What this means

Self-management refers to workplaces and communities such as schools in which people have a great deal of control over the things which affect their work and outcomes.

A challenge is to achieve the best mix of top-down and bottom-up initiatives in educational change and improvement. Validating and valuing the knowledge that school communities have of their own issues is vitally important. When working well in a school, self-management means that:

• Key stakeholders (teachers, parents and students) are involved at the outset in a strategic planning process
• They jointly define the key issues and challenges and, as a partnership, develop the vision, values and goals.

It also means that educational change is most likely to be effective and lasting when those who implement it feel a sense of ownership and responsibility for it.  

The division between what should be decided at the centre and what is best decided locally is blurred. As well, while people may want to have a greater say, they need to be convinced that their involvement will make a difference.

What is also evident is the increasing range and complexity of management knowledge and skills required by principals and teachers. As principals have said to us, school managers need to be:

• Skilful managers of multiple changes, including broader, more systemic change
• Able to anticipate and respond to new initiatives, challenges and opportunities
• Able to prepare for the professional development needs of a learning community.

All of which can mean working harder and longer around a range of management and administrative tasks. Principals often make the point that this range of tasks can get in the way of a singular and sustained focus on the all-important task of managing educational change and improvement.

Cliches abound which can confuse things, too - cliches such as 'schools are over-managed and under-led'. This may imply that management is inferior to leadership.

Yet high-quality management - the capacity to develop and follow through with strategic and implementation plans, program work and enable change and systemic change in particular - is obviously so central to high-quality education and schooling. When it’s less effective than it could be, or needs to be, we all pay a price.

case study

To be developed.

ACTION CHECKLIST

To be developed.