Educators in the case school indicated that there were challenges that they encountered to distributed leadership and shared decision making. Challenges highlighted by educators included resistance and lack of support from peers (5 educators), accommodating diverse viewpoints (5 educators), time constraints (4 educators), lack of consistency (2educators) and lack of opportunities (2 educators) Reference was also made to such challenges as the SMT’s approach to leadership, attitude of other educators to those that take on leadership roles, the lack of support from the Department of Education to encourage decentralisation and shared decision making, the school context, self-imposed barriers and time constraints. However, due to the length
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constraints of this dissertation, only the three most pertinent challenges have been privileged for discussion. These are lack of peer support, time constraints and self- imposed barriers.
4.7.1 A LACK OF PEER SUPPORT
Many participants in the study believed that their colleagues were supportive of them taking on a leading role in decision making processes in the school. Descriptions such as “encouraging”, “trust my decision” “have faith in my decisions” or “comfortable with it” were used to describe the support received from peers.
However, there were hint that this general support not always being present. Certain statements were qualified by such terms as “at times”, “some”, “most” and
“generally”. More direct reference to the negative attitude of some educators was captured in statements such as “others sarcastic and envious” (Q3) and “show disregard if not to their liking” (Q18). The existence of feelings of negativity towards educators involved in decision-making is underpinned by the following statement:
Some educators are resistant to ideas and inputs from level one educators who take on leadership roles, they probably feel intimidated or that educator is not senior enough…and they may therefore not be co-operative (I, TL2, 9/12/2010).
Correspondingly, TL2 stressed that there were some educators on the staff that questioned her ability to be a leader and they gave the impression that she was not
“qualified enough to be part of certain decision making” (I, TL2, 9/12/2010).
Resistance from peers was also raised by the primary participants and this becomes evident when “they may not get the support of other teachers” (I, TL2, 9/12/2010) or when some educators “do not fully support one’s initiatives” (I, TL1, 15/12/2010).
SMT3 observed that some educators did not lend support to the initiatives of educators due to their “personal aspirations” and in their attempt to climb the career ladder “they will try subtly without making too much of waves to cause obstructions or to pass negative comments or to say something just to throw a spanner in the works” (I, SMT3, 14/12/2010). SMT3 also recognised that in educators fulfilling their personal aspirations they “do not want others to succeed or if they succeed too much, it will make (them) look ordinary. This is where the ego comes to play … and egos get dented” (I, SMT3, 14/12/2010).
SMT1 however, did not view the negative attitude of educators “as a major hassle” (I, SMT1, 14/12/2010) and usually according to the SMT1 “if there is a teacher leader in
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charge of something, they show respect for that teacher and whatever initiative or decision that teacher has to make” (I, SMT1, 14/12/2010).
In the final analysis, it cannot be denied that within the case school “if someone is in a leadership positions, there are individuals that attack them on a personal level. It is mean, but they throw challenges to catch the teacher off-guard” (I, SMT2, 29/09/2011); however, this negativity and lack of support for those assuming a leading role in decision making, while more the exception than the norm, was nevertheless reported as a barrier to distributed leadership and shared decision making.
4. 7. 2 TIME CONSTRAINTS
Time constraints also acted as a barrier to teachers’ engagement in leadership and this was noted by TL2 who commented that teachers “don’t want to commit because it is going to infringe on their time and lifestyle (I. TL2, 9/12/2010). Time constraints referred to by educators was also associated with personal lifestyle demands. TL3 also subscribed to these views and indicated that “sometime it may affect your classroom time, sometime it may affect your personal time” (I. TL3, 2/12/2010). SMT1 was of the view that being involved in leadership and decision making roles “means that they have to share their time with their teaching, etc. and that obviously impacts negatively on teaching” (I, SMT1, 14/12/2010). This loss in teaching and learning time was also commented on by TL3. TL3’s concern was genuine as the time table was sometimes adjusted for educators who took on a leading role in decision making to consult with other members. If an educator was involved in planning an event that involved learners, then learners were sometimes taken out of the classroom in preparation for that event. Many teachers felt that these events were “in their way and disrupting their learning programme” (I. TL3, 2/12/2010). A similar sentiment was expressed in the statement “learners are called out of your class because something comes up and the children suffer” (FGI, TL7, 28/09/2011)
Getting teachers to be a part of decision making was not always possible as “time is always a factor with that” (I, TL1, 15/12/2010). TL1 stressed that there were huge demands on the teacher and on a personal level taking a leading role in decision making structures meant that she “is spreading (herself) too thin” (I, TL1, 15/12/2010) and in her attempts to complete her work “she sleeps at about 11 o’ clock every single night”
(I, TL1, 15/12/2010). Similarly, TL2 observed that teachers sometimes “don’t want to commit because it is going to infringe on their time and lifestyle” (I, 9/12/2010). TL1 and TL2 both took a leading role in decision making structures and were able to do so
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because they sacrificed much of their personal time, so much so that TL2 believed that
“I am at a stage in my life now where I can give it my all, I can give it a 100%” (I, TL2, 9/12/2010). TL2 acknowledged that not everyone was at that stage in their lives where they could dedicate all their time to school and she believed that, “We have quite a few teachers at school that could take on stronger leadership roles, but they tend not to because they feel that they will not fulfil their duties [due to time constraints]” (I, TL2, 9/12/2010). Evidence presented indicated teachers view “balancing full time teaching and informal leadership roles within a school has been found to be a crucial hindrance”
(Hlatywayo, 2010, p.31) to taking a leading role in decision making.
4.7.3 SELF-IMPOSED BARRIERS
Besides context-driven challenges that faced educators who assumed leadership roles, the data also highlighted that teachers themselves created their own barriers. A lack of initiative falls within this category. This attitude of not wanting to be involved in leading and decision making was conveyed by TL3: “people shy away sometimes because they don’t want to be leaders and they do not want to take responsibility” (I, 2/12/2010). Another educator indicated that because of her “personality I wouldn’t be immediately recognised as a leader because I have a tendency to be playful.…. I am not taken seriously as a leader” (FGI, TL7, 28/09/2011).
Some of the challenges to decision making expressed by the secondary participants were in turn echoed by the primary participants. Fear of failure as a barrier to taking on a leading role in decision making was mentioned. This could be attributed to a “lack of skills, especially as we have a lot of young people” (I. TL1, 15/12/2010). Thus, self- imposed barriers were not unique to the case school as literature reveals that a teacher’s background, whether personal or professional, sometimes discourages the open pressing of a point of view and this may result in non-participation in decision making. In addition, some teachers perceive the invitation to share in decision making as not sincere (Allen, 1993). TL2, in commenting on the lack of skills, felt that some educators:
Haven’t taken the time to read up and become familiar with educational matters and the ever-changing policies. It’s like snowballing on them and they don’t have the effectiveness to manage these leadership roles. They lack the skills because they are not pushing themselves hard enough (I, TL2, 9/12/2010).
While TL3 indicated there were instances of educators shying away from taking responsibility. Shying away from decision making could be due to a number of factors
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and Griffin (1995) attributes this to a lack of confidence, resulting in a feeling that the audience or participants were intimidating TL1 has observed that:
Fortunately in our school, it is not one of the things that affects a large number of people, maybe a few people who feel that they do not want to come on board and get involved in decision making … I don’t see this as a challenge in terms of decision making … People are not evasive when it comes to getting involved in decision making (I, SMT1, 14/12/2010).
I concur with SMT1 that self-imposed barriers to educators participating in shared decision making were minimal in the case study school and most educators took up the leadership challenge when confronted with it.