And knowing is half the battle...

Less technical, more ideological this week. But in my mind as I wrote it, I was often thinking about how difficult it can be to employ digital enhancements to university settings due to hesitancy to change and the need to call to action. This was particularly as I had a great deal of fun earlier this week building and playing with a whole new way of doing something quite big just because the idea came to me and addresses some longstanding issues.

For those in their forties, hopefully this week's blog title brings back from the recesses of your memory, a line uttered on a near-weekly basis by a member of the covert special mission force, GIJoe (or Action Force for us in the UK because "GIJoe" meant nothing to us so we had to have a different name for the action figure and cartoon line) after their end of episode PSA. Normally it involved a valuable lesson about staying out of trouble or danger (here's a fun example about theft for those who never had the pleasure).

The point of them (beyond putting parents more at ease about a show that was pretty much about special ops good guys shooting snake-themed bad guys with laser guns - albeit never really hitting anyone) was to give kids the information they needed to make good decisions. But that knowing was only half the battle. You can "know" all the lessons in the world, all the right things to do; but if you didn't put them into practice, if you didn't do them when it came to it, well then you've lost the battle. It's one that I find myself paraphrasing with my own children when they exclaim "I know...!"in response to me reminding them they have not yet done the thing I asked them to do (normally something as classically parent-esque as brushing their teeth or putting on their shoes). I'll say "c'mon, I asked you to brush your teeth ten minutes ago..." and they'll reply "I know!" I then respond with "well knowing isn't doing, now is it?" at which point they then slump off to get on with the thing I'm now (according to them) "nagging" them about (because all us parents are complete evil-doers for trying to beat back the scourge of fillings and plaque...).

Anyway, paraphrased or not, the sentiment is one that's important for evolution of education and enabling that evolution through a combination of digital and enhanced traditional practices. Knowing something needs improving or knowing one needs to do something isn't actually doing it. Knowing that student feedback is not of an appropriate quality (i.e. it doesn't help the person receiving it do better) is great because you've recognised an issue that needs resolving. Knowing that student mental health is in crisis is great because you've again recognised the issue and are showing empathy for the situation. Knowing that a process is clunky or takes up staff time is great because you've listened. Knowing that staff need upskilling in order to face the educational world of tomorrow is great because you're appreciating that times are changing. And a whole host of other "knowing" that are lovely you say you know because it suggests you care and you want something to be better.

But knowing is only half the battle... you have to do as well. Now it doesn't always have to be doing the literal thing; the putting it into practice. More often than not the doing that makes a difference comes from green-lighting the implementation of the practice; usually the practice (or the tool, the process, the idea, the solution) already exists and is just waiting there, being all amazing and waiting to be let out from the base and into the field. It might have been going on little excursions and exercises away from the barracks and inspiring a few of its teammates to follow it. But ultimately it's not looking to be a lone soldier in a one man unit; it's looking to be part of a battalion (or at least a squad). And without someone who is willing to step up, recognise that solider for the potential they have for turning the tide of the battle and send them in to train the rest of the troops, the battle just rages on. And it doesn't always have to be the general. It doesn't have to be command. The commanding officer in one department makes a change that the commanding officer in another department noticed improves performance and implements themselves, eventually the top brass will hear about it, evaluate it, and maybe it will become standard operating procedure. I think I may have taken this military metaphor as far as is sensible to take it. The point is, the commanding officer in that first department didn't have to be the expert in that things that made a difference. They didn't have to design it. But they had to have the skillset to see that the practice could solve a problem that they knew about, and have the courage and the faith in their people to use it. Then you know what that second department did? It followed their lead.

And that's the key there - lead. Not just being in charge (although, okay the fact that the military has a fully-functioning chain of command does rather muddy my metaphor), but having the ability to see something that works (or even that can work with the right support or spin), knowing that there is an immediate or long-term problem that needs addressing and where those two can meet and succeed. Being able to make a decision to do by widening the use of that practice, and even of pushing back from higher up just because the order didn't come down from above. It's why universities can be such great places for innovation and best practice, because what you have in a sector, a work environment, that is based less on hierarchical formality than so many others (okay we still have management structures and people in positions termed leadership, but it's more a back and forth of shared responsibility with management being accountable than a strict asking permission/"stay in your lane" situation) it creates a place where innovators can try their practices out to peers at their level or show to those higher up in the organisation through a more organic means of connecting than I think more traditional corporate structures allow.

But it still means having people in the appropriate positions and places possessed of the right attributes. A term not to be confused with skills, which more and more I find people conflate when talking about leadership. An interesting blog I stumbled upon on LinkedIn by Rich Diviney on the difference between skills and attributes paints this picture quite nicely. In short, skills tell us what to do in a known situation, but attributes tell us how we will act in an unknown situation. As a simple academic example, a lecturer might be skilled at talking about their specialist subject with authority and fluency and confidence. But do they retain that skill when something goes wrong, when they lose access to their slides for example? Do they have resilience, adaptability, perseverance? Thankfully we all have those (and many more) just in different... concentrations or proportions I suppose. Some are more honed and at the fore than others is all.

So when it comes to knowing that something needs updating, or upskilling, or enhancing, or even just testing, you don't have to necessarily have the skill to make the doing happen, but you do have to possess strength in the right attributes that can enable the doing. Leadership definitions are banded about all the time with varying descriptions and contradictions, but they all seem to agree on one thing - strong leadership translates vision into reality. To turn knowing into doing for the betterment of others and the realisation of that vision, a good leader needs the attributes of active-listening, self-confidence, resilience, agility, and integrity (among others). If you're faced with problems you know need solving, issues you know need resolving, things that simply aren't working and they are all in the way of your vision (or the wider vision, not necessarily your personal one - though it's important for succeeding that you genuinely buy into that wider vision) and you're a good leader, then you need to look around, listen, evaluate, take risks, be confident in your evaluation (of what's around you and of the risks) and make a decision to do. Because if the battle keeps on raging and your best people and your best weapons are constantly training back inside the wire and you're sitting on the sidelines unwilling or unable to make a decision, those that suffer as collateral damage will be the students.

As I mentioned earlier though, it doesn't have to be overall command that makes these decisions to implement "the doing". Universities are composites of corporate and academic facing elements all working towards the same vision but focussing on a particular area. Sometimes these overlap, sometimes they cross paths, and sometimes they operate entirely independently from one another (catering for example, has no influence on my day job, save my students complaining about the price of coffee and somehow thinking that's either my fault or that I can magically fix it - but both catering and I are working towards the same vision that will come about, in part, due to a high quality student experience). But in each of those focussed areas (could be a service, could be a faculty, could be a department) there needs to be people who are willing to innovate and to stand up and say "this isn't working, but I have a solution," and there needs to be people who, whether they fully understand the solution or not, have those crucial attributes of character to recognise the value of that solution that practice or even that idea, to evaluate it (or delegate to those who can, as specialist skill becomes just as important at that point), and to make it happen - to enable those with the skill to make it a reality. And that's a powerful partnership, because now the accountability you have thrust upon you as a leader makes more sense because that accountability is based on your attributes and your skills to make decisions that can impact a lot of people. And that in turn is based on recognising and valuing the skills and attributes of those around you, to trust them (and have them trust you), and to put your faith in their ability to enhance/solve/resolve to get us all closer to the reality of the vision we all share.

But equally if those who are in the position of greenlighting the doing at the mid-level don't possess the aforementioned necessary attributes, those potential solves for issues known often go unseen higher and wider through fear of trying something they can't see beyond their not understanding how to do it or of their perception of its difficulty.

So don't let better never come because doing is too hard. And don't hold back on trying to improve things just because you don't have the "right" job title. I said recently in a quick tweet that I don't think leadership should be measured, but it should be valued. I stand by that because success, whether measurable or not, is far more valued when it comes about through the value put in those that contribute to that success by those leading them.

And when you have shared value, when you know what to do and you know that you will do, then yes knowing is half the battle. But now you also have the action of doing, which means victory for the good guys (that's all of us in HE by the way, in case you were wondering). "Yo Joe!"