10 tips for passing practical assessments when applying for a senior teaching job

Your CV has made the cut, now it’s time for presentations, demonstration lessons and psychometric tests. Here’s how to prepare for success

Interviews for teaching jobs used to involve a half-hour chat to a panel of well-meaning governors. But these days, they are more like physical and psychological assault courses with presentations, demonstration lessons, psychometric tests, observations and in-tray exercises. And if you’re applying for a senior teaching job, you need to prepare yourself for the practical tests as well as the formal interview.

Demonstration lessons

Give a lesson plan to the observers beforehand so if it all goes horribly wrong at least they know what you intended to achieve. Detail how you plan to differentiate and show progress, even if there wasn’t time during the demo lesson.

Mary Glynn, candidate development manager at Prospero Teaching, says: “The first question the panel are likely to ask at the formal interview will be about evaluating your performance in practical things like the demo lesson. Focus on answering this well – show you are a reflective teacher and can justify the decisions you made.”

Be ready to explain at interview how you differentiated, especially for EAL or SEN, how you planned for progress, justify why you changed tack or improvised and acknowledge any mistakes you made.

Don’t expect parity, though. You could get a tough year 9 group when another candidate gets sweet little year 7s. Your lesson might have to be taught after the formal interview while another might be interviewed before.

Presentations

You are likely to be asked to do a 10-minute presentation on the role you are applying for. You might be asked about your vision for the English department or how you would take forward safeguarding, pastoral care or behaviour in the school. Here’s how to deliver a cracking presentation:

Plan a beginning, middle and an end – basically tell a story in about why you are right for the job.

- Your beginning (maximum two minutes). Think A,B,C and D:

A is for attention – get the panel’s attention with an arresting quote or statistic.

B is for benefit – what is the interview panel about to learn from you in next 10 minutes? Summarise it in 15 seconds.

C is for credentials – tell them (again in 15 seconds) what your credentials are.

D is for direction – give them a 20-second outline of the structure of your presentation so they’ll remember it once you have finished.

- Your middle (maximum seven minutes). This is your content, the meat in the sandwich. Give a compelling outline of your vision supplemented perhaps by a diagram or infographic, maybe a few stats, a very short video clip all on half a dozen PowerPoint slides.

- Your ending (maximum one minute). Finish with a call to action or an inspiring line that sums up you and what you will do.

Lesson observations

You are required to observe someone else’s lesson to test whether you can identify outstanding teaching. They’ll be looking to assess the quality of your written and oral feedback, your confidence to assess what you observed or a coaching tip to develop skill and technique. You also need to show a wider appreciation of your subject knowledge or leadership potential.

In-tray exercises

These test your ability to prioritise and cope under pressure. Can you deal with a dozen things coming at you at once? How will you prioritise urgent matters like multiple staff absences, coursework deadlines and the school boiler breaking down all on the same morning? You can prepare for these by searching for examples on the internet. Search for “in-tray exercises for teachers” – Exeter University and @TeacherToolKit has them. There are no right answers but practising helps you prepare.

Psychometric tests

These are a harder to prepare for because they are supposed to objectively test your mental ability, aptitude and personality. You may be asked to engage with a variety of exercises that test your verbal and numerical ability or your abstract, spatial or mechanical reasoning. I did one for a headship with the three other candidates for the job that involved building a three-foot high tower with paper clips and sheets of A4. It was worse than an episode of The Apprentice.

Search “Leadership” online, and you’ll find a million articles offering advice on how to be a better leader.  Eleven simple steps, nine strategies, five leadership tips – we’re inundated with so-called education and training about how to lead well.  The question remains, if the road to great leadership is so easy and accessible, why are there still so many ineffective, demotivating leaders who crush the potential of their employees and organizations?

Eight years ago, I met “courage in leadership” expert Bill Treasurer, at an author retreat of Berrett-Koehler, the publisher of my first book Breakdown, Breakthrough, and was immediately impressed.  I watched him quietly lead, and build a collaborative and open space for discussion, feedback, and dialogue among a diverse group of authors and publishing professionals.  I liked him instantly and felt this man truly walked the talk.  So I was excited to learn he has a new leadership book out called Leaders Open Doors out this week.

Bill is Founder and Chief Encouragement Officer of Giant Leap Consulting, and the author of Courage Goes to Work.  In his books, he shares his pioneering work in the new organizational development practice of courage-building.  Bill insights have been featured in over 100 top publications, and he draws on his experience as a former member of the U.S. High Diving Team, during which time he executed over 1,500 high dives from heights that scaled to over 100 feet, requiring intense levels of courage every day to succeed as a top athlete.

I caught up with Bill to ask him about his courage-focused brand of leadership, and what he teaches leaders to help them inspire, motivate and lead individuals and organizations forward.

Kathy Caprino:  Bill, we read so much about what makes a great leader today. What do you think is missing in all this advice we’re inundated with?

Bill Treasurer: Despite the volume of leadership advice, and maybe because of it, leadership is the most over analyzed, thoroughly dissected, and utterly confused topic in business. Too many leadership writers, myself included, have spent too much time complexifying the idea of leadership, and not enough time offering down-to-earth ideas that everyday leaders can use every day. We’ve become the Legion of Leadership Complexifiers (LLC). We’ve nuanced the topic so much, and inflated the standards for what it means to be a leader so high, that hardly anyone can be deemed a leader anymore.

Two years ago, after a conversation with a very wise person, I resigned my membership in the LLC. I had a conversation with my five-year-old son, Ian. He had been selected as the “leader for the day” at his pre-school. I gave him a big high five and said, “What did you get to do as class leader, little buddy?” His reply? “I got to open doors for people.”

Those seven words helped me cut through the clutter and get back to what’s most essential about leading others: creating opportunities for growth and development. I wrote Leaders Open Doors to help lighten the leadership load by getting back to the most essential aspects of leading others.

Caprino: What’s the biggest failing that unsuccessful leaders suffer from?

Treasurer: At first blush it’s easy to think that the biggest failing is oversized egos. But I think it’s what’s under those oversized egos that’s the real problem. FEAR. So many leaders carry (and convey) a great deal of fear, which contorts behavior. Fear can drive a leader to be ill-at-ease, hyper-controlling, and overbearing. At a certain saturation point, those fears get transmitted to the people being led, and everybody becomes anxious and frazzled. Over the long-term, it kills performance, morale, and ultimately the leader’s career.

Here’s a phrase I wish leaders would stop using: “What keeps me awake at night is…” Why do leaders continuously need to remind people what gives them anxiety and insomnia? Employees don’t want to know why a leader can’t sleep at night. They want to know what gets the leader up in the morning. Leaders should stop showcasing fears and start highlighting opportunity. Who would you rather be led by — someone who is squirrely in his or her own skin, or someone who is so confident in their role that they sleep soundly at night?

Caprino: Your new book talks about leaders opening doors.  Why is this so important, and why is it left out of standard, non-effective advice for developing leaders?

Treasurer: Einstein said, “All that is valuable in human society depends on the opportunity accorded the individual for development.” In other words, the one of the smartest people who ever lived is saying, “Hey, you know what moves society forward? When everybody has a chance to grow and develop.”

Einstein isn’t alone. Peter Drucker, the father of management consulting, was clear, “The focus of the organization must be on opportunities rather than on problems.” Yet a lot of advice for leaders focuses on sharpening their problem-solving skills.

Leaders Open Doors gets leadership back to the essential idea that, first and foremost, leaders have to be creators of opportunity. Leaders need to be continuously focused on identifying and creating opportunities for people and organizations to grow and develop. Leadership, in this sense, isn’t about the leader…it’s about those being led. Open-door leaders intensely focus on bettering the lives, conditions, and skills of others. By focusing on the individual, the collective (i.e., the organization) is strengthened. Companies grow when people grow.

Caprino: For new and emerging leaders (and veterans), what are the top 5 ways leaders can open doors, and why are these important strategies

Treasurer: Here are my top 5 recommendations:

Use opportunity to motivate, develop, and engage people.

Even small opportunities can make a big difference. Involve employees when you’re grappling with a big or risky decision. Invite an employee to join you when you’re presenting to your boss. Let an employee lead a meeting in your absence. Open doors for your employees to engage, present, create, innovate, and even fail.

Start by meeting with each person you lead and ask them about their career aspirations. What, for example, are they hoping to get out of the experience of working for the company? What skills are they hoping to strengthen or deepen? What contributions do they hope to make beyond the ones they’re already making? In other words, have a conversation with each of them about them, not just what you’re wanting them to do for the organization. Once you know what each person you’re leading wants and need, you’ll be in a better position to identify opportunities within the organization that can help them get what they desire while also furthering the goals of the organization.

Coach people to value and embrace discomfort.

Virginia “Ginni” Rometty, the CEO of IBM, put it best: “Growth and comfort do not coexist.” The opportunities you provide people should give them sweaty palms. Nudge people into their discomfort zones, but not so far out that they choke with fear. Ask them what aspects of their jobs are getting boring. Then, set stretch goals. Have them take on tasks outside of their current skillset.

Promote courage by creating safety.

If you want people to take on challenges or do uncomfortable things, you need to create a climate where people who make mistakes–or even fail–aren’t fired. Sara Blakely, the billionaire founder of SPANX, said, “When someone makes a mistake at SPANX – especially when those mistakes key us on to a new insight – I am never disappointed. In fact, I go up to them and give them a high five.” Imagine what that attitude does to promote a positive environment where people feel free to be innovative and take risks.

Say, for example, you’ve shifted the role of one of your direct reports. Ways to create safety might include giving them lead time to learn the new role, scheduling one-on-one time coaching time with them, providing “air cover” from those who may get impatient with the direct’s learning curve, and having tolerance for early mistakes.

Broaden people’s view.

People can get narrow and habitual in their thinking. Open-door leaders help shift people’s perspective and help them think more broadly. Sometimes even small shifts can make a big difference. One CEO I work with was frustrated that he wasn’t getting enough leadership from the managers of the company’s business groups. They spent too much time being operational and tactical, and not enough time being strategic and innovative. In other words, they were managing, not leading. So the CEO changed their titles from Business Group Managers (BGMs) to Business Group Leaders (BGLs). The expectation shift was clear, and their behavior changed because of it.

Open up.

Too many leaders get all wrapped up in their “role” (and ego) as leaders. But employees want to know that their leader is real and not just performing a function.  People need to see the person behind the role.  They want to know that you remember where you came from, that you’re in touch with your roots, and that you can relate to their lives. Show them some of your authentic non-work identity and interests. Let them know what you care about beyond the goals and objectives of the department or organization.

* * * * **

Strategies like these are important because they are not complex or hard to understand. Leadership is hard, but it doesn’t have to be complex. Your life as a leader, and the lives of those you impact, will be far more rewarding, successful and productive if you bring your behavior back to the essential approaches above.

Simply lead by keeping leadership simple. Above all, be an opportunity-creator.

How To Find A Great Mentor -- First, Don't Ever Ask A Stranger

Today I heard from a lovely new connection on LinkedIn LNKD +2.63%, who responded to a recent post I shared about Why Your Job  Search Has Stalled Out.  He asked a question I hear frequently from professionals who know that mentorship is important to their careers, but don’t know how to achieve it.

He asked:

“In my pursuit of THE job (not just any job), I have so far addressed all your recommendations but mentorship. This is the stage where I have stalled out. I have found many professionals that have shared my dreams and are now big successes in the industry, but find myself hesitant in approaching them and asking for help. These hesitations may be due to me not wanting to come across as needy, but I think they mostly stem from lacking the trigger words that would inspire acceptance of such a request. I really need help in this area and humbly ask for your help in the follow-through of this job hunting step.”

I’d love to tackle this question, because so many people I speak to are struggling in their approach to finding mentors, and are ending up disappointed, angry or confused.

Below are the top 4 tips I can share about finding fabulous mentors, and making the most of the help you receive:

1. There are no “trigger” words that will help you get mentoring from a stranger. Don’t bother.

First, it’s critical to know that, to find great mentors, you don’t want to reach out to strangers. That’s not how you’ll find them.

Sheryl Sandberg, in her book Lean In, likens asking strangers to be mentors to the behavior of the main character in the favorite children’s book Are You My Mother? The book is about a baby bird that emerges from its shell in an empty nest, and goes in search of its mother.  The little bird asks everything it sees (a kitten, hen, dog, cow, steam shovel), “Are you my mother?”  The answer is always the same. “No!”  This is just like a professional asking a stranger, “Will you be my mentor?”

Sandberg says:

“If someone has to ask the question, the answer is probably no. When someone finds the right mentor, it is obvious.  The question becomes a statement. Chasing or forcing that connection rarely works.”

Instead, find great mentors through the inspiring people you’re already interacting and working with now. They need to be people to whom you have already demonstrated your potential – who know how you think, act, communicate and contribute. And they have to like, trust and believe in you already (why else would they help you?).  They also need to believe with absolutely certainty that you’ll put to great use all their input and feedback.

Strangers (especially people in the media and the public eye who’ve become “huge” successes, as the individual above mentions) will virtually always have to say “no” to mentoring requests from strangers.  Why? Because their time is already spoken for, and they’re drowning in similar requests.  Secondly, they don’t have a relationship with you, and therefore can’t know how you operate or if it’s a great investment of their time to help you.

2. What can you do to get on the radar of strangers whom you admire?

Don’t ask for mentorship, but follow their work, and be helpful and supportive.  Give, and give more.  Tweet out their posts, comment in a positive way on their blogs, share their updates, start a discussion on LinkedIn drawing on their post, refer new clients or business to them, and the list goes on.  In short, offer your unique voice, perspectives, experiences and resources to further the action and conversation that these influencers have sparked.  Understand that you are able to be of service to them, and go out and do it.

3. Be someone who is enjoyable to mentor.

The third piece of attracting empowering mentoring is in how you operate in your career and your life.  Are you somebody you yourself would like to mentor? Are you open, flexible, resilient, respectful? Are you eager to learn, and committed to modifying how you’re interacting in the world so you can have even more success, reward and happiness?

 - Be great at what you do – while this sounds obvious, it is the most important thing you can do to get noticed.

- Ask for more responsibility – be sure to have specific ideas for how you can contribute in deeper, more expansive ways. Be creative/think outside the box.

- Don’t be a wallflower – participate in all meetings even “optional” ones. Volunteer to represent your team on important department or enterprise-level initiatives. Prepare ahead of time so that you can meaningfully advance the discussion.

- Promote the success of others – your generosity and openness are critical to your success, and will be remembered.

- Build your support network – reach out to groups within your company and outside your line of business. Learn what they do and how you can help them succeed.

4. Put yourself in a potential mentor’s shoes.

Finally, whenever you’re in a quandary about how to get help from someone, put yourself in their shoes.  If the tables were turned, what would you want to see from this individual asking for help?  If you were inundated with requests for help every day, what type of person would YOU choose to assist, and why? Go out and become that person that others would love to support and nurture.

Successful leadership transitions: traps to avoid, tips for success

It’s never easy to step into a leadership role from outside an organization.

Michael Watkins, an authority on leadership transitions, has concluded through his research that 40 percent of executive leaders hired from the outside fail within 18 months. He estimates the cost to the company of a failed leader at 14 times the leader’s annual salary. Watkins’ findings are especially applicable to transitions in non-family leadership roles within a family business. 

Think of the statistics on keeping family businesses in the family for successive generations: Only 33 percent make it from generation one to generation two, and just 11 percent make it to the third generation. In an article on its website, thefbcg.com (“Transitioning from Family Leadership to Non-Family CEO: Best Practices for Maintaining a Family Enterprise”), Family Business Consulting Group observes, “As a family business moves down the generations, the likelihood that it will need to turn to a non-family leader increases.” Most family businesses ultimately will have to hire outside leaders. 

Before looking at three tips for a successful leadership transition, it’s important to recognize two common pitfalls in the process. Few would disagree that the first six months are critical to the success of a new leader. So why do we put people in a position in which their chances for success are slim? 

1. We don’t recognize the need for diligence.

The trap is to view the success of the previous leader as an indicator that the job is easy because all it needs is maintenance for a while: “Dad has run this organization well for 25 years. The team is solid, and we’re a market leader. This job should be a snap.” 

The reality is quite different, as Family Business Consulting Group observes (“Preparing Owners for a Non-Family CEO,” thefbcg.com): “Ownership groups looking at a non-family CEO for the first time often find they must change the informal ways in which they function and become more structured. For instance, if Dad was the previous CEO, it cannot be expected that the new CEO, who no longer shares the family’s last name, will be given the same degree of trust and respect initially upon the transition.”

2. CEO equals business leader plus family therapist.

Whether it’s due to reputation or how much we’re paying them, it’s easy to expect new leaders to have it all figured out right out of the gate. Making the job too big is a trap. As Watkins’ research shows, it’s not easy to step into a leadership role, especially in family businesses with the added expectation of having to navigate — and often repair — complex family dynamics. While the ability to steer through such complexities is essential, making it the new leader’s job to rewrite the rules is a recipe for disaster. 

Families need to own the work of creating a situation where someone from the outside can come in and be successful, not ask a new leader to fix the family. How can a family-owned business maximize the odds of success for its newly hired leader?

Here are three tips for making a transition successful:

1. Make the culture rules clear. 

Business culture can be a difficult thing to define. In a closely held business, culture is often broad-brushed with generalizations like “family-focused” or “people matter.” Leader Onboarding Inc. (leaderonboarding.com) has developed an assessment, New Leader Culture Snapshot, designed to help new leaders understand performance culture from multiple perspectives.

The survey asks two open-ended questions: What is the most important thing for this new leader to learn about the culture/performance climate in their operation? What are some potential early wins for this new leader?

In family businesses, communications and decisions are often informally executed. A Monday-morning breakfast to discuss the week’s priorities can help to formalize the process. Getting feedback from the team and the family around the important aspects of the culture and performance climate is a good start in making the rules clear to the new leader.

2. Help the new leader to find company wins and family wins. 

Trust is what successful leaders have and unsuccessful leaders lack. A new non-family leader in a family business faces additional obstacles in this regard. In any leadership transition, it’s critical that a new leader build trust from the beginning and avoid situations that can foster mistrust. One of the biggest mistakes I see is having a new leader fire someone in the first three to six months. 

Company wins can range from devoting more resources to professional development of staff to continuing traditional employee gatherings or recognition programs. Family wins can range from the new leader making a point to have informal lunches with key family leaders to learning about the history of and relationships with key suppliers before making decisions about whom to bring into a new project. Trust is built through wins that matter to key stakeholders. In a family business, those stakeholders include both employees and family members.

3. Support, support, support.

Every transition will include mistakes and complex situations that a new leader will need help to navigate to a positive outcome. A mentor is an ally during transition who provides a second perspective and an established reputation to help the new leader to remove barriers and avoid fatal mistakes. Remember that family businesses are beset with informal communication channels and family-centered traditions that can be difficult for an outsider to see. Assigning a mentor to provide a safe place to talk through some of these gray areas and help the new leader make good choices is critical.

Leadership transitions are inherently challenging, and the dynamics of a family business make them especially demanding. There are many steps that organizations can take to increase the likelihood of success. The first steps are to recognize the need to be proactive and deliberate with the transition, and to create realistic expectations for the new role. 

For more Leadership Tips from The Shearin Group, visit this site.

Congrats. You had the job interview. Now, your work is done, right? Wrong.

In today’s hypercompetitive job market, effective follow-up after the interview is a must, and failing to do it well might cause you to lose out to another candidate.

The line between being persistent and being a pain, however, is blurry at best. So to help you sort things out, I sent a query to my colleagues in the careers world — recruiters, career coaches, hiring managers and CEO’s — asking for their best follow-up advice.

I received more than 60 responses on topics ranging from thank you notes to handling rejection. Here’s a summary of their 10 best tips:

The Thank-You Note

On this point, everyone agreed: A thank-you note is a must. Most of the pros recommended you send one via email within 24 hours of the interview. Several suggested a handwritten card as a supplement when a personal or creative touch might be especially valued.

But if you really want to stand out, you need to do more than just say “thanks for your time.” The experts suggested these techniques to make your thank-you note shine:

Reference an article of interest. Include in the note a relevant article, link or book recommendation relating to a topic that was discussed during the interview. It’s a value-add for the interviewer and will reinforce your industry expertise.

To really make an impact, Jene Kapela, a South Florida-based leadership coach, says you should write a blog post on a topic discussed during the interview and then share the link to the post in your thank-you note.

Include supporting documentation that illustrates your ability to do the job. You don’t want to overwhelm the interviewer, but adding one or two carefully-curated examples of your work (non-confidential work samples, press mentions, etc.) can be a smart way to show off your expertise.

“It helps show you are the real deal,” says Tyson J. Spring, head of New Business & Strategy for Elever
Professional, an Austin, Texas recruiting firm.

Provide a follow-up response to one of the key interview questions. Ever draw a blank or give a less than stellar response during a job interview? Use your note to modify, correct or amplify one of your responses.

Todd Cherches

, CEO 
of BigBlueGumball, a New York City-based management consulting and coaching firm, offers this example:

When you asked me about my single greatest accomplishment in my last job, I apologize that I drew a blank. However, immediately after leaving, it hit me that I should have mentioned I was voted the top salesperson in my department for 2013, and proudly received a special recognition award at my company’s year-end national convention. Continue reading…