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286 PART 4: THE LEADER AS A RELATIONSHIP BUILDER
maintain a soft gaze into the speaker’s left eye and respond only with body language (facial
expressions and nods). The speaking student should continue until they have no more to
say or until they feel an emotional shift and the problem seems to have disappeared. After
students switch roles and play both speaker and listener, the instructor can ask the class
for perceptions of what happened and what they were feeling during the conversation.
It works well to have the students choose a second pairing, and redo the exercise with
a new problem. The only difference the second time is that the “listener” role is given
fewer restrictions, so the listener can make brief comments such as to paraphrase or ask a
short question. The listeners, however, should keep spoken comments to a minimum and
definitely should not offer their own ideas or point of view. After the students finish, the
instructor can gather opinions about what the experience was like for both the speaker
and the listener. Key questions include the following: What did it feel like to listen rather
than respond verbally to what another person said? What is the value of this professional
listening approach? In what situations is professional listening likely to be more or less
effective? If the instructor desires, the exercise can be done a third time to help students
get more comfortable with a true listening role.
Source: Adapted from Michael Ray and Rochelle Myers, Creativity in Business (Broadway Books, 2000), pp. 82–83.

Leadership Development: Cases for Analysis

The Superintendent’s Directive
Educational administrators are bombarded by possible innovations at all educational levels.
Programs to upgrade math, science, and social science education, state accountability plans,
new approaches to administration, and other ideas are initiated by teachers, administrators,
interest groups, reformers, and state regulators. In a school district, the superintendent is the
key leader; in an individual school, the principal is the key leader.
In the Carville City School District, Superintendent Porter has responsibility for
11 schools—eight elementary, two junior high, and one high school. After attending a
management summer course, Porter sent an e-mail directive to principals stating that
every teacher in their building was required to develop a set of performance objectives for
each class they taught. These objectives were to be submitted one month after the school
opened, and copies were to be forwarded to the superintendent’s office. Porter also wrote
that he had hired the consultant who taught the summer management course to help
teachers write objectives during their annual opening in-service day of orientation work.
Mr. Weigand, Principal of Earsworth Elementary School, sent his teachers the follow-
ing memo: “Friends, Superintendent Porter has asked me to inform you that written perfor-
mance objectives for your courses must be handed in one month from today. This afternoon
at the in-service meeting, you will receive instruction in composing these objectives.”
In response, one teacher sent a note asking, “Is anything wrong with our teaching? Is
this the reason we have to spend hours writing objectives?”
Another teacher saw Weigand in the hall and said, “I don’t see how all this objectives
business will improve my classroom. It sounds like an empty exercise. In fact, because of
the time it will take me to write objectives, it may hurt my teaching. I should be reading
on new developments and working on lesson plans.”
In response to these and other inquiries, Principal Weigand announced to the teachers
with a follow-up memo, “I was told to inform all of you to write performance objectives.
If you want to talk about it, contact Dr. Porter.”
Source: Based on Robert C. Mills, Alan F. Quick, and Michael P. Wolfe, Critical Incidents in School Administration
(Midland, MI: Pendell Publishing Co., 1976).

QUESTIONS
1. Evaluate the communications of Porter and Weigand. To what extent do they com-
municate as leaders? Explain.
2. How would you have handled this if you were Superintendent Porter?