What if we committed to leading like artists?

What if our schools developed common language for leadership—for the adults and the students—that echoed the skills of artists, like:

• thinking expansively, flexibly, and with nuance

• tuning in to undercurrents

• accepting ambiguity and the absence of answers

• embracing lack of closure

• relishing complexity and uncertainty

As Fast Company put it, “Never has the capacity to create, evolve, and exploit mental models of things or situations that don’t exist yet, been so much in demand. The ability to ask, as Rilke is suggesting, the right questions–active, expansive, exploratory—will be a vital imperative.”

When you look at the forces at play in the world, how do you define leadership? And is that definition widely understood—and shared—by everyone at your school?

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Each Wednesday we share a “what if” scenario. Consider it a provocation rather than a suggestion.

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