Piecing together the leadership puzzle : a self-study of practice.
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Date
2014
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Abstract
In today’s rapidly changing world, educational leaders are swamped by competing priorities
that make inordinate demands on their time, energy and focus. They are consumed with
operational matters such as teaching and learning activities, school management and
administrative tasks and extra-curricular programmes, which leaves them with little time for
reflection. As a consequence they put themselves and their schools at the risk of doing more
of the same and achieving the same results. Drawing from the literature that suggests the
value of reflection for leaders, I decided to undertake a reflexive study that interrogated my
leadership practice. I searched for meaning to understand who I am and who I am as a leader.
I desired knowledge on how and why I enacted leadership in the manner I did. Questions of
what should be improved and how it should be improved were considered as my leadership
practice was critically examined. I used self-study as a methodology to critique my
leadership practice and generated data using the personal history narrative and memory work
methods. Interviews with research participants using artefacts in a digital memory box,
served as prompts to remember, reconstruct and re-story events as I co-constructed my
personal history narrative. The multiple viewpoints that a research mentor, critical friends
and research participants offered, challenged my assumptions, reframed my perspectives and
validated the data in co-flexive conversations. Using the puzzle metaphor I describe the
complexity, uncertainty, messiness and challenges I experienced in discovering who I was
and how I enacted leadership. This study has equipped me with knowledge and skills to
effect leadership transformation and get closer to the goal of self-actualisation through
authentic conduct. Reflexive practices provided rich insights into my personal and leader
self/selves and my leadership practice became visible to myself/selves and others for critique.
Tacit knowledge became explicit and I was able to recognise good leadership practices that
could be strengthened. I also became acutely aware of the weaknesses and gaps in my
leadership practice, which led to the formulation of improvement strategies. This research
suggests that for school leaders to become effective, they should engage in deep reflexive
practice in order to explore their multiple selves to uncover the complexities, contradictions
and nuances that explains their practice and at the same time serve as a catalyst for
transformed practice.
Description
Ph. D. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban 2014.
Keywords
Educational leadership -- South Africa., Educational change -- South Africa., Transformational leadership -- South Africa., School management and organization -- South Africa., Theses -- Education.