a rigor workshop. 

I would start out the workshop by saying, what is rigor? And everybody would be all proud of themselves, right? They'd be raising their hand, oh, rigor is this and rigor is that. And they were all wrong, right? Because they were all just rec what they had been taught about rigor, but it wasn't real. It wasn't alive in their classrooms. And so that's why a lot of you have such a hard time giving teachers feedback, because you're giving teachers feedback using the same edu babble that they're using, but there are all these different definitions. So you might go into a classroom and say, hey, there is not enough student voice in this classroom.

And the teacher's like, what do you mean? I called on five students. I did have student voice. They had multiple choice options. I gave them a menu for what they could do. So your idea of student voice. Their idea of student voice, totally different. I see this with differentiated instruction. You go in a classroom and say, my teachers aren't differentiating. And when teachers are saying I am differentiating, I have a high, medium, low, or whatever it is. That always happens when we have edubabble. So imagine you having a vision full of edubabble, full of these terms of art that we use that have been used so much that we've robbed them of their meaning.

Imagine having a vision full of that and expecting that vision to drive your work. It can't. It can't. You. Every time you say that vision, everybody hears something different from what you meant. And so that's the first reason that 100% vision is so valuable and meaningful, because it's really clean and clear. When I say 100% of second graders will be at or above grade level in reading and math, there is no ambiguity there. There is. It's 100%. Right. So no excuses for different kids. It's, you know, at or above grade level. That can be. That's quantifiable. And it's by, you know, like by the time they get to second grade.

So at the end of second grade, we do a test. Are they above grade level or at grade level? Yes or no? It's very binary, right? So when you have that kind of clarity, everybody knows what they're working towards. And so you don't have the ambiguity. You don't have all the arguments about, are you doing it, Are you not doing it? It's clean. It's also clean for you and it keeps you accountable. Right. If I know that that's what I'm looking for, I'm not going to start hedging and playing with the numbers. I don't have a way to let myself off the hook or make excuses.

And it forces me to choose strategies that are gonna get me there so I don't have time to waste on other stuff. It gives me clarity. It gives me focus. And once I have that clarity and focus, the work gets more clear. The work gets more focus. When I go into work every day, I know what to do. I'm not getting distracted. My teachers aren't getting distracted. What are we doing? This. That's it. And so it helps me make clean decisions. Will it get the second grade gets to at above grade level by second grade or won't it? If. No, we're not doing it. If the district comes to Me with sort of crazy, you know, I shouldn't call it crazy. 

Districts make decisions based on what they think is right. 

But a district comes to me with something that's not aligned with my vision, I have a good way to defend my vision. I have a good way to. To be able to respectfully push back or if I don't want that smoke, I have a good way to take what the district is asking me to do and transform it to something that's going to serve my kids. So my vision becomes a district translator. The district says, hey, I want everybody. You know, you need you to do three classrooms a day, walkthroughs. Right? Okay. I'm not gonna just be randomly dropping into classrooms and making everybody mad.

I have a system and a reason for coming into classrooms. I'm looking to see, is this work getting kids at or above grade level or after second grade, keeping them at or above grade level? So you see the difference. When I have a vision that is clear, that doesn't have that edgy babble, it takes away all of that stuff that's getting in the way of us all being on the same page, that the vision, the clarity of that 100% vision helps us to be on the same page. So that's the first reason why it's really important. Now, here's the second one. You may not even realize this one. This is the one that I don't talk about a lot because as educators, we don't like to talk about this. Right. Having 100% vision sets you apart from your colleagues. It really does. In a good way. Right.

So we often joke inside of you that being a builder makes you a bit of a weirdo, and we kind of embrace that term. But what it really does is makes you a bit of a rock star. The people who do this work stand out. The moment that you declare 100% vision, you're not like everybody else, and they're not like you. The moment you start working towards that 100% vision, you start outpacing everybody else in your district because they're still stuck in the tired old model, and you are now moving in a new model. And so those little tiny incremental gains, that's not your business anymore. You don't do that. You're doing strides because you're getting to 100%. And so because you're not doing incremental strategies, and Instead you're using 100% strategies because you're a builder now, you look different and people start noticing again. We don't like to talk about it. We want to say it's all about the kids, but let's be honest.

We're professionals and we have ambitions. And having that hundred percent vision sets you apart. It helps you to stand out. It also helps your school stand out because things look different in your school. And what does that mean? It means more people want to work with you. It means that your teachers are happier working in your school. Your school has an identity that is unique. We talk about this inside of bu. When you have a vision, a mission, and a core values, the intersection of your vision and your core values defines the identity that you have as a school. Right?

So when you have a vision, this is what we're building.

So 100% of our kids are going to have at least one college course by the time they graduate. Okay. That is a unique value proposition in the business world. That's what they call it. That is something that you are guaranteeing for every kid. That makes your school automatically unique. People know what your school is about. So when people, when everybody else is scrambling, trying to get teachers and ended up putting just warm boxes, bodies in front of kids, you are taking your time and you have a lot more options and choices because of all the places to work. The right people are gonna work at your school. They're gonna want to work for you. And word gets out at that school, this is what they're doing. So you begin to attract the right people to your school.

Your school stands out and your district takes notice because you start putting up scores. You start getting results that nobody else is getting. And I know that there have been times when people in BU have started this thing and they've gotten their 100% and they started working towards it. And we have a couple people where they didn't do anything else. They just got their vision and just really made that a part of their culture. And test scores skyrocketed. I'm talking about double digit gains in all categories to the point where they went from either the middle or in many cases the bottom of the pack to the top of the pack in their district. And so now all of a sudden, everybody's looking at them. What are you doing?

How are you getting these scores? Because you have drawn a line in the sand. A hundred percent helps you to be accountable. That's why you also can't borrow visions. I talked about borrow visions last time. It's also why you can't just borrow somebody else's 100% vision and then try to make it work because it has to be. It has to be something that is. That is in your heart. It has to be your vision. We spent a lot of time on this. Those of y' all who've worked with me, you know, I'm really funky about that tingle test. I'm like, mm, mm. That's not your vision.

We've done work sessions before where someone will be like, oh, yeah, here's my vision. I've been like, nope, that's not it. And I'll say, yes, it is, and they want to defend it. I was like, nope. And then we keep working, and we keep working, and it gets to a point where they say what they really want, and their whole demeanor changes. And it's so wild to watch, because when you actually find your vision, then everything about you changes. Their demeanor changes, their face changes. And what's been crazy is we have been seeing people who have come to, like the vision workshops in the past. They see other people go through it in real time. We have it on recording where we've seen people.

That's the moment. 

I'll say, there it is. That's what we've been looking for. And that's when we find your real vision, when it becomes yours. That's what makes you stand out. See, what makes you stand out doesn't mean you just grab a new language, right? And I see a lot of people doing it. It's very frustrating to me, right? They're like, oh, I have 100% vision. They say it, and there's no tangle because they're just parroting back to me what they've heard on this podcast or what they've heard in a workshop. The people who have gone through the process and really gone through the process the right way, and they come out with 100% vision. That's not borrow, but it's theirs. They say it, People say. They say it with their chest.

They say it with conviction. You see it, they change. And because of that, that's what makes you stand out, is that you have a vision that you really believe in. Not only do you believe in the value of the vision, you believe it can happen. That's what starts changing things. That's what having 100% vision is really about. It's not about just the words. It's about that. And that's why that part is so important. That's why we spe so much time helping you get a vision that you own. Because when you own it, it changes you. And once it changes you, you change everything around you. That's why you stand out. That's what people take notice of.

That's what makes the difference when people, when you have that 100% vision. And that's why so many people who try to just kind of borrow a vision from what they hear on this podcast or what they've read in the books that and call it 100% vision, they get frustrated because it doesn't work. Because they didn't do the work. They just substitute. I always say they leadered all over the buildership. They leadered all over it. They went about creating 100% vision the way that they went about creating the sorry vision that they already had. And so then they're surprised when a month later they're back into doing the other stuff. Because if you don't believe it with conviction, if you don't go through the process of taking your vision through the tingle test and not being satisfied until the vision passes the tingle test, you're not ready. You don't have 100% vision. But when you do, it changes you and people notice.

And that's what makes you stand out. It's not just that you have 100% vision, but it's that you, you fully embody what that means. You are not, you're not just a regular principal anymore, you are 100% principal. You're not just a regular department head anymore. You're 100% departmental head. And there is a difference in you and people see it. And that's what makes you stand out. That's what makes your school stand out. Because it changes the culture. It is so powerful. When you do it right, you can't just borrow a vision, you have to do it right.

That's the second reason why I think the vision is such a big deal.

Hey builders, real quick, before we get on with the rest of the episode, I want to talk to you about the 100% collective. If you are interested in becoming a builder and developing that 100% mindset, then the 100% collective is for you. Not only do we have monthly masterclass is live masterclasses where I show you how to take some work that you are already doing, but do it like a builder. Do it in a way that's more effective, more efficient, in a way that takes the work and stops it from being drudgery and makes it actually something that feels meaningful, that moves you forward. We also have done for you toolboxes with all the tools you need to be able to implement. And we have step by step playbooks that lay out the entire process for you, so you don't have to even think about it. You just take the playbook and you can implement it right away in your schools. And we have a supportive community. So this is a safe place where you can bring your challenges.

And there are other people, other builders just like you who are encouraging you, who are applauding you when you win, and who are giving you their experiences as well so that you can learn from each other. If you are tired of just kind of going through and doing the work the way you've always been doing it, and you're ready to stop being a leader and to start, start building something amazing, the 100% collective is where you need to be. Join us@brewershipuniversity.com community now. Back with the program. And that leads me to the third reason why I think your vision is such a big deal and why I talk about it all the time. This work is. I don't know. I found being an administrator very frustrating. I did not like it. I know I'm not supposed to say it because I talk to principals all the time. I know people who love it. I recognize that was me. What I'm doing now is what I should be doing, right?

But I see a lot of people who should be principals who love it, who are called to this work burn out because they don't have 100% vision. Because here's what happens when you have 100% vision. You. It helps you weather the storms. It helps you stay anchored in crisis. It helps you to not feel like every day when you go to work, all you're doing is listening to and trying to fix other people's problems. It helps you to be impervious to everybody else trying to drive your school. So I've been talking a lot online about are you leading somebody else's. See, when you don't have a 100% vision, you're leading somebody else's school. When your vision is borrowed and all the ways that it could be borrowed, you're leading somebody else's school.

It's not your school. Right. And here's how I know if every time you're ready to make a decision, that decision gets filtered through, well, what are the parents going to think or what are the teachers going to think, or what's the district going to think? It's not your school. All you're doing is. Is you are a placeholder for somebody else. Right? Your teachers are running your school. Your parents are running your school. The district is running your school. You're the person if you're the principal, you're the person who's supposed to be running that school. But how many of your decisions actually are truly your decisions? And also how many of your decisions actually get supported by everybody around you?

When you don't have a hundred percent vision, you leave yourself vulnerable to being put in a position where you are not leading your school. You are appeasing the people who really are. The hundred percent vision protects you from that. So if you ever feel like when you go to work, you know, no matter what you want to do, the parents are going to block it or the teachers are going to block it, or the district is going to block it, and so you feel like there are things that you really, really want to do, but you can't do it. And it's not even about permission. You just know that nobody's listening, everybody else's stuff. You might start out that way, and people might even nod and be like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then two weeks later, somebody's sabotaging it. Two weeks later, somebody else's agenda comes in and knocks you off your square. If that's how you feel, I promise you it's because you don't have 100% vision.

Once you have 100% vision, nobody can knock you off your square because 100% vision anchors you. 

I'll give you a real example. One of the principals inside of BU came, and when he started bu, he was kind of burned out, you know, and he thought the burnout was that he had been an educator for a long time. He had been in his school for six, seven years. And, you know, he's kind of saying, maybe I'm just getting bored and looking for a change. And so he thought that the burnout was the work. The burnout was, hey, it's post Covid. Everybody's burned out. Hey, I've been in this work too long, and maybe I need another change. And it wasn't until he got his 100% vision that he realized what the source of the burnout was.

You know what the source of the burnout was? It was that he became a principal because he wanted to make a difference. And all he was ever doing was just making other people happy, solving other people's problems and everybody else's agenda kept knocking his agenda further and further down the road. So if you find yourself saying, oh, I really want to do that this year, but. Or we'll get to it next spring, we weren't able to get to it this year, but next year for sure, or you know, I would do that, but if I do that, my teachers will kill me. They will just revolt. They just can't take another thing. Or I, you know, I'd like to do that, but my district won't support it. If you find yourself saying that, it's probably because you don't have 100% vision.

Now in those exact same circumstances, right? See, he got the 100% vision. This is what he said to me. So I like it feels different. He says, now when I make tough decisions, I can anchor it in the vision, and I don't get the pushback. I can go to the district and say, hey, yeah, about that thing, we're not doing that, but here's why. But then he has the data to back up his why he has the receipts. He's saying, we're focused on this. This is making the difference. I know you're trying to get us here, but we have a way to get there that's actually working. And he does it in a way that's respectful but firm.

And he can do it because he has a vision that anchors him and he wins. And he doesn't have to worry about appeasing the teachers, because the teachers are focused on the vision, too, because he's learned the vision story in that process. And so the teachers are on board. The teachers are protecting the vision. He doesn't have to worry about the parents, because when the parents come with a demand, he says, listen, here's our vision over here. I see what you're trying to do, but if we did this, it takes us away from our vision, our mission, and our core values. But I understand your concern. So let me show you how the vision solves. It changes everything. That's fourth. This is the fourth reason that you need a vision. And this one, I talk about it a lot inside of bu. I don't talk about it enough here on the podcast.

And I gotta change that, because it's really important. 

When you have a vision, your vision becomes the solution to the problem. So this is where I feel like a broken record sometimes, and I feel like I wish I had something more glamorous and sexy to give you, but I just don't because it's, you know, the boring stuff that works, right? So your vision is the solution to your problems. So your vision, your mission, core values, they function as a solution. They are the starting point. So anything that comes up, oh, we're having a lot of kids skipping this year, and what do we need to do about it? The answer's Gonna be in your vision, mission, and core values. You don't have to go look outside and find a program and do.

The answer is right there in front of you, right? We've got an attendance problem. Answers right there. We've got. We look, we just got our state scores back, and the kids have gone down instead of up and some of the benchmarks. And I'm worried now that maybe we're heading the wrong direction. The answer's in your vision. And so when you have a vision, the right one, one that is your conv. That. That. That you're truly convicted by one that you are, you believe in one that it's a hundred percent vision. The answer's in your vision. So you don't have to go looking for answers elsewhere anymore. You go back to your vision. And this makes decision making and problem solving so much more simple.

Because here's how it works. You know, we had a person in bu. Attendance was an issue. Kids were skipping. She's a high school principal, and so she's like, what do I do? They went back. Who are we? What's our vision? What's our mission? What are our core values? And where in those three things, what's missing? What's broken? What are we not doing? They tightened up that and then built a new attendance architecture. And now not only have they addressed the attendance issue, but the teachers are more firmly anchored in the vision, mission, and core values because they see how it can solve problems. We had another principal dealing with a district mandate. You know, like the district is saying, you gotta all do this thing.

And they were like, how are we gonna roll it out? The teachers don't have enough time. It's eaten up their planning time. I says, you're looking at logistics. What does your vision say? What's your mission? What are your core values? And she went there, and I said, so how do we implement this district mandate in a way that honors your vision, mission, and core value policies? And we found a way. And it didn't eat into teachers instructional time. It actually moved the vision forward. And when they did it, they were one of the only schools in a district who did the thing the district said was so important with fidelity.

And they did it without complaint. 

It served their agenda. Not just so they weren't just jumping through the district's hoops. They used it to serve their agenda. So their agenda kept moving forward. Your vision has the answer. If you have the right vision, then you can rely on it to point you in the right direction. When you don't Know what to do. What's your vision say? When you don't know how to solve a problem, what's your vision say? And if you get into that habit, there's no problem you can't solve. You stop stressing out every single time. The tide changes, and it changes all the time these days because you don't have to stress out because you've got a vision there.

So when people say to me, well, I mean, you know, I have a vision, or I don't need a vision right now. What I really need is get people in PLCs or, you know, all of that stuff, I realize they don't get it. They're still thinking like a leader in a leadership paradigm. Everything they're saying makes sense. But when you're a builder and you think differently, you realize that the solution to all of that is in your vision. So we're doing coaching week in a couple of days. Starts Sunday, January 25th. We're gonna go Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and we're gonna be help. I'm gonna coach you on how to get that kind of vision. Not just a random 100% vision.

You can do that on your own. You don't need coaching week for that, but how to kind of really dig through and think about what's right for you, for your school. What do you want? It's a very different process than probably you've ever experienced before, but it's deeply meaningful. And you walk out with a vision that. That you can anchor in. A vision that sets you and your school apart from everybody else. A vision that you can use to solve problems, a vision that you can use to make decisions. A vision that can guide you. A 100% vision.

And what I'm realizing is, you know, I thought, oh, yeah, we'll do. You know, this vision thing is so important. We need to make it available to more people. Right now, the only way you can get that kind of coaching is in bu. So let's, you know, let's do something to make it available to more people. You know, we tried to do something a couple times a year to just, you know, get. Get buildership out there, get more people access to it. Because not everybody can, can. Can be in bu, right? So we understand that. So I put it out there, right?

I just said, you know, we're going to do coaching again.

I thought, oh, my goodness, we're gonna have to close doors early. Ca capacity for so many people to da, da, da. And people are just gonna love this. And what I realized is that Coaching week. Getting your vision. Not for everybody. It really isn't, because not everybody's ready to be a builder. And so there are a lot of people out here who just want an easier way to be a leader. I don't do that. I don't. I don't. Buildership and leadership don't play well together. They just don't. They're very different things. And I probably need to do a better job of showing that distinction, because a lot of people hear me talk about things like, you know, like, even, like, PLCs and are like, oh, I already do PLCs.

You don't trust me. You do not do PLCs. Like a builder. That's why our hashtag is like a builder. Because it's not about doing different work. The work is the work. Right? It's about doing it like a builder versus doing it like a leader. So what I've realized, the realization I've had, is that coaching week just. It's just. It's not going to be for everybody. Not everybody's ready to think like builders and to recognize what the vision is. And one of the big frustrations I have is that, you know, I'm trying to tell people, this is so much better. It's so much easier. You're going to love it. It makes everything easier. People don't believe me.

That's okay. But if you're listening to this episode and you realize that you do not have 100% vision, and you realize that you need it, then join me for coaching week. And by the end, you'll have it. And then from there, everything else changes. So you've got a choice, right? You can either continue to lead somebody else's school, continue to make decisions based on who's screaming the loudest, continue to try to figure out every new problem starting from scratch, rather than having, like, a home base, a place you can go back to, a place you can anchor, or you can build 100 vision. One that is that you are the one that you that deeply convicting. One that one that matters. One that everybody understands and can support, one that can govern and guide your work and protect you from. From getting trapped into this appeasement trap where you're constantly appeasing everybody else.

You can continue with the vision you have, or you can get a real vision, a 100% vision, like a builder. 

I'll talk to you next time. Hey, if you're ready to get started being a builder right away, then I want to invite you to join us at Buildership University. Our exclusive online community for builders just like you, where you'll be able to get the exact training that you need to turn your school into a success story right now, with the people and resources you already have. Inside, you'll find our best online courses, live trainings with me, tons of resources, templates and exemplars, and monthly live office hours with me where you can ask me anything and get my help on whatever challenge you're facing right now. If you're tired of hitting obstacle after obstacle and you're sick of tiny little incremental gains each year, if you're ready to make a dramatic difference in your school right now, then you need to join Buildership University. Just go to buildershipuniversity.com and get started writing your school success story today. Hey, this is Robin and thanks for listening to the show.

Now, if you really enjoyed the content, would you do me a favor and share it with somebody else? All you need to do is pull out your phone, click on the little three dots next to the show, and you'll see see an option there to share the show. Click that and send it to somebody else who could really benefit from what you learned here today. Not only are you going to look like a rock star, but you're going to be helping out somebody else who really could use this information. Plus, I will be so grateful. So just go ahead. Right now, click on those three dots and share the show. Thanks for listening and I'll see you next time.