This is a bonus blog this week! I am currently working through a book study with a team of administrators in my district, and this month we were asked to share our takeaways via social media. I could not think of a better way to share my takeaways than right here on my blog.

The book we are studying is Innovator’s Mindset: Empower Learning, Unleash Talent, and Lead a Culture of Creativity by George Couros. One of the chapters we read this month was Chapter 6, Engage vs Empower. This is my favorite “education” book, and this is a very important chapter for educators. It’s actually pretty applicable to anyone in a leadership role, regardless of what field they are in.

The question that really stuck out to me the most was this: “If you had to choose between compliant, engaged, or empowered, which word would you want to define your students?” This isn’t just a question about how we want our students to be labeled. It’s a question about how we, as leaders, want anyone in our organization to operate. As a high school administrator, do I merely want compliance out of my teachers? Of course not. Do I want them to be engaged in their work? Absolutely. Do I want them to feel empowered to take risks and to make decisions based on what is best for our students? YOU BETTER BELIEVE IT!

How do we then create an environment where this type of empowerment occurs?

“If engagement is the ceiling – the highest bar – we may be missing the point. Think about it: Would you rather hear about changing the world, or do you want the opportunity to do so? A story about a world-changer might engage us, but becoming world-changers will change us.” – George Couros

The key to empowering others is to give them authentic opportunities to create, do, and contribute. Give students opportunities to create or do something awesome, but let it be something that THEY CHOOSE. “Here are the standards or learning objectives. How we go about getting there is up to you. You’re in the driver’s seat.” Give your staff genuine opportunities to have input on the vision and the goals of your school/business/organization. When people feel like they can actually affect change within their organization, they will feel empowered, and that empowerment rights a lot of wrongs.

Another thing that stuck out to me was the following quote:

“Empowering students to succeed in life means that we pay attention to the skills companies are seeking.” – George Couros

Now we’re not just talking about empowering students academically. We’re talking about empowering them to set themselves up for success later in life, and THAT is the kind of work that should inspire and empower US as leaders. Couros mentions an article that Thomas Friedman wrote titled “How to Get a Job at Google.” In that article, Friedman discusses the five hiring attributes that Google desires most in its employees.

1. Cognitive Ability – “Learning ability. Ability to process on the fly.”
2. Leadership – “When faced with a problem and you’re a member of a team, do you, at the appropriate time, step in and lead?”
3. Humility – “The ability to step back and embrace the ideas of others.”
4. Ownership – “It’s feeling the sense of responsibility, the sense of ownership, to step in.”
5. Expertise – This was the least important item on the list. There are some technical jobs that need a certain amount of expertise, but outside of that, the other four abilities are considerably more important.

“If you take somebody who has high cognitive ability, is innately curious, willing to learn and has emergent leadership skills, and you hire them [with no background in a specific position]….,once in a while they will mess it up, he said, but once in a while they’ll also come up with an answer that is totally new. And there is huge value in that.” – Thomas Friedman

Now, and most certainly in the future, being able to think on your feet, to learn, and to adapt is vitally important. Our job is to empower our teachers to create environments that focus on these skills. The content is a means by which these skills can and should be taught, not necessarily the other way around.

I really do love George’s book. He challenges a lot of the commonly held “this is the way we’ve always done it” beliefs/practices. More importantly, he actually practices what he preaches. He is disrupting education in a very good way. It is now up to the rest of us to follow his lead and disrupt our spheres of influence, so that the people around us will feel empowered to disrupt within their spheres of influence. If enough of us get on board, we can do some really amazing stuff.