Our Books

Invest in Your Best: 9 Strategies to Grow, Support, and Celebrate Your Most Valuable Teachers

Support, celebrate, and grow your best teachers so that they stay in your school and continue to have maximum impact. Burnout and teacher turnover are on the rise, yet we often spend more of our energy on the underperformers. In this powerful book, you’ll learn why it’s crucial to recognize your best teachers, going beyond superficial gestures of appreciation and investing in them in deeper ways. And, you’ll find that doing so will elevate everyone else as well.

7 Mindshifts for School Leaders: Finding New Ways to Think About Old Problems 

Persistent problems in education―numeracy, reading ability, equity, grading, and teacher retention―can only be solved if we approach them as the crises they are. This practical guide introduces seven mindshifts to help leaders chart an innovative course of school improvement, becoming empowered to not just deal with perennial complex issues but extinguish them all together so students and teachers can thrive. Features include:

• Seven adaptable models for finding solutions to perennial problems
• Stories highlighting the successful implementation of each mindshift
• Discussions to help match mindshifts to particular problems
• Technical tips and reflection questions 

Retention for a Change: Motivate, Inspire, and Energize Your School Culture

More often than not, generic solutions used to boost teacher retention are failing (i.e. increased salary, better working conditions, lack of induction support). Low teacher retention rates in schools negatively impact student achievement for all the students in a school, not just those in a new teacher’s classroom.

In Retention for a Change, we give precise strategies for motivating, inspiring, and energizing a staff. The goal is to make your school a place of success for everyone. Teacher retention is a huge issue that continues to grow, and we believe that this book is one-of-a-kind in that it tackles a tough topic with practical solutions.

Candid and Compassionate Feedback: Transforming Everday Practice in Schools

Too often educational leaders are caught in a “culture of nice,” finding it difficult to give their teachers and staff critical feedback to improve their practice. This important book helps leaders become both candid and compassionate, unrelenting and supportive, and demanding yet caring. Exploring real scenarios and situations, this book helps you through the common traps of trying to improve performance, and the strategies to move beyond these pitfalls to achieve desired results. Addressing best practices for driving change such as informal feedback mechanisms, collaborative decision-making, and teacher leadership, this important book will help you create a trusting and supportive environment where you can have candid educational conversations in person and in writing, during informal chats, in PLCs, and with other leaders.

Passionate Leadership: Creating a Culture of Success in Every School

Passionate Leadership is an inspiring call to action for teachers and principals around the world to recommit to passionately serving children, building the communities children deserve, and celebrating our successes. The authors of this book examine what it takes to be a passionate leader and take courageous actions which lead to student growth and success. Educators ready to push to new heights and break boundaries will find:

• Practical ideas and suggestions for how to serve as a beacon of hope in the field
• First-hand experiences from enthusiastic leaders modeling what passionate leadership looks like
• Charts and graphs that will help you assess your strong points and identify areas you can improve on

Building a Winning Team: The Power of a Magnetic Reputation and the Need to Recruit Top Talent in Every School

Building a Winning Team is about the critical need for schools and districts to promote a positive reputation for the community in which they serve. There is a growing need to recruit and retain teachers in the field of education, and this book addresses new ways to approach what we call “the talent equation.” We provide stories from real practitioners along with new and innovative ways to approach vision work, branding, culture, recruitment, human resources, and more. This book combines the research, theory, and practical application in both a how-to guide for implementation and the inspiration needed to grow your team to be the best that they can be. At the heart of this book is the notion that great schools consist of great teams that have a winning mentality. If you’re looking for new ways to tell your school’s story, develop an award-winning reputation, and recruit top talent, this book is perfect for you.