EPISODE #343

Hey, builders, before we jump into today's show, I need to know something. Are you and I connected on the socials? Because if we're not, we need to be. So connect with me. I'm on Facebook. Obinjackson. I am on Twitter. Obin steps. I'm on LinkedIn. Robynjackson. Let's connect, and let's keep the conversation going. Now onto the show. You're listening to the School Leadership reimagine podcast, episode 343.

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 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 right now, my inbox is flooded with emails screaming, one thing they're saying. They're all saying some version of, hey, it is almost the end of 2025, and. And if you don't act now, 2026 is going to be a disaster. And there's all this pressure out there right now to redeem 2025 and. And to get things done and to start planning for 2026. And if you're a lot like me, you're feeling that pressure, too. In fact, the other day, I found myself online looking at and ordering one of Those big, giant 2026 wall calendars and thinking, I got to get my act together. But right now, I don't know about you, but I'm feeling this dual pull, and maybe you're feeling this, too. You know, on one hand, the break is coming, and I'm really looking forward to winter break, to just kind of shutting everything down and getting some rest and regrouping. I need it. I'm tired. But on the other hand, I'm also feeling this pressure because there were so many things that I said I was gonna get done at the beginning of 2025 that I haven't gotten done. There are milestones that I wanted to hit that I haven't hit.

There are things that I wanted to accom that I haven't accomplished. And maybe you're feeling that way too. This dual pull between really needing a reset to relax, to do things that you want to do that have nothing to do with work, whether that's sleeping in late or pursuing a hobby or spending time with family or traveling. You don't want to be thinking about work. But on the other hand, it almost feels irresponsible to take a break right now because there's so many things that are piling up on your desk. There's so many things in your inbox that you have to take care of. You have a incomplete to do list. And so if you're feeling that tension, tension right now, today's episode is for you. Because I want to talk about a third option. It's not rest or make up work. There is a third option that builders choose. And I think that when we re anchor in what builders do, it can relieve a lot of that tension and help you to really enjoy your break. So here's the thing. You know, the end of the year, there's. There's two messages. On one hand, you've got all this wrapped stuff where, you know, you kind of take a look. It's a time for people to stop and take a look back at the year. And a lot of times when we do that, though, we realize that there's just all this stuff we thought we were gonna do and we haven't gotten done yet. And that creates this feeling of incompleteness, maybe even a feeling of failure for some of us because we had all these dreams at the beginning of the year, we said, this year is the year. I'm gonna get more discipline.

This year is the year. 

I'm gonna get more focus. This is the year I'm gonna. Things are gonna be different. And in many cases they're not different, or progress is taking longer than you thought. And then on the other hand, when we look back on the year, if we are really intentional, we see some of the things we did accomplish and it inspires us because we're saying, hey, we've done that. There's so much more work to do. We could do this, this, this. And we started dreaming. And we, because of the way, you know, the Industrial New Year's resolution complex that's out there, we feel this kind of tug, pull pressure to set some goals, to rush around and make these declarations, to sit out and map out our new year. But builders, you'll need to take a beat because that is actually counterproductive.

Now those of you who are in Buildership University, you know, we spend a lot of time on our one plans. And the reason we do that is, is because once you complete your one plan, your one plan gives you something in which you can anchor. And I know it's hard, and y' all hate me when we're doing the One plans, or if you don't hate me, you hate the one Plan because it's really hard. And what makes the one plan so hard is not the planning itself. It's the unlearning of how we've been taught to plan so that we can think strategically about pursuing our 100% vision. Now, if you're not in Buildership University and you don't have that one Plan process, the pressure is still there. The idea is still the same. When you have a 100% vision and you anchor in that vision, it helps you to filter out all of the noise, the messaging, the pressure to have a plan, to have another plan, to put a plan on top of the plan, to revisit the plan. It takes all of that pressure off and helps you to stay focused. And that's my message to you.

At this time of the year, you gotta stay focused. And it's not only my message to you, it's my message to myself. Because I often get distracted. I can easily succumb to the pressure of the messaging for this time of the year. I can easily start to beat myself up about all the things that I thought I was gonna get done that I didn't get done. I've been very tempted to go back to the file that I had at the beginning of 2020, all the things I want to accomplish. And it's almost like it's. What is it? Is it sadistic or masochistic? I guess it's masochistic, this masochistic urge to go back and to beat myself up over all the things that I didn't accomplish. And I want you to resist that right now. Because the end of the year is an arbitrary deadline. Doesn't mean anything. We're in the middle of a school year. So the end of 2025 is the middle of the school for us, which means that there is still time to get stuff done. Even in your personal life, the end of 2025 and the beginning of 2026, it's a made up deadline. It's not real. There's no pressure for you. There's still time to get things done. So this whole idea about January and reinventing things, you gotta resist it and keep your Focus on what matters most, which is your 100% vision, and making steady and consistent progress towards your 100% vision.

So the problem is that the calendar, it creates this illusion of clarity. 

Like, you know, you have a new year, this idea of a clean slate, fresh energy, but you don't. It's not a clean break for you, right? The new year plans that we're making, we're making in this irrational sense that things are going to be different without recognizing that maybe things don't have to be different. Maybe we should be sticking to the things that we already put in place and double down on those, because those are the things that are gonna get us to our 100% vision. So my first caveat for you right now is to resist the urge to create a new resolution. Instead, go back to your vision. For those of you in BU, go back to your 1 plan. For those of you not in BU, go back to your vision and your mission and your core values and anchor in those. Resist the urge to try to reinvent yourself and do something new, even if things aren't working.

The solution when things aren't working is not to do something different. I mean, when you really think about it, you already tried something, you're trying something, it hasn't even had a chance to work, to work. We're in the middle of a school year and then you're like, oh, it's not working because it's not working as fast as you want it to work. So let's abandon all of that and do something different. And what's going to happen is if you do that, then first of all, you're hurting your credibility with your staff. You know, you've announced, here's the direction we're going in and you're changing direction. Mid course, they're going to just stop believing you, which means they're going to be slower to implement because why should they bother? You're just going to change your mind again. Secondly, you've wasted all of that ramp up time. You've wasted that learning curve. You know, you're right at the peak of the learning curve right now. People are figuring it out. They've just started to figure it out. And if you say now that's not working, forget that we're going to try something new, then you have a new learning curve. It's a people. You're starting from scratch and it's not going to, you're not giving it time to work before the end of the school year. So you need to resist the urge to do something new instead.

Go back and look at what you're doing. You can refine it, you can tweak it, you can find ways to make it better, but don't abandon things right now. The second thing is that if you treat January like a, like a, like a do over and a revamp, you're interrupting the natural rhythm of the school year. This is not the time to revamp. Perhaps this is the time to sit back down and double down, but it's not. Maybe this is the time to anchor in, but it's not the time to reset. You are just upsetting the apple cart and you are making things harder for yourself and for your teachers. You don't want to chase new. You want to make sure that you are protecting the continuity of the work that's already being done. And so builders, we're not planning, we're not recreating a whole new plan in the middle of the school year. And we're not abandoning stuff early because it's premature. This is why builders use 90 day cycles, because I know that there's this, I mean, the natural rhythm of the way that human beings are wired. We want the reset in January. And if you can't resist it, instead of revamping everything, use the 90 day planning process. And I'm going to link to the podcast where I kind of lay out the 90 day planning process, because that's not the purpose of this podcast. But I did do a podcast where I explained the whole process and you can listen to it. I'll link it in the show notes. And if you want to get the show notes, you can always get them@schoolleadershipreimagined.com and then put the episode number. This is episode 343. So schoolleadershipreimagined.com episode 343 and I'll make sure I have the link there.

But here's the idea. 

The, the idea of 90 day plans is not that we're going to do something new in 90 days. The idea of 90 day planning is that we're going to every 90 days, sit down, take a look at where we are with our vision, identify what is our biggest constraint right now, and spend next 90 days removing that constraint. Now think about how much more powerful that is. You're not starting from scratch, you're not upsetting the apple cart, you're not building something new. Instead, the way you double down is, now is a great time to start thinking about, okay, what we've been trying to do something so Far, and it hasn't worked, or it's not working as fast as we thought, or it's not working as well as I wanted it to. What is the biggest obstacle? And then spend the next 90 days focused on removing that obstacle. So the thing that you want to do and the thing you want to accomplish, you actually do, you actually accomplish. And this makes so much more sense than trying to plan out your whole 2026. You have no idea. It makes more sense than even planning out the rest of the school year again. You have no idea how many of us at the beginning of the school year had all these plans.

And then all of a sudden, something comes in and changes. Everything happens all the time. It's like, built into the nature of the job. We work in a fast, in some ways, we work in a very slow profession, but in other ways, the work moves very, very quickly, and things change. You have to think on your feet all the time. So it doesn't even make sense to make a plan for the rest of the school year right now, because things are going to change so much, and you have no idea how they're going to change, and you have no control over whether or not they change. But 90 days, you can predict 90 days, you have some control over 90 days gives you enough. It's a long enough period of time for you to accomplish something, but it's a short enough period of time for you to be able to predict, for you to be able to kind of look ahead and see what's happening and anticipate what's coming up. So right now, 90 days, thinking about the next 90 days, as opposed to all of 2026 or even the rest of the school year, makes more sense because you can actually see cause and effect, and you can adjust without abandoning your original direction. And it keeps you close to the real conditions happening in your school right now, not the fantasy ones you imagine will happen for later on in the school year.

So this is about thinking strategically in a way that doesn't set you up for failure later on, because we all know every year we all make the resolutions. I don't even know if I'm going to put myself through all the things that I thought I would do for 2025, and instead I think I'm just going to think about, okay, where are we now? And what do I need to focus on for the next 90 days? That way, when you go into the break period instead, frantically trying to fix everything because, oh, my goodness, I'm so far behind, you can be a lot more strategic about if you choose to work, what things you focus on working right now, working on right now, and what things could wait until January. When you think about what's going to the next 90 days, you can be a lot more strategic. And maybe you say, I don't need to do anything. I just need to rest and regroup and spend time really thinking through and understanding my obstacle rather than frantically trying to work and keep busy so that you can look productive.

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 masterclasses, 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 is 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 building something amazing, the 100% collective is where you need to be. Join us@brewershipuniversity.com community now. Back with the program. So here's what I want you to do. I want you right now to ignore all the messaging about 2026 is coming. Oh, you got to get ready. Just ignore that. And instead I want you to just think about the next 90 days. I want you to think about January, February, March. Don't think about the rest of the school year, just January, February, March. Think about your vision, your mission, your core values, those of you in bu. Pull out your one plan and take a look at it. And then I want you to think about what is right now, the biggest obstacle standing between you and your vision, mission, and core values. For some of you, it's going to be, you don't have the systems in place. For others of you, it's going to be a student issue that's becoming more and more and more pronounced.

For some of you, it's going to be a staffing issue. For some of you, it's going to be an instructional issue. I don't want you to think about all the things you should be doing, and I'm using quotes you should be doing, because it's not what you should be doing necessarily. Other people are telling you you need to be doing. Instead, I want you to think about what are you trying to accomplish, where do you want to be, where do you want to be ultimately, and where do you want to be by the end of this school year? And then I want you to think about not all the things you need to do, but what is the number one obstacle standing in your way? I really want you to drill down here. And so this is where. If you're going to be thinking about anything and planning and all of this, this is where you need to spend your time. What is the number one obstacle? I've been thinking about this a lot myself lately for the things that I want to accomplish, for the vision I have, for helping principals achieve their 100% vision in three years of us. What's the big obstacle right now? And I'm telling y', all, it's harder than you think, because there are a lot of things that you think are obstacles, but then when you really drill it down and you say, okay, if I change this, If I spent 90 days working on this and fix this completely, am I closer to my vision? Am I closer to my mission? Am I closer to my core values? And if the answer is, no, it's not your biggest obstacle, it is an obstacle and probably a symptom of the root cause, the big obstacle, but it's not your biggest obstacle.

So I want you to keep drilling down until you've come up with your biggest obstacle. It took me, I'll be honest, it took me not one session of thinking it through, but a couple of different sessions. And I had to, you know, kind of really process it, but I know what it is now. And then the next thing you're going to do is figure out, okay, so when I go back to work, whenever that is, I'm going to spend the majority of my time removing this obstacle. And in some cases, you don't know how to remove the obstacle, that's fine. So you're going to spend some time figuring it out, researching, looking for answers, finding somebody to help you think it through. You know, if you, those of you who are in bu, you bring that to office hours, we'll talk it through there. Those of you who are not in bu, you talk, Talk to a trusted mentor, talk to a colleague, spend some time kind of journaling about it. But if so, if you don't know how, don't let that stop you. You don't have to know how to solve it. You're going to spend 90 days figuring that out. If you already know how to solve it, then you're going to spend the next 90 days putting a process in place that helps you stay accountable to it. Either way it goes, you're going to just focus on the next 90 days. And once you've identified the obstacle, then you're just going to spend the next 90 days removing it. And what that does is it takes away the pressure for you to fix everything or suddenly reinvent yourself. It's tangible, it's doable, and most importantly, it's the most. It's the best use of your time.

Because if you remember the question, the filtering question is, if I solve this in the next 90 days, will I be closer to my vision? 

So what you're doing now is you are solving an obstacle that at the end of 90 days puts you closer to your vision, which means that you will see progress, you will see growth. You'll be able to look back at your 20, 25 self in March and say, I've already accomplished something. I've started the year and I'm already winning. That's what happens when instead of trying to tackle everything, just focus on what's right in front of you. Remove the obstacle, and that opens up progress. We are so trained to do something. That's why we're tired, actually, because we're always doing something. And every day we create a to do list. And then every year we start thinking about all the stuff we want to do and didn't do and should have done. Clear yourself of all that garbage. Right now, you are where you are for whatever reason, and it's not time for you to beat yourself up and say, maybe I should have been more organized, or maybe if I had done this, or maybe if I had done that, what good does that do? It doesn't serve you. We almost think that if we punish ourselves enough, it'll make up for the fact that we didn't do. It's Done. It's in the past. Let it go.

Instead, I want you to focus on what's coming up. 90 days, that's it. Not the whole school year. You don't need that kind of pressure. Just the next 90 days, you're not going to do everything, just one thing. So you're going to ask yourself, what is the one obstacle in my way right now that's keeping me from my vision? Your hundred percent vision. And if I remove that obstacle, I will be so much closer to the vision. Things will be so much better then. I just want you to think about getting to march. What needs to happen for that obstacle to be gone by march? Not dealt with, not better. Gone. I'll talk to you a couple of examples. We have some people in BU who have been going through this 90 day process and it's been incredible. You know, Dr. Trina, she's like a beast at the 90 day process right now. Every 90 days she's sitting down and she's removing obstacles.

So she's making all these huge, these huge milestones. Scott eliminated an issue that, a big persistent issue that was going on in his school that they had been dealing with for years. 90 days, they focused on it, it was gone. And he continues to do that over and over and over again. The principals who follow this 90 day process, they don't have the same kind of pressure everybody else is suffering under right now. Instead, they have focus. And every time you eliminate a problem by using this 90 day system, it's a problem you don't have to deal with. So the work gets lighter, your to do list gets shorter. Stuff starts. That pile of stuff that's sitting on your desk, whether it's your physical desk or your metaphorical desk waiting for you to solve that pile gets smaller and smaller. It begins to shrink because you are solving problems. And you see, most of the time we're not actually solving problems. We're just kicking the problem down the road. We're just, we're just dealing with it today, knowing it's going to show up later on. We don't have time for that. That is not only frustrating and emotionally exhausting, it's so inefficient. If it's a real problem and it's standing in the way of your vision, get rid of it. Get rid of it.

Now I hear somebody out there saying, what if my problem's a person? 

Your problem's not a person. It's a process that allows that person to dominate. So if you think your problem is a person, dig Deeper. Figure out what process is allowing that behavior to continue to take control of your school and distract from your vision. Deal with the process. The process. Let the process deal with the person. That's not your problem. Deal with the process. Let the process deal with the person. So that's my. That's like, let's. We're all in this together. Let's do this together, shall we? Let's. Let's figure out. Let's. Let's resist the New Year's resolution pressure. Let's resist. You know, I'm going to do my little 2026 calendar. I'm going to fill it out. I'm going to put some things in that, you know, we have the year that we need to do. I'm going to do all of that, but I'm not doing this whole pressure thing to get everything figured out. I'm not going to succumb to the pressure to try to get in and get caught up. The work needs doing. It will get done, may not get done. Between Christmas and New Year's, I may spend that time dreaming. I may spend that time really understanding what's going ahead.

I probably will spend that time thinking about my biggest obstacle and thinking about how I remove it. I may spend that time not thinking. I fully intend to spend part of that time perched on the couch under a heated blanket with some of my emotional support petaphors and hot chocolate with copious amounts of whipped cream, watching something that doesn't ask anything of me. I promise you that part of my break will be that. But then part of my breakup may be in my office. But instead of this pressure to try to finish out 2025 strong, I'm going to be thinking about the next 90 days. I'm going to be thinking about what needs to happen so that I get closer to my vision. And I'm challenging you to do the same. We don't. You know, the hardest part over and over again that I have when I'm working with builders is not teaching them the process. The process is simple, straightforward, makes a lot of sense. The hardest part of my job is helping you undo the years of bad training and leadership thinking that has held you captive. So if we're going to make any resolutions for 2026, let it be this.

It's time for us to stop blindly accepting the leadership baggage that we have been handed for years. And it's time for us to start thinking in ways that make sense. It's time for us to start doing the work that really matters. And it's time for us to get away from beating ourselves up and feeling all this pressure and just move forward consistently and intentionally and to see real progress. Because instead of just blindly following the leadership playbook that is leading us nowhere, we are deciding to be intentional and purposeful about how we spend our time, where we spend our energy and what we do. Even if it's counter to the prevailing narrative out there. Because instead of just feeling this pressure, always feeling like we're not enough, always feeling like we should have done more, always feeling like. Like we have to do more. We are just being so focused and so strategic and so intentional. Like builders. I'll talk to you next time.