These articles are presented by Littleford & Associates in an attempt to provide relevant and important information to those who are concerned with providing an effective, efficient and economical educational atmosphere and experience.
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Below are articles by topic written by Mr. Littleford. Please click on a link to go to that article topic.
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Article Topics:
- Executive Searches
- Head / Executive Compensation
- Faculty Compensation and Evaluation
- Board Governance
- Strategic Planning
- Financial Management and Marketing
- School Climate
EXECUTIVE SEARCHES
- How Important is the Well-being of the Head’s Family to a Search?
- Head Compensation Trends: Building a Retirement Asset Through Deferred Compensation Plans
- Head Search Committee Behaviors and How They Affect Outcomes
- The Search…The Transition… and then the Succession
- Common Mistakes In The Search Process
- The Core Principles Of A Successful Search: Advice For Boards And Heads
- The Head Search, School Culture and Trust in the Consultant
- Fascinating Facts About Internal Succession
- The Search and the Departing Head: Valued or Forgotten?
- Doubts At The Altar: When Searches Fail
- Retirement Planning For Heads Of School: Some Useful Tools To Get There
- Powerful Elements of the Head Search Process: The Risks of Transitions
- The Next Generation Of Heads
- Is It "The End"? And If So, Then What?
- The Need To Focus On The Intermediate Sanctions Act And Conflicts Of Interest
- Navigating a Head of School Search in Rough Waters
- WHAT ABOUT THAT HEAD OF SCHOOL SEARCH?
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HEAD / EXECUTIVE COMPENSATION
- THE AWKWARD CONVERSATION: WHAT ABOUT MY COMPENSATION?
- Performance Bonuses for Heads or Not?
- Never Ignore Head Compensation Planning
- Section 4958 – “Intermediate Sanctions”
- Head Compensation: The Process, The Product and the Reporting
- In Defense Of Head Compensation
- The Truth About Statistics: Why Head Compensation Information Fails to Deliver
- The Intermediate Sanctions Act: The "Next Level" of Compliance
- Income Opportunities In Tight Economic Times
- The Safe Harbors Act: The Necessity Of Demonstrating Annual Compliance
- What Is “Deferred Compensation?” And Why Do So Many Heads Have It Or Want It?
- A Changed World For Head Recruitment And Compensation
- Head Compensation: The Race to the Top
- The Importance Of The Head Compensation Process
- Surprising Facts And Figures About The Head Compensation Process
- Tools to Recruit, Retain and Reward Heads of School: Why They Are Even More Important Now
- The Big Dig: Digging Your Way Through The New Form 990
- Ties That Bind or Wound: The Power of the Contract and the Contract Process
- Executive Compensation: The Process, Pitfalls And Opportunities
- Head Compensation: Understanding The Changing Rules
- Head Compensation: It Is Difficult To Be Your Own Advocate
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FACULTY COMPENSATION AND EVALUATION
- How to Engage Teachers in the Challenging Conversation about Money
- Why We Will Have Failed Them: How to Regain Faculty Trust
- Salary Systems in Independent and International Schools
- The Whole Package
- Building Morale: The Importance of STAFF not Only Faculty Compensation
- Mission Based Compensation: THE Key to Financial Sustainability
- Up to 85% of Your School’s Budget
- What IS a Philosophy of Compensation?
- Faculty Salary System Designs: Becoming More Innovative
- Compensation, Collaboration and Culture: A Winning Story
- Threading the Needle: Addressing Faculty Compensation Challenges While Avoiding Major Risks
- When And Why Teachers Decide To “Organize”
- Mission And Money: Or How To Make The Most With What You Have
- Designing A Politically Safe Process For Changing Faculty Compensation Systems
- Update on Performance Pay: Gaining National Attention
- Teacher Evaluation And Accountability: When Entitled Parents Meet Entitled Teachers
- “Fuzzy” Salary Systems
- The Explosion of Extra Pay
- Yes: A Successful Model of Teacher Evaluation – The Importance of Leadership, Culture, Attitude and Training
- The Faculty Salary Challenge: Not Just How Much, But How?
- Trends from the Trenches – Patterns in Faculty Benefits
- The Professional Growth "Trap"
- Faculty Salary Systems: Rapid and Systematic Changes in Schools Worldwide
- Performance Pay Can Work In Independent Schools
- Faculty Salaries: Doing More Than Talking About It
- Salary System Modeling: Thinking Through Your Decisions
- Selling Your Benefits: What Teachers Need To Know
- The Danger Of Inequities In Faculty Workloads
- Ensuring Rational Faculty Salary and Benefit Systems: Time for a Dialogue
- The Latest In Faculty Compensation: Allocating Resources Among Your “Buckets”
- Persistence Pays Off
- In an Economic Downturn: Intelligent Ways to Make Compensation Go Further
- Mission Based Compensation and Flexible Pay: The Challenge Confronting Boards, Heads and Teachers
- Performance, Compensation And Evaluation: They Are Always Related
- Recent Trends In Faculty Compensation – And Some Cautionary Notes
- Faculty Salary System Designs: Tradition and Innovation
- What About "Merit" Pay?
- Transparency, Collaboration and Engagement: Boards, Faculty and Administrators in Salary System and Benefits Design
- How to Provide Teachers with Fairness and Predictability of Compensation…and the Ability to Influence Their Own Future Earning Power
- For the Skeptics on Faculty Compensation: Salary Systems Compared
- WHAT OUR TEACHERS VALUE
- Published or Non-Published Salary Systems: The Pros and Cons
- Yes, Our Teachers Deserve More Money but HOW to Deliver It?
- What happens when salary systems become corrupted?
- Salary Mania: The Pace of Increases in Teachers’ Salaries is Moving Faster than the Philosophy Behind Them
- RECRUITING MISSION DRIVEN TEACHERS
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BOARD GOVERNANCE
- How The Personality of a Board Chair Affects Board Governance
- Seeking The “Light” in the Polarized Environment in Independent Schools
- Becoming And Remaining A Healthy Board: The Rules Of Engagement
- How Political Capital Affects Executive Decision Making and School Culture
- Controversial Topics: 360 Evaluation and Executive Session
- Strategic Governance Reduced to the Absurd: Lessons Learned
- Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen and the Head was “Cooked”!
- Short Term Solutions Can Lead to Long Term Problems
- The Impact of the Pandemic on Mission and Governance
- New Heads Arriving and the Dangers Ahead
- The Entry Challenge
- Why Heads are Wary of Executive Sessions
- John Littleford Featured in Taipei American School’s Fall 2019 Window Magazine
- When the Board Becomes the Problem
- Healthy Boards and Strategic Planning Go Hand in Hand
- Every Board Has a “Personality”
- What “Rogue” Board Members Can Accomplish
- Board Structures: The Good, the Bad and the Downright Ugly
- Premature Dismissals: Overlooking Head Transition
- Why a Leadership Coach?*
- The Governance Game III: The Importance of Transitions
- Mission “Tugs”
- Following a “Founder” and Can You Survive?
- The Theory AND Practice of Board Governance
- The STILL Sad State of Head Departures
- Strengthening Parent Associations
- The Qualities That Schools Desperately Need In A Board Chair
- The Need for Bi Lingual Boards and Heads: Understanding and Sharing a Common Language in the Board Room
- Board Policy Manuals: When Do They Create Problems?
- Head Transition/Entry Plans: Risks And Opportunities
- Managing Crises: Dealing With The Unexpected
- Board Governance And Teacher Evaluation: Where Do The Two Meet?
- Broadening Governance Training: A Lesson to Be Learned
- Effective Coaching For Heads Of Schools And Board Chairs: Cases Of Encouragement
- Which Comes First? Search Or Governance?
- How To Fire the Head, AND More than Once!
- When Schools Go to War
- Who Fires The Head?
- The 20% Rule
- Why Board Chairs Serve?
- The “Ji Huey” Moment: Turning A Crisis Into An Opportunity
- The Boards You Should Not Emulate
- The Value Of Age Induced Wisdom
- Developing Healthy Board Governance: What to Do about the Parent Driven Board
- The View From 50,000 Feet: The Perspectives Of Executive Directors Of Independent And International Associations Of Schools
- Intelligent Governance In Challenging Economic Times
- Managing The Errant Trustee
- Elephants in the Board Room
- Drama in the School House and the Board Room
- Leadership Transitions: Strategies To Support A New Head And Maintain School Stability
- Head Evaluation: The Risk Of Not Doing It Or Doing It Poorly
- Fortress Head, Fortress School: Attacks from Within and Attacks from Without
- Strong And Stable Boards: Wise, Committed And Loyal!
- Transitions, Strategic Planning and.. Failure: How to Avoid the Trap
- Board Governance: Where Is The Baby Elephant?
- “Extreme” Board Behavior But Sometimes The Norm
- Problem Trustees ( And How to Help Them): Part II
- Dealing with Problem Trustees (Or Their Problem Spouses)
- Making (Or Breaking) The Chair/Head Partnership:
- The Longevity Of Heads And The Effectiveness Of Schools
- The Role of the Chair: The Promise and the Price
- The Risks And Stress Of Transition
- Leadership Of Schools And The Longevity Of Heads
- The Governance Game – Part I: What’s At Risk For Independent Schools
- The Governance Game – Part II: The Role of Change in School Instability
- The Governance Game – Part IV: Board Subcommittees – Their Role In Supporting The Mission and Stability of the School
- Board Structure: The Plight of the International School
- Evaluation Of Boards: Self-Reflection In A Healthy School
- The Politicization of Boards on Re-opening our Schools
- Board/Head Collaboration: The Stress Points and the Rewards
- Nurturing Your Head: A Five-Point Paradigm
- Governance in the Trenches: Some Solutions
- How Much Communication is Too Much?
- The Pandemic: What We Will Have Learned
- Managing Stakeholder Discontent: A Rising Tide
- Walking In the Shoes of a Head of School
- Managing Head of School Transition and Succession
- Head Compensation: The Lay of the Land
- Succession Planning: The Time Has Come
- The Vaccination Wars Continue: How Do our Schools Respond?
- What Did We Forget and Why? The Consequences of Rapid Board Turnover
- Following a Long Term Head
- Executive Coaching is not Small Potatoes
- How Can We Turn the Corner Towards Better Governance Practices?
- To Boards of Trustees: Is It Time for a Head’s Sabbatical?
- Faculty Anxiety and Disgruntlement Can Be Turned Around
- Some Key Indicators of Strong or Weak Board Governance Behaviors
- HOW DO YOU SPOT A “ROGUE” BOARD MEMBER?
- HOW TO PARTNER EFFECTIVELY WITH PARENT ASSOCIATIONS
- The Board Subcommittees You Need (and the Ones You Don’t)
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STRATEGIC PLANNING
- Strategic Planning Initiatives Worldwide: What are Parents and Teachers Saying?
- The Key Questions to Ask when Undertaking Strategic Planning
- Healthy Boards and Strategic Planning Go Hand in Hand
- Strategic Planning: Taking Appropriate Risks
- The Strategic Planning Process:
- Protecting Our Schools Through Strategic Planning
- The Strategic Decision: Choosing a Planning Process that Fits the School's History and Culture
- Strategic Planning: Leading and Not Following the Process
- Fall Out from Strategic Planning
- Transitions, Strategic Planning and.. Failure: How to Avoid the Trap
- Strategic Planning And Why The Process Generally Frustrates Boards
- Strategic Planning: A Wise Political Investment
- Efficient And Effective Strategic Planning
- Strategic Planning is Crucial but Proceed with Caution!
- Is the Timing Right for Strategic Planning (or Not)?
- Strategic Planning: Managing Rising Stakeholder Voices and Expectations
- A Major Risk in Strategic Planning: What If Your Mission May Have Changed?
- Strategic Planning and a Cautionary and yet Upbeat Tale
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FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT AND MARKETING
- Key Survival Factors for Independent Schools
- Marketing the Mission to Full Enrollment
- Engaging Independent School Parents in the Time of Covid-19
- Compensation And Tuition Setting: The Message Is Mixed
- Beneath The Surface: What The Numbers Reveal
- More Marketing Bang For The Buck
- Beneath the Surface: Trends in International Schools
- Branding is Powerful: Proven Strategies
- How To Get A Handle On Controlling Expenses And Increasing Income In Difficult Economic Times
- A Mission That Resonates in a Soft Admissions Market
- Managing The Bottom Line:
- Profit Centers: Has Your School Tapped These Revenue Sources?
- Income Opportunities In Tight Economic Times
- The Nine Sacred Cows Of Financial Management:
- Marketing the Mission is More Important than Ever
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SCHOOL CLIMATE
- The Importance of Healthy Faculty Cultures
- "Managing School Climate-And Not Letting It Manage You!"
- Understanding Faculty And School Cultures
- Improving Faculty Cultures: Touching The Heart And Soul Of Schools
- Unhealthy School Climate: Common But Seldom Improved
- IT, Brutus!
- School Cultures: An Interesting Model And Then Some
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