Stop Fake Work in Education
Creating Real Work Cultures That Drive Student Success
Foreword by Debbie Silver
Don’t do more work—do the right work.
Educators at all levels have increasing demands keeping them working harder than ever, but they are often working hard on things that don’t really help them reach the loftiest of goals—student success. This “Fake Work” can mire the most dedicated educator in exhaustion, burnout, and a lack of confidence that improvement is possible.
Nielson and Burks show leaders and their teams how to stop doing Fake Work, by providing tools for gaining focus, building high-performance teams, and identifying and driving the right work with the right behaviors. When you offer your team a better way of working, planning, and collaborating, you turn Fake Work into Real Work—and stagnancy into dynamic change. This data-driven, research-based guide shows you
• An overall approach to addressing your culture—the foundational elements that supports the change that sets you up for maximum performance.
• A simple, three-part model—strategy, alignment, execution—for shedding Fake Work
• Road maps for aligning organizational strategies and actions
• Tools for gaining focus, building teams, and cultivating productive behaviors
• Real educators’ stories
• Exercises, reflection questions, charts, checklists, and more
School change remains elusive when the path to success is murky. Clear the way for principals, teachers and students by turning Fake Work into Real Work—and uncertainty into true success.
Supplements
Nielson and Burks reframe the work of schools. They advocate that leaders become discerning and discriminate between fake work and meaningful work. Through scholarly writing, stories from the field, and charts, they have created a hands-on guide for culture building. As a principal and a superintendent this book would have been invaluable guide. Just the charts alone provide a powerful reflective tool for leaders.
Having worked with Betty Burk for many years, I have observed first-hand the effectiveness of the practices identified in this book. Mrs. Burk and Mr. Nielson share research that has allowed them to develop effective strategies focused on how leaders can maximize high-leverage approaches to their work as well as how to recognize distractors that can get in the way of success. This book is a great resource for anyone wanting to increase their effectiveness, by honing in on practices that yield positive results and managing work that can get in the way. Using the approaches in this book, will aid in a leaders ability to grow a collaborative and climate focused on the “right work”.
Gaylan Nielson and Betty Burks have nailed it! As acentral office administrator who received extensive training around the concept of “Fake Work” and its impact on people working harder but accomplishing less is now centered around the topic of education. As a superintendent of schools, I cannot wait to apply the strategies that lead to building a high-performance culture that drives student success through an emphasis on the “Real Work”. Finally, a book that is practical and easy to apply to the field of education.
Reflecting on the sense of urgency to “get it right” in our schools, the book has captured the essence of the real work that must be done to achieve that lofty goal. Commendations are offered, in that the book serves as a:
- Compelling call to action for educators to become transformative agents of change within schools;
- Strong resource and vehicle for strengthening school culture by working both collectively and strategically;
- Transformational platform for creating essential school-wide and systematic change; and a
- Roadmap for ensuring that we, as educators, remain relentlessly focused on “Standing on the X”.
As a professional development consultant, I want to align the work we do with teachers and principals with district strategic plans. It's often difficult, if not impossible. Now I realize that it's because of Fake Work! When the strategic intent of the district is disconnected from the focus on student success, there is no purpose for professional learning. Nielson and Burks offer a way to cut through the often difficult processes of strategic planning with this thoughtful, fully developed yet concise guide to creating a plan around the real work of great schools. It's an easy read and a book from two people who know schools and can guide others in improving student achievement with a careful but easy to accomplish process.
