Ep #96: Celebrate Your Wins

Something I see in a lot of my clients is a reluctance to associate work with pleasure. They see work as work and fun as something that should be enjoyed out of office hours. This makes a lot of sense on some level, but what it’s actually doing is making your work environment so much harder to enjoy.

It is not your job’s job to make sure you have a fun time at work. The only person responsible for making work a pleasurable experience is you. We’ve talked about every other aspect of scheduling this month, but now, it’s time for the good stuff.

 

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Ep #95: Why Learning New Things Is Hard, But Worth It

We’ve been focusing on workload this month and I hope it’s helped you through the lull in motivation a lot of school leaders feel around this time of year.  Today, we’re going to take a good look at how you can reframe your thoughts about your workload, especially when it comes to taking on new responsibilities.

Learning new things is hard. We know this. But why is it such a challenge, even though we’ve gone through our whole life acquiring new skills every step of the way?  Well, that’s kind of the reason. It occurred to me just the other day, there is a type of mental fatigue that goes with every part of the process of learning something new.

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Ep #94: Prioritizing Your Workload as a Leader

I recently looked at the job posting for a job as a principal, just out of curiosity, and I was slightly shocked to find no less than 40 bullet points for different tasks that were expected of the applicant. That is a huge number. It’s little wonder that our school leaders are feeling increasingly more pressure in their jobs.

There is nothing more disempowering than being given way more to do than there is time for in your workday. So, what can we do to take some of that empowerment back and still do an amazing job?

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Ep #93: Principal Burnout

Even though the school year has just begun, I know for a fact that many of you principals will be experiencing some degree of burnout. Things are hectic right now, and the long summer break seems like it’s a million miles away, which doesn’t make things any easier.

You may even have thought of throwing in the towel. Well, I’ve got news for you: the burnout you’re feeling is not going to go away just because you change your circumstances. Take it from me, even though I’m now self-employed, there are still days when I wake up and I just don’t want to do the work I’ve set out for the day.

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Ep #92: Mental Health

Devastatingly, in the week leading up to me recording this episode, there were three mass shootings in our country – one of those was a town very close to where I live. This got me thinking, while it seemed like everyone was looking for someone or something to blame, what can we do as school leaders to remove the stigma around mental health?

I believe that mental health should get as much focus as physical health. We have physical education programs in schools and there is never any shame around hiring a personal trainer or joining a gym. So how can we integrate awareness around mental health in the one place where kids go for no other reason than to learn?

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