Leadership Team Components Leading to Implementation Success: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

Facilitating change in schools requires the leadership, time, and skills of a number of educators in the school community. While the principal usually initiates change activities such as implementing a new program or initiative or reform, the planning and the daily monitoring of the implementation becomes the purview of teams of school personnel. By sharing or distributing the leadership responsibilities, engagement and commitment to the intended change increases as does the likelihood of success. Although much has been written about the importance of teams to program implementation and school outcomes, less is known about the specific contribution of a team’s organization, leadership capacity, or processes. This exploratory study examines these components of leadership teams at 19 high schools implementing School-wide Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (SW-PBIS). We found that team functioning was significantly associated with program implementation of SW-PBIS. Additionally, we found that the process component was significantly associated with implementation fidelity, organization had a weak association, and leadership capacity had no association. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.