Episode 117: There Is Joy On Your Campus, It’s Just Not In Your Office
The Private School Leader Podcast
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Show Notes
I want you to use your imagination.
You are at your school and you hear laughing kids. You hear excited voices and then you see big smiles and you see happy kids doing interesting things.
When you see and hear all of these things, are you in your office? Probably not.
Of course some good things happen in your office, but it is mostly a place for holding meetings, responding to emails and making phone calls.
There are many joyful things happening on your campus, but you usually have to go to that joy.
On today’s episode of The Private School Leader Podcast, we are going to discuss the fact that There Is Joy On Your Campus, It’s Just Not In Your Office.
I know that you are super busy, so be sure to listen while you are doing something else. I hope that you will get value from this episode as you serve and lead your school community. Thank you for taking some time out of your day to listen to the podcast!
Thanks for making a difference,
Mark Minkus
What is your biggest problem right now? I want to hear more about your biggest problem and I want to help you solve it.
Whether your problem is feeling guilty that your family gets what’s left of you at the end of the day, relentless parents, difficult teachers, a lack of boundaries between work and school, feeling overwhelmed, Imposter Syndrome, enrollment or teacher morale, I can help.
I would love to hear more about your biggest problem and I would love to be your coach. Go to www.theprivateschoolleader.com/coaching to learn more about working with me 1-on-1.
Being a private school leader is a VERY difficult job. You have to make hundreds of decisions every day, and you have to keep everyone safe, increase enrollment, keep the parents happy, keep the board happy, motivate the teachers, deal with student discipline, beat last year’s test scores and come in under budget.
That can lead to you feeling tired, discouraged and stressed out. I’ve been there. That’s why I created THRIVE Academy just for you. THRIVE Academy is a digital course that will help you get out of survival mode and get back to feeling energized at school. To learn more, go to www.theprivateschoolleader.com/thrive
I am excited to share with you a new resource and I want to give this to you as a FREE GIFT to say “thank you” for listening to the podcast. It is called The 7 Secrets To Improving Teacher Morale. As private school leaders, we are always looking for ways to improve teacher morale at our schools, but it is hard to know where to start. Well, now you have a step by step plan and you can grab it at theprivateschoolleader.com/morale
I want to give you a FREE gift called 7 Strategies To Effectively Deal With Difficult Teachers. Sometimes we need some courage and confidence to deal with difficult teachers. What you need is a plan! This guide is a step by step plan that you can use to help one of your difficult teachers improve their performance and improve their attitude. Go to theprivateschoolleader.com/difficult to grab this free guide!
I want to say thank you for listening to the podcast by giving you a FREE GIFT. It is called The 7 Steps To Having A Successful Meeting With An Upset Parent. This guide is an 11 page pdf that gives you a step by step plan to have better meetings with the parents at your school. Every good coach has a game plan. Every good teacher has a lesson plan. Too many private school leaders don’t have a plan when they sit down to meet with an upset parent. Well, now you have a PLAN! You can grab this FREE GUIDE at www.theprivateschoolleader.com/meeting
I’ve created a free resource for you called “The 6 Things That Every Private School Teacher Wants From Their Leader”. This guide is a 6 page pdf that will be a game changer for you. I guarantee you that if you do these 6 things, the teachers at your school will be happy to follow you. You can pick up your free guide by going to www.theprivateschoolleader.com/guide
I want to give you a gift to say “thank you” for listening to the podcast. I have created a FREE guide for you called “5 Strategies To Help You Work With Difficult Parents”. We know that working with parents is part of the job and most of our parents are great, but some of them can be very demanding and emotional and difficult. This guide will give you the tools that you need to build better relationships and have better meetings with the difficult parents at your school. Go to www.theprivateschoolleader.com/parents to grab the guide. Thank you again for listening every week!
Please check out all of the free resources on my website that can help you serve and lead your school community. There are "Plug & Play PD's" (45 minute webinars with guided notes) as well as Top 10 Lists of Leadership Books, Productivity Books and TED Talks over at www.theprivateschoolleader.com/resources. You can grab the show notes for today's episode at www.theprivateschoolleader.com/episode117
Please write a review of this podcast and help the algorithm push this content out to more leaders. I would love to get your feedback about the podcast, ideas for future episodes and hear about how you are implementing these strategies in your life and at your school. You can email me at [email protected] Thanks!!
I’ve created a FREE RESOURCE for you called “The Top 6 Ways To Protect Your School From a Lawsuit”. This is a 10 page pdf that will help you to keep your staff and students safe and help keep your school out of court. Litigation is expensive, time consuming and extremely stressful. This common sense guide will help you to be more intentional and proactive when it comes to protecting your school. You can grab “The Top 6 Ways To Protect Your School From a Lawsuit” at www.theprivateschoolleader.com/lawsuit. Thanks!
I am excited to share a brand new resource with you. It is a 9 page pdf called: “How To Use Verbal Judo To Have Better Conversations With The Parents At Your School” What is “Verbal Judo”? "Verbal Judo" is a communication strategy that focuses on using words effectively to de-escalate conflict, resolve disputes, and achieve positive outcomes in various interpersonal interactions, particularly in high-pressure situations.
George Thompson and Jerry Jenkins wrote a book called Verbal Judo: The Gentle Art Of Persuasion. So, I have taken several important strategies from the book and applied them to your life as a private school leader. Grab your free copy of “How To Use Verbal Judo To Have Better Conversations With The Parents At Your School” at www.theprivateschoolleader.com/judo
TRANSCRIPT:
• Welcome to the Private School Leader podcast, where private school leaders learn how to thrive and not just survive as they serve and leadave their schools. • • I strongly believe that it is possible to have a long and happy and fulfilling career as a private school leader. • And my passion is to help you figure out exactly how to do just that right here on the Private School Leader podcast. And I'm your host, Mark Menkus. • • • So I want you to use your imagination. • • You're at school • and you hear laughter. You hear excited conversation from kids, kids interacting with teachers. • You see • • smiling kids • • doing interesting things. • • • It's memorable, it's awesome, it's colorful, it's noisy, it's fantastic. • • • So I want to ask you, • • • where • • on your campus is that happening? • • And is it happening in your office? • • • The laughter, the excited conversation, the smiling kids doing interesting things, all of those awesome things, is it happening inside your office? • • • And the answer is probably not. • • • And, you know, in your office, mostly • • • • • what's happening is meetings and • • taking a phone call from a parent, um, maybe dealing with a discipline issue, maybe meeting with a teacher or a couple of teachers, • • um, talking to the athletic director, • um, • • you know, • • meeting with a family that's a prospective family to the school, talking to board member on the phone or in person. You know, those are the things that happen a lot in our office. Maybe working on accreditation, self studies. You get it. • But • • • • • • • there is joy on your campus. • • It's just not in your office. • • • And so it's super important for us to engage with that joy and to remember why we're doing the hard thing, that we're doing this job. • • And so, on today's episode of the Private School Leader podcast, we're going to discuss the fact • • that there's joy on your campus. It's just not in your office. • • And I'm also going to give you some strategies of how you can go to the joy. • • • •
The seven Secrets to Improving Teacher Morale can help improve school morale
And before we jump into that, I want to give you a free resource just to say thank you for listening to the podcast. This one's called the seven Secrets to Improving Teacher Morale. And if you're listening to this in real time, it's still early January. • • And when that calendar flips over to January, • • and we see that we still have, you know, uh, half of a school year to go • • sometimes we are very motivated to try to improve certain things at our school. • • And one of those things, • • teacher morale is kind of elusive and kind of difficult to • • m • • In some way tangibly improve that. And so what you need is a plan. And you can check out the privatehoolade leader.com morale to grab your free guide that's called the 7 Secrets to Improving teacher Morale. And I think that it will be a big help for you as you try to do that at your school. • • • • • And then I want to help you with your difficult job. You know, you have so many things on your plate and that plate continues to get more and more full. Nothing ever comes off that plate. And yet you're supposed to get it all done, • • • keep everyone happy. As far as the teachers and the parents • • • • improve upon last <