Coaching to the Root of Resistance

On several occasions I’ve asked a group of coaches, “Raise your hand if you have ever worked with a resistant teacher.” Each time, the room is quick flutter of proud jazz hands and at least one participant has also inadvertently shouted out the educator’s name like it was just sitting on the tip of their tongue waiting for permission to be vanquished. Resistant educators, it seems, are ever-present in the coaching field and the likely cause of many nervous eye-twitches. It isn’t that educators are resistant by nature, it’s just that they are resistant to change. And since coaches are change agents, they will likely always be surrounded by some sense of resistance.

 Perhaps the easiest stance to take when working with these educators would be, “I can’t coach those that don’t want to be coached,” but if you take the time to get to the root of resistance, you may uncover a willing partner.

 Getting to the Root of Resistance 

 Resistance is most often the manifestation of another issue, and by taking time to investigate you may be able to uncover what is underneath. Does the educator have a previous experience with coaching? Does the educator feel like they are being made to comply with an initiative? Does the educator feel safe to voice their opinions and concerns to leadership? To a coach? Has the school culture and community shifted as a result of change? These questions are only a few that may lead you to a place where an educator can name their resistance and move onward.

 One framework for maintaining the investigative lens while coaching that I have found helpful in the past is Elena Aguilar’s “Mind the Gap”. Essentially it states that while resistance often reads as someone purposefully (will) defying someone or something, it is rarely the case. Most often there is another gap that is preventing the individual from being on board.

 Underneath that resistance there may just be a need to strengthen a technical skill or build upon pedagogical knowledge; both of which are easily addressed in a coaching partnership. If it is a technical skill, such as classroom management, it can be addressed within a coaching cycle-- goal-setting, modeling and observation-feedback. If it is a pedagogical gap, the partnership may look for opportunities to learn via professional development, text studies or peer observations.

 Gaps in capacity and emotional intelligence may also impede full buy-in and will require a more in-depth, holistic approach. An educator’s unwillingness to try a new strategy may actually be a fear of failure or perhaps something is happening in their life outside of education which is inhibiting them from being able to fully participate at that moment. The point is, that is is rarely a matter of will and time is needed to uncover the gap.

 Michael Fullan has often written about change and he offers some other layers of resistance to his investigative approach. You can read about all twelve categories on his two-pager: Reluctance to Change. Many of his categories overlap with Aguilar’s “Mind the Gap,” but there were several other opportunities to get to the core of resistance that I have found helpful in my work. One layer that Fullan reminds us of is that some people are happy with the way things are, and so have no want or need for change. For this educator, it is necessary to paint a picture of an alternative future. I have found the use of data to be extremely powerful with this group of educators. If the data is showing that student outcomes are not where they need to be, and there is a possibility of a future where student outcomes improve, most educators will quickly leave their resistance behind.

 The Big Four 

 No matter which investigative framework or stance you choose to employ when coaching around resistance, there are four big reminders I find helpful to hold onto in every interaction:

•  Check Your Emotional Intelligence 
• If You Insist They Will Resist 
• Don’t Become a Resource Provider
•  Don’t Take it Personal 

Given their positionality to see the whole picture, leaders and educators depend on them to have high emotional intelligence. And coaches demand that of themselves as well. In fact, many coaching experts have indicated that a high emotional intelligence is the key to strong leadership. That doesn’t mean, though, that a resistant teacher won’t get under your skin--coaches are humans too! That is why it is so important to do a purposeful mental check of your mental intelligence when you know you will come into contact with someone who has not been open to a partnership. Even if coaches don’t normally share our feelings through facial expressions, sometimes they unknowingly come across if we are not mindful. I was reminded of this a few years ago when I was part of a collaborative team. I had struggled to have meaningful collaboration with one of the members in the past. On this day, this member was presenting something that I disagreed with, but we had committed to hearing everyone’s voice. Following the meeting, while walking out with another colleague, they said, “Well I know how you feel about today’s presentation.” I made a move to contest that I hadn’t said anything, but she simply made a circle motion over her face. I knew I would need to check my emotional intelligence at future meetings.

 If you insist, they will resist. If my four year old has a mantra, this is it. Of course, isn’t really everyone’s mantra. Human beings don’t like being made to do something. If they understand and agree with the purpose or they’ve had some agency in the decision, however then it is more likely that they will actively engage. Sometimes the struggle as an instructional coach is that you are often called upon, or even hired, to help implement a new curriculum or strategy. There are a few coaching moves that can bring everyone into the fold. We often talk about how important the teacher-coach relationship is, but building a relationship with administrators is also important. Once you are in a position to have open conversations with administration, coach them on the value of including teachers in the process of selecting curriculum and deciding on school-wide goals. Become experts of the curriculum--almost all curriculum (unless it is scripted) leaves opportunities for teachers to make it their own-focus in on these opportunities so teachers can take ownership before moving into the intricate workings.

 Educators appreciate “things”. With the resources of time and money often restricted, an easy in for a coach with a resistant client is providing them with resources. I remember working with a teacher that had been teaching for a long time and had previously been an administrator. I got the feeling that she thought I was too young to possibly offer her anything. I made a point of popping in her room to check in every week and she finally asked me if I had any good poetry lessons. I was so excited I spent hours in the library pulling age appropriate and engaging poetry for her 8th grade class to do a poetry dive. I even laminated a class-set of sentence stem discussion cards as a parting gift. I started modeling the lesson and the students were really engaged and I thought, “Finally.” Except where was the teacher? The kids continued their work and I continued wondering, Where is the teacher? She came back at the end of class, and smiled as her students stacked up the books on the back table. After the students left she asked, “So what do you want to teach next week?”

 The final reminder, I feel, is the most important--Don’t take it personal! Besides the often stressful work life, educators have lives outside of the classroom to attend to as well. A teacher’s resistance may feel personal, but that is likely not the case. I remember working with this amazing biology (9th grade) team to incorporate engaging strategies into their instruction. The team was extremely open to observations and feedback, except for one teacher. This one teacher would see me coming and abruptly pull her door shut (mind you the bell hadn’t even rang yet and students were left queuing outside her door). Fortunately, this was a lab classroom with a door in the back of the room so I would slip into the way back, feigning ignorance and smiling broadly as she rolled her eyes. I tried to kill her with kindness. I tried being directive. I offered to model. I even offered to make copies (which I almost never do). I couldn’t wrap my head around how she could spend so much energy fighting a process that everyone else was embracing. It wasn’t until the year was almost over that I learned maybe she was spending her energy resisting me because it was something she had control over; she had been diagnosed with a rare and untreatable illness.  I always remember her when working with resistance teachers and remind myself to get over myself-it’s probably bigger than me. 

Don’t give up on the resistors. Investigate a little. Dig around and ask why? Then ask why again--hopefully once you get to the root of the problem and find a partnership. We are all capable, creative and complete.

The Many Hats We Wear; Coaching and other Roles

“So now you want me to be a coach!?”

 This was a common thread woven throughout the feedback following Elena Aguilar’s The Art of Coaching Institute hosted in Wisconsin, August 2017.

 It was my first month as the Wisconsin Coaching Coordinator, a position new to the state, and I was feeling both overwhelmed and ecstatic that coaching was being embraced and shared by the state to such a large group of educational leaders.

 A month later (when I momentarily came up for air from all the new learning) I started sorting through the feedback and realized that we had failed to do the very thing I will suggest in this blog post; be clear about how we hoped to define roles.

 When you are in a position where you wear many hats; especially with the same client, there are three simple, but key guidelines to follow. The first is to have a working definition for each of the hats you wear. It is important that you have a working job description for each role you are required to perform. This will make you feel more confident in your work and clarify the work for the client. Equally important if you are working for an organization or educational service center, is that you have agreed on a common definition of roles. A few years ago I was working for an educational service center as an instructional coach and a medium sized district hired me to work with PLCs (Professional Learning Community) in all content areas to incorporate more writing into their curriculum. This district had a long history of working with the service center and they had also contracted with an EL (English Learner) coach and several content specialists. I began working with PLCs as they planned and started asking them questions about writing and their content area in general. After a few weeks I asked if they felt comfortable bringing in some student writing samples. One PLC member said, “How can we, you haven’t given us any strategies yet.” After inquiring on this statement a little more, I found that the EL coach has been providing the PLCs with specific strategies to engage EL students. The instructional coach team at the service center had defined their role and likely the EL coach department had as well, but we had failed to communicate across departments. This lead to both confusion for our clients and some embarrassment on our end. Had we some shared understanding of our roles, we could have defined them for the teachers we were working with.

 Which leads into guideline two-- Transparency is key. It is better to be direct and explicit with clients regarding the role you find yourself in. I had been providing some professional development for an English department over the course of the summer and then was asked to return and coach the English department PLCs. When I returned to the PLCs I explained that I would be switching to a coaching role and gave them a document called, “What a coach is….What a coach isn’t” to ensure that we both knew exactly what my role was.

 The final guideline is to be flexible, yet firm. You want to provide the client what they need, but you don’t want them to expect that it will always be done for them. When I showed up to coach another PLC they asked me what PD I had ready for them that day. I had to re-explain my role and told them that if there were some topics they needed to build capacity around, we could put them on the calendar. This way I was still providing them with what they needed without confirming the expectation that I would be in charge of PLC learning and meetings.

 Now let’s take a moment to talk specifically about the two terms facilitator and coach since much of the feedback following The Art of Coaching Institute was directly connected to how these two terms are different. There isn’t a simple answer for this one. Depending on who you turn to in the coaching world, you may get a different response. Joellen Killion lists facilitator as one of several roles an instructional coach might use. Elena Aguilar has used the two terms interchangeably. Some models of coaching consider facilitation part of a continuum.

 I would argue that the most important thing is that you stick to the three aforementioned rules-have a definition that works for you and be transparent with your clients.

 If I could go back to the institute I would have been clear with participants that we were not asking them to become coaches, but rather learn some coaching strategies to infuse into their work. I would have reminded them that their clients would still be depending on them to act in the capacity of consultant or trainer, but their might be moments when it would be appropriate to switch hats and take on the role of coaching---just be sure everyone knows which hat you are wearing!