Episode 232: Six Essential Elements of School Culture (and How Leaders Shape Them)

Darrin Peppard (00:01.036)

All right, my friends, welcome back into episode 232 of the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. Man, I'm really excited about this one. I am stoked to just spend a little one-on-one time with you today. Yeah, that's right. No guests this week. It's just you and me. And we're going to talk about something that is absolutely foundational to everything we do as leaders, and that's school culture.

Now, if you've been with me for a while, if you've been listening to the show, ever heard me speak, worked alongside me, any of those things, you know that I believe culture is not just something we hang on the wall or talk about in our staff meetings. To me, school culture is so much more than that. It's the way people feel when they come into the school. It's the traditions.

It's the practices. It's the routines that we have. It's the purpose that we pour into the work that we do. To me, school culture is the look on kids' faces in the building. It's the energy you feel when you're in the hallways. It's the conversations teachers have in the teachers' lounge. It's what you see.

with teaching and learning in your classrooms. All of those things, it's the way parents talk about your school in the community. All of those things are parts of school culture. And here's the big kicker. We, as the school leaders, we get to carry the ball. We're the quarterback. Everybody in our school is part of the team. When it comes to school culture, we're the quarterback.

Darrin Peppard (02:05.77)

Everything we do, all of our actions, day to day, choices, decisions, our presence, everything we do either strengthens or weakens school culture. So yeah, we're the ball carrier when it comes to school culture. And that's what I really want to get into today. I want to talk about all of these elements of school culture. I've got six very specific things I want to talk about, but

I want to also talk about how does the school leader really impact those things. Well, let me start with a story. I want to take you back to the early days of my high school principalship.

Darrin Peppard (02:53.738)

I really struggled in my first year or two. Those of you who've listened for a long time, know this story, but let's just say I was Captain Chaos. I was the guy who just thought they had to be in the middle of everything. And when you try to do everything, you are the master of everything, master of ceremonies. And unfortunately,

You're not working on the work you need to be doing. I absolutely was not paying attention to my school's culture at that time. I was just trying to be a superhero.

At a point in time when I was fortunate enough to work with my leadership coach, I remember him asking me. And again, this is a story many of have heard, but the first time that my coach came to my building, he asked me at a point, he said, Darren, do you want to be a firefighter? Do you want to be a leader? Because what I see you doing right now is just running around, just chasing from one thing to the next. And you're not focused on what really matters.

And he went on to talk to me about what he felt mattered in school leadership. And he challenged me to identify for myself not what he felt mattered, but what I felt mattered. And it took some time, but over time I was able to really dial it in. If you've read Road to Awesome, The Journey of a Leader, you know that I talk about six things that I think were absolutely critical and number one on that list.

build and maintain positive culture and climate. I will absolutely defend that as the number one, and I think it should be number one on everyone's because that is what drives everything else. That is what floats all boats, your culture and climate. But it wasn't until that moment in time when my coach asked me that question.

Darrin Peppard (05:00.449)

that I was really clear about what mattered to me. And so as I go through this today, I want you to be thinking about that. I want you to be reflecting a little bit on what really matters to me as the leader of my organization.

And again, we're going to lean very specifically into culture and climate. And that's really where I want to go. I've got six essential elements that I want to share that I think are key to school culture. And for each one of them, I'm going to share with you what it is, but I'm also going to share why I think it really matters. And most importantly, I'm going to share how you as the leader can help shape that very specific thing.

So to me, number one, and this gets back to something I talk about all the time here on the podcast, but that clarity. And in this case, we're talking about clarity of purpose and clarity of vision. Why are you doing the work you're doing? What are you truly trying to accomplish? What is genuinely the goal? More importantly, what is the vision that you have for

your facility for your building for your campus. You know, I think about this often. And as a school leader, we talk about mission and vision often. Now, it's one of the ISLIC standards. It's a core element in leadership, but it's something that often gets overlooked by leaders because we're so focused on just the day-to-day operations that we forget about that importance of strategic visioning.

Here's the real truth about that. It's not about the mission and vision that goes in your strategic plan. Those things are important. I'm talking about the, here's where I see us. This is what I think is possible this year. This is what I believe we can accomplish. This is something we can do to move our building forward, to improve our...

Darrin Peppard (07:17.269)

student outcomes to make a difference in the life of our kids. This is something you cannot delegate. You as the leader have to be the one that is driving that vision. You have to be the owner of that vision. You have to be the one who sees it so clearly that here's where we're going. Here's what we're going to accomplish. And then this is where you become the salesman.

because you gotta sell that vision to everyone. You gotta make sure everybody understands their role, their responsibility, their piece of the pie, if you will, in how we get there. That's what leadership is all about. And nothing, nothing will greater impact your culture than having a really strong, clear vision of where we're gonna go.

and getting everyone to see and own their part of it. Man, you get everybody pulling on the same end of the rope, everybody who understands what the goal is and what we're trying to accomplish. It is incredible what happens and what a driver that is for your school culture and your climate.

I just think it's just so powerful.

I also think it's extremely important that you as the leader protect time on a regular basis to ensure that this work is happening. You can't just say this at the beginning of the school year, say, hey, here's what I think is possible this year and never talk about it again. You need to live this thing out loud. Every meeting, every conversation, every opportunity you can find to talk about that vision, to really push that.

Darrin Peppard (09:07.085)

And that's how things start to align. People start to hear it. You start to speak it into existence. You make it a reality. And that's something that you have to do. Only you can do as the leader. Because the more you repeat it, the more you think maybe people are getting tired of hearing it.

the more they start finishing your sentences. That's when you know, this has become an embedded part of our reality. Everybody knows this is where I want to go. That's super powerful right there. That's element number one, in building and maintaining that positive culture and climate, clear vision, clear purpose. Element number two, element number two,

is trust and psychological safety.

Darrin Peppard (10:04.724)

We know culture grows at the speed of trust. And when people don't feel safe, nothing else matters. I work with a lot of schools that have had a tremendous amount of churn in those leadership ranks. You know, new superintendent, another new superintendent, another new superintendent, new principal, new principal, new principal, fifth principal in seven years.

six superintendent in nine years, the more we have that leadership churn, the more people tend to retreat, if you will, and kind of just pull back into their own little space of safety. For teachers, that means just back into their classrooms, you know, and we end up with basically silos. We end up with a bunch of independent contractors that share a hallway. And that's not, that's not going to benefit anyone.

That doesn't move us forward. Our teachers need to know that they can take risk in instruction and not be harshly judged. Our teachers need to know that there is a clear, consistent path, that there is an understanding of how things work in a building. A big part of trust and psychological safety is simply having a well-run school.

Clear systems in place, clear expectations, clear procedures. Clear, who do you go to for this, for this, for this? What is the process like for this? And consistency in terms of how things are handled. Whether that's student discipline or attendance or professional learning or expectations of curriculum development, whatever it might be.

being consistent, being clear, and running your school really, really smoothly with clear systems, that builds trust. But so does your presence. When you are consistently showing up at the front door, in the hallways, in classrooms, teachers know that the work you're doing is getting accomplished.

Darrin Peppard (12:35.424)

They see you. They feel better seeing their principal.

I that's just reality. When we follow through on promises, when we keep confidential conversations private, when we own mistakes as a leader, I remember several botched decisions I made as a principal. And instead of spinning it, just standing in front of the staff, owning it, not pointing fingers at anyone else, but just simply saying, I got this wrong. You know what happened?

People thanked me. I had a teacher come up in tears after one specific incident that I apologized to the entire staff. And she said, you know, I've never had a leader apologize. Thank you.

That vulnerability deepens trust and it creates safety. We want our people to feel like they're seen, heard, valued and trusted and they can't if they're not in a space where they feel psychologically safe. But now flip that over when your teachers are feeling that psychological safety, when they feel that trust, they're empowered and they're gonna take risk and they're going to do amazing things and they're gonna innovate.

And what does that lead to? It leads to students who take risk. It leads to students who innovate. That's what we want to see. Leads to kids who learn and not just rote memorization. mean, learn.

Darrin Peppard (14:17.996)

Trust in psychological safety, It's absolutely essential. Third, relationships. A sense of belonging.

It's the heartbeat of your school culture. People don't excel in environments where they're invisible. They really thrive when they feel connected, when they know they belong. Again, seen, heard, valued, trusted. For leaders, a big part of that is, again, being visible. Don't hide in your office. It means knowing people's names. It means greeting kids at the door, having conversations with them.

having fun with them. Just have fun with your kids. And we see it all the time. Instagram, TikTok, these principals who are using their hallway cameras to capture them high-fiving kids and hugging kids and playing and enjoying time with kids. You get to work with kids. Go enjoy it.

Go enjoy it.

I had one year, I think it was right around the time when the front-facing camera on cell phones started to be a thing, when the selfie started to be a thing. I probably was a part of, I don't even know, a thousand selfies that year? We called it the year of the selfie. We had so much fun together. My kids knew they were seeing her valued and trusted. But the same was true for my staff.

Darrin Peppard (15:59.948)

To me that's what it's really all about. You've got to lean in and build those relationships. know, no significant learning ever happens without a significant relationship. We know that.

But it's also about you as a team.

you as the leaders adults in the building. One of my favorite memories as a building administrator was when I started taking my leadership team on a retreat to just get away, to leave the building behind and to really work to build those relationships between us.

You see, it wasn't just about me building relationships with each of them. They needed to build relationships with each other. And I wasn't thinking about that. I just assumed, which was a mistake, that a relationship with me meant they had a relationship with each other, but they weren't necessarily connecting. And so taking these retreats and leaving town for a couple of days, and yes, we did a lot of work. We did a lot of strategy. We did a lot of...

working on processes and procedures and all of those kinds of things, but we hiked. We ate meals together. You know, we sat on the edge of the pool with our feet in the pool and just got to know each other. You know, that experience really bonded us together. And when we got back to school,

Darrin Peppard (17:38.632)

our sense of belonging, I think really leaked out into the school.

Darrin Peppard (17:46.516)

It was palpable how tight we were as a team. And I remember just all year long, I just kept saying, I love my team. I love my team.

my admin assistant at the end of the year. I came into my office and there's a wrapped present on my desk and inside was

a picture in a frame of me and the team and engraved on the frame was I love my team. And relationships and belonging are huge. One of the schools I work with right now, very large high school, very large leadership team. Their number one thing this year there, this is what we believe is possible is really building adult connectedness.

within the school. They want everybody to feel seen, heard, valued and trusted on their campus. And they're focusing first and foremost on the adults because they know if they do that with the adults, the adults will do that with the kids.

Darrin Peppard (18:57.373)

Next up, celebration and recognition. Yes, absolutely. This is a big part of it. We have got to make sure that we are celebrating the things we want to see. You know, when, when we celebrate, we tell everybody what we value because whatever we're celebrating, clearly that's important to us. If the only things that we recognize are test scores or athletic trophies,

We got to think about the message that that's sending. Culture grows when we really celebrate effort, growth, the daily wins, the things that often go unnoticed. Leaders don't need to have these big elaborate ceremonies either. As a leader, sometimes it's just that simple handwritten note. It's that quick conversation in passing in the hallway.

where you just acknowledge somebody for what they did. And maybe it's a quick shout out in a staff meeting, you know, or stopping a student in the hallway and saying, you know, hey, I heard about how hard you worked on that project and I'm proud of you. The more celebration we can do, the more we can shine light on the good and reinforce the values of the things that we want to see and spread some joy.

That's just amazing. That moves the needle. One of my favorite celebrations that we would do during my time as a high school administrator was recognizing any of our students who had raised their GPA by 0.5 or more. You know, it's hard to get a 4.0 and it's hard to get a 3.5. And we recognize those kids too. But a kid that moves at 1.7 to a 2.2,

And most schools doesn't get recognized, but we made sure that we recognize those kids too, because we want to put that value on growth. We want to celebrate the kid who said, you know what, I'm going to turn it around this year. I love doing those celebrations. And I think the more we find ways to recognize reward and reinforce the things we want to see.

Darrin Peppard (21:26.635)

that quickly, quickly, could become the DNA of your school. It also becomes very quickly the things people talk about. The more you celebrate, the more people share those kinds of things. And that's powerful.

The fifth one I've alluded to already, but I'm to go a little deeper here.

Number five is consistency of expectations and accountability. Nothing, and I mean nothing, will undermine your culture faster than being inconsistent. When the rules shift from day to day, when the expectations are enforced only with certain people and not with others, we lose trust.

I'll give you a simple example. When I first became a superintendent, we had an administrator in the district who was also a coach and he... Oh, how do I say this? He was... He was one to take it pretty easy on his athletes when it came to discipline, but pretty good at bringing the hammer at anyone else.

The lack of trust in that building was very evident when I first got there.

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When we choose to only hold certain people accountable and let others do what they choose, we set ourselves up for failure. And we may think we're doing the right thing. We may even have a reason for it. But being consistent and having clear accountability.

those are the things that will really make or break the culture that you're trying to build.

Darrin Peppard (23:40.277)

The same thing goes with holding adults to expectations. There was a point during my leadership career where an individual that I supervised had a difficult time, I guess, saying no or holding people to an expectation and would really just tell people what they wanted to hear.

instead of what they needed to hear. When those things happen, that also undermines your culture. You've got to be really clear about what matters to you, about what you expect, and then you've got to be willing to hold people to those expectations. And you don't have to be mean, you don't have to be a jerk to hold people accountable. I mean, the truth is people will rise or fall to the level of accountability you're willing to hold them.

How do you do that? Well, set the tone with very clear expectations from the beginning, and then revisit them often. Hold everyone, including yourself, accountable to those things. I mentioned earlier, when you make a mistake, own it. Apologize. Make it right. If you do that, if you lead in that way,

others will follow you. And when you have others who choose not to, that's when you've got to have the tough conversations. That's part of leadership. I've seen a lot of leaders who struggle with hard conversations. Look, hard conversations are hard. That's why they're called hard conversations. It doesn't mean you have to enjoy having them. But if you're clear about what matters to you, if you're clear,

about what you expect.

Darrin Peppard (25:42.877)

All you need to do is to simply stick to what you believe in and be brave to have those conversations. And those types of conversations don't have to be done in a confrontational manner. They can be done in an inquisitive manner, a manner consistent with curiosity, asking people why they're having a difficult time with that expectation or what they may not understand about the expectation. Oftentimes,

People just simply want to have a conversation about it. Maybe they'll agree, maybe they won't, but you've got to stick to what you believe. You got to walk the walk in essence. Again, accountability doesn't mean punishment. And unfortunately in our profession, accountability has really taken on that connotation. What it really means is support, feedback, and fairness.

See something you want to see, you reinforce it. See something that you don't want to see, you have the conversation. You ask questions, you give feedback, you provide support, and you do it being fair. When people know what the expectations are, and when they know that they're going to be consistent and they're going to be fair, they'll relax, they'll focus, and they'll do their best.

Alright, finally, let's talk about modeling and intentionality. This could be the most powerful piece of all, although I would argue all five of these have been really, strong to this point. So let's just say this. People don't listen to what leaders have to say nearly as much as they pay attention to what leaders do. You know, if we, if we preach positivity and walk around with stress written all over our face,

Staff's gonna mirror that energy. If we say that relationships matter but we never leave our office, people notice.

Darrin Peppard (27:48.425)

something just as simple as telling staff to greet students at the door and then us not do that, they notice. Whatever it is that you expect of staff, you have to be willing to do it yourself.

your culture lives in how you model it.

Be really intentional about how you spend your time. Be really intentional about how you show up and be really intentional about the tone that you use because that sends a very powerful, powerful signal. Leaders who model curiosity, leaders who model resilience and leaders who model hope, even in the hardest times, are the ones that others will follow.

Your behavior, your presence, the energy you bring, as the most consistent message you can send out as far as what really matters in our school. If you spend time stuck in your office all the time and you're not out in the classrooms, in the hallways, out at the front door, dismissal lines,

Bus pickup lines. Cafeteria.

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they'll notice. But when you are there consistently, they'll notice that too. And it really will make a big impact on your school culture.

So let's bring this all together. Culture is not a program. Culture is not an initiative.

Culture is not some poster. Culture is not nifty little Klingons on the steps going up into another floor. Those things are cool. Don't get me wrong. Culture is the accumulation of all your daily actions and choices. Leaders, you carry the ball. You're the quarterback. You carry the culture.

These six essential elements that I've shared with you today, clarity of purpose, trust, relationships, celebration, consistency, and modeling, all are within your influence. Focus on these. Put them on your calendar. Be intentional about these things. And you'll build a school where staff want to stay, where students feel

empowered to learn. And you'll have a community speaking so positively about your school.

Darrin Peppard (30:49.753)

what it's all about. That my friends is truly the road to awesome.

Thank you so much for tuning in and listening today. No pep talk this week because I think the entire thing was a pep talk.

If this episode resonated with you, I'd love you to share it with a colleague. Please leave a review for the podcast. Those things, those reviews that you leave, those five stars, all those kinds of things really help to drive the algorithm to get more listens for this show, to get this in front of more leaders. And that's really what I want. I want to pour into leaders. And so I'm asking for your help.

leave us a review, share this with a colleague, let somebody know, hey, you need to check out Leaning Into Leadership. And don't forget, you could always connect with me at roadtoawesome.net or on any of the social media channels, Darren Peppered, on all of them. I'm happy to share resources, happy to share insights with you. In fact, I shared a lot today and challenged you.

to really be intentional putting them on your calendar. So I'm going to drop in the show notes, our free School Leaders Planner. It's a weekly planner that will help you identify your priorities, really be intentional with time blocking and focus on the work that only you can do and then spend some time reflecting. So I'll make sure that's down there in the show notes for you.

Darrin Peppard (32:33.172)

Thank you again for joining me here on Leaning Into Leadership. Get out there. Have a road to awesome week.