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As public schools grapple with declining resources, increasing competition from private education providers, and greater community demands, the need for innovation and inspiration is paramount. This book contains a series of informative articles on innovation, effective leadership, student-centered practices and blended learning which will motivate all leaders to make change happen in their schools. Learn how to build the capacity of others and beat the odds for your students. See how blended learning and student-centered practices foster motivation, provide greater voice and choice for your students and staff and lead to increased academic gains. Explore innovations that can provide cost savings measures and more effective learning environments. Through inspirational leadership, grounded in innovation, districts can achieve greater results for their students.These articles provide reflections, practical insights and knowledge garnered from actual experience in turning an urban, economically challenged district with poor achievement into an award-winning highly successful school system. We hope these articles will help you to create schools where students and staff want to be.
About the author
Dr. Mark D. Benigni - is an experienced K-12 public educator who has led schools and a school system to increased student growth through collaboration and innovation. He was recently recognized as a 2015 Education Week Leaders to Learn From. He has served as Mayor of the City of Meriden for four terms, as well as a city-wide city councilor.
Summary
In 1990, IBM had its most profitable year ever. By 1993, the company was on a watch list for extinction -- victimized by its own lumbering size, an insular corporate culture, and the PC era IBM had itself helped invent.
Enter Lou Gerstner. The presumption was that Gerstner had joined IBM to preside over its continued dissolution into a confederation of autonomous business units -- effectively eliminating the corporation that had invented many of the industry's most important technologies. Instead, Gerstner took hold of the company, making the bold decision to keep it together, defiantly announcing, "The last thing IBM needs right now is a vision."
Told in Lou Gerstner's own words, this is a story of an extraordinary turnaround, a case study in managing a crisis, and a thoughtful reflection on the computer industry and the principles of leadership. Summing up his historic business achievement, Gerstner recounts high-level meetings, explains the no-turning-back decisions that had to be made, and offers his hard-won conclusions about the essence of what makes a great company run.
Read by Edward Herrmann
