Three Outputs of Truly Great Teachers

GREAT.

No living person has thought more about the word “great” than Jim Collins has in his long and focused career. If you're a teacher in search of surprising insights into both your career and your life, you could do a lot worse than picking up Collins' Good to Great (hardcover; Kindle; audio). It's not about teaching or schools at all; and it's totally about teaching and schools.

So according to Collins, three outcomes make an organization great, and I think these apply to us teachers, too:

• Superior results
• Distinctive impact
• Lasting endurance

Let's look at each briefly.

Superior results for a sports team? Championships. Superior results for a business? Profits. Superior results for a school? In the long-term, flourishing students. In the short-term, student growth toward mastery of subjects.

For me as an individual teacher, superior results look like efficiently and intelligently producing as much growth in my students as I can, given my constraints. My English and social studies classes are all about helping students become better thinkers, readers, writers, speakers, and people (see Ch. 1 of These 6 Things for more on this Everest statement). The more “better” they each get, the more superior my results are.

Distinctive impact means that, were we to vanish tomorrow, there'd be a “gaping hole” that could not be easily filled by any other teacher. If we went away, would we be missed — and why?

This is one of those soul-searching lines of questioning, isn't it? We want it to lead us not into pride or ego-seeking, but instead into becoming more who we are. In my school building, we've got all sorts of amazing individuals teaching — Ms. Tata in choir, Ms. Swift in art, Mr. Modisher in math, Mr. H in TV productions, and on and on. What makes these teachers great in my mind, in terms of the distinctive impact they make each day, is that they are them. If they were to leave tomorrow and I had to take over their classes, maybe I'd eventually learn to produce the superior results they produce. BUT I'd never be able to do it in the distinct way they do it.

Because, I'm not them.

Last, let's look at lasting endurance. That this makes the list of three things is one of the reasons I admire Jim Collins' wisdom. Ours is a now-now–NOW culture; we want overnight successes and wild trajectories. But you can't be great, according to Collins, if you're a flash in the pan. You're not great for winning some teaching award or writing some bestselling book.

No — you're great when you stand the test of time.

Time, inevitably, brings setbacks. It brings easy years and hard years; seasons of white-hot passion and seasons of ennui. Producing superior results and having distinctive impact in the ebb and flow of years and decades…that's what makes an educator truly great.

So if you've never read Collins, read him. He's good people.

And if you're wondering if you're great, you're probably well on your way. Keep coming back. Time takes time.

Best,

DSJR