Educational Management and Administration

Leadership, supervision and school administration for a Vice Principal post.

Where candidates lose marks on this

1. Calling salary a motivator. In Herzberg's two-factor theory salary is a HYGIENE factor — so are working conditions, job security, school policy, supervision and interpersonal relations. Their absence causes dissatisfaction; their presence does not motivate. Motivators are achievement, recognition, the work itself, responsibility, advancement and growth.
2. Swapping the Theory X and Theory Y assumption lists. X assumes people dislike work, avoid responsibility and must be coerced and controlled. Y assumes work is natural, people exercise self-direction, and they seek responsibility. Anchor: X = distrust, Y = trust.
3. Treating laissez-faire as a kind of democratic leadership. In the democratic style the leader is fully present and decides with the group. In laissez-faire he abstains from the decision altogether. "Leaves everything to the staff" is laissez-faire, and in the Lewin–Lippitt–White study it produced the least and poorest work.
4. Attributing POSDCORB to Fayol. POSDCORB is Luther Gulick, in a 1937 volume edited with Lyndall Urwick. Fayol gave the 14 principles and the five elements (planning, organising, commanding, co-ordinating, controlling). Taylor gave scientific management; Mayo gave the Hawthorne studies.
5. Getting Fayol's counts wrong, or importing span of control into his list. Fayol = 14 principles and 5 elements. Span of control is NOT among the 14 — it is a classical concept associated with Urwick and Graicunas. Fayol's list does contain unity of command and scalar chain (with the "gang plank" exception).
6. Misreading the Managerial Grid. 9,9 = Team management (the ideal), 5,5 = Middle-of-the-road, 1,1 = Impoverished, 9,1 = Task/authority–compliance, 1,9 = Country club. Coordinates run (concern for production, concern for people) — reading them backwards flips 9,1 and 1,9.
7. Treating inspection and supervision as synonyms. Inspection is occasional, evaluative, authority-centred and fault-finding; supervision is continuous, developmental, co-operative and improvement-centred. Equally wrong is the overcorrection that inspection has been "abolished".
8. Calling the grapevine illegitimate or always false. The grapevine is informal, not illegal; it is fast, it crosses levels, a good deal of it is accurate, and it flourishes where formal information is missing. The managerial answer is to feed the formal channel, not to try to abolish informal talk.
9. Confusing the Hawthorne effect with the lighting result. The Hawthorne effect is the change in behaviour that follows from being observed or given special attention — not "the effect of illumination on output" and not "the effect of incentives".
10. Mixing up the school-level planning documents and their owners. The School Development Plan is prepared by the SMC under RTE Section 22 and is the basis of grants; the institutional plan is a professional plan prepared by the head with the staff from the school's own needs and resources; the academic calendar is the year's schedule of events and examinations. Three different documents, three different owners.

Two more that cost marks quietly: delegating responsibility (you can delegate authority; ultimate responsibility stays with the head), and confusing compromising with collaborating (split the difference versus find the win–win).

Where this is taught

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