Coaching Culture Starts with the Leadership Team with Dr. Christy Lamb, ep. 269

Coaching Culture Starts with the Leadership Team with Dr. Christy Lamb, ep. 269, Instructional Coaching with Ms. B Podcast

Chrissy Beltran [00:00:03]:

Hey, coach, and welcome to Instructional Coaching with Miss B. Today, we are talking about how coaching culture starts with the leadership team. Now I have a lovely guest, Christy Lamb, who’s actually been on the podcast a few years back. And so I’m really excited to welcome her back. We are starting our series on coaching culture and morale. This is a huge issue that many coaches face. It’s actually the foundational problem that we have across our schools. There is no coaching culture and morale is tough right now. So sometimes the issue that teachers have with with learning and working alongside a coach is actually more about the way the school works. When we toss too many initiatives out at the same time or provide a dump and go PD model with no follow-up, our teachers feel unsupported and overwhelmed. And we do that without their input. It’s even worse because it feels like it’s top down directed. We need a clear tiered plan for professional development and the direction we want our school to go. Actually, I have a free mini course that’ll walk you through creating a three tiered coaching plan that supports your entire school without adding more to your plate. So you’re gonna learn how to map out the whole school needs, which become your PD focus, the group needs for teams, and those become your PLC priorities, and then individual needs, which are your coaching cycle and teacher support one on one. You can head to Buzzy With Chrissy Beltran Dot Com Slash Action to get the free mini course. So let me introduce my wonderful guest, doctor Christy Lam. She is a school leadership scholar and a coach who specializes in helping current principals set up systems to help their schools thrive. She’s passionate passionate about running effective meetings, shared leadership where tasks actually get accomplished, and creating unique school cultures that balance achievement and fun. Perfect guest to kick off this series, so let’s welcome Christie. I am so excited to welcome my guest today. Welcome Christie to the podcast.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:01:50]:

Thank you, Christie. Good to be here.

Chrissy Beltran [00:01:52]:

Yeah. Thank you. I guess I should have said welcome back to the podcast.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:01:54]:

Yes. It’s been a while, though. Okay.

Chrissy Beltran [00:01:56]:

It has. Yeah. It’s it’s been, like, like, five years, I think, which is wild to think if that’s possible. How’s that possible that it’s been?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:02:04]:

I know it. I know it.

Chrissy Beltran [00:02:05]:

Yeah. So this is an episode in the series that we’re working on, coaching culture and morale. And so I’m really excited to speak with you about this because I feel like the leadership team has such an integral part in creating the culture of a school. So can you help us kind of envision what a school with a positive coaching culture can look like?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:02:24]:

Yeah. I have been a coach, and I have been a coach under multiple different principles. And it’s really interesting how an administrator can, I think, really make or break that coaching role? And so I think when I think of a school that has a positive coaching culture, it means that the administrator and the coach are both very clear about what that role is, what the impact we wanna see from that role is, having that coach be a part of leadership teams and committees, and then also making sure that the teachers also really understand the role and the desired impact of the coach. And so everybody’s really working on the same page. The best I think the most healthy, and positive coaching cultures I’ve seen are when the the principal is really highlighting that coach’s expertise and, for lack of a better word, giving really good PR for the coach. Mhmm. I remember when I was first a coach, I almost felt like I needed permission from the principal to actually do my job on some level.

Chrissy Beltran [00:03:27]:

Yes. That’s a really good point because whenever you’re getting started, you’re like, well, can I how do I like, what am I allowed to do? Do I, like, approach teachers? Do they yeah. Having all those conversations at the front end are so it’s so important because you don’t know what they envision as your role.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:03:41]:

No. No. And, you know,

Chrissy Beltran [00:03:43]:

they might not even know. I that’s what I said.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:03:45]:

I said, I don’t know that. Administrators always know the role of the coach or what they want that coach to do, but I’m a pretty big believer in if I have these quote unquote, like, extra positions. If I have reading specialists or coaches, or, you know, MTSS people, that’s a lot of resources going into a role. And, that should be one of my priorities is to make sure I really know how I’m getting the best use out of those people’s strengths and skills. And so I’m really passionate about making sure that when we hire people like that, that we all are all on the same page about what’s gonna happen.

Chrissy Beltran [00:04:20]:

Yes. And that is really part of the the responsibility of having a leadership team. The the leadership team helps get all the leadership on the same page. So can you talk a little bit about the idea of a leadership team? Because not all schools really treat their support staff that way. So, you know, who could be on the team and what the purpose is is the way you see it.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:04:39]:

So, Chrissy, when you talk about a leadership team, do you mean typically, like, a group of teacher leaders that are kind of helping to shape the vision, or do you mean more of the administrative team that’s made up of, like, principals and assistant principals?

Chrissy Beltran [00:04:51]:

Well, so the leadership teams that I have participated in were principals, assistant principals. And then in terms of, like, support staff, we also have the librarian, the CTs you know, the technology coordinator, instructional coaches, the counselor was part of leadership. Okay. Really anybody who was, like, the support staff that had that could contribute to, like, the big ideas of the school that knew what directors were coming down and, like, figured out how to support teachers through them. Anybody who was providing support to teachers and kids at the school level.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:05:20]:

Yep. So I typically, I think the question was, who do I usually put on that team? Is that what we were talking about? So I, have a really systematic way that I like to create, committees. And so typically, like you’ve mentioned, when I have I have worked in schools that haven’t necessarily had a whole lot of those teams or had a lot of those positions. So for me, it was always like me as an elementary principal, my my counselor and my teaching and learning coach, it was like kind of the three of us were really those people who, I felt like were leading the building as a small team. But I’m very, very passionate about shared leadership and, having a leadership team that is representative of the whole entire school. And so on that team, it was always me, my reading specialist, and my counselor. My counselor was kind of my SEL, lead, and then my teaching and learning coach was kind of my instructional lead. And then we would have representatives from, one from each grade and then making sure that we had electives also. And the whole point of that particular leadership team was to make sure that we were all moving in the same directed direction with our school improvement goals. And I mean, like, for real for real. Like, that’s what we did. And then those people were actually the leads of those subcommittees. So if you were on the leadership team, it meant you led a subcommittee. So it meant you might be leading the instructional leadership team, the behavioral leadership team, or the community and culture leadership team. And so it was kind of this overarching lead team into the subcommittees that really did the grunt work of getting everything going and moving and executing.

Chrissy Beltran [00:06:59]:

Can you talk a little bit about the logistics? Because that is an issue that I feel like a lot of people struggle with trying to figure out, okay. So when do we sit down at a table together? You know, when do we have these conversations?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:07:10]:

So because of that, I had three teams. I called them, you know, instructional, and we actually called it student support with behavior m t or not MTSS, but your, your PBIS and your behavior plans, all of those pieces, and then our community and culture. And so, we just met once a month for each of those teams. So I had all of my committee meetings, for example, maybe on Mondays. So instructional would meet first Monday of the month Okay. Behavior, second Monday, and, and then community and culture third. And then the last Monday would be my leadership team where we would plan for next month’s committees.

Chrissy Beltran [00:07:45]:

Mhmm. Okay. I like that. It does make sense. And I like it because then it’s, like, as far as as your teachers go, it’s like a consistent thing on their calendar every third Monday or whatever. And for you, it’s like every Monday, I’m gonna be in a mini mini school. Yep. Yeah. I think

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:07:59]:

I like that. Also, I think when you’re creating these types of teams and committees, it’s essential that you literally list out every single thing that needs to get done in your building outside of, you know, teaching and learning. So and then you have your committees take over those. So you don’t wanna just have some random person out there doing your March literacy night. Like, that should be done through your community and culture team. Right? You don’t want to have people who kind of have these little things that are just their own projects because once that person is gone, then your event is gone, or then your initiative isn’t gone. So every single thing has to go through your leadership and committee teams.

Chrissy Beltran [00:08:40]:

Mhmm. Yeah. Whenever there’s a lot of turnover on committees like that, it makes it difficult to kinda sustain practices and movement because you’re like, okay. How did we do this? What what what was already done? We don’t know. So Yeah. Yeah. It’s a good point. You wanna have at least a few people stay. Like, you only wanna turn over part of your team every year.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:08:56]:

Yes. And we’ve all been somewhere where, like, one person owned a a special fundraiser or a special event that happened every year. And then that person retires or they get a promotion, and nobody knows what to do anymore.

Chrissy Beltran [00:09:09]:

That’s very true. And whenever I was a coach, I’ve the as a literacy coach at a school, my responsibility was the family literacy night. And so when I left, I literally put together a binder on what to do for the like, I met with the next person and helped, like, prepare her because she was like, I don’t even know where I’m she had participated in them every year, but she was like, I don’t know how to do like, to set this up. You know? Yeah. Right. Yeah. So then okay. So then how can the leadership team, as you’re describing it, support a positive coaching culture across the school?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:09:40]:

I think this is where we want to make sure that we have our coaches, obviously, are a big part of those teams. Whichever team it makes the most sense for them to join, given what their duties are, and their job description through HR and all of those things. I think too that I would expect the people on my leadership team, to be the models of how to use our coaches. And so if we are asking our coach to come in and perhaps do some feedback or co teaching or modeling, those sorts of things, Those leadership team members would be the first people who would sign on to do that with the coach. And again too, it’s not when you set up your committees and your leadership team in this way, it’s not just me shouting out saying, hey, use the coach. Let her come in and model a lesson. Or, let her come in and give you feedback. It’s really from the team of this is how we’re using the coach for this particular initiative. So if we are doing a new phonics intervention, the team decides this is how the coach is going to be utilized in this, in this initiative, in training us for this intervention, in modeling for this intervention, as opposed to just me as the principal saying this is what we’re going to do, or even worse, having zero communication about how the coach will be used.

Chrissy Beltran [00:11:06]:

Right. Yeah. I have two follow-up questions, and I’m writing them down so

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:11:09]:

I don’t forget. Right.

Chrissy Beltran [00:11:11]:

Because I first wanna know how are you choosing teachers for this leadership team role?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:11:15]:

Mhmm. I’ve done it different ways. Typically, when I go into a new building, I just leave the leadership team as is, and then start to, explain what my vision for the team would be. And so to get people to be thinking, is this something you even, want to do? And I’ve done it where, every single person in my building has had to be on a committee of some sort, of extra duty. And then I’ve done it to completely voluntary. And I think that depends on where you are in your leadership journey and your school culture of which one you go with. There’s no wrong answers. It’s just different answers depending on where you are. But ultimately, I make sure that I write out the structure of the committees of the, this is what the leadership team does. This is what the instructional team does. These are all of their tasks, all of their duties. And then I generally put it up for, volunteers of who actually wants to be a part of making that vision come to fruition. And sometimes I’ve asked specific people just because I thought they would be best, but you definitely have to have committed folks. Yes. Because I literally, our whole school would run on on the, unfortunately, on the work of these of these teams and Mhmm.

Chrissy Beltran [00:12:32]:

Of the

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:12:33]:

leadership team and of the committees.

Chrissy Beltran [00:12:35]:

Yeah. Okay. And then my other question is, what how do you put boundaries? I’m picturing you the conversations that you had about okay. Like, let’s say we have a new phonics initiative, and we’re deciding how the coach is going to be used during this time. Yep. Do you put boundaries around this? Because I’m I’m picturing certain teachers who would say, yeah. I want you to work with my most struggling kids. I want you to pull them out.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:12:55]:

So, again, that’s where yeah. I think that’s a great question. So, again, it’s the leadership team deciding this. Mhmm. And so it’s not just necessarily each teacher getting to choose on their own how they want to use the coach. We are bringing in journal articles to our leadership team meetings, and that’s something that we’re thinking about of using our coach for a specific initiative. If we’re looking up a phonics intervention, again, we’ve looked at the research behind how the intervention was created to know where our strengths are as a staff in terms of our instruction and where our weaknesses are, in terms of our instruction as a as a staff, as a group. Right? And so it’s not just necessarily this third grade teacher saying, hey. I want you to pull my kids so I don’t have to do that small group. It’s a team of some of my best teacher leaders who understand research, who understand evidence, who have probably been in charge of creating a master schedule and have a really great contextual understanding of how our school runs and what it needs. And so they’re deciding, hey, We know that our lowest scores right now are in second grade. And so we actually, want even though none of us are second grade teachers, we actually really want this coach to be able to push in during every single second grade, RTI time or, win time, whatever it might be. And so they’re making decisions on behalf of the school using data and evidence as opposed to just, oh, I don’t really like doing small groups, so I’m gonna have her do it. Yes.

Chrissy Beltran [00:14:33]:

Yeah. I love that. And it it kinda speaks to how important that oh, go ahead.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:14:38]:

Well, I was gonna say if, now if we have a teacher who is weaker in that, I want my leadership team to be aware. Right? If we have a new teacher who doesn’t totally know how to run a small group or an intervention group, then we’re hopefully, that leadership team then is saying, hey. We have three first year teachers. We need to make sure that she’s modeling extra in those classes too.

Chrissy Beltran [00:15:00]:

Mhmm. Yeah. I think that what you’re everything you’re saying really speaks to how important the selection of people for this committee is. Yeah. Because then you’re looking for people who will think bigger than their own classroom and their own, you know, grade level even. I think that’s so important. You’d also I love that it’s you’re building leadership capacity, but you’re also building knowledge in the people, you know, on that committee. That’s great.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:15:24]:

It is. I think too if you’re listening and maybe you are somebody who’s considering this type of leadership model, it takes a while. You have to do a lot of work to build up the, you know, just capacity of staff. You have to create a lot of cognitive cognitive dissonance of what a leadership team is and the definition. I’ve been in so many schools, you probably have too, where the leadership team’s sole purpose is actually just to bring problems to the administrators, and opinions of, like, hey, just so you know, the staff is really mad about, the new schedule that you made. Everything. So, so it’s definitely changing the role in some cases of how your leadership team works.

Chrissy Beltran [00:16:08]:

Yes. I like that. They’re not just like a what is like, a complaints box or what is, like, a suggestion box? Yeah. I think that’s great. So then instructional coaches, as part of this leadership team, you know, they’re not administrators. Right. How can they support building the school culture in meaningful ways through the work with their leadership team?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:16:26]:

I think being a, a part, a meaningful and active participant in these, meetings is important. Sometimes I’ve noticed that some of our most, for lack of a better word, like, most senior people sometimes end up taking a back seat in meetings. Like, they think that they should let, teachers be the ones to share more. But I really do think that all of our voices are important for a reason. Right? Your coach has different knowledge and different context than your third grade teacher, than your specials teacher, or whatever it might be. I also think that being really good at your job is essential. And not that not all coaches are, but I think it’s incredibly important that if you are the literacy coach, right, that you are an expert in literacy. That when people come to you with questions, you are able to figure it out, if you don’t know it. Right? Or that you do know the answer. I think it’s incredibly important to model and show vulnerability and have things fail and be able to reflect with people, and show how you come back from failure. So it’s definitely that balance of humility and also the confidence and expertise, I think, are really critical, as coaches are working with, these teams to create a positive culture.

Chrissy Beltran [00:17:44]:

Yes. I think so too. You know, as as I’m listening to you, I’m I’m picturing teams, like, working like this on at schools. And one of the complaints and this is just, like, a random it’s it seems like such a silly problem to have, but it’s a real problem I’ve seen in so many schools where teachers are like, that person has always picked for things. They are a favorite. They are the favorite. How do you address that, or do you address it? Do you I mean, what does that even look like? Because there’s different ways to respond to this, and it seems so petty and silly because it’s often that they’re the ones doing the work, guys. Yeah. You know?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:18:17]:

Yeah. Yeah. It’s yeah. To be picked isn’t always a great thing. It usually means you’re spending a lot of extra time at the school and Yeah. In in preparation. So I believe that every single staff member in our buildings has a strength and has a gift. And I really try hard to find what that strength and what that gift is. And then I try to put them in places where that gift can shine. So do you end up having the people who are kind of involved in everything and maybe they wanna go into administration in the future, so they do put their hands in a lot of different pots. Absolutely. But I really wanna make sure that even if someone is not the type of personality who wants to be on the leadership team, that I’m still finding their gift in a way, highlighting it, and making sure that it’s benefiting our school in some way. Mhmm. Even for example, I have, had a Shire teacher at one point who was incredible at providing opportunities to respond to her students. She doesn’t wanna be on the instructional leadership team. She doesn’t wanna be, like, leading professional development in front of the entire staff. But my leadership team, because I knew that strength about her, I could tell my instructional leadership team, hey. This teacher is incredible at this. This is one of our cognitive engagement, is one of our evaluation standards. So it is PD that we’re giving. Can we figure out a way to include her in that PD? Whether she’s modeling it or we do a video or something along those

Chrissy Beltran [00:19:52]:

lines. Yeah. Student work samples if she’s because some people are like, I do not wanna be in front of a camera, and I do not wanna be in front of other people. And sometimes we can’t avoid that. Right? This has to happen. But, but, yeah, there are definitely ways to include people who maybe they’re not that natural sort of like, some people have those natural leadership qualities where they’re comfortable leading those conversations, and some are just much more comfortable children.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:20:13]:

And I I think too that’s where, like, the coach can be so instrumental too is because that is part of his or her role is to be in classrooms, and to be looking for patterns across the building, to be looking for those pockets of greatness across the building, and has a different lens from the building administrator, especially depending on that administrator’s background. I pride myself on being, an instructional expert. But not all administrators get placed into the role, with that background.

Chrissy Beltran [00:20:46]:

That’s right.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:20:46]:

So, I think that that’s really important for a coach to be able to also look for those, for the gifts of each and every staff member.

Chrissy Beltran [00:20:54]:

Yes. Absolutely. And to to figure out how to highlight, get people into each other’s rooms. And, I mean, part half of coaching culture is just the idea that we can all get better at this.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:21:03]:

Yes.

Chrissy Beltran [00:21:04]:

You know? That’s it’s just we can all get better, and we can get better especially by learning from each other because, like you said, different teachers have different strengths. So if we can get people into each other’s rooms and if we can get having get them having conversations across grade levels and vertically and in departments maybe when they didn’t expect to learn something from that person. Teachers spend so much of their career shut in a room with a bunch of kids.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:21:28]:

You know? It can be really isolating.

Chrissy Beltran [00:21:31]:

Yes. How do you learn when you’re shut in a room with a bunch of kids and you are having to be on every minute of the day? How do you even think sometimes? And I feel like that’s the biggest disservice that we do to teachers is we we say, welcome. You’re a new teacher. Oh, we’re so happy you’re here. Get in there. Close your door. Do what we tell you to do, but we’re not gonna really see how it’s going. You know? Like Yep. You just never get to see anybody teach. And getting people into each other’s classrooms and highlighting the strengths of teachers is so valuable. And we miss that opportunity so much every day.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:22:02]:

Yes. And and I will say too that with I mean, it probably sounds really like fantasy world, like, finding the strengths and gifts of every single teacher and then using them. I think on the opposite end of that, I’m I also have really high expectations of if we’re not doing something that we need to be doing or we’re not doing it at the level, giving I give really specific feedback on that too. So it’s not just always about, oh, everything’s dandy and everything’s roses and and that sort of thing. I’m very passionate about just giving really quality feedback on both ends. I want you to I always tell teachers too. You know, one of our evaluation standards is on the spot feedback to students. And, so I always tell teachers, I say, you did a great job going around and checking papers and, you know, having kids go back and change something that was wrong or fix something that was wrong. I said, but you never once told kids what they were doing right.

Chrissy Beltran [00:22:59]:

Uh-huh.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:22:59]:

Every kid who had it perfect, you just kind of walked by and smiled as opposed to really showing them what they did right. And we need to do that with teachers too.

Chrissy Beltran [00:23:09]:

Yes. That’s one thing that I remember learning as a new teacher that is so valuable that does translate to coaching is you find those specific praise points. You know, when you’re working with that small group, you find the praise point and then you find the teaching point. Yeah. And what an easy transition that is into, hey. I see that you’ve really made an effort in this area. It’s affecting your kids in this way, and this is something we can move forward with.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:23:29]:

Yes. Yes. Completely agree with that.

Chrissy Beltran [00:23:31]:

Yeah. I love it. Alright. Well, thank you so much for all of this. It was so it was just so pleasant, and, it does I mean, it’s yeah. It’s been really nice, and I think I love that you know, it I know what you’re saying about fantasy. Right? Because sometimes we could we picture classrooms, and we’re like, what’s this what’s what’s the strength? I mean, that’s just sincerity. You know? We’ve been in those rooms that we’re like, I’m really looking hard here, you know, and it’s a challenge. But I think that having that frame of mind if we don’t start with that frame of mind, if we start with the expectation that there are gonna be rooms that we don’t see anything good in, then that’s that’s what we’re gonna see every time. Right?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:24:05]:

And and it is it’s a journey. I think I think sometimes we think that all change has to be made immediately, but most lasting change takes a little bit of time, and not everybody moves at the exact same pace. So when you do walk into those rooms where you’re struggling to find a strength, you will find one, but it might just take you a little bit longer.

Chrissy Beltran [00:24:27]:

Yes. That’s right. Thank you so much for being here today. How can people keep learning from you?

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:24:34]:

Yeah. Join me on Instagram at doctor Christy Lam. That’s my most active platform. Would love to see you there and at www.doctorchristylam.com.

Chrissy Beltran [00:24:44]:

Awesome. Thank you so much for being here today.

Dr. Christy Lamb [00:24:46]:

Thank you.

Chrissy Beltran [00:24:48]:

I sincerely really enjoyed that conversation. It’s so uplifting to think about how we can really make change happen at the school level by involving teachers and instructional coaches, you know, in in leadership. And we’re building capacity, we’re building knowledge, and we’re moving forward as a team. And you know what? Honestly, when decisions come from fellow teachers, teachers are more likely to accept them, right, than if you say it just came from the boss. Right? So thank you so much, Christy, for being here. Next week, we’re gonna continue our work around PLC teams. I’m gonna chat with I’m sorry, around, building culture and coaching culture and, you know, through teams, through whole school opportunities and individual coaching with Nicole Turner. And we’re gonna talk about the simple steps to creating a coaching culture. I can’t wait to share that with you. And until then, happy coaching!