I look through my 4 weeks’ worth of “draft” postings and wonder if my musings remain relevant. As the daffodils peek through and I have a week free from answering the barrage of “where are the…..?”, “who has the…..?” “has……called out sick?” ” what time do we…….”, and “how long does the paragraph have to be?” questions I hope to revisit and reponder some of these drafts. These five weeks have made me better understand the resistance that many teachers have towards incorporation of technology. When day-to-day is such a multitude of minutae, technology just does really seem to be “one more thing I gotta deal with.” Rather than viewing it as a tool for simplifing the tedious and mundane, it becomes one more hurdle towards getting to the weekend.
Of course, this could be easily solved with a solid development plan. Although I can’t find it again now, I read a tweeted blog entitled “Bad technology leadership is just bad leadership.” Effective leadership involves planning for the unplanned. Technology tools can be an excellent way to make that planning lasting, sustainable and collaboratory.
kellysopeningworld 
I agree technology can become just one more hurdle to overcome if it is not a part of a personal landscape.
Yes, Kelly, break time is when reflection can and should occur. We should reflect every day. And it is time to pull out those old writings and thoughts and think back thru them.
Leadership…now there is a fuzzy yet vital concept. I have seen schools, foundations, corporations, universities, and military training departments do amazing things with technology when they have leadership. I wrote a little piece for Leader to Leader journal 1-2 years ago based on my World is Open book.
But what does technology leadership require? I list a few things below. But Leader to Leader journal has more and better ideas.
1. Adept planning skills. Effective leaders think ahead.
2. Collaboration skills. They involve people.
3. Motivational know-how. But genuineness in employing motivation…not manipulating people. Fostering autonomy, ownership, love of the task, passion, commitment, drive, belongingness, respect, etc.
4. Interpersonal skills. Knowing how, where, when, etc. to interact with others. Treating others as human beings.
5. Risk taking and experimentation. Leaders are not afraid to take risks (with technology, for instance). They try things out AND report back on what happened.
6. Communication skills. They tell everyone what is happening. If it is a new technology system that is coming down the pipes, they explain why it was selected. They also recruit people in the selection process. Ground up. Not top down.
7. Honesty. When it fails, they take (or share in the right way) the blame. They also rally others around new possibilities and learning from those mistakes.
8. The Vision thing. They help people around them create a vision of the possible and then try to help to see it get enacted, if and where possible. The vision statement or document or motto or theme is somewhat dynamic and flexible yet with enough stickiness and achieveable goals or milestones what people work toward it.
9. Culture of Openness and Respect. The leader has a vision yet is open to new ideas, policies, people, perspectives.
10. Grounded. The leader is stable; as in someone you can approach for an insightful, wise, honest, respected, etc., opinion.
There is more to leadership than that (e.g., listening skills, compassion, role model,high energy, etc.). I just typically quit at 10 things as you know or I would be writing all day. Smile.
Thoughts Kelly?
curt
This list is going on my office door.
I often wonder if my experiences with great leadership have led to some of my cynism today. My high school French teacher, my cooperating teacher for my student teaching and my elearning mentor are three people (all women too….Hooah!) who have provided excellent leadership models for me. Having such strong models at such a young age though, I feel that I am not nearly patient enough with those who have been cast into leadership roles without adequate preparation or personality consideration.
As I write this, I also just realized that these three leaders were all very techno-rific as well. So that makes me think that the planing and calculated risks may be particularly salient.