Running head: ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR ECC 510 1

Annotated Bibliography for ECC 510

Shelly T. R Treleaven

City University of Seattle in Canada

 2

Introduction

This collection of articles and a book were the result of research on qualities and

effectiveness of leadership, and how one learns to become a more effective leader. When

searching the terms ‘effective leadership,’ ‘learning to be a leader,’ and ‘qualities of effective

leaders’ many articles and books were listed but it became evident that ‘school’ needed to be

added to the search terms as many results were focused on corporations and businesses. These

articles and books were chosen as they are more closely related to educational leadership.

Annotated Print References

Cranston and Kusanovic (2015) expressed a concern over the emotional costs that are a

reality for teacher leaders in our educational systems. They stated that when working toward

positive change it is often the leader who faces the greatest challenge as well as paying the most

significant individual, social, and emotional cost for this change to happen. They indicated that

it is difficult, if not unlikely, for anyone to proactively learn about emotional leadership while

working as a leader. Their focus in the article was primarily based on the education of effective

leaders by making certain that they have an opportunity to grapple with the issues around the

emotional expectations of their job in an experiential learning environment. The authors created

a number of dramatizations about a variety of scenarios that they believed develops emotional

sensitivity and situational empathy. Cranston and Kusanovich concluded that through the

theatrical methods they suggested, current and future leaders would be more effective, better

construct meaning, develop strategies, and able to face the myriad of emotional dilemmas and

challenges they are expected to maneuver through.

Crawford (2007) stated in her article that “emotion is potentially so powerful that its

influence has to be ‘managed’ in some way” (p. 95) however this article only illustrated the cost
 3

of emotion on the leader. Cranston and Kusanovich’s (2005) article did offer some perspective

and ideas for the development of emotional intelligence and perseverance as a leader, but stated

that one is not able to learn proactively does not ring true in the teaching profession as this is the

foundation of professional development and professional growth plans.

Crawford (2007) explained that rationality and emotion are united in how effective

leadership is obtained. She indicated that there is much research on the rationality component

but states that the quality of emotion had little focus until more recently. Crawford explained

that emotion is the language of relationships, and relationships are at the core of what happens in

schools. The purpose of this article was to view how the leaders were impacted by the emotion

and meaning in their daily experiences. It was also intended to see how the leaders

communicated about these feeling. The concept of ‘emotional labor’ or ‘feeling rules’ where a

person is expected to behave and react a certain way as part of their job was a constant source of

stress for the leaders as they felt torn between being professional and being human because it

created a moral conflict. Moral conflict was an area of focus for Furman (2004). While

Crawford recognized that evidence indicated that emotion is necessary in making effective

decisions, and that not enough or too much emotion are equally harmful to this process, unlike

Furman who offered no strategy to develop the balance between rationality and emotion.

Crawford concluded that the leader of the school is the symbolic representation of the emotional

state of the entire school and indicates that their role is to be emotional in a rational way.

Crawford (2007) allowed for the humanizing of the role of leader and it offered a positive

perspective on leadership as a whole, it is through its varied sources in its extended list of

additional supporting articles and books that value is obtained.

 4

Davis and Leon (2014) started off with a powerful message of hope. They referred to the

compelling speeches of Robert Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln to illustrate how these men

leveraged their personal convictions to motivate and inspire people. The authors explained how

it is important that leaders understand themselves, and that they have the ability to communicate

what they believe in and what they value to others. They said that it is through the explicit

communication of vision and goals together with the consistent actions of a leader that

organizations succeed.

Davis and Leon (2014) provided extensive lists and practices that a person can employ in

order to develop the components of an effective leader. They stated that the qualities of personal

courage, core values and noble character are the essential elements that need to be refined in a

person and that this may be done at any time. They offered significant information on specific

areas that leaders can develop. The list of sources used by Davis and Leon allowed for further

exploration of their topic which would enhance the understanding of leadership development, but

one must recognize that many of the sources are not current as they date back more than twenty

years.

The article by Eaker and Keating (2008) is a critique and a challenge to current leaders.

Eaker and Keating stated that creating a professional learning community is important but

creating a shared culture was more important. They explained the expectations-acceptance gap

as when leaders communicate the expectations and then are willing to accept something

significantly less. This impacts the culture of the school and creates an ambivalence and lack of

confidence among the staff as the expectations don’t seem to amount to anything. They

indicated that by creating the shared culture the role of leader can change from authoritarian to

promoter and guardian of the shared vision.

 5

Eaker & Keating (2008) offered some guidance along with information that is valuable to

a leader but when compared to the volume of strategies and concepts shared by Davis and Leon

(2014) it seemed to be lacking in overall substance. There are a number of quotes and one-liners

in this article that stand alone as inspiration but in general this felt like it was redundant.

Finnie and Abraham (2002) discussed a book primarily designed as a guide to develop

stronger business practices; however, the concepts and information about leadership are easily

transferred to the field of education. Finnie and Abraham create a succinct article that

summarized some of the key concepts from the book Good to Great by Jim Collins (2001).

They provide a list of eight traits of ‘good-to-great’ companies and of these; five are directly

relatable to educational leadership. These five traits are eerily similar to those shared by Davis

and Leon (2014). This consistent correlation may lead one to imply that this increases their

validity. Finnie and Abraham also included the five levels of leadership outlined by Collins,

which clarified the difference between a good leader and a great one. A curious concept was

introduced which implied that a leader can only be recognized as great once they have been

succeeded by someone and the successor continues to thrive. This implied that in order to be

considered an effective leader one must be able to have all the structures and culture in place and

be able to leave without a change in expectations or consistency.

Finnie and Abraham (2002) concluded that all great organizations require the skills of a

level five leader which meant that the person is unpretentious, dedicated, and committed to the

goals of the group, not those of the individual. This resource connected to the research in that it

identified qualities of a leader and provided a limited synopsis of how to develop them.

Furman (2004) identified that this is the missing link in the previous ethical decision-

making processes studied. The ethic of community is an additional component to ethic of

 6

justice, ethic of critique, ethic of care, and ethic of profession which Furman referred to from the

studies of Beck and Murphy (1994), Sergiovanni (1992), and Starratt (1994) which were

included as sources in this article. Furman explained the dimension of community or communal

processes as separate components which start with deep or intentional listening, for the

understanding and valuing of the individual, their culture, or their community. Furman then went

on with developing dialogue, where people think together and lastly work toward a common goal

for the good of the community. The purpose of ethic of community is the development of social

justice and its ability to intervene with marginalized children.

The strategies and recommendations made by Furman (2004) are much the same as the

concepts shared by Eaker and Keating (2008). Furman’s conclusion was that effective

leadership required ethical practice and developing the communal aspect is the missing link from

all former structures. The perspective or expectation that the group or community requires

participation in ethical practice is not new but Furman offered that not only is it the key to all

ethical practice but is necessary for all effective leadership.

Leithwood and Azah (2016) was a study with two questions as its focus. These questions

were concerned with the characteristics of effective leadership networks and the second

measured the quality of a members learning based on their participations in the network. The

study used a rather small sampling which only included grouping or networks designed by

districts so results may not be empirical in their determination.

One focus of this study was to determine whether the quality of collaboration had an

important impact on the results of the group (Leithwood & Azah, 2016). There were two lines of

evidence that impacted the collaboration: one was that given some circumstances members of the

groups found it easy to resist change and participated in the social loafing where they allowed
 7

others to complete the work and still managed to take credit for the completed work and two,

given very specific group skill development the participants took the time to actively listen to

their peers and engaged in one another's thinking. This sounded a lot like the article by Furman

(2004) where deep intentional thinking along with dialogue was employed in the ethic of

community. Leithwood & Azah suggested that there was no correlation between collaboration

and an individual's skill development as part of the group unless they were a part of the shared

responsibility and group accountability where each person was held accountable to the network.

Ultimately the outcome of Leithwood and Azah’s study (2016) was to provide strategies

on how to improve the productivity of teams or networks, and it was determined that

accountability to the network is of vital importance. Given that the participants had volunteered

or been assigned by their district for the networks, it can be assumed that personal motivation

would impact the learning within the network.

Lencioni’s book (2002) is exceptionally readable and provides a framework for

leadership implementation. His work was designed for business but can easily work in the

educational field. As a story, it provided the reader with a clear vision of how teams function and

are connected to practical methods and offered feasible strategies to follow. The book may help

organizations to develop an effective team and was specifically designed with leaders in mind.

The five dysfunctions described were absence of trust, fear of conflict, lack of

commitment, avoidance of accountability, and inattention to results. They were introduced in a

hierarchical manner with trust laying the foundation. While this is not newsworthy, Lencioni

explained that “the most important action a leader must take to encourage the building of trust on

a team is to demonstrate vulnerability first” (p. 201). He then said that fake emotional

vulnerability was a sure way to destroy trust. This was reminiscent of Crawford (2007) who
 8

emphasized how important emotion was for school leaders and how critical it was to model

appropriate emotional responses and of Davis and Leon (2014) who said, “trust building requires

personal integrity . . . and consistent behavior over time” (p. 12). Lencioni took what are

common ideas or concepts and shared plausible scenarios with advice on how to avoid these

dysfunctions within any team.

Sergiovanni (1984) described leadership as creating excellent not competent structures or

forces within our schools. He used piano playing to compare competence as the accurate playing

of the notes and excellence as multidimensional and not the notes but rather the pauses between

them (p. 6). He explained excellent leadership through a hierarchy of ‘forces.’ These forces

were technical, human, educational, symbolic, and cultural, where Sergiovanni indicated that of

the five forces, cultural was the only way to reach excellence. It needed a strong leader with a

clear and articulated vision where the staff were given the freedom to pursue the goals in ways

that had meaning for themselves personally. A cultural leader according to Sergiovanni

“assumes the role of ‘high priest,’ seeking to define, strengthen, and articulate this enduring

values, beliefs, and cultural strand that give the school its unique identity” (p. 10). They are the

moral leader. This connects to Davis and Leon (2014) where they said “[t]o be of noble

character then, requires the courage to act upon core values and deepest convictions with

patience, charity, and a sense of justice” where they too indicated the value of this leadership

skill. Sergiovanni concluded that developing a strong culture and having a clear vision for the

future is the primary goal of an excellent effective leader.

Conclusion

There was a common theme that permeated all of the ideas shared in these articles -

leadership can be learned. In order to become more than average, effective, excellent, or even
 9

great, one must be ethical, develop a strong culture, but more than anything be prepared to be

emotionally connected, challenged, and committed.

 10

References

Cranston, J., & Kusanovich, K. (2015). Learning to lead against the grain dramatizing the

emotional toll of teacher leadership. Issues in Teacher Education, 24(2), 63.

Crawford, M. (2007). Rationality and emotion in primary school leadership: An exploration of

key themes. Educational Review, 59(1), 87-98. doi:10.1080/00131910600797155

Davis, S. H., & Leon, R. J. (2014). Developing a leadership brand: The heart of effective school

leadership in turbulent times. Planning and Changing, 45(1/2), 3.

Eaker, R., & Keating, J. (2008). A shift in school culture. Journal of Staff Development, 29(3),

14.

Finnie, W. C., & Abraham, S. C. (2002). Getting from good to great: A conversation with Jim

Collins. Strategy & Leadership, 30(5), 10-14. doi:10.1108/10878570210442506

Furman, G. C. (2004). The ethic of community. Journal of Educational Administration, 42(2),

215-235. doi:10.1108/09578230410525612

Leithwood, K., & Azah, V. N. (2016). Characteristics of effective leadership networks. Journal

of Educational Administration, 54(4), 409-433. doi:10.1108/JEA-08-2015-0068

Lencioni, P. (2002). The five dysfunctions of a team: A leadership fable. San Francisco, CA:

Jossey-Bass.

Sergiovanni, T. J. (1984). Leadership and excellence in schooling. Washington, D.C: National

Education Association, Department of Supervision and Curriculum Development.