Learning to lead: a practitioner perspective

This reflective essay presents a personal account of experiences and models that have shaped the development of the author as a leader in tertiary education. It is presented from the perspective of a practitioner whose career has led her through academic and administrative roles in Australian and UK institutions into her current position as academic registrar of a large, global university. The author concludes that, in learning to lead, the ideas that have been influential and which she has integrated into her practice are those that resonate with her own understanding of leadership and which are consistent with her values.     

Developing leadership in higher education: perspectives from the USA,the UK and Australia

It is broadly acknowledged that leaders in the twenty-first century are required to navigate an increasingly complex landscape and that the types of challenges individuals and organisations face in the knowledge era require the capacity to adapt and respond to continual fluctuations and change. Outcomes from previous leadership research, combined with the perspectives of colleagues and observation over the past decade, prompted concern that leadership in higher education (HE) institutions was, in the main, not demonstrating the level of readiness or capability to effectively respond to the challenges embodied in the transition to the knowledge era. In seeking to establish how well founded this concern was, this study, supported by a Peter Karmel International Travel Grant, investigated leadership development thinking, programmes and practices within the HE sector in the United States of America and the United Kingdom, and explored how this applies within the Australian context. A number of themes emerged that support the idea that the work of leadership will ideally be based on relationships rather than the ‘command and control’ models of the past and on distributed leadership processes and practices throughout the organisation.     

Distributed leadership with the aim of ‘reculturing’: a departmental case study

This article considers a secondary science department that has, since 2000, developed distributed leadership as a form of human capacity building. Using a longitudinal ethnographic case study allowed us to consider how distributed leadership can be nurtured and developed in a department. Our analysis centres on two key issues: the nature and pattern of distributed leadership practices and the continuity that provides coherence to those practices. From our analysis, there appear to be two major conclusions. The first of these is the need for administrators to be purposeful in the appointments that they make to formal leadership positions. To enact distributed leadership practices requires leaders who can exercise both formal power and influence. The second conclusion relates to the time required for continuity of leadership practices to give rise to changes that lead to teachers managing the teaching and learning programme.     

Countering plutocracies: increasing autonomy and accountability through culturally relevant leadership

In urban school districts across the USA there are mandates to implement zero tolerance policies. As this occurs, there is an increasing number of students, specifically students of colour, who are being jettisoned out of the educative process. When school principals have little autonomy regarding how they handle disciplinary infractions within their schools, it becomes relatively easy for them to opt out of making tough decision. The authors assert that Culturally Relevant Leadership is a framework that, if applied correctly, can help school leaders reduce the multiple school suspensions and expulsions that are occurring among students of colour.     

Leadership styles and decision-making styles in an Indonesian school context

School leadership has been well researched in developed countries. However, in Asia, particularly in Indonesia, school leadership has not been well explored. Using survey data from a sample of 475 teachers in six Lampung school districts, this paper examines the relationships between school principal leadership styles and school principal decision-making styles in an Indonesian school context. Findings are that most of the relationships between school principal leadership styles and school principal decision-making styles are significant. These findings suggest that teachers perceive that principals should exhibit much more transformational leadership style and rational decision-making style but avoid laissez-faire leadership style and avoidant decision-making style.     

Interrogating conceptions of leadership: school principals,policy and paradox

Currently educational research literature demonstrates wide discussion and endorsement of ‘distributed’ leadership while concurrently traditional, hegemonic forms prevail in practice. This article investigates understandings about educational leadership held by Australian school principals. The article describes the contradictory conceptions about educational leadership currently in circulation. It interrogates underlying assumptions and questions how both hegemonic and newer leadership conceptions and assumptions serve educational leaders. Data from principals around the country and across education systems reinforced the predominance of un-theorised or under-theorised notions about leadership, with similar assumptions found in important policy artefacts and practices. This article emerges from interviews with 100 principals focusing on their professional learning needs, which revealed interesting ideas, issues and dilemmas concerning ‘leadership’. It fills a gap in research on distributed leadership by exploring contradictions inherent in policy, practice and understandings in this area. The article is structured into four sections. First, extant literature on this topic and the research are explained. Second, the article focuses on principals' conceptions about leadership and those inherent within important policy and practical artefacts. A discussion of the findings focuses on the discrepancy between theory and policy endorsement and the views of practitioners. Finally, the article canvasses the implications of the research.     

Describing an ‘effective’ principal: perceptions of the central office leaders

The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine how district leaders of two school systems in the USA describe an effective principal. Membership categorisation analysis revealed that district leaders believed an effective principal had four major categories of characteristics: (1) documented characteristics (having a track record and being a good manager), (2) instructional skills (instructional leadership and data leadership), (3) interpersonal skills (team player and community leader) and (4) perceptual characteristics (being a perfect fit for school and passionate leader). Based on the findings, a graphical model of portraying an ‘effective principal’ from the point of view of district leaders is constructed. Implications for policy, research, practice and leader preparation are offered.     

邓小平的群众观及其启示

群众路线是党的根本工作路线,也是党的政治路线和组织路线,是党在长期革命和建设的实践中始终立于不败之地的制胜法宝。邓小平的群众观包含丰富的内容,坚持群众路线,是实现党的领导的重要保证,在长期的革命和建设实践中,人民群众的信任和拥护是实现党的领导的基石,对于巩固党的领导地位,提高科学决策水平具有极为现实的意义。新形势下,以邓小平的群众观为指导,坚持执政为民的理念、发展社会主义民主、加强群众路线工作制度建设是我党贯彻群众路线工作的必要之选。     

领导理论:现状、趋势与展望

传统的领导理论包括领导特质理论、领导行为理论和领导权变理论,当前领导理论的新发展包括变革型领导、分布式领导、诚信领导、关系型领导等。领导理论的发展呈现以下趋势:从关注外部情境因素走向关注内部心理因素、从集权式领导走向分权式领导、从效率至上走向道德至上、从关注结果走向关注过程等。随着领导理论的发展,性别领导、跨文化领导、领导理论的跨学科研究将是今后领导理论的关注重点。     

Node.js高效分布式实时应用研究

Node.js应用平台的出现,为大数据实时应用提供了一个很好的可选技术方案。研究了分布式实时应用处理中任务的抢占式处理策略和双路由策略,并探讨了在Node.js平台上利用Redis或ZeroMQ技术实现高效可靠分布式实时应用的方法。