Category: Thought Leaders

Bandwidth is a term we have come to use with great frequency over the last 20 years.  We typically use it to describe the amount of capacity a system has for delivering/processing digital data.

The more bandwidth you have in the system, the more capacity it has to receive, move, and process the digital information at hand.

In the digital realm, we can increase bandwidth through beefing up the capacity of the transmission, hardware, and/or software systems.

Wise leaders understand that organizations also have “bandwidth,” in terms of the capacity of their teams.  Only in the rarest of cases can they simply buy more bandwidth (as occurs in the digital context).

In most instances, those astute leaders understand that they must build the capacity of the organization – its “bandwidth” – through very intentional processes of expanding the learning and skills – the “bandwidth” – of each member of the organization.

Organizational learning occurs as result of purposeful planning and deployment processes, NOT happenstance.

But, oh what dividends it pays…

*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com

I recently read Conscious Leadership: Elevating Humanity Through Businessby John Mackey, Steve McIntosh, and Carter Phipps (2020).

This was an excellent read, detailing how leaders can approach the work of influencing others from a holistic mindset of improving the future through a triadic focus on environmental, social, and economic stewardship.  JM is the founder of Whole Foods and actively practices/encourages that stewardship perspective, both personally and organizationally.

My top takeaways:

– Conscious leaders are relentless about their own personal learning and growth.
– Conscious leaders demonstrate and embody the “why” while showing us a reasonable pathway to “how.”
– Meaning is a far greater motivator than money (for most people).
– Leading with love means persistent demonstrations of generosity, gratitude, appreciation, care, compassion, and forgiveness.
– Integrity = Truth-telling + Honor + Authenticity + Courage
– Leaders who fail to invest in the development of their team members will most certainly lose the best ones.
– Leaders who fail to engage in systems thinking (i.e., patterns, connections, interdependencies, relationships) are failing to think.
– Effective leaders understand the three prevailing social worldviews – modernism, traditionalism, and progressivism – and seek continually to build bridges between the holders of each.

My favorite quotes:

“The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity.” (p. 53) 

“There is nothing that will undermine your culture more than saying one thing and rewarding something else.” (p. 106)

This book is well worth the time for anyone interested in making better futures, for others and for ourselves, a reality.

*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com.

Dr. Pedro Noguera has coined the phrase “Probecito Syndrome” to describe the view of many toward children raised in non-privileged environments.  Loosely translated, it means “poor baby” syndrome.  It is the assumed inability of those children to achieve academically, based on the environments in which they were raised.  Former President George W. Bush also spoke of this viewpoint as “the soft bigotry of low expectations.”

Noguera, Dean of the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California, has researched and written extensively over the last 20 years about issues of educational equity (and inequity) as they apply to children raised in non-privileged environments.  He chronicles well the pervasive low-expectation worldview that predominates in all but the rarest of communities.

Yet, a group of rural schools in Texas are aggressively challenging the Probecito mindset, by adopting and deploying the P20 Model, supported by Collegiate Edu-Nation(CEN).  The leaders in these schools are boldly asserting that ALLchildren, even those from non-privileged environments, possess the needed intellect and proclivities to prosper in a rigorous educational experience.  And, to successfully compete thereafter in the global work environment.  These progressive leaders and school communities have learned that, provided the right support systems and educational guidance, ALL students can, in fact, learn and prosper.

High Aspirations and High Expectationsare the watchwords of schools in the CEN universe.

To what effect?
Better futures for those students.
Better futures for the current and future families of those very students.
Better futures for the rural communities from which those students come.
Better futures for the state/nation/world those students will eventually become.

*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com

Times of uncertainty put a strain on all of us. Times of uncertainty call for exceptional service from those of us in leadership roles (whether we’re parents, teachers, managers, preachers, mentors, board members, executives, coaches, captains,….).

How can we best lead in times of uncertainty?  What do others need to hear, see, feelas they rely on us to lead forward?

Consider the following three-point recipe as a guide for leading in uncertain times:

High Aspirations– the best servant leaders help us think about, talk about, envision, and codify high and lofty futures for ourselves and for the organizations we are members of.  Clarity around direction is critical.

Create the Conditions– the best servant leaders constantly work with us to craft the success-enhancing conditions over which we have control – embed new systems, craft new schedules, build needful infrastructure, forge new partnerships, revise, reshape, reorganize – to optimize the likelihood that our Aspirations are realized.

High Expectations– the best servant leaders keep us, in intensely disciplined ways, focused on our High Aspirations and engaged continually in Creating the Conditions, by embedding accountability. They both model and insist that we “walk the walk” toward our aspirations, with the clear understanding that achieving High Expectations is a process, not an event.

For perspective, just imagine the outcomes we can expect if our leaders choose to map for us a path of

Low Aspirations > Stagnation in Status Quo > Low Expectations.  Leaders of this mindset are plentiful, because it is by far the easier and less risky path.

When, really, has the future ever been certain?  Our wisest leaders know this as fact; thus, they constantly challenge us to think about and toward better futures.

We can aim for better.

We can do better.

We can be better.

The futures of those who follow our lead, especially our children, depend on it.

*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com

Most of us want to be successful. And the meaning assigned to the word “success” is unique to each of us.

Regardless of our respective goals, our priorities, the task of actually achieving them is the tricky part. How do we get to where/what we wanna be?

Being able to stay focused on that which is important seems to be the key. Our days are filled with an overwhelming bombardment of interactions, data, information, meetings, reports, scheduling obligations,….

More often than not, most of those encroachments on our time are NOT well-aligned to our achieving “success,” as we understand it. So, what to do????

Consider a simple two-step approach:

Decide, and write down and keep handy, the 2-3 three things you deem MOST important to your being able to achieve “success.”
Dedicate a portion of each day, EVERY day, to pursuit of those things and only those things. It does not have to be a huge chunk of the day, but it’s best done EVERY day.
Otherwise, as so oft noted by the late Dr. Stephen Covey, the urgent will most certainly crowd out that which is important.

Life is too short to forsake the important.

*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com

Problems are not hard to find. They present themselves to us, every day, in a million ways. Identifying problems is not rocket science. The challenge is always in figuring out how to address them in some meaningful and sustainable way.

Dr. Kim Alexander, as school superintendent in the rural community in which he was raised (Roscoe, Texas), saw a problem:

Systemic generational poverty

• which led to low aspirations,
• which led to low expectations,
• which led to terrible educational, social and economic outcomes,
• which led to more generational poverty,
• which led to…………
• An Endless Cycle of More of the Same…………

Dr. Alexander decided to do something about it. He began engaging with members of his rural community and with external stakeholders, inviting them to explore ideas for breaking that cycle of generational poverty, with its subsequent negative outcomes.

Step by step, brick by brick, idea by idea, the concept of the P20 educational model began to take form and gain traction. That P20 assumes EVERY student in the community will have both opportunity and the needed support systems to move ever upward in degree attainment and/or the adding of industry-valued certifications.

The pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place. The evidence of impact became quite compelling. If it could work in Roscoe, Texas, then why not in other rural communities? Eventually, Collegiate Edu-Nation (CEN) was conceived and formed as the vehicle to share the P20 model with other rural servant leaders who have also decided to create better futures for their children and communities.

The perpetual downward cycle of educational, social, and economic deflation in rural America need not persist. That cycle can – and has been – be reversed in demonstrable ways.

CEN and the P20 Model are built on the foundation of three very lofty goals:

College and Career Focus – for ALLstudents, through school transformation processes.
Educational Attainment – systems and support for degree attainment and industry certifications.
Transformative Educator Development – embedded, innovative, and ongoing professional development.

No, it’s not rocket science. It’s hard work. Very hard work. (Definitely not work for the faint of heart.) But well worth it if creating better futures for our rural students, schools, and communities is what we desire.

Interested in building a “rocket” for your rural community?  Start HERE.