Managerialism An ideology on the wane? John MacBeath Professor Emeritus University of Cambridge

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ManagerialismAn ideology on the wane?John
MacBeathProfessor Emeritus
University of Cambridge
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Managerialism and NPM

• Generic skills and techniques applied by
  management to make organisations run efficiently
• A market orientation to public services
• Competition, targets and defined outcomes
• Supervision, monitoring and inspection

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One size misfits all

• Standardisation
• Specialisation
• Centralisation
• Maximisation of scale
• Bureaucratisation

Knowledge hierarchy
Fragmentation Synethisation Sanitation
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CHILDREN ASK QUESTIONS
How do you tell when you're out of invisible
ink? If Barbie is so popular, why do you have to
buy her friends? What happens if you get scared
half to death twice? Why do psychics have to ask
you for your name? Why do kamikaze pilots wear
helmets? OK, so what's the speed of dark?
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The commodification of learning

• They are losing the very qualities that made
  them human, masters of their own inventions,
  victims of a rush to modernize, bureaucratize,
  streamline and cellophane-wrap.
• (Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Finney, 1950)

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An ideology on the wane?

• The post truth political environment?

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THE POST TRUTH POLITICAL ENVIRONMENT

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7 dissatisfiers

• Stress
• External accountability
• Bureaucracy
• Societal factors
• Personal and domestic concerns
• Workload
• Salary and status

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7 dissatisfiers

• Stress
• External accountability
• Bureaucracy
• Societal factors
• Personal and domestic concerns
• Workload
• Salary and status

commodification
intensifcation
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Children the new commodities

• We no longer look at children as children with
  all their quirks, idiosyncrasies, and all the
  things that make them unique human beings. We see
  them as grade enhancers and grade detractors.
  Will they add value or lower our scores?
• (David Berliner, AERA, 2006)

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140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0
200 400 600 800
1000
variables
days
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Xmas
140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0
200 400 600 800
1000
variables
days
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Who said?

• But in all my experience, I have never been in
  any accident of any sort worth speaking about. I
  have seen but one vessel in distress inall my
  years at sea. I never saw a wreck and had never
  been wrecked nor was I in any predicament that
  threatened to end in disaster of any sort.

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Who said?

• But in all my experience, I have never been in
  any accident of any sort worth speaking about. I
  have seen but one vessel in distress inall my
  years at sea. I never saw a wreck and had never
  been wrecked nor was I in any predicament that
  threatened to end in disaster of any sort.
• (Captain E.J. Smith, 1907, RMS Titanic)

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• We learn from repetition at the expense of events
  that have not happened before
• (Taleb, The Black Swan the impact of the highly
  improbable, 2007, p.78)

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Improvement through inspection?

• I have always been cautious in saying that
  inspection causes improvement because, frankly,
  we dont. To say inspection causes improvement is
  fundamentally unprovable. I think its a bit too
  simplistic to say that either OFSTED does cause
  improvement or OFSTED doesnt cause improvement.
• (in MacBeath, School Inspection and self
  evaluation 2006)

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Managing paradox
avoid mistakes deliver results now follow the
rules compete retain control assess
individuals specialise
innovate think long term be flexible collaborate d
elegate encourage teamwork promote generic
approaches
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MANAGING PARADOX?
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GREEDY WORK
The task of leading a school in the twenty first
century can no longer be carried out by the
heroic individual leader single handedly turning
schools around. It is greedy work, all consuming,
demanding unrelenting peak performance from
superleaders and no longer a sustainable notion.
Peter Gronn, The New Work of Educational
Leaders Changing Leadership Practice in an Era
of School Reform, 2003
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Stress contagion

• In five years time teacher stress has doubled.
  Also to parents and pupils school is causing
  stress. In secondary education almost the same
  number of students as teachers report that they
  experience stress.
• Schools which consult little or lack vision are
  more likely to cause stress. In schools which
  connect a strong sense of identity with well
  organised consultation amongst teachers, parents
  and pupils experience the least stress. (Het
  Neiusblad, April 26, 2003)

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building organisational capacity
Through recognising developing and evaluating
hidden capital
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100 75 50 25 0
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Japan
100 75 50 25 0
Mexico
UAE
USA
Norway
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Leading for Learning

• The treasure within
• The capital without
• The challenge between

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The new world of childhood

• Designer children
• The infant crime wave
• Life in cyberspace
• The 50/50 gap
• The anxiety epidemic
• Growing up absurd

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Stories from the front line

• The mother who with great effort has now
  succeeded in getting her five year old to bed at
  1 instead of 3 a.m.
• The 7 year old who threw his Playstation against
  the wall in a tantrum then had tantrums for a
  week until his mother bought him a new one
• A 6 year old who told his teacher how to go about
  killing pimps and prostitutes after mastering The
  Grand Theft Auto in which the player has to kill
  as many people as possible.
• Parents who cant say no to their children
  demanding televisions, computers in their
  bedrooms, taking meals on their own and isolated
  from the rest of the family
• Parents who will do anything to shut their
  children up just to get some peace. Young
  single parents on benefits or low income are
  particularly vulnerable to such pressure.

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Warum muss Ich in die Schule gehen?
In school you meet people from different from
yourself from different backgrounds, children you
can observe, talk to, ask questions, for example
someone from Turkey or Vietnam, a devout Catholic
or an out and out atheist, boys and girls, a
mathematical whiz kid, a child in a wheelchair...
I believe whole heartedly that the open school is
there first and foremost to bring young people
together and to help them to learn to live in a
way that our political society so badly
needs. (Von Hentig, p.47)
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Leadership as a subversive activity

• (re) focus on learning
• (re) create conditions for learning
• Foster the dialogue
• Share leadership
• Strengthen internal accountability

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Subversive leadership
Intellectual
Political
Moral
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leadership
Organisational learning
Professional learning
Student learning
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leadership
Organisational learning
Professional learning
Student learning
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Teaching and learning in the wild

• Embedded in relationships
• Contextualised
• Learner-centred
• Concerned with skills and dispositions
• Supportive but challenging
• Enjoyable but risky
• Relaxed but alert
• Age blind

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TAMING THE WILD

• Possessive learning (cholesterol knowledge)
• Performance learning (the activation gap)
• Proactive learning (knowledge to go)

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LEARNING IN THE UNFAMILIAR
tasks/ problems
unfamiliar
novel problems in familiar contexts
unfamiliar problems in unfamiliar contexts
familiar problems in familiar contexts
familiar problems in novel contexts
contexts/situations
familiar
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LEARNING IN THE UNFAMILIAR
tasks/ problems
unfamiliar
novel problems in familiar contexts
unfamiliar problems in unfamiliar contexts
familiar problems in familiar contexts
familiar problems in novel contexts
contexts/situations
familiar
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Lui Chiu Yee, Kylie (Tai Po Old Market Plover
Cove Public School)

• When we get older, teachers dont tell us the
  answers. They ask questions, and let us find the
  answers by ourselves. We may surf the Internet,
  and go to the library to find some books. When
  we do it in this way, we can learn how to learn.
  We will be more interested in the things we
  learn. We also think that if teachers just stand
  in the classroom and talk and talk, it will be so
  boring. This is active education and we like it
  very much. Teachers always ask us to do some
  projects, and before they teach us they ask us to
  find some information, so we can learn by
  ourselves. They would tell us more, so we can
  remember it well.

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THE KNOWLEDGE ORGANISATION?

• In a sense knowledge shrinks as wisdom grows for
  details are swallowed up in principles. The
  details of knowledge which are important will be
  picked up ad hoc in each avocation of life, and
  the habit of active utilisation of well
  understood principles is the final possession of
  wisdom.
• (A.N. Whitehead, The Aims of Education, 1937)

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leadership
Organisational learning
Professional learning
Student learning
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• Talented people create great organisations
• OR?
• Great organisations create talented people

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Rethinking accountability

• Political
• Public
• Managerial
• Professional
• Personal

Professional accountability involves putting the
needs of the students at the centre of ones
work, collaborating and sharing of knowledge,
with a commitment to the improvement of practice.
Personal accountability refers to values that
are sacred to a person - fidelity to personal
conscience in basic values such as respect for
human dignity and acting in a manner that accepts
responsibility for affecting the lives of others.
(Moller, 2008)
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• Neurons connect parts of our brains with one
  another
• but no cables made of neurons drape from person
• to person. We talk about ideas. We share
  insights. We
• pool recollections.
• (David Perkins)

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The wall
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Peer observation

• Find a critical friend
• Agree a protocol
• Find a focus
• Observe selectively
• Find time for feedback and dialogue
• Observe the 41 rule
• Discuss what might be different

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leadership
Organisational learning
Professional learning
Student learning
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THE PACE AND FLOW OF CHANGE
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CONTROL high
COHESION low
COHESION high
CONTROL low
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CONTROL high
COHESION low
COHESION high
WEAK AND WILD
CONTROL low
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CONTROL high
DEPENDENCY AND DILIGENCE
COHESION low
COHESION high
WEAK AND WILD
CONTROL low
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CONTROL high
DEPENDENCY AND DILIGENCE
CONSENSUS AND CONVIVIALITY
COHESION low
COHESION high
WEAK AND WILD
CONTROL low
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CONTROL high
DEPENDENCY AND DILIGENCE
CONSENSUS AND CONVIVIALITY
COHESION low
COHESION high
WEAK AND WILD
DIVERSITY AND DENSITY
CONTROL low
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Ethos indicators

• Long term goals 1 2 3 4
  Short term goals
• Competitive 1 2 3 4
  Collaborative
• Risk taking 1 2 3 4
  Avoids risk
• Likes change 1 2 3 4
  Dislikes change
• Avoids conflict 1 2 3 4
  Welcomes conflict
• Open to new ideas 1 2 3 4
  Shuns new ideas
• Looks to the past 1 2 3 4
  Looks to the future
• High stress 1 2 3 4
  Low stress
• Authoritarian 1 2 3 4
  Democratic
• Parent friendly 1 2 3 4
  Parent unfriendly
• Pupil unfriendly 1 2 3 4
  Pupil friendly
• Uses time well 1 2 3 4
  Uses time badly

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leadership
Organisational learning
Professional learning
Student learning
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Leaders as learners

• The most notable trait of great leaders,
  certainly of great change leaders, is their quest
  for learning. They show an exceptional
  willingness to push themselves out of their own
  comfort zones, even after they have achieved a
  great deal. They continue to take risks, even
  when there is no obvious reason for them to do
  so. And they are open to people and ideas even
  at a time in life when they might reasonably
  thinkbecause of their successthat they know
  everything.
• (Hesselbein, et al., 1996, p. 78)

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The Ying and Yang of Leadership
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MAN
WOMAN
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Five key principles

• There is a focus on learning
• There are conditions favourable to learning
• Leadership is shared
• Connections between leadership and learning are
  made explicit
• Staff and students share a sense of mutual
  accountability

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THE COMPLEXITY OF CHANGE

• The rule of the vital few A few exceptional
  people doing something different start and
  incubate an epidemic.
• The stickiness factor Some attribute of the
  epidemic allows it to endure long enough to
  "catch", to become contagious or "memorable".
• The power of context The physical, social and
  group environment must be right to allow the
  epidemic to then suffuse through the population.
• (Gladwell, 1999)

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START DOING
GO ON DOING
STOP DOING
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The policy environment

• Centralization

Political power
Professional power
Decentralization
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LOA TZU
Go to the people Live among them Start with what
they know And when the deed is done The mission
accomplished Of the best leaders The people will
say We did it Ourselves.