Strategy and Change
Management
The Council of International Schools (COIS) has identified Michael as an Affiliated Consultant with expertise in consulting schools on how to develop, implement, and evaluate strategic plans.
Essential Questions
These are some questions that guide my work with international schools:
How can we differentiate our school, ensuring we attract families fit for our Mission?
What challenges or opportunities should we be allocating greater attention and resources to?
How do we effect meaningful change in the face of high turnover, for both staff and leadership?
How do we compel our community to contribute actively to our vision for the school?
How can we live our Guiding Statements?
How do we measure our Mission?
Service
Introduction
Michael’s Strategy and Change Management Consulting Services focus on capacity building schools to:
Leverage their strengths to overcome challenges and take advantage of hidden opportunities;
Develop a compelling diagnosis that will compel the community to focus greater energy and resources where the school can yield the greatest results;
Implement guiding policies that are sustainable in the face of leadership and governance turn-over; and
Identify, execute and monitor a coherent set of actions that will enable the school to scale change initiatives for maximum impact.
International School Strategic Planning and Change Management principles differ from that of other industries, in that greater time and attention needs to be made to solicit and incorporate buy-in from the school’s greater community. Additionally, Strategic Planning and Change Management initiatives should be seen as a ‘long game’, which presents a significant challenge for International Schools that often have high turnover in Senior and Middle leadership positions.
Consulting Process
STAGE 1
Strategy
During this stage, Michael will facilitate a process that surfaces the reason for the change, understand what change will look like, and more importantly, ensure there is a coherent set of actions identified to effect change.
STAGE 2
Communications
At this stage, Michael focuses on getting stakeholders educated, building consensus, and creating a sustainable communications platform to support our change management initiative through to completion.
STAGE 3
Operations Optimization
During this stage, we capacity build stakeholders across the school to understand their role relative to the strategy and implement tools for evaluating the effectiveness of actions taken.
As Jim Collins wrote, we will help the “leaders (that want to go) from good to great start not with “where” but with “who.” (We will help them get) the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats.”
I will identify obstacles to change and devise guiding policies to mitigate them.
I will ensure that everyone is working towards the same goal.
I will provide staff with direction, support, and tools to evaluate their progress so that they can properly report and adjust when required.
A 3-6 month interlude is generally required after each stage to allow for reflection, implementation, and feedback, as well as results presentation.
Strategic Planning and Change Management Consulting Services drive positive results.
In many cases, workshops and short-term consultancy engagements have a very short-term positive impact and much lower activation ratio. Research shows that 65% of Change Management initiatives fail to make changes permanent and in many schools 3, 5 and 10 year strategic plans are seldom realised because of high turn-over in senior leadership positions.
PDAcademia’s consulting services counter that by capacity building teams within the school that will take ownership of the strategic plan and change initiatives deemed imperative to moving the school from its current state to the desired future state. These teams are insulated from high turnover because we implement measures to ensure that the school is able to recruit and orientate new leaders that can continue to support the strategic plan and bring fresh energy and ideas to helping realize it.