Excerpts from an interview on 12-29-11 with
Dan Smith
Executive Director of the School Administrators of Iowa (SAI), 2006 to present.
Dan grew up in Ohio and went to Dana College in Blair, NE. He has been an educator serving the communities of Ralston, NE, Griswold, IA, Manning, IA, Dunkerton, IA, Knoxville, IA and Cedar Falls, IA before leading SAI.
First Job: Newspaper carrier for the Cleveland Plain Dealer at the age of 10.
Currently Reading: 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created by Charles C. Mann and Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie.
A couple of the best thinkers he has known are:
Floyd Winter - former Director of Secondary Education, Cedar Falls, IA School District
Darrel Weaver - former teacher/coach at Griswold, IA
Leaders on Thinking: Do you have a time, place, routine for thinking?
Dan: Yes, daily exercise is an important time for me to reflect. Purposefully reflecting on important decisions is critical. You have to take the time if you have the time to do so.
L on T: There are many sources of information available. How do you decide where to acquire your knowledge?
Dan: I try to be widely read. Read all kinds of literature. We should challenge ourselves to watch and read widely different points of view and not just sources we always agree with. It is critical that leaders maintain a knowledge level about developments and happenings in their profession. Technology has made this kind of knowledge readily available today. However, "source credibility" is now more important than ever. You have to be aware of a source's point of view and biases.
L on T: Do you change your mind on matters at times?
Dan: Yes. A favorite quote of mine is from Richard Elmore, "I use to think, but now I think." You have to keep an open mind about things.
L on T: What do you wish you would have known earlier about leadership and how to think better?
Dan: That deeply listening to the people you work with is so important to understanding what is actually going on in your organization. I would also want to be better at "trust but verify." What I mean by that is that you have to trust people and believe that they are doing the right thing for the good of the organization but at the same time there needs to be an accountability system in place that verifies and supports what they are saying is true. These two things have to be balanced.
L on T: What do you think causes leaders to suffer from poor thinking?
Dan: One thing that leads to poor thinking is thinking in isolation and believing that, "I alone have all the answers." The more important the decision or issue the more discussion and collaboration there needs to be. Another thing that leads to poor thinking is when there is not a clear, good choice. It can be natural for leadership to drift toward the choice with the least amount of conflict. This is seldom a good thing nor the right thing. This type of bad thinking is more a male thing, I think.
L on T: How have you thought differently from others?
Dan: I am a competitive person and I wanted my organization to be better than those we were compared too. I had to think and do things differently if we wanted to be better than them. As a superintendent one way we did this was through partnerships with the various stakeholder groups of the school district. We worked collaboratively with these groups in ways that other districts didn't or couldn't.
