The Micropolitics of Effective School-Based Leadership: Teachers' Perspectives

Abstract

Although the micropolitics of educational settings has received significant attention in recent years, few empirical studies of this important phenomenon have been published. The data discussed in this article were drawn from a larger qualitative study that examined the perspectives of 1,200 teachers on the everyday strategies school principals use to influence them. This article focuses on the responses of the 836 teachers who specifically reported strategies used by principals whom they described as open and effective. The goals and impacts of strategies employed by open and effective principals are only briefly discussed. The data strongly suggest that open and effective principals rely primarily on normative strategies and pursue normative goals. The concept of normative-instrumental leadership, derived from the data, delineates open and effective principals' everyday political orientation vis-à-vis teachers. This concept is examined in the context of compliance theory and the notion of transformational leadership.