Episode 263: Leadership Presence (Part 2)- Breaking Through the Chaos

Darrin Peppard (00:00)

Hey everybody, welcome back into the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. This is episode 263, and this is part two of our three-part series on leadership presence. Now, last week you'll recall that we talked about the hidden cost of distraction, how trust, psychological safety, and emotional connection begin to erode when you're not fully present. Now, don't worry if you haven't yet listened.

to episode 262, the first one in this series, can jump back and take a listen to that one, but it's not required listening before you jump into this particular episode. So stick with us here if you want to jump back and check out episode 262, you can do so. But today I want to talk about how we really focus on breaking through that cycle where we aren't fully present, either physically or...

mentally. Before we jump in, I want to just take a moment to thank the sponsors of this show, the amazing individuals who help us bring this show to you each and every week. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Digicoach. Now, if you're a school leader, an instructional coach, or a district administrator trying to get a clearer picture of what's actually happening in your classrooms, Digicoach is a powerful tool to support that work. It allows you to

collect walkthrough data quickly and efficiently, identify trends, and align your feedback to your instructional priorities. But here's what I appreciate most. Ditch a Coach doesn't just help you gather information. It helps you focus your leadership. Instead of reacting to isolated observations, you can begin to actually see patterns of what's happening across your classrooms. You become much more intentional using Ditch a Coach. And when you're intentional,

your much more presence in the coaching conversations that will follow. If you want to lead with clarity instead of chaos, head over to digicoach.com and let them know that you heard about him here on the Leaning Into Leadership podcast for special partner pricing. Once again, that's digicoach.com.

Friends, this episode is also brought to you by HeyTutor. One of the biggest challenges we face as leaders is ensuring that every student has access to the support they need. When learning gaps feel overwhelming, HeyTutor partners with schools and districts to provide high impact tutoring solutions, both virtual and in person, aligned to your goals. Instead of scrambling to build intervention systems alone, HeyTutor helps you implement structured research-based support so students can close gaps

and gain confidence. And here's why that connects to today's conversation. When your systems are strong, leaders can stop firefighting and be present where it matters the most. Check out the link in the show notes to learn more about Hey Tutor, heytutor.com.

Okay folks, let's go ahead and dive into this conversation. if you're like me, you've probably promised yourself, I'm gonna slow down today. And then by 9.17 in the morning, you realize you're sprinting like crazy. You walk into the building thinking, hey today I'm gonna be much more intentional. Today I'm gonna be more present. And then the emails start. And then the interruptions come.

and then the discipline issues pop up, and then a meeting runs long, and before you know it, you are in full-on sprint mode again. Last week we talked about distraction, the hidden cost that comes with it. Today I want to talk about why it keeps happening. Because the truth is this, you're not failing as a leader, you're not struggling, you're just simply overwhelmed. You're capable of being present, but you can't be present.

when you're completely overwhelmed. See, the thing is, when you fall into this overwhelm, when you fall into the cycle of chaos, a big part of it is that you haven't built margins into your leadership. Presence is impossible when you are stuck in survival mode. That survival mode leadership, it's really difficult for you to have that both physical and mental presence that really great leaders need to have.

Now I've talked many times here on the show about the cycle of chaos. That's constant reactivity, a high cognitive load, absence of clarity, overextension, and survival mode leadership. And I don't want to reteach that framework today. You can go back, listen to that episode. It's episode 257. We'll put a link in the show notes for you so you can go check that out. But I do want to talk about something that I think oftentimes people misunderstand about chaos.

See, chaos isn't loud. Chaos is cumulative. Chaos is this continual buildup rather than just one single event that throws you off. Chaos is just stacking small things day after day. It's the interruptions day after the day. It's the back-to-back meetings. It's the unresolved conversations. That leads to that decision fatigue where we just feel confused.

exhausted and we've realized that we're carrying everyone else's problems. That's what chaos really is. Chaos isn't again, it's not that one big event. You can handle the one big event. It's that continual onslaught of all those time bandits that ultimately lead to you being stuck in that cycle.

And you know, the reality is when you're in that state, you can't calm a room down because your mind is racing. You can't listen deeply if your mind is already on the next meeting because you're not really present on this one. If presence matters, and it does, we wouldn't be doing this series if it didn't matter.

then building margin into our day, into our routines is essential. That's gotta be engineered. You don't build margin spontaneously. You've gotta be intentional. You schedule it, you structure it, and then you stick to it. So today, what I wanna do is give you three practical ways that you can build that margin so that as a leader,

you can really work to increase that presence. And the first is calendar integrity. Now, if you're like me, folks, I am as far from a type A as a person can be. If I don't schedule it, it doesn't happen. It's just that simple. Putting things on my calendar and being extremely intentional is how I can find that margin. I call it calendar integrity.

But here's the thing, if every minute of your day is booked with other things, then you've left absolutely no time for yourself to just mentally move from one thing to the next. I mean, it's one thing to physically be running from one meeting to the next or running from a meeting to your vehicle and jumping in your vehicle and driving to that next meeting. It's a whole different thing.

when your mind is jumping from one meeting to the next. part of calendar integrity is to build in like five minute buffers in between those meetings. If you have to stack meetings, build five minute buffers in and don't let them go. Protect one block a week specifically for reflection time. Don't let it go.

whenever possible, don't stack your commitments back to back to back to back to back. Give yourself some time for your mind to let go, for your mind to reset, for you to physically take those three deep breaths that all of us know can make such a difference in helping us move away from that cognitive overload.

reality is you have to plan it. You have to build it in. Ideally, find somebody to help you hold that in your calendar. I would highly suggest your admin assistant or your secretary. Maybe you have an assistant administrator or somebody like that who can also help you really stick to that. But really lean into that calendar integrity because if you plan it and you stick to it, it truly will help you increase your presence.

The second one, decision discipline. Leaders often lose margin because they make way too many small decisions. You know what I'm talking about here. You are solving problems that you should really allow other people to own. Or maybe it's you step in too early when you allow them to own it and ultimately you're micromanaging them. The other side of it is you just hold on to things a whole lot longer than you should.

That is exhausting. You can't continue to hold everything that belongs to other people. So ask yourself, what is it that I am holding onto that somebody else should be carrying?

there's this misunderstanding of what delegation is. Delegation isn't just about getting work off your plate. Yes, it is. That's certainly a part of it. But it's also about preserving capacity for yourself to focus on the things that only you can do when you're carrying all the other things that others should be doing.

There's just no space. There's no margin for you to be working on the work that truly matters. And it just keeps you spinning in the cycle of chaos. Be willing to let those things go. Be willing to allow others to do the things that they should be doing. If you listen to the podcast on a regular basis, you've heard me talk about this before, but that is the big misunderstanding.

about servant leadership. Servant leadership isn't doing everything for everybody, not in any way, shape, form. Servant leadership is empowering others to do for themselves. It's allowing them to do the things that they should be doing and not doing it for them. That's a moral imperative we have as leaders to grow other leaders. You can't grow leaders if you keep doing all their work.

Delegating is not a bad thing. Delegating is leadership.

Okay, the third one, clarify your top three. At the start of every week, identify what are my top three priorities. And then ask yourself, does my calendar reflect those top three priorities? Because here's the reality, if it's not, then your presence will suffer because you will feel like everything is gonna be urgent and none of those things are meaningful.

You're going to be working on work. Again, we just talked about this, that you should be giving to others and not working on the work you want to be working on, but that you know is important. So really focus on clarifying those top three priorities. Stephen Covey once said, the secret is not about prioritizing your schedule. It's about scheduling your priorities. So lean into that, put your priorities on.

your calendar block intentional time. You can't be present for what matters most if you're not clear on what matters most. So make sure you get those things crystal clear each and every week. And I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, Darren, that sounds great, but I could use a structure for that. Well, I've got something for you. I created a while back, maybe a little over a year ago, as part of a paid course that I have.

a School Leaders Weekly Planner. And it actually incorporates everything that we just talked about. Those three things that I've just shared with you are built right into that weekly planner. And here's the thing. I built it to put in this paid course, but I feel like it's such an incredible resource that I'm just gonna give it to you for free.

I'll pull it out on the course. I'll give you a separate link for it. It's down on the show notes and you can go and download the School Leaders Weekly Planner at no cost. If you're serious about breaking the chaos, if you're serious about protecting your presence, that planner will give you a practical place to start because what I've built into that planner is a space for you to really go and schedule your priorities.

I've built in a space for you to be reflective both on a daily basis and on a weekly basis. If you use it, that is calendar integrity. So go check out that weekly planner. It's a fantastic tool. And again, I'm giving it to you for nothing. Now, let give you one more tool in this episode. Here's kind of a bonus one for you. I call this a 15 minute weekly presence audit. And this kind of goes along with

that weekly planner. But at the end of each week, and you can do this right in that school leaders weekly planner where you have that opportunity for weekly reflection, at the end of each week, I want you to take 15 minutes and ask yourself some questions. First, where did I feel rushed this week? Where did I feel like I was really fully present this week?

what created the difference between the two. And what needs to change on my calendar for next week so I can be more present more often. You see, here's the thing. Presence is not an all or nothing thing. It's not an on-off switch. And it's not even a Likert scale, a one to five. It's a constantly sliding moving pendulum.

And we want that pendulum to be much more in the direction of fully present than completely checked out. So I want you to work on some of these pieces, these three tips that I gave you, the weekly presence audit, and of course that school leaders weekly planner, so that you can keep yourself more frequently in that fully present side of that pendulum swing.

Sometimes the reality is you have got to get up on the balcony and that's where that reflection, that's where all of these pieces I've just given you are so critical. Sometimes you got to get up on the balcony before you can get back in the game. You got to take that time to regain your perspective. You got to take that time to pause and intentionally

reflect on where you are before you can start to fully change the patterns. don't change overnight. So give yourself that latitude, get yourself up on the balcony. That's gonna give you the opportunity to build the margin into your leadership that you really need. Again, margin is intentional. Your presence, it's gotta be engineered and you do that through building that margin.

Ultimately, as you continue to do that, that is where you continue to grow more and more trust around and with the people that you lead. Now, episode 264, that will be our next episode and that's gonna be part three, the third part of this three-part series where we're gonna talk about interpersonal work that helps make your presence genuine. So far, we've focused on

why it happens, how we can keep it from happening. But now we want to talk about how do we make presence genuine, real, and authentic. I'm super excited for that episode. Before we go there, let me give you a reflection question for this week.

What on your calendar right now is stealing margin from the moments that matter most?

Find one thing, change one thing, break the chaos, build the margin and protect the moments that matter the most. That's what leadership is. Hey, thank you so much folks for joining me here on episode 263 of the Leaning Into Leadership podcast. As always, I appreciate each and every one of you. If this episode resonated with you, please share it with somebody else who might benefit from it. Don't forget to rate.

review and subscribe because that's how we drive the algorithm to get the Leaning Into Leadership podcast into as many ears and in front of as many viewers on YouTube as possible. Until next time, get out there, have a road to awesome week.