Leadership is filled with difficult decisions and the leader is often faced with questions that don’t have a satisfying answer. It is sometimes the simple decisions that cause major angst in the emotional make-up of followers. Leaders often make a decision failing to understand the fallout it will cause and the negative ramifications it produces in the lives of others.
Recently, we have been crafting our school calendar for next year. This task is not extremely hard and can be accomplished in just a few hours. After designing a proposed 2012-2013 school calendar, the assistant dean sent it to the faculty for ideas, suggestions, and comments. After reviewing the input from the faculty, we realized that we needed to adjust the calendar so that school would begin after Labor Day, include 3 days at Thanksgiving and 3 full weeks at Christmas time, and be finished prior to Memorial Day. Now, the state of Ohio requires 182 instructional days, including 2 days for parent teacher conferences, and 2 days for in-service. It didn’t take a second look to realize that there are not enough days to create such a calendar. The tasks of prioritizing the requests of faculty and then building an appropriate calendar were not a hard task, but it was a lose-lose experience. Most likely everyone will lose some desired aspect of the calendar.
The vast majority of professionals in my organization have hearts of cooperation and spirits of collaboration. Once the calendar is finalized, most faculty and staff will make quiet adjustments to their plans and will move forward with excitement into the coming school year. However, I am convinced that with every decision made (no matter how small or big and no matter how carefully the decision has been analyzed) there are at least five people in every organization who will criticize the direction provided.
Simple changes involving facilities can bring discord. A decision is made to paint a classroom that stands in great need of rejuvenation. “Why did you choose that color of paint? Why didn’t you poll the students and involve them in the color selection? Why isn’t my room being painted, too? Why didn’t you paint the room over the summer months instead of waiting until Christmas break? Isn’t there a better place to spend our limited money?”
Required decisions also result in grumbles… We will be conducting a mandatory fire drill next Tuesday. “I sure hope you pull the drill in the afternoon once all the important academic sessions are complete. Please don’t pull it in the afternoon, that’s when the younger children have their quiet time. Why can’t we have it on Monday and get it out of the way? Why do we have to have fire drills anyway; no one takes them very seriously? I was planning on giving a quiz that day, now I have to totally revamp my lessons.”
Yes, even weather related decision making can bubble up comments from the concerned. School will operate on a 2-hour delay schedule because of the snowy roads. “Why didn’t we just close school, the roads are really bad out there. I grew up in Wisconsin and we never would have delayed school for such a dusting of snow. The 2-hour delay schedule makes my classes so short; it is really hard to get anything accomplished. Lots of students won’t come to school at all because of the roads, what a waste of a day. The administration is just interested in completing the required number of school days, not in the safety of our students and the faculty.”
The little dark clouds of pessimism and discouragement can cast a giant shadow on the culture of an organization. I have been in a room of sunshine… laughter, smiles, and positive conversation… in walks a dark cloud and the entire atmosphere changes. Pessimism is a light- sucker, a black hole, a cold blanket, a de-motivator, and so easy to flow out of our mouths. One negative comment can sway a crowd. Why? Because the human spirit is bent in that direction… the natural response is toward darkness. Light and enthusiasm are supernatural responses (enthusiasm comes from the Greek, meaning “in God”). Complaints are contagious; the sinful nature loves the dark; we can all identify with pessimism…. and we are even drawn to it.
Bruce Willis stars as Russ Duritz in the 2000 Disney movie, The Kid. Russ is a wealthy L.A. image consultant, but as he nears 40, he finds himself cynical about most things, lonely without any close relationships, and estranged from his father. Russ has little patience with his clients and when they begin to complain about their current position or situation in life, Russ quickly turns to sarcasm and preaches a message of reality. In one scene in the movie, a client begins to communicate her sob story to Russ. Russ, the professional consultant, responds “Wha, wha, wha someone call the whambulance!”
I have considered establishing a whambulance service to remove the dark clouds from organizations. I might need a fleet of vehicles, but my biggest problem would be what to do with them once I removed them from the premises. I sure wouldn’t want to take them home for dinner and foul play would not be appropriate. All the same, a whambulance service might be in great demand.
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