Thinking clearly is vital. You know this. When you think clearly, you’re more focused, have a better understanding of your goals and of what it takes to achieve those goals, and can more effectively communicate with those you work with.
 
Lately, you’ve been feeling muddled, feeling less certain of your goals, and your direct reports have commented that they aren’t clear enough on what you want them to do. You find yourself wanting to think more clearly. Good.
 
Question: What helps you think clearly?
 
Answer: What helps me think clearly is taking time to think, writing, and having someone ask me open-ended questions: What’s your goal? What’s happening? What can you do? What will you do?
 
Take steps to think more clearly. Today.

You want improve in planning. You know this is going to feel like climbing a steep set of steps, so you decide to take it 1 step at a time.
 
Question: How can you climb the next step?
 
To find out:

• Read about the 5 developmental steps (below).
• Then, use some reflection questions to identify what you will do to climb the next step.

 
Here are the 5 steps:
 
Step 1: You work.
You’re a missionary, you’re out of language school, and you’ve just started doing full-time ministry. You’re sitting in a room, getting introduced to other missionaries. Each person introduces him/herself by name and job title. Your turn comes, and you say, “Roger, evangelist.”
 
A few weeks later, you’re out walking in your neighborhood. You’re feeling a little fuzzy about your ministry. And you find yourself thinking, “What’s my plan?” A few days later, you take time to pray and to write out your plan. It describes the activities you want to do, for example, teaching English Bible classes, making and distributing tracts, and talking with those in your neighborhood. You look at your plan and feel better.
 
 
Step 2: You work, and you have a documented plan.
You look at your plan every once in awhile. But you notice that having a plan hasn’t helped you as much you thought it would. You think maybe that’s because your plan isn’t as good as it should be. You wonder, “How good is my plan?”
 
You take a look at your plan, pray, and decide to revise it. Instead of just listing your activities, you decide to:

• List your overarching ministry purpose, the 4-6 goals you need to accomplish in order to achieve your overarching ministry purpose, and the key activities you need to do for each of your goals.
• Make everything SMART: Specific • Measurable • Attainable • Relevant • Timebound.
• Keep your plan to 1 page.

 
Step 3: You work, and you have good documented plan.
You continue to look at your plan every once in awhile. And you notice that upgrading your plan hasn’t helped you as much you thought it would. You find yourself asking, “How can I really use my plan?”
 
A couple of days later, you read an article about paying attention to your goals. The article suggests that you review your goals on a daily, weekly, quarterly, and annual basis. You pray about it and decide to do this. And you decide to measure your progress on your goals and to reflect each month by talking with a fellow missionary about ministry progress. You know that reviewing your goals, measuring your progress, and reflecting will take time, but you think it’ll be worth it.
 
 
Step 4: You intentionally use your plan to guide your work.
As a result of reviewing your goals, measuring your progress, and reflecting, you find that you’re using your plan a lot more to guide your work. And you find that you’re more clear about what you want to accomplish. So, you improve your plan by putting in better activities, revising your goals, and by tightening the alignment between your overarching ministry purpose, goals, and activities. You share your “improved” plan with colleagues, invite feedback, and use feedback to further improve your plan.

In addition, you increasingly recognize that you have limited time, energy, and abilities. You find yourself wondering, “How can I manage myself better? How can I get more focused, work smarter, and pursue excellence?”
 
You pray, watch a video, read an article, take a self-assessment, and explore getting a coach. As a result, you decide to get a coach. Your coach empowers you to:

• Identify what helps you focus.
• Target your strengths and reduce your frustrations.
• Determine the amount of time you will invest in each goal.
• Identify 3 articles you will read about best practices in evangelism.

 
Step 5: You think success is being a person who is focused, works smart, and pursues excellence.
As a result of working with your coach and using your plan to guide your work, you find that you’re more focused, working smarter, and intentionally pursuing excellence.
 
And you’ve shifted your thinking about success. Instead of thinking that success is having a plan or even achieving a plan, you now think success is being a person who is focused, works smart, and pursues excellence—as evidenced by the achievement of your plan.
 
You’re wondering, “How can I empower others to strategically pursue God’s calling?” You pray, and you watch a video and take a self-assessment on leading by asking questions. And you decide to apply your learning to empower others to reflect, get clear, focus, prioritize, and pay attention to their goals.
 
 
Now, ask yourself the following 5 questions:

1. Which “step” best describes me? (Be brutally honest. When doubt, choose the earlier stage.)
2. How do I feel about being on this “step”?
3. In terms of climbing the next step, what helps/hinders me?
4. To climb the next step, what do I need to keep doing? start doing? stop doing?
5. What will I do to climb the next step?

Improve your planning. Start climbing the next step. Today.

You’re planning a workshop for an organization. You’re talking to the contact person about the objectives, and the contact person keeps talking about skipping the application so there’s more time to cover more content. I’ll be you’re frustrated.

I’ll bet you’re frustrated and that you feel like a basketball coach who’s been given the following choice: during the season you can have your players either practice or play, but not both.

I’ll bet you don’t like the choices.

Why? Because you want practicing and playing. You want to do training that involves understanding and applying. You want “and” learning, not “or” learning. So, you choose:

• Rehearsing and performing.
  
• Attitude and behavior
  
• Using head/heart and hands.

Use “and” learning, not “or” learning. Work smart. Today.

You’re in the staff lounge, and the basketball coach walks in.

You: How’d the game go last night?
Coach: Pretty well.

You: What was the score?
Coach: The players dribbled, rebounded, passed the ball, and took shots.

You: Did you achieve your game objectives?
Coach: The kids played.

You: How will you prepare for next game?
Coach: We’ll keep practicing.

How are you feeling about the conversation? Personally, I’m frustrated. I’m beginning to wonder how well the coach understands basketball.

Let’s try the conversation again:

You: How’d the game go last night?
Coach: Pretty well.

You: What was the score?
Coach: 65-64 in double-overtime. We lost.

You: Did you achieve your game objectives?
Coach: Yes. We out-rebounded our opponents and made 80% of our freethrows.

You: How will you prepare for next game?
Coach: We’ll work on work on reducing the number of shots in the key. Our opponents scored 24 points in the key.

Sounds better.

Question: When someone asks you about your work, what does your conversation sound like?

Real question: What will you do to clearly communicate results?

Work smart. Today.

Tom Postema, department chair coordinator at Christian Academy in Japan (CAJ), describes how curriculum mapping helps CAJ:

CAJ department chairs think curriculum mapping helps us increase our CLASS:

• Collaboration
  
• Learning
  
• Accountability
  
• Strategic planning
  
• Sustainability

To find out why, read on.

How does curriculum mapping help CAJ increase Collaboration?

• I am in more discussions about curriculum now and this has resulted in me collaboratively developing unit plans.
  
• I can get ideas for lessons from colleagues' maps.
  
• We can work together cross-grade level or cross-departments on specific units or projects.
  
• As a result of curriculum mapping, principals are increasingly talking with each other about curriculum and are increasingly working with teachers on unit plans.
  
• Curriculum mapping helps me see that curriculum development is a together thing.

How does curriculum mapping help CAJ increase Learning?

• It helps me plan instruction more effectively, and planned instruction increases student learning.
  
• We can modify our maps in response to assessment in order to promote student learning.
  
• It helps me increase alignment between the content and skills I teach and the content and skills I assess.
  
• It helps us use common vocabulary across divisions and departments to reinforce student learning.
  
• It helps us compare what we thought we were teaching and what we actually are teaching–and then we can go ahead and plug the holes.

How does curriculum mapping help CAJ increase Accountability?

• I'm glad that I can see colleagues' unit plans and they can see mine. "Going public" helps me be accountable for my unit plans and helps me support their work.
  
• The curriculum coordinator can see the overall picture, and this helps him provide the accountability departments need to work effectively.
  
• Curriculum mapping helps the administration hold itself accountable to reach its two goals of developing an exemplary curriculum and meeting curriculum related accreditation standards.

How does curriculum mapping help CAJ increase Strategic planning?

• We use mapping data to determine what the professional development topics for next year are going to be.
  
• We use mapping to implement our plan to get the curriculum done.
  
• We use mapping data to determine curriculum goals for next year, including having units with accurately mapped content and skills.

How does curriculum mapping help CAJ increase Sustainability?

• A new teacher can come in and quickly know what their curriculum is.
  
• You can find it; you can adapt it; you can use it.
  
• You can determine what resources you have and what resources you need to sustain a program.

Kim Essenburg, Christian Reformed missionary and English 10 teacher at Christian Academy in Japan, reflects on leadership: Their 4 answers? Foot. Brain. Nose. Heart. Read More...

Working smart means mapping curriculum. And the good news is that mapping curriculum can help you increase CLASS:

• Collaboration
  
• Learning
  
• Accountability
  
• Strategic Planning
  
• Sustainability

Here’s how:

• Collaboration: Mapping facilitates collaborative dialogue about what is being taught and assessed.
  
• Learning: Mapping requires planning for student learning. Planning for student learning results in increased student learning.
  
• Accountability: Through mapping, a school demonstrates accountability to best practice.
  
• Strategic planning: Mapping data can be used to develop and support strategic plans.
  
• Sustainability: A new teacher can be given the mapped curriculum.

Work smart. Map curriculum. Increase CLASS.

Everyone wants success. The questions is, “What is success?” Defining success will help you work smart. Consider the following possibilities, develop your definition of success, and share your definition with colleagues.

Success is...

1. Joining God is what He’s doing, not starting down your own path.
   
2. Achieving your mission, not implementing a Christian philosophy of education.
   
3. Using diversity to achieve one mission, not using unity to achieve diverse missions.
   
4. Building community in order to achieve the mission, not achieving your mission in order to build community.
   
5. Caring for others as you do mission, not doing mission as you care for others.
   
6. The Parable of the Talents, not the Parable of the Good Samaritan.
   
7. Getting targeted results, not getting results.
   
8. Reaching a pre-determined destination, not reaching a destination.
   
9. Getting it done, not getting it perfect.
   
10. Batting 300, not getting a 98%.
    
11. Distinction, not perfection.
    
12. Displacement, not distance.
    
13. Direction, not motion.
    
14. Hitting the bulls-eye, not going the distance.
    
15. Doing right things, not doing things right.
    
16. A program that is exemplary, sustainable, and replicable; not a program that is exemplary.
    
17. Quality outputs based on quality inputs, not quality outputs or quality inputs.
    
18. Increased student learning, not increased teacher learning.
    
19. A Christian who teaches Christianly, not a Christian who teaches.
    
20. Learning, not being learned.
    
21. Getting experience, not getting knowledge.
    
22. Doing, not knowing.
    
23. Using learning, not getting learning.
    
24. Professional development that targets mission achievement, not professional development that targets teacher knowledge.
    
25. Adding 1 best practice per year, not adding 5 best practices per year.
    
26. Asking questions, not dispensing answers.
    
27. Working smarter, not working harder.
    
28. Increasing “face” time, not increasing email.
    
29. Using data, not collecting data.
    
30. Maximizing strengths, not remediating weaknesses.
    
31. Reaching potential, not achieving at a high level.
    
32. Adding value to student learning, not students achieving to a high degree.
    
33. Getting things right through repeated failure, not getting things right the first time.
    
34. ReadyFireAim, not ReadyAimFire.
    
35. Using documents, not having documents.
    
36. Productivity, not effort.
    
37. Effort, not productivity.
    
38. Talking about student learning, not talking about schedule changes.
    
39. Looking at student work, not looking at teacher work.
    
40. Students learning, not teachers teaching.
    
41. Students learning, not students behaving.
    
42. Students behaving, not students getting good grades.
    
43. Students on task, not students wanting to learn.
    
44. Students achieving, not students trying.
    
45. Students trying, not students achieving.

Work smart. Define success.