52. Leadership Strategies for Small Schools with Susanne Carpenter

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Aubrey: Welcome to Mindful School Marketing. I’m Aubrey Bush.  Tara: And I’m Tara Clays. Today we’re joined by Suzanne Carpenter. Suzanne is a strategy and leadership consultant, and the principal of Carpenter Leadership Consulting as an educational leader for more than 20 years. Suzanne partners with independent school leaders to develop and advance high functioning and strategy focused leadership teams. Welcome, Suzanne. We’re glad  Susanne: you’re. Hi, Aubrey and Tara, it’s so great to be here today. Thank you so much for having me,  Aubrey: and we’re so excited that you’re here and that we’re talking about this important topic. Before we dive in, can you tell us a little bit more about yourself and  Susanne: what you do? Sure. So as you mentioned, I’m the principal and founder of Carpenter Leadership Consulting, which I actually just started in July of 2022. After stepping out of being in working in schools full-time, uh, I had been in educational leadership for almost the bulk of my entire career. Most recently at Walnut Health School for the. I live in the Boston area, so it’s in Natick, Massachusetts, which is a day in boarding school for grades nine through postgraduate for young artists. So a wonderful place. I loved being there and I also realized over the last number of years I was looking for something different as I was trying to figure out the next step in my career. I started to feel like I was getting drawn to the work of the adults in our community and really thinking about how do we support our leaders to be stronger and better in what they’re doing. Um, I grew up on the admission side of the house. I like to say, uh, I’m not, I don’t have a teaching background. And so I started many, many, many years ago as an assistant director of admission and then worked my way up through the process. And when I first gained leader, Um, as a director of admission and financial aid at Worcester Academy, I realized it was something I had aspired to be for so long, but I actually didn’t really have an understanding of all the other aspects of what it meant to be a leader. And so as I started to think about my next step in my own career journey, I really wanted to help leaders and leadership teams in our independent schools. Um, I think independent schools are just these amazing. Impactful places. I am the product of an independent school. I graduated from Westover School in Middlebury, Connecticut. I actually sit on the board of trustees there now. So I feel very deeply committed to our independent schools and I know that when you have great leaders in our schools, our schools are stronger for it. And on the side note, I live in the Boston area with my husband and daughter. Um, and I’m just really excited to have this conversation with both of you. Tara: Yeah, we’re excited too. And, um, I have a, a question, um, that we hadn’t talked about beforehand, so I’m gonna throw it in here, which is great. I’d like, I’d like to, cuz we do try to prepare a little bit, but then as you talk sometimes we come up with, with other questions. So here we go off the cuff. Um, I wanna ask a little bit about the term leader because. You know, I think, um, small schools, small teams, small. Um, what defines a leader like d? Is there a certain role that you have to have to be a leader or is anybody a leader? Can you talk a little bit about who a leader is and who, and who you’re talking about when you say that in a independent school  Susanne: setting? Sure. So I think that’s a great question and I think. There’s a lot of assumption around what leadership looks like, and I also feel as though there’s this weird fallacy in our independent schools that you haven’t succeeded at leadership if you haven’t become ahead of school. And I actually don’t think that that’s true. and there are different paths to leadership, and leaders may look like department chairs. They may look like deans of faculty. They can be see sitting at the senior leadership level. They can be heads of school. But I also think we lead ourselves, right? So that journey doesn’t mean that you have to have this robust team that you’re leading. You may be leading initiative. Um, I imagine that for some of the folks that are listening to this, they may be a leading a team of one, which is themselves in the work that they’re doing, but they have to lead those initiatives and build relationships and build bridges. So you are still leading even if you don’t necessarily have this big team associated with you in your schools. And so I think it’s really important when you sit in a position of authority that you’ve thought. And understand what it means to relate with others to help move things forward, to have goals that are, you know, both push goals and achievable goals, and how you can actually better the institution even if the people that you’re leading might not necessarily all directly report into you all of the time. Thank you so  Tara: much for, for saying that cuz it’s a question that I think about all the time, even for myself, I have, you know, I, I think of my, I don’t think of myself as a leader often because I don’t have a big staff under me, so I was wondering about that. So thanks so much for  Susanne: clarifying that. You’re welcome. Well, I also think that when you are by yourself in a department, you’re like, am I a leader? Who am I leading? What am I leading? .  Aubrey: That’s so true. I’m so glad you clarified that because we often work with small schools and sometimes you are that department of one and you’re like, what team? Mm-hmm. , what team, where is it? It’s not here, but you are a leader and um, I appreciate the kind of, the definition about that. So I’m curious, you know, um, you know, we’re, as we’re talking about leaders, you know, and, and what they’re going through right now, perhaps, what are some of the key things that you find leaders struggling with? Susanne: Yeah. I think that’s such a good and important question, especially after the last number of years. Right? I, I mean, I imagine that we all sort of have this question of like, what are we, what are we leading, what are we doing? But I think is an overarching theme, in my opinion, the biggest challenge our leaders are facing today is really supporting and sustaining themselves and their teams, and. I, you know, we haven’t always taken good care of ourselves when we sat in leadership roles, and when you talk about being mindful or being intentional, I, I do think that we think about leadership and moving into leadership roles in our independent schools, very skills based and what the role or the responsibility is, but not necessarily what it means to be a manager of yourself and other people, or a manager of your depart. and there’s this quote by Simon Sinek, and if I get it totally wrong, I apologize, but it’s gonna come really close, which is, leadership is not about being in charge. Leadership is about taking care of those in your charge. And so how are you thinking about those soft skills in many ways that come along with your leadership? So I, you know, as I mentioned earlier, like I don’t think that you always. Are taught those skills and independent schools, like many organizations don’t have the structure in place in order to think about what it means to be in a leadership position. And we often are promoted without much training. So, you know, I moved into a, a director of admission position. In 2007, I had aspired to that position, but I hadn’t really thought about all the nuances that go along with being in a leadership position that included things like performance reviews. Having difficult conversations with other people, kind of trying to figure out how to get people in your corner for certain situations, like whipping the vote, I guess is the other way to, to get things done. Um, but I think that we talk a lot about the tactical responsibilities of jobs. So in thinking about, you know, marketing or enrollment professionals that might be SEO or social media strategy, The R o ROI of certain efforts, conversion rates, yield, direct mail campaigns, like all those things that, having been on the enrollment side, we talked about a lot and clearly that is your job and those are the responsibilities of it. But the leading piece is the piece that’s kind of missing from the equation for us. And so I don’t think it’s uncommon for people to kind of end up in these leadership roles and, and be like, wait, I have to do. What am I doing, ? Uh, so that to me is sort of the big overarching challenge that sits for leaders in our schools right now. And coming out of Covid, we’ve all been dynamically changed over the last couple of years, and so, The things that we thought we knew or could rely on aren’t necessarily always those same tactics that work today. And so we’re really in this moment of trying to figure out, you know, we’re leading people, right? Like these are humans involved. And as humans we are messy and we have emotions and things aren’t always perfect. So how can we better help our leaders? become better at, at leading people or leading departments as they’re moving the work of the school forward.  Tara: Yeah, I love that, especially in context of how we’re talking about who the leader is, so, you know mm-hmm. seems like that’s even part of the challenge is defining that. Right. Um, so now that we’ve talked about the challenges, let’s talk about some strategies for managing them. So how do you work with schools and what, what kinds of solutions do you see, um, being implemented successfully?  Susanne: Sure. So I like to talk about sort of how are we, how are we thinking about what you, what are those things that you need in order to be successful as a leader? And I. I’m gonna focus on a couple today. I think the, the base of all of it is trust. So without trust, it’s really hard to have people move forward and to feel as though, you know, buzzwords of psychological safety, um, comes up a lot. But being able to have people be themselves and, and be authentic in those spaces. Is incredibly important. And to me there’s kind of three ways you go about doing that as a leader. And so one of the ways I work with folks in schools is let’s talk about what, you know, relationship building looks like for you as a leader. And in many ways I do think that feels like a no-brainer, right? Like you’re in relationship with people that you work with on a regular basis, but especially if you’re a team of one. Then you have to figure out how you’re spending time with people in other parts of the school and how are you forming strong connections with them. And so when you’re talking and sharing information, being open to feedback, and I know that’s tricky if you’re a marketing professional, cuz I feel like people in that are not in enrollment or marketing think it’s the E. Those are the two easiest jobs to do in the school. There’s a lot of opinions about it. But sometimes there’s real nuggets there in, in working with other people. So how are you engaging with those folks who don’t directly report to you within an organization? Because really building relationships is the backbone of trust and, and I also. oftentimes say like, this is the work that takes a really long time to do cuz it’s so deeply important. But trust doesn’t just happen overnight. Like I don’t think you can walk into a place and be like, trust me, I know what I’m doing. And everyone’s like, yes Suzanne, I’m totally gonna trust you. Um, but really by focusing on the relationship building, they’re really focusing on communication skills and. They’re gaining valuable insights on perspectives on what’s happening within the institution. And so from a marketing perspective, you’re like, oh my gosh, that could be a great post that we’re working on. I actually need to highlight this thing that’s happening. Or for an enrollment professional, it might be like, this is a great thing for me to talk about in this interview that I have with this family that popped up. Um, so you start to see how those relationships become really important. . And then when you, if you do have a team, I also feel like developing your people is so important and great leaders really do develop others. It’s a muscle that we have to work. We also need a, if you’re, you know, alone, like developing yourself and you know, we don’t do a great job at developing other people cuz it requires a lot of work, whatever. And I think. That’s a really tricky part of what we do. Um, and so you need to start thinking about how do you think about those things that you don’t necessarily always have to do yourself. So can you delegate tasks to other people if you are finding that you’re. A department of one for, for example, but you have a faculty member who’s excited to participate in the work that you’re doing, how might you help them grow in that way? Um, but I do think that you’re really trying to set goals and expectations and encourage other people, especially if you do have a team that is reporting to you, you want to focus on how you’re developing them. And I also do think feedback is a huge portion of. Conversation because we always assume feedback should sort of fall into the negative context, but I actually think there’s a lot of amazingly positive feedback that people have about the work you’re doing, how that you can improve. And also as a leader, how do you improve yourself by gaining feedback from those folks that are on your. And, and really moving that forward. I think asking great questions is also a huge part portion of that work that we do as leaders. And really saying like, how do you like to be managed is not a question I ever was asked by someone that I reported to. And people can sometimes make assumptions, right? Like, well, this is the way I like to be managed, so I’m going to manage you. And I find that if you. Honor the person who’s sitting in front of you and you’re focused on their particular growth, their growth process and trajectory may look and feel very different than a number me, another member of your team. But you know, that’s, you know, equity versus equality, right? You’re being equitable because you’re giving the person what they need in order to grow. And not trying to just say, well, everyone’s gonna do the same three conferences and this is what we do. Um, so that, The second one. And then I think the third one is you actually have to drive accountability. And it’s easy to talk about accountability and raw numbers of, you know, did we, did we get the number of likes on a post? Did we meet our conversion rate goals? What are our application numbers? But I actually think it’s more about. Intentional goals for yourself and for your team to grow and then openly commit to the work that you’re doing. And so even if you are that department of one as a leader, if you let other people know what you’re responsible for and what you’re trying to achieve, , it just role models for others, especially if you hit that roadblock and you need help, you drop the ball and you have to accept responsibility for it. But it allows you to become efficient in your own processes. So those are kind of the three areas that I end up focusing on a lot with, with clients that I’m working with now, um, and thinking about how they move themselves and their teams forward. .  Aubrey: This is fascinating to me because having been a leader in a school, yes. I didn’t feel like , there was a lot of training about, hey, oh, you’ve got this role now. What, how are you, how are you being a leader? Um, and I love the things you brought up, um, relationship building being so important. Um, I remember I used to hate going down to. In lunch, like the, the crowded lunch space with the, the middle school students. But it also meant I got to know the middle school students and I got to know the middle school faculty members, which guess what, you know, I learned that they had children and that they had a dog named Fluffy. They just adopted. And like it builds up. So when I’m asking like, Hey, can I come to your room to shoot this? Or like, maybe I dropped the ball somewhere. They’re more forgiving cuz that relationship has been formed. Um, so I love. You brought that up. Uh, I think there’s so much here and just remembering to. I think it’s the book multipliers or something, um, that talks about developing others, right? That you talked about like developing your team and what, what works for one person is not necessarily gonna work for another, but asking the right questions too. I always like, like to ask like, what, what does appreciation feel like to you? Because everyone, you know, it’s uh, the five love languages or whatever, everyone feels appreciated a different way. So you saying thank you publicly to one of your team members? They might not be the person who wants the public acknowledgement, but maybe they want the handwritten note or a box of chocolates on their desk or something like that. So, um, I appreciate you, you kind of brought up, um, all these important topics that as leaders we’re not trained to really think about. There’s not really tools available when we move into that next role. So, uh, I’m, I’m glad you shared, shared them with, um, with people here today. Cause I think it’s gonna, um, be eye-opening for them to think about that. I’m curious. , you know, as we’re, we are kind of a marketing podcast. Um, and you did mention a few marketing strategies here, but I’d love to know like how team and leadership focused improvements can help a school grow enrollment and increase retention.  Susanne: Hmm. I mean, that’s such a good question and of course why you’re here to talk. I mean, I don’t think you can really talk about outcomes if you’re not willing to talk about leadership and. If you have a sh, if you have strong leaders in your school who are supporting building, uh, the faculty who are building relationships with the adults, those are incredibly strong schools. And if you’re fostering a positive environment, schools really start to attract and retain talented faculty, talented staff, but also that has an amazing impact on student enrollment. And so happy schools breed happiness. Right? I mean, I do think that that is a, a real thing that you feel when you enter a school. , all of the marketing in the world cannot change how this campus feels when you step onto it for the first time. And so when you have a strong leadership presence and when you have leaders who are developing relationships and holding people accountable and have real goals for moving the institution forward, you’re also creating a really supportive and engaging learning environment. And that’s a place where families wanna send their children. And it’s a place where children wanna. Every day, right. That engaging learning experience. I mean, as a parent, the, the thing I’ve always loved is when my kid comes home and wants to like talk about the thing that happened in class today that just feels like that special sauce that’s in our schools. So, you know, those are those things that really impact enrollment because without strong leadership then you’re sort of a visionless institu. And that starts to struggle. Um, you know, and strong leaders, when you hold others accountable, I mean, you’re holding your team accountable to meeting enrollment or marketing goals as well. And so it’s not as though, it’s just all like, I’m gonna bring in brownies to the next meeting. Right? I mean, that’s amazing and everyone likes baked goods, but you also need to make sure that you’re. Conversations when people aren’t meeting goals or if the team is off track or thinking about how you’re partnering with another office. Typically, enrollment and marketing work really closely together to say like we’re struggling with. This certain grade level in enrollment, like what are those strategies we can do to work together? And so we’re all accountable for that. So those are those things that really start to help your schools thrive. So that’s why I really feel like it benefits not only the people sitting in the leadership positions, but it benefits the school’s institutional health. Yeah, absolutely. It’s,  Tara: it’s like this organic puzzle. All the pieces have to fit together and  Susanne: mm-hmm. . Um, yeah, if.  Tara: I think we’ve talked about this particular concept or quote before, right? Like nothing, nothing kills a bad brand more than you know, the promise of something that’s, that’s not there. So that’s really important. And I think it’s not, it’s not the the motivator or the driver, right? You’re not necessarily thinking about. Um, enrollment and, and how all of these other pieces are going to lead to having more students. Certainly that’s part of it, but, but really you wanna have a, a positive work environment and a positive classroom environment and, you know, all of the, all of those pieces come together and then result in, in. Growth, uh, in terms of your student body. So I think that’s, that’s really helpful to kind of bring it in for perspective as this really high level view there, the, the forest for the trees. Um, and I wanna talk now a little bit about mindfulness. Speaking of trees in the forest, cuz think about being in the forest and  Susanne: being meditative. Forest bathing. Right. Exactly.  Tara: Yeah. Um, so, you know, on our podcast we talk about marketing, we also talk about mindfulness because as we talked about when we first, before we started recording, Aubrey and I kind of like this Woowoo a little bit. You know, we like to talk about, um, being in our heads and approaching. thoughtfully and mindfully. So can you share a little bit with us about maybe your, how you define mindfulness and how it applies to these challenges that we’re talking about? I think you’ve touched on it a little bit, but you know how it applies to some of these challenges. Mm-hmm. that  Susanne: leaders face. So I think in terms of leadership, mindfulness is really about being intentional and being present. And, and sort of if you do have a mindfulness practice, one of the hardest things to do is to tune out the chatter in your mind. And the way I look at that from, in putting it into a context of kind of a one-on-one in a leadership context is that sometimes you need to pull away all of those distractions to think. Very intentionally the person who is sitting in front of you. And when you do that, you are building trust and you are engaging with someone. You are developing a relationship. You are acknowledging the person in front of you. And you know, there’s so many distractions today, right? You know, you’ve got your phone and it’s going off all the time, and you know that there’s this thing that you still have on your plate. But sometimes if we just. Become more mindful in those moments and become more present. The work gets done faster and it gets done better and, and so that’s the way I think of mindfulness or being mindful in a leadership capacity in schools is just being very intentional about those things that you’re doing about leadership and not always about the. Aubrey: That makes so much sense. And we do live in a world of distractions. I think, um, at the recent conference that we held, um, it was that we have an attention span less than a goldfish now. Um, so to to be That’s horrifying . I know it is. Right. I mean, gosh, where have we gone? How we come here? Um, but I think that’s really important, like to focus on someone and, and to be able to really listen and hear amidst the many other things that are tugging at our minds and our hearts and our, you know, all the other things. So, yes. And now I’m really excited because Woohoo, it’s a rapid fire question time period of the show. Are you ready?  Tara: Think of short attention spans. Speaking of short attention span Yes. For doing the rapid fire. Short answer questions  now?  Susanne: Yes, .  Aubrey: Um, okay, I’ll kick us off. So if you could put one book as mandatory reading in the high school curriculum, what  Susanne: would it be? Uh, so my, those people who’ve reported to me will not be surprised when I say Fierce Conversations by Susan Scott. Uh, it is a book that I have. Multiple copies of they are dogeared, they are highlighted and they have post-it notes all inside of them. Uh, and I, I also know, you know, another one that’s about feedback is radical candor, which is Kim Scott.

1. Was presented with fierce conversations many years ago, so that’s like my little clutch book that I hold onto. I don’t think we talk about how you have honest feedback and have a difficult, or what she refers to as fierce conversation. Early enough in age. And I do think that’s an interesting thing, especially today, to just be like really open with someone to be able to say, you know, I wanna have a difficult conversation with you and I, we’re gonna still have a relationship at the other end of this.

It, it’s, it’s so important and it’s not something that we ever teach anyone, right? You sort of have to either learn it through osmosis or read on your own. , all those things. So that is why Fierce Conversations would be the book I would put in a high school curriculum. Love it.  Tara: Great. I’m gonna add that to my list as well. So , what is one app you could not  Susanne: live without? Mm, so I, the answer is the Peloton app, which I questioned whether or not this would be my answer, but I have realized. The phy, my physical health directly impacts how I do my job. How I lead my workout routine was the thing that fell apart early on in Covid, given being in a school, trying to keep a school running, being in a remote, learning all of the, like the world was in disarray. And so apparently I was, I, but I have really come to realize, . As a leader, you need another outlet. And for me, that outlet has to be working out and really committing to that. So, you know, they have, it has it all. I mean, we, we do have a bike and I do like the bike, which I didn’t think I would until Covid. Um, but I’ve found that it is the thing that I go back to literally on a daily basis. And it’s not social media. Yes, .  Tara: Well, you’ll have to share your username with us after, because I actually found Aubrey on there this morning doing a chore workout. So , I joined  Aubrey: her. That was hilarious. Yeah, she like sent a message. She’s like, look, we were. Yeah. That’s  Susanne: amazing. I feel like,  Aubrey: love it. This is like an unofficial ad for Peloton, but I do, I use their meditation app. I use everything like mm-hmm. . Yeah. And, and how often, I mean, I do think it’s a great outlet for any leader. Like you need to have that, that, that way to get the stress and like just focus. You’re only there, you’re doing your thing and just what it does for your body mind is, is so important because our leaders are. Such stress every day. So to have an outlet like that is really important. So I’m glad you mentioned that app cuz we happen to be fans of it. Um,  Susanne: oh good. Well, we’ll definitely find each other. Let’s connect. Yay. Um, okay, next rapid fire question. Uh, what are you reading right now? . So this is a fiction book. So I have a group of friends that we do a book club. Um, so the book that we’ve chosen for our next book club is Vita by Isabel Iye. Hopefully I have not butchered her name. Um, she’s Chilean and it’s, it’s, I’m not that far into it. I literally just started it, but it’s a beautiful book so far.  Tara: Wonderful. Thanks. We’ll put that on our Good Reads list as well. And then our final, our final question is, what is one great piece of advice  Susanne: that you’d like to leave us with? Ooh, I, that is a good question. So it’s actually advice that a mentor gave to me when I first moved into a leadership role, which is, remember, it’s not about you, it’s about your team. And it was always a good thing to come back to in those moments of challenge, and it, it made me not center myself in a conversation. So I will, I will leave that advice with you as well.  Aubrey: That’s a good one. I feel like that could be a sticky note on the wall. Like, because it’s a, it’s an important one. We, we don’t always think that, and we’re, we’re very, as humans, very, uh, you know, US-centric, right? Like, so, um, that’s a good reminder for our leaders. Thank you. Well, we’re so excited that you were on the podcast today with us sharing such wonderful knowledge. Now. Where can people find you if they wanna learn more about what you do and how you support schools? Sure.  Susanne: So you can find me online@carpenterleadership.com or on LinkedIn, and I am Susanne Dash carpent. Tara: Thank you so much. We’ll be uh, connecting with you I’m sure going forward. It’s been great having you on the show.  Aubrey: Thanks. Yes, thank you so much. We learned so much and we appreciated you sharing your  Susanne: wisdom. Thank you so much for having me. This was so fun. Bye bye bye.