Читать книгу The Together Leader - Heyck-Merlin Maia - Страница 7

It was June 17, 2003, 12:30 pm. I had no choice. I pulled my car over on a residential Houston street, threw down the driver's seat, and curled up for a catnap. In approximately sixty minutes, I'd be training fifty veteran educators on how to support rookie teachers over the summer. But right then, I needed to sleep. My backseat was packed to the brim with training materials and supplies hastily thrown into boxes. The address and directions for the training were scrawled on the back of an envelope. Oh, and did I mention I had another session scheduled for the very next day that I had not yet planned?

Now how did I get in this precarious predicament, you may ask? A dreadful combination of a new job, unclear roles and responsibilities, not enough sleep, poor delegation, and lack of preparation. I was an un-Together Leader, and I had hit a breaking point. And the stakes were high. We were preparing teachers to go in front of students. So on this day almost fifteen years ago, I made a vow to never, ever get myself into that kind of situation again.

Perhaps you empathize? You, too, may be trying to juggle the high volume of work and responsibility thrown at you every day. Maybe you have all your to-dos reasonably under control but wish you could be more planned ahead. Or maybe you're just exhausted and looking for a better way?

This book can work for you if you are a new manager. It can work for you if you've shifted careers from the corporate world into the nonprofit sector and you're thoroughly confused about the culture. Or maybe you've made the move from teaching to school or district leadership, or you've quickly realized your MBA was practical but didn't teach you how to prioritize in a world of limited resources. Or maybe you have been in your role for a few years and you realize that lack of Togetherness is holding you back from achieving your goals or securing a promotion. Perhaps you are trying to get your own mission-driven work off the ground. You may have unlimited vision and passion but require finer execution skills to make your dream a reality. Regardless of who you are, let this book be your guide in managing your time, energy, people's work, meetings, projects, and stuff. If we leaders are not Together, we will not get the ambitious results we want for our organizations. But if we are Together (along with a few other things), big and meaningful change can happen.

Some of you may have read my first book, The Together Teacher, a guide for teachers and other folks who work on a fixed schedule in on-your-feet environments without much discretionary time. But now you're a leader, and you have a different challenge: choice. You get to choose how you use your time. It's wonderful and daunting all at once.