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Abstract
Change process research often discusses barriers that impede organizational change (e.g., Banta, 1997; Cavacuiti and Locke, 2013; Mutchler, 1990; Stewart et al., 2012); however, no empirical research has addressed how behaviors established in leadership models counteract these barriers. This study explored these two interconnected constructs of leadership and change in stories of secondary school department chair change attempts, and identified specific leadership behaviors described within their stories that aided the conversion of change barriers into conditions that enhanced the change process. Leadership behavior identification within department chair stories of change was guided by Blake and Mouton’s (1962) leadership theory, which has been further delineated by Yukl et al. (2002), and identification of change process barriers was guided by Ely’s (1990a) eight conditions for change. From the combined descriptions of six successful and four unsuccessful narratives of department chair-led change emerged essential conditions for change and commonly occurring change barriers. Specific leadership behaviors capable of overcoming these change barriers were also identified. Unexpectedly, this investigation also unearthed a change barrier seemingly unrelated to previously identified conditions of change: the contentious resistor. The contentious resistor was described as the most detrimental barrier to department chairs’ leadership of the change process.
Introduction
Department chairs leading change
Most secondary schools in the United States are structured with a principal or administrative team as the primary locus of leadership, under which department chairs supervise teachers within a specific content area (Siskin, 1990). Since this organizational structure first gained prominence in the 1930s (Tyack, 1974), department chairs have evolved into content-focused educational leaders, often supplanting school principals who earlier served that role (Brown et al., 2000; Pellicer, 1990; Peterson, 1989). Based on their position in the school hierarchy, department chair numbers likely exceed those of other administrative leaders within their school systems (Brent et al., 2014); however, despite their numbers, prevalence, and potential to lead school change, relatively few studies have focused on the role of the department chair in school leadership.
Department chairs at both secondary schools and colleges are expected to manage the smooth operations of their departments while simultaneously leading curricular and instructional change that enhances student experiences and growth (Feeney, 2009; Hannay and Erb, 1999; Lucas, 2000; Sergiovanni, 1984; Tucker, 1993; Wettersten, 1994; Zepeda and Kruskamp, 2007). Department chairs describe performing a wide range of duties such as coordinating professional development, evaluating faculty and programs, setting schedules, running meetings, overseeing budgets, and conveying information to both their administration and their teachers (Gmelch, 2004; Gmelch and Miskin, 1993; Stark, 2002). Wettersten (1994) examined secondary school department chairs and identified their tasks additionally included developing curricula, supervising and evaluating teachers within their departments, and contributing to school policies through their interactions with administrators. Recent research has determined that in addition to these multifaceted tasks, department chairs play, and are expected to play, the role of change agent in school systems (e.g., Brent et al., 2014; Peacock, 2014). The idea of the department chair as an agent of change is not new: Rinker (1950) believed department chairs should be promoters of change. However, limited research exists that discusses the department chairs as change agents (Peacock, 2014), and even fewer studies exist that explicitly examine how department chairs promote change within their content area (Gaubatz and Ensminger, in press; Rigano and Ritchie, 2003; Tam, 2010).
The department chair position is unique within the hierarchy of secondary educational institutions due to its placement between the administrators who create policies and the faculty who transform those policies into action. This positioning allows department chairs to interact with faculty one-on-one and in groups, as well as with administrators as they make organization decisions and plan for the future. This access to various players in the school hierarchy positions the department chair for the benefits of distributed leadership (e.g., Brent et al., 2014; Spillane, 2005), which views leadership as most effective when it is diffused throughout a system and when it moves in multiple directions through multiple stakeholders. Given the movement toward distributed leadership within schools and the role department chairs have within the structure of schools, department chairs are in a prime locus to facilitate top-down and promote bottom-up change in schools. However, more research is needed to understand how department chairs lead change and the actions they take to facilitate change in their departments.
Communication with various types of personnel allows department chairs to influence the organization at the three levels of learning described by Leithwood and Louis (1999): individual faculty learning, learning in small faculty groups, and whole-school organizational learning (Melville et al., 2012). The potential for department chair influence appears to be understood by various players within schools. For instance, during interviews designed to investigate the role department chairs played in school systems, department chairs were described as “buffers,” “conduits,” “pipelines,” and “intermediaries” between the hierarchal levels of teachers and administration (Wettersten, 1994). Based on their organizational positioning and potential to influence others, it stands to reason that department chairs could serve a crucial role in the successful implementation of school change (Melville et al., 2012).
A drawback to this mid-level leader position, however, is that department chairs must balance the expectations of their administration with the interests of their faculty (e.g., Gmelch, 2004; Hannay and Erb, 1999; Melville et al., 2012; Peacock, 2014; Wettersten, 1994). Although this bridging position uniquely stations department chairs as key players who can aid in the conversion of policy into action, it can also inhibit change due to the inability of department chairs to make unilateral decisions for their departments; these middle-level educational leaders need the support of both their administration and faculty in order to institute meaningful change (Tucker, 1993).
In addition to the difficulties associated with their mid-level position, department chairs usually lack the ability to use coercive or reward power to entice their faculty to support a change; therefore, they often rely on their expertise and interpersonal skills to gain support for curricular or program changes (Tucker, 1993). In a literature summary completed by the National College for School Leadership (NCSL), department chairs in the UK were found to use their interpersonal and professional skills to influence faculty when initiating change (NCSL, 2003). Similarly, Busher (2006) determined that department chairs who relied on authoritative power to force a change were largely unsuccessful, but they were more successful when they coupled authoritative power with interpersonal leadership skills. These findings are mirrored by survey results reported by Gaubatz (2013), which indicate that experienced secondary school science department chairs understand that individuals in their positions need to focus on their interpersonal influence to be effective leaders.
Multiple studies have shown that leadership behaviors revolving around interpersonal skills and demonstrating expertise require leaders to be context-aware (Liden and Antonakis, 2009; Yukl, 2009; Yukl and Mahsud, 2010). Within department change studies, Hamm (1994) and Stark (2002) found that successful leaders adjusted their behaviors based on their interpretation of the context in which they worked, which is influenced by department membership. Some of the faculty-influenced, context-dependent adjustments in leadership behaviors included changing the membership of teams based on an understanding of interpersonal relationships and faculty skills, setting agendas when faculty needed guidance, and facilitating discussion about change without appearing to advocate too strongly for a certain outcome (Stark, 2002). Other examples of department chairs altering their leadership behavior based on context include the manner in which they express their leadership behavior, such as either sharing their expertise in a subtle way so as not to offend their faculty, or expressing their expertise in more overt demonstrations to gain faculty attention (Gordon and Patterson, 2006). Further illustrating the importance of department chair-awareness of faculty-created context, Gordon and Patterson (2006) determined that department chairs were most successful enacting change when they exhibited a concern for people in their interactions, demonstrated expertise, and acknowledged the talents and importance of others. Tam (2010) reported that when a department chair focused their actions on building shared visions and missions, empowering teachers, increasing their knowledge and skills, and creating a collaborative environment, they were able to promote a more hospitable climate for change in the department. These findings further suggest that changing the climate of the department was as critical as changing structures. Department chairs have also been shown to alter their leadership behaviors based on which stage of the change process they are in and how teachers are responding to these stages (Gaubatz and Ensminger, in press). In combination, these studies indicate that department chair perception of the context in which they work influences their leadership behavior; therefore, their internal processing of environmental information could prompt strategic choices in how they respond to change process barriers.
This study recognizes the potential for leading educational change through leadership action at the department chair level, as well as the challenges that accompany this position, and therefore asks the question: How do department chairs describe their reform efforts in light of the change barriers they face? Department chairs need to employ strategies beyond simple authoritative power to enact change, so it is critical to understand what behaviors best facilitate the successful conversion of policy reform ideas into effective, on-the-ground departmental changes. The findings of this study begin to fill a gap in the literature by examining department chairs’ descriptions of and reflections on their leadership behaviors, as identified by Blake and Mouton’s Management Grid (1962, further developed by Blake and McCanse as the Leadership Grid, 1991) in response to change barriers (as identified by Ely, 1990a) in both successful and unsuccessful stories of change.
Barriers to change
Hannay and Denby (1994) reported that secondary school department chairs felt staff attitudes presented the main barrier to change implementation. This finding reflects research that has identified barriers to change, as well as conditions that enhance the probability of change attempt success (e.g., Ely, 1990a; Rogers, 1995). According to Ely (1990a), the absence of these change-enhancing conditions presents barriers to the change process that must be addressed by leaders in order for their change attempts to be successful (Ely, 1990b: 11). Based on the focus of this study, eight contextual conditions that promote change (as described by Ely, 1990a) guided the identification of change barriers contained in department chair stories of change. Ely’s (1990a) conditions of change include:
Dissatisfaction with the status quo. Members dissatisfied with the status quo are more apt to accept the idea of change.
Sufficient knowledge and skills. Members who possess the required knowledge and skills to participate in a change effort are able to play a supporting role in the change process.
Availability of resources. Sufficient funding, support personnel, and equipment should be present in order for a change attempt to be successful.
Availability of time. Members need time to learn, perform, and reflect on their roles in the change process.
Rewards or incentives. Members receiving external or internal rewards due to change implementation are more motivated to support a change.
Participation. Participants feel more ownership and investment in the change when they are involved in decisions related to the change or the change process.
Commitment. Participants should feel that stakeholders and leaders are committed to the change.
Leadership. Leaders need to support and encourage change participants during the change process.
These eight conditions are often reflected in research on barriers to change, such as the domains that should be addressed by change agents as they communicate with change participants (Armenakis et al., 1999). These domains include: (a) establishing a discrepancy to make a need for change from the status quo understood; (b) enhancing feelings of self-efficacy so members feel they have the capacity to aid in the change process; (c) emphasizing a personal valence which provide members with incentives to change; (d) principal support from leadership; and (e) explaining the appropriateness of the change to their specific situation. Also, mirroring Ely’s (1990a) satisfaction with the status quo barrier, Greenberg and Baron (2000) found that teachers who lacked an understanding for the need for change presented a barrier to the change process. Similarly, fear of the unknown can also increase follower resistance to change (e.g., Fullan, 2001; Greenberg and Baron, 2000; Kotter, 2012), which correlates with Ely’s (1990a) barrier of lacking sufficient knowledge and skills. Tam (2010) reported that lack of professional knowledge and skills, lack of time, and lack of resources as contributors to teachers’ resistance to implementing a school-based curriculum reform. Furthermore, congruence with the conditions for change identified by Ely is commonly seen when authors of change literature exert that including stakeholders in the decision-making process decreases resistance to change initiatives (e.g., Bass and Avolio, 1994; Schmoker, 1999).
In addition to literature echoing common threads in Ely’s (1990a) work, research has demonstrated that change participants view Ely’s (1990a) conditions for change as important. The importance of these conditions, however, varies based on contextual factors such as the organization in which the change was attempted, the innovation itself, and the characteristics of the change participants (Bauder, 1993; Ensminger and Surry, 2008; Jeffery, 1993; Ravitz, 1999; Read, 1994; Surry et al., 2006). Stein (1997) found that these conditions were valued differently depending on the current phase of the change process. Stein’s (1997) results indicate that dissatisfaction with the status quo, commitment, and leadership are most important when a change is first considered, whereas sufficient resources and participants’ knowledge and skills impact whether the change takes hold, and participation in the decision-making process, time, and incentives appear to impact how participants work to implement the change. In a similar line of exploration, this study employs Ely’s (1990a) conditions of change to identify: (a) change process barriers commonly encountered by secondary school department chairs as they lead change efforts; and (b) leadership behaviors that aided department chairs surmounting these change barriers.
Within this particular study, barriers to change were often evident via teacher resistance, which corresponds to the general conceptualization of resistance as behaviors that attempt to maintain the status quo (Zaltman and Duncan, 1977). In addition to change literature exploring resistance to change, researchers and theorists have focused on sources of resistance that do not solely revolve around the idea of the change itself. For instance, Zaltman and Duncan (1977) categorized change barriers as an interaction with the context created by the members who are experiencing the change. They described these types of contextually constructed barriers into four categories: cultural, social, organizational, and psychological. Cultural barriers occur when the values represented by the change clash with members’ values, social barriers emerge through individual and group behaviors, organizational barriers are created in conjunction with how individuals work and are placed within their organizational system, and psychological barriers manifest based on the personalities of individual members. In each of these categories, the change is a factor, but so are the experiences and attitudes of the members of the system.
Bridges (2009) presents yet another view on factors that play into resistance. He describes resistance to change as stemming from loss and the subsequent grief experienced by individuals affected by the change. Within his conceptualization of resistance, he defines change as the situational, external initiative, and transition as the individual member’s internal, psychological adaption to the change (Bridges, 2009). His perspective suggests that resistance has a personal element that can be linked to the perceptions, thoughts, actions, and feelings of those who are experiencing the change. Bridges (2009) identified three phases to transitioning: (a) Ending Phase during which time members let go of their previous identities or realities; (b) Neutral Zone during which time members are in the process of crossing from the old ways to the new ways; and (c) New Beginnings during which members are functioning well within their new environment. His phrase: “unless transition occurs, change will not work” is echoed in the common understanding that members need to “buy-in” to the change if the change is going to be successful.
Resistance can also surface through intra-office politics. This can emerge as covert or overt instances of resistance (Kotter, 2012), and it can also emerge in the form of resentment-resistance which occurs when individuals lack trust in their team members, or when they resent their leadership (Block, 1993). O’Toole (1995) noted that resistance can emerge in situations where a person perceives a threat to their social relations. Kotter and Schlesinger (2008) stated: “Although scheming and ruthless individuals sometimes initiate power struggles, more often than not those who do are people who view their potential loss from change as an unfair violation of their implicit, or psychological, contract with the organization” (Kotter and Schlesinger, 2008: 2–3). This form of resentment-resistance stems from employees’ sensitivity to fairness and justice within their organization (Folger and Skarlicki, 1999).
Barriers to change are often viewed negatively, but they may also present change agents with an opportunity to more fully examine the change initiative and possible consequences. This view places barriers, which often emerge as a form of resistance, in an approachable light: change agents should recognize that resistance may occur after change participants have reflected on the putative change, the impact the change could have, or how the change could affect participants’ work. According to Ford et al. (2008), leaders who are interested in initiating a change should provide change participants with ample time to reflect on and consider the change idea. He suggests that leaders should share their ideas about the proposed change honestly, and be receptive to change participants’ concerns. Through this open approach, change agents can view resistance as a tool that provides them with a deeper understanding of how the change process might manifest (Ford et al., 2008). The value of listening to ideas embedded in resistance was demonstrated by the findings of Gaubatz and Ensminger (in press). These findings described change agents who either adjusted their leadership behaviors in response to teacher concerns or tabled change attempts in response to teacher feedback. These change agents who responded by listening and seriously considering the message within teacher resistance were more apt to view the change attempt, successful or not, as a positive experience, whereas change agents who did not fully listen to teacher concerns were more likely to witness not only failed change attempts but damaged relationships.
Leadership behaviors in the context of change
The Leadership Grid examines behaviors along two axes on a coordinate grid, with one axis measuring the valence of leadership behaviors focused on people, and the other indicating the valence of leadership behaviors focused on tasks (Blake and McCanse, 1991; see Figure 1).
Yukl et al. (2002) enhanced the use of this grid by identifying specific behaviors within leadership literature as being focused on either people (such as providing support and encouragement, or consulting with member on decisions), tasks (such as planning short-term activities, or monitoring external environment), or change (such as encouraging innovative thinking).
Through a meta-analysis of leadership studies, Judge et al. (2004) determined that both the people- and task-focused axes of the Leadership Grid correlated with general leadership outcomes (concern for tasks, ρ∩ = 0.29, and concern for people, ρ∩ = 0.48). They additionally found correlations between leaders’ concern for people and followers’: (i) job satisfaction (ρ∩ = 0.46); (ii) satisfaction with their leaders (ρ∩ = 0.78); (iii) motivation (ρ∩ = 0.50); and (iv) perceptions of their leaders’ effectiveness (ρ∩ = 0.52). Correlations were also found between leaders’ task-focused behaviors and: (i) followers’ satisfaction with their leaders (ρ∩ = 0.33); (ii) their own motivation (ρ∩ = 0.40); and (iii) their perceptions of their leaders’ effectiveness (ρ∩ = 0.39). The results of this meta-analysis support the robustness of the Leadership Grid’s conceptualization of leadership behaviors.
The Leadership Grid (Blake and McCanse, 1991) is also a basis for the Life Styles Inventory (LSI), which assesses individual’s thought patterns in 12 different domains (LSI, 2011). Four of these domains create the Constructivist cluster, which represents thinking that is focused on both people- and task-related behaviors and is related to achieving satisfaction by growing as individuals and helping others to grow as well. Four other domains create the Passive-Defensive cluster, which represents thinking about achieving security by using people-focused skills, and the final four domains create the Aggressive-Defensive cluster, which represents thinking about achieving security through task-focused skills. This instrument was used within this study as an outside assessment of department chairs’ general thinking styles in response to the context in which they work for data triangulation with document and interview analysis.
A prediction of this study was that department chairs would describe using different leadership behaviors in response to different change barriers. This mirrors recent assertions that leadership effectiveness changes based on contexts (Gaubatz and Ensminger, in press; Liden and Antonakis, 2009; Yukl, 2009; Yukl and Mahsud, 2010). For instance, Yukl and Lepsinger (2005) determined that certain situations benefit more from more traditional, task-focused management approaches than from people-focused styles. Similarly, Gaubatz and Ensminger (in press) found that secondary school department chairs used different leadership behaviors during different stages of the change process impacting the success of the change. The idea that differing leadership approaches should be used in different situations is also supported by the various camps, which are based on the intuitive view of leadership within context (Fiedler, 1964; Hersey, 1985; Hersey and Blanchard, 1988; House and Mitchell, 1974).
Certain studies have found that leaders sense the context in which they work, such as the environment created by followers within a system, and it influences how they respond (Cuban, 1988; Gordon and Patterson, 2006). The ability to sense, internally process, and respond to the context created by individuals in a system enhances a leader’s ability to choose the most effective approach to a change. For instance, Lim and Ployhart (2004) determined that different leadership approaches were found to be more or less effective depending on the quality of the leader-followers relationship and the type of task the group was completing. The impact followers can have on the change process, and therefore on how a leader should approach change, is described by Zaltman and Duncan’s (1977)Strategies for Planned Change, which also emphasizes that the type of stakeholder resistance is one of the main factors leaders should consider when leading organizational change.
Methodology
Investigating the connection between leadership and change involves exploring constructs that reciprocally influence one another. Based on the contextual, recursive relationship between change and leadership, a multiple case study approach was chosen to examine “how” and “why” certain phenomena materialize within this context. As Yin (2003) stated, case studies should be applied when: “contextual conditions … might be highly pertinent to your phenomenon of study” and when: “the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident” (Yin, 2003: 13). This applies to this investigation in which the construct of leadership behaviors and change barriers are overlapping and intertwined.
This multiple case study analyzed department chair-led change processes as described by the mid-level manager change agents. The retrospective nature of these stories provided the department chair and researchers with knowledge of the outcome of the change attempt, which in turn provided opportunities to identify trends in successful and unsuccessful change attempts. Additionally, focusing on the voice and perspectives of the department chairs on their past change attempt experiences enhanced their ability to reflect and analyze their role in the change process; it also provided a window on how their perceptions of context influenced their behavioral choices. Change agents in this study have years of experience in education and in educational leadership, and they have had training in leadership; therefore, their retrospective views on their experiences add additional insight into the mid-level managers’ leadership experience.
Department chairs in this study were purposefully selected from a pool of Illinois Science Educator Leaders Association (ISELA) and Illinois Science Teacher Association (ISTA) members who responded to an online survey designed to identify possibly insightful stories of educational change. Participants were chosen based on their perceived ability to shed light onto the question: How do department chairs lead change? The participants’ stories of change were viewed, as Yin (2003: 32) proposed: “like multiple experiments”; this potential for replication could lead to a fuller understanding of the interplay between the constructs of change and leadership. This approach of purposeful selection of participants also strengthened this qualitative research by identifying: “conditions under which a particular phenomenon is likely to be found (literal replication), as well as the conditions when it is not likely to be found (theoretical replication)” (Yin, 2003: 47).
Three male and three female department chairs participated in this project. Two of these department chairs shared only successful experiences with leading change, and four shared both successful and unsuccessful experiences leading change within their departments. Participants’ schools were located within 100 miles of a major Midwestern United States city. Briefly, the participants and their stories of change include:
Peggy is a science department chair with over 15 years of educational experience. At the time of this study, her school was transitioning from a rural high school to an outer-ring suburb. Her description of a successful change resulted in the implementation of a common grading system and common assessments within content courses.
Samuel is a science department chair with over 15 years of experience in education. His suburban school community is wealthy and has little minority representation, and students at this school are consistently high-performing. His change attempts revolved around creating two new course sequence strands. One course sequence strand focused on physical sciences and progressed to the life sciences, while the other began with an Earth/environmental science emphasis and progressed to the physical sciences. The first course sequence strand implementation was success, while the second was not.
Anita is the science and music department chair for three high schools within one ethnically diverse suburban high school district. She has over 15 years of experience in education. Anita’s successful change initiative was the creation of common course assessments. These assessments provided a common instructional goal that guided curriculum development and teacher professional development discussions.
Joseph is a science department chair who has been in the field of education for 6–15 years. His suburban school has little minority representation. Joseph shared a story of successful change in which his department replaced a popular freshman (9th grade, first year of high school) course. His story of unsuccessful change involved an attempt to use the teacher-intensive curriculum mapping process to analyze the content and skills of courses to uncover gaps or repetitions within a program.
Mary is a science department chair with over 15 years of experience in education. She teaches in a fairly wealthy suburban high school. Her story of successful change resulted in a new course sequence strand proposed by her teachers, and her story of unsuccessful change revolved around the implementation of a common student laboratory report format.
Xavier is a science department chair at a suburban high school with little minority representation. He has been in education for 6–15 years. Xavier’s successful change story increased inquiry lessons within two core courses for sophomores and juniors (10th and 11th grades). His unsuccessful story was an attempt to increase inquiry lessons in a third core course for freshmen (9th grade).
Three forms of data were collected through a variety of approaches, thereby increasing the validity of the findings through methodological and data triangulation (Denzin and Lincoln, 2003; Yin, 2003). These three forms of data included: (i) documents department chairs viewed as illustrative of their change process and strategies; (ii) transcripts from a series of three interviews with department chairs: and (iii) the results from the LSI which assesses thought orientations.
Prior to the interview series, department chairs selected for this research project completed the LSI and submitted it to Human Synergistics, Inc. for scoring. The results from this inventory on their context-dependent task- and people-focused thinking patterns and their current leanings toward satisfaction or security, provided discussion points for later interviews, as well as triangulation of the data collected in department chair documents and interviews.
Also prior to the interviews, participants electronically shared documents they felt illustrated important aspects of their change process. Unlike spoken words uttered during an interview, the documents provided by participants were tangible, concrete, and permanent pieces of evidence from their change process. A certain amount of weight, therefore, can be afforded to documents within qualitative research based on the level of effort which would have gone into their construction (Creswell, 2009). Documents analyzed in this portion of the study included presentations, emails to teachers, feedback from teachers, feedback or guiding forms for teachers, results from department meeting brainstorming activities, meeting notes, change choice options, and meeting agendas. Documents were analyzed and coded for the leadership behaviors (based on modified categories identified by Yukl et al, 2002) and conditions of change (as identified by Ely, 1990a; see Table 1).
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Table 1. Task- and people-focused leadership behaviors, modified from Yukl et al. (2002).
Along with providing data triangulation, department chairs’ documents provided researchers with an initial understanding of their change processes, and information from these documents was used to augment initial interview prompts, resulting in site-specific interview questions.
After submitted documents were analyzed, department chairs shared their verbal accounts of and reflections on their change process in three progressive interviews. Interview transcripts were analyzed through the same coding system as the documents, again based on a modification of Yukl et al.’s (2002) leadership behavior categories, and the conditions of change identified by Ely (1990a) (see Table 1).
The first interview in the series consisted of questions about the general change attempt and clarifying or elaboration questions based on the document analysis. These questions were designed to open the conversation about the department chair’s leadership behaviors and strategies during the change process, and included items such as: From where did the idea for change originate? What were your beginning steps? How did you approach your faculty? How did they respond? How did you respond? What were your concerns?
The second interview involved member-checking of the initial interview and the summary of the transcript coding. This member-checking promoted a collaborative feel to the conversation, and furthered clarified and elaborated the department chair’s view of their experiences leading change. Additionally during this interview, results from the LSI were reviewed with each individual department chair during the second interview for further discussion on their leadership and their experience of their change process.
The third interview increased the collaborative aspects of the conversation between the investigator and participants. During this interview, information compiled from all department chair stories of successful and unsuccessful change attempts was shared, and participants were asked to comment on trends they saw identified within the information collected.
Results and discussion
Most change process barriers identified in department chair stories of change manifested primarily as descriptions of teacher resistance, and could be directly related to the absence of conditions of change identified by Ely (1990a) in department chair stories. One exception to this finding was the unexpected and powerful barrier termed within this article as “the contentious resistor.” Although all cases explored in this study described encounters with barriers to change, department chairs leading successful instances of change described converting change barriers into conditions for change through their leadership behaviors. Table 2 shows a portion of the data analysis revolving around common barriers described within department chair change attempt stories.
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Table 2. Conditions (based on Ely, 1990a) in successful and usuccessful change attempts.
Table 2 delineates the change attempt goal (first column), the commonly described change conditions as from Ely’s research (1990a; second column), whether the condition was present at the start of the change process (third column), or if it was present by the end of the change process (fourth column), and whether the change attempt was successful or unsuccessful (fifth column).
From this analysis of barriers emerges the fact that all department chairs within this study described encountering barriers in both successful and unsuccessful change attempts (see Table 2). Additionally derived from this analysis is the fact that the number of barriers present at the beginning of the change process did not predict whether a change attempt would succeed. This is most clearly demonstrated by Anita and Joseph’s descriptions of their change attempts, both of which describe converting a relatively large number of change barriers into change conditions. Another generality illustrated in the analysis within Table 2 is that the most common barrier present in both successful and unsuccessful change attempt stories was teacher satisfaction with the status quo. This change barrier was present in all case descriptions except Mary’s story in which her teachers approached her about creating a new freshman course. Key in this analysis is that in each successful instance of change, satisfaction with the status quo was converted to dissatisfaction with the status quo, but this conversion was not achieved in any of the four unsuccessful change attempts. Department chairs who could not create teacher dissatisfaction with the status quo, despite the presence of other enhancing change conditions, were unable to implement successful change.
In addition to identifying common barriers in department chair stories of change, this study also identified the essential department chair leadership behaviors that appeared to prompt the conversion of change barriers into conditions that enhanced the change process. As shown in Figure 2, department chairs who shared external and internal information and provided professional development were more able to move teachers from feeling satisfied to dissatisfied with the status quo and to increase teachers’ knowledge and skills. Department chairs also tapped into teachers’ callings and set clear expectations and objectives as a way to encourage teacher participation in decisions.
Satisfaction with the status quo
The most influential barrier emerging from this study that related to Ely’s (1990a) conditions of change was teachers’ satisfaction with the status quo. This barrier was present in the beginning of all but one description of successful instance of change, and was present throughout the change process in all four accounts of unsuccessful change attempts (Table 2). Satisfaction with the status quo was illustrated in stories of change when department chairs reported teacher comments such as: “I want to grade the way I want to grade, I’ve been grading this way for 30 years”; “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”; and “We’re just going to continue to do this because we don’t want to lose it.” Rigano and Ritchie (2003) and Tam (2010) reported similar findings and reported that department chairs had to address the status quo and help facilitate a new way of thinking among their faculty in order to promote change. This included developing a shared vision and mission among the faculty.
When analyzing the stories of successful instances of change, the conversion of teachers’ satisfaction with the status quo to dissatisfaction with the status quo appeared to be coupled with department chairs’ descriptions of specific task-focused leadership behaviors, especially the sharing of internal data or external information (Figure 2). Sharing internal data often involved department chairs collecting and analyzing department data, such as attendance rates, grade distributions, exam scores, and laboratory usage, whereas sharing external information often consisted of department chairs gathering professional information from outside sources, such as journal articles, experiences of teachers in other schools, and video clips. Department chairs also used the people-focused leadership skill of providing professional development, promoting teacher awareness of current professional topics during department meetings and discussing topics in one-on-one meetings and during informal conversations. When department chairs reflected on their use of these tasks-focused behaviors, they reported that they strategically shared information from internal and external sources with the goal of planting the seeds of teacher dissatisfaction with the status quo, hoping that teachers would eventually view the possible change as valid, feasible, and worthwhile.
Anita reported that she worked to overcome the barrier of teacher satisfaction with the status quo by: “bringing in articles that explained why moving in this direction was a good idea … I’d find an article that would say exactly why we should be doing this.” She’d then open it up for department discussions: “When I read this article, this is what I think. What do you think when you read this article?” To help spark dissatisfaction with the status quo, Xavier shared an observation with his teachers: “You know, it’s a shame that we live on a prairie and we don’t utilize it.” He also shared data with his teachers to emphasize how they were performing compared to other schools in their district: “It seemed like they needed a little bit more realization that it is very important …” In addition to articles, department chairs shared information from other departments and schools to open teachers’ minds to new ways of viewing their own work, such as common weighting of grade categories from the math department and analytical grids based on course sequence innovations implemented in others schools.
Department chairs often coupled internal department data with external information. This sharing of internal data helped teachers see how their role related to the larger system, including their department, school, and professional field. For instance, Xavier shared his department’s grade distribution compared to other departments in his school. He said: “For the past four or five years, their [content area] percentages of Ds and Fs, not only among the science courses, but among all courses in the district, is one of the highest.” This information surprised teachers and spurred heated conversations of academic rigor, enrollment, and student experiences in science education, eventually leading to a reassessment of their grading practices. Peggy and Anita shared parent concerns about test fairness and grading with their teachers. Peggy told her teachers: “You know what really helped (with answering a parent concern) was when I could respond and say, ‘the test is the same – we use the same test’.” Sharing this information prompted teachers to see the benefit of, and then explore, implementing common tests within their content areas.
In the six successful instances of department chairs leading change, department chairs most frequently used the task-focused leadership behaviors of monitoring internal data and examining external information, such as grade distributions, parent concerns, and journal articles, to help them counter teacher satisfaction with the status quo. However, department chairs also used people-focused leadership behavior of providing professional development in subtle ways to increase teacher dissatisfaction with the status quo; as teachers learned more, they were able to see ways in which changes could benefit their students. These leadership moves, however, were occasionally not sufficient: department chairs who led unsuccessful change attempts used some of these same leadership behaviors, but were unable to create this condition of change necessary for teachers to view potential change positively.
Lack of knowledge and skills
When department chairs interpreted teachers as lacking the requisite knowledge and skills to fully participate in a change attempt, they described using similar task-focused and people-focused leadership behaviors as they did with the barrier of satisfaction with the status quo. As shown in Figure 2, many department chairs reported that they worked to increase teachers’ knowledge and skills by providing professional development through local- and national-level professional training, department discussions on research articles, or sharing information collected from their own department or school. Anita emphasized the importance of professional development to increase teachers’ knowledge and skills by stating: “Providing them with basic training on good assessment writing was essential … to ensure that each of them had the skills and knowledge to complete the task given to them.”
Joseph not only provided professional development opportunities for his teachers but he also attended some of these workshops, even though he did not need the training. He stated he attended these sessions with his teachers to: “show support for teachers who struggled with the change.” This people-focused leadership behavior increased his connection with his teachers and increased their trust in his ability to understand their needs related to the change.
Another common leadership behavior described in conjunction with overcoming a lack of teachers’ knowledge and skills included asking teachers who were currently participating in the change to share their successful lessons with their colleagues during department meetings as a form of informal professional development. Xavier stated that: “One of my goals that we’ve done is to increase show-and-tell during department meetings … Sometimes I prod them by telling them that the person they’re working with right down the hallway has some really good ideas.” This people-focused leadership strategy not only provided professional development for change-resistant teachers but it also provided recognition for the work of their change-receptive counterparts.
Lack of participation in decisions
The third common barrier in department chair stories of change was teachers’ lack of desire to participate in, or their exclusion from, the decision-making process. All stories of successful change involved teacher participation in at least some portion of the decision-making process, even if teachers had to be convinced to participate. Unsuccessful stories of change included descriptions in which teachers were not ever convinced to participate in the change, as well as stories in which teachers participated in the change decision, but based on their involvement in the change process, they decided to abandon the change attempt.
In this study, four of the six stories of successful change involved teachers in the decision-making process early in the change process. A frequent strategy described by department chairs in their stories of change was to encourage teacher-involvement by combining the task-focused leadership behavior of monitoring the internal environment with the people-focused leadership behaviors of consulting with teachers. Many department chairs within this study shared how they elicited written thoughts and ideas from teachers through department-wide and one-on-one discussions. The additional step of collecting teacher input in written (and usually anonymous) formats encouraged teachers to share their ideas without having their peers influence the sharing process. Department chairs often shared the compiled comments from this written feedback on further discussion. Some of the prompts for the written feedback included: “Pluses/Minuses,” “Professional areas of strengths/weakness,” “After reflecting on the data, I think our team should do X to improve our course,” “I affirm this decision/I do not agree with this decision because …”
Another people-focused leadership behavior used in almost all change attempts involved department chairs encouraging involvement in the decision-making process by tapping into teachers’ feelings of duty to determine and act on what was best for their students. This not only called to mind teachers’ job descriptions but also inspired teachers to make students’ lives better. Some phrases shared by department chairs that accessed teachers’ shared vision included: “If we all agree that this is the best thing for kids, why aren’t we doing it?” “If it’s better for kids, then what else are you going to say?” “I said, ‘We’ll do what’s best for kids, and deep down, that’s what it’s all about’.”
In two of the successful change attempts, the change was initiated without teacher input, but teachers eventually participated in the implementation decisions and the final details of the change. These initial change decisions came from upper administration, and therefore teacher input was not sought in the early stages of the change process. This created some teacher resistance when teachers were finally invited in on the process, but as Peggy explained to teachers:
We have two choices here: You can be part of this team to create the questions and have some input and then you get your ideas and ways of doing things become part of the way we all do it, or you can step back and be stuck with whatever the team develops.
In the other situation involving a top-down change initiative, Anita stated: “Guys, this is being bandied about by administration – before we have this imposed on us, I want to know what you think.” Although Anita and her teachers knew that the change was coming whether they were on board or not, having time to share ideas softened the inconvenience of the change and allowed teachers to be involved with the smaller-level change decisions.
In unsuccessful change attempts, the involvement of teachers in change-related decision-making might have softened the damage done to the relationships between the department chair and department members. When Mary consulted with her teachers on a common lab report format, the feedback she received was highly negative; teachers did not want, nor did they see a need for, a common lab report format. Based on this feedback, she was able to table the change idea in a collaborative manner, which resulted in little damage to her relationship with her department and left room for a discussion on the topic in the future. She shared how she thought of this failed change attempt: “I can live with this. It did raise awareness, and I do want to revisit it later on.” This acceptance to ending her change effort was mirrored by Mary’s LSI scores, which indicated her moderately high concern with establishing relationships and accomplishing tasks, and coupled with relatively low scores in her passive and aggressive-defensive cluster; these combined scores match her descriptions of comfort with ending her change attempt without the accompanying needs to establish security in her position or her feeling of self-worth.
Unlike Mary, other department chairs who incompletely involved teachers in the decision-making process, or whose teachers chose not to participate in decision-making not only had their change attempts fail but their failure resulted in hard feelings between the department chairs and department members. As Samuel shared: “I was pushing … well, not pushing … That’s when all of this stuff really started to push back. I didn’t realize it was going to be that much of a change …” In later interviews, he reflected that his subjective valuation of teachers’ views would have been corrected or modified had he more strategically gathered information from teachers on their perspectives of the benefits of the change attempt.
Contentious resistor
Three of the four stories of unsuccessful change contained reports of teachers who passively or actively demonstrated discontent with the current department chair by resisting change initiatives in a manner that did not align with barriers associated with Ely’s (1990a) conditions of change. The resistance in these three stories of unsuccessful change appears to have been fueled by an inability or unwillingness to, as Bridges’ (2009) work implies, transition through a previous organizational change. This poisonous bleed over from previous unresolved change connects with literature on resentment-resistance, which emerges when individuals have hard feelings about their leadership (Block, 1993) or when power struggles surface based on individuals’ feelings of unfairness or threats to their self-esteem (e.g., Folger and Skarlicki, 1999; Kotter and Schlesinger, 2008; O’Toole, 1995). Although their behaviors stemmed from previous change events, their actions had serious consequences for the specific change stories explored within this study.
Teachers presenting this type of resistant barrier to the change attempts described in department chair stories engaged in subtle acts of resistance such as refusing to participate in the decision-making process, or overt displays of insubordination such as challenging the department chair to step down from their position. Teachers who exhibited this form of resistance shared not only a similar exhibition of lack of respect for their department chair but they also shared an influential part of their professional history in common: all of these resistors were either former department chairs or teachers who applied for the department chair position but were not chosen. Department chairs who experienced this form of resistance stated that the individual resistor seemed to think that they could better fulfill the roles and responsibilities of the department chair position.
Descriptions of these “contentious resistors” and their histories in three of the unsuccessful stories of change include:
Samuel: “I think [his] being a much more veteran teacher among a lot of younger teachers, people were just listening to that person. And this person did not get this job, but I’m not sure that was a factor. And he had been here much longer than I.”
Joseph: “I have the former department chair in my department, so that made it difficult. He was the biggest adversary. He was the cause of a lot of problems early on …”
Xavier: “There were four others in the department who went for the department chair position with me. That has also contributed to the dynamic. Two of them who didn’t get the position thought that their ideas were better.”
In Samuel’s reflections on the impact of the contentious resistor on his change initiative, he recognized that although teachers were involved in the decision-making process, the behind-the-scenes actions of the contentious resistor undermined his leadership: “We had made the unanimous decision to do [this change], but teachers, even teachers who were hired for this specific purpose, weren’t agreeing anymore.” Unfortunately, Samuel was unaware of the fomenting resistance until teachers voted overwhelmingly to eliminate the change. He stated: “It felt like it came out of nowhere.” In Samuel’s case of a contentious resistor, much of the resistor’s work occurred behind his back, so once the change attempt ended decisively and abruptly, he was unable to work with the resistor, or with teachers influenced by the resistor, to save the change effort.
Joseph’s story of unsuccessful change involving a contentious resistor involved a teacher who had been the previous department chair, but chose to step down. This individual actively challenged the leadership of the current department chair in multiple situations. He described the impact on his department: “… it was anarchy, they (teachers) were going to him (the resistor) for everything.”
Joseph shared that he attempted to counter the impact of this barrier to his change initiation by openly communicating with his challenger and focusing on the teacher’s professional calling to decrease his resistance:
So we had a talk and I told him, in a not-so-professional way, that it is your job to teach and my job is to make sure that this department runs well … we know that our hearts are in the right place – it’s for the students. We’re doing it for the students and for the benefit of the staff.
Xavier’s case of unsuccessful change attempted to reduce the impact of this form of resistance through professional development, team creation, and consultation; however, when these attempts to reduce resistance failed, he decided to involve his administration to emphasize the need for change with the one specific content area team that contained the contentious resistor. At the time of the last interview with Xavier, this effort had not resulted in the reduction of resistance from this individual, and therefore had not increased cooperation from the team.
Joseph and Xavier also attempted to address the barrier created by their contentious resistors by reorganizing teams. Joseph described the importance of instituting a leader within content teams that he could trust because: “they would mediate the nay-sayers.” Furthermore, both Joseph and Xavier joined teaching teams themselves to model behaviors and guide teachers on a more informal level, as well as to monitor the team more closely. However, when planning on which team to place the contentious resistor in to mitigate her impact, Xavier explained that he felt each team seemed too fragile to handle her negative effects. He lamented: “I don’t know where to hide her.”
More so than with other barriers, department chair experiences with contentious resistors caused personal and professional stress, and distress. Samuel elaborated the hurtful situation created by his contentious resistor by sharing his understanding of how teachers were speaking of him behind his back:
There were a lot of parking lot conversations about it, and it was anonymous kinds of things too, and it was very, very difficult. Someone called them ‘assassins’…those people who were trying to shoot you and you didn’t know who or what.
He summarized his experiences with contentious resistance by saying: “You talk about painful times in your leadership, and that was definitely painful.”
Joseph stated that his experiences with his contentious resistor had harmed his health and personal life, so much so that he was considering looking for a different job. Ironically, the contentious resistor who was causing Joseph so much grief had been the previous department chair, but had stepped down when he faced the same type of personnel challenges.
In all three stories containing a contentious resistor, no department chair leadership behavior described was able to convert this barrier to change into a condition for change. Interestingly, although only three department chairs shared their experiences with contentious resistors in their change stories, during the final interviews in which the compiled data was shared with all department chairs in the study, the other department chairs responded to these stories of contentious resistors by sharing their own experiences with this exact challenge but in situations other than the change stories they shared for this study.
This barrier of the contentious resistor provoked not only professional reflections by the department chairs who shared their stories of contentious resistors but it also was the barrier that elicited the strongest emotional response of sympathy and frustration from all department chairs within this study. During the final interview, department chairs who had shared their stories containing contentious situations expressed relief that they were not alone in their experiences, but they were also dismayed by its prevalence and the apparent inability to counter it.
LSI
Department chairs within this study generally scored strong in the Constructive cluster of the LSI, and low in the Passive-Defensive and Aggressive-Defensive clusters. However, department chairs who were currently recovering from a contentious situation or who were in the midst of working with a contentious resistor had higher-than-average scores in their security-seeking, people-focused Passive-Defensive clusters. These LSI scores mirror the stories told within their interviews: the more contentious the context, the more self-protective thinking styles emerged. The two highest domain scores within this cluster were Avoidance and Dependence. The context in which individuals work influences their LSI scores, and these two scores in particular often emerge when leaders are concerned about self-protection; they avoid risk-taking, they fear rejection, and they feel threatened (LSI, 2011). This mirrors the feelings department chairs shared when describing how they dealt with contentious situations: they expressed hurt, anxiety, and stress over their inability to gain the respect and cooperation of their resistant teachers, they questioned their ability to conduct their job sufficiently, and they felt under attack from their teachers.
Conclusion
Researchers and theorists have long postulated the connection between leadership and change; however, none have identified clear connections between change process barriers and behaviors described in leadership models. The current study extends our understandings of the interplay between these two constructs by examining how secondary school department chairs described how they used behaviors associated with the Leadership Grid (Blake and Mouton, 1963; Yukl et al., 2002) to overcome barriers to the change process (Ely, 1990a).
The main barriers that emerged from department chair stories of change that aligned with change conditions identified by Ely (1990a), included teachers’ satisfaction with the status quo, a lack of teacher knowledge and skills, and a lack of teacher input on change decisions (Table 2). In general, department chairs described predictable leadership behaviors used to counter these barriers (Figure 2). For instance, when department chairs recognized that teachers were satisfied with the status quo and therefore would be resistant to change, they strategically shared information from internal and external sources to help their teachers develop dissatisfaction with the status quo. Also predictably, department chairs provided teachers with professional development if teachers required new skills or knowledge in order to participate in the change process. Less predictable trends emerged, however, when department chairs worked to involve teachers in the decision-making process; in these situations, department chairs called upon teachers’ sense of duty or expressed direct objectives for teachers or teacher teams. Finally, department chairs described using a range of leadership behaviors, all limited in their effectiveness, when they faced the unexpected form of resistance that emerged not based on the change itself, but based on teachers’ perception, or resentment of their department.
Mid-level leaders have a difficult role to play within organizations, and yet they sit at the fulcrum from which they can usher in change, converting policy and ideas into action. To best access this potential for positive change, academic department chairs might benefit from professional training that would increase their efficacy as change agents. From the findings of this investigation, a few basic suggestions are presented for change agent consideration as they strategize how to respond to change process barriers:
Learn about the department. Monitor the department’s internal environment by evaluating data and program effectiveness, and be aware of the professional and personal relationships that exist within the department. Understanding the psychological factors that could impact change implementation should help department chairs strategize how to best share information with department members.
Learn about what others are doing in your field. Monitor the external environment through conferences, articles, and professional literature, and from others within your professional network. This involvement and knowledge can provide ideas on how your department could be improved, and thoughtfully sharing this information with department members can increase their interest in change by increasing their dissatisfaction with the status quo and their knowledge and skills.
Educate members through formal and informal channels. Provide professional development through various avenues, but keep the information focused so department members do not become overwhelmed. Topics should have common themes that support the direction and philosophies of the department.
Solicit feedback from department members. Involving members in decision-making increases their feelings of worth, builds trust, and provides the department chair with valuable information on the proposed change and the change process. Department members should share their thoughts during group and one-on-one discussions, and through written anonymous feedback.
Be patient. Department chairs should allow time for members to consider the merits of possible changes, explore alternatives, and provide feedback.
Reorganize teams to reduce the impact of negative members. This requires department chairs to have an understanding of how individuals impact one another.
Directly address contentious resistors. Discuss their role within the department and ask them to suggest ideas that could help them adjust to these roles. Contentious teachers may thwart change attempts based on their feelings of resentment or their fear that they are not recognized for the value they bring to the department. Until their original negative feelings are addressed, they could continue to interfere with department development.
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Author biographies
Julie A. Gaubatz is the Science Department Chair at Hinsdale South High School. She recently completed her doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction from Loyola University, Chicago. Her research interests include science education and change leadership.
David C. Ensminger is assistant professor within the School of Education at Loyola University, Chicago. He splits his time between the Curriculum and Instruction and Research Methods programs. His research interests include organizational learning and change, and student learning.