Coordinator project
Abstract
This paper examines the organisation of a small language school, in particular with regard to a newly established post of coordinator. Interviews were conducted with principle stakeholders with different perspectives – the school director, an experienced coordinator and a teacher working with the new coordinator on the subject of coordination in the school. These interviews were then analysed in order to develop the new coordinator role. A consideration of important points of the role of the academic manager is then related to the school. These points are then tied together to produce a job description for the new post. Appraisal of the new post, and of the whole school is then looked at, followed by a discussion of how to manage the changes suggested. The paper concludes by looking at the benefits for the organisation of the new post.
Full text:
EMT ASSIGNMENT
Expectations, desires and reality: the use of staff interviews to develop a new coordinator role in a private language school
MSc/Diploma in TESOL, English Studies, Aston University
JANUARY 2006
Introduction
This paper examines the organisation of a small language school, in particular with regard to a newly established post of coordinator. Interviews were conducted with principle stakeholders with different perspectives – the school director, an experienced coordinator and a teacher working with the new coordinator on the subject of coordination in the school. These interviews were then analysed in order to develop the new coordinator role. A consideration of important points of the role of the academic manager is then related to the school. These points are then tied together to produce a job description for the new post. Appraisal of the new post, and of the whole school is then looked at, followed by a discussion of how to manage the changes suggested. The paper concludes by looking at the benefits for the organisation of the new post.
Background
The school was founded in 1992, in the north of Italy, specialising in young learners. When the school was founded there was only one full time teacher (the owner) and two part time. The school has gradually grown over the years, and now has a staff of fourteen, consisting of nine full time teachers, two teachers/secretaries, two part time/occasional teachers and one secretary/cleaner. The school offers three main types of courses:
The school has grown to be the market leader in its town for young learners, but the growth of the school has lead to several organisational challenges, one of which will be discussed here. As the director felt that it was no longer possible for him to do everything he formed an advisory committee to help with strategic planning, resembling Mintzberg’s (1993) strategic apex, and appointed coordinators to look after quality management of various age groups of students. Many of the school’s students have grown up attending the school, so after the thirteen years that the school has been running, children who started at the age of five are now eighteen. This has caused an expansion of the number of courses over the years as this first intake has progressed through the school with now approximately the same number of courses at each age group. This has meant that the high school courses, leading to the PET and FCE exams, have recently expanded, so a new coordinator was needed to help organise these courses. This new post has recently been appointed, but has no job description, or definition. This has lead to the organisation represented by the chart in appendix 1. This chart was created by the author, and refined throughout the course of this project as his understanding of the organisation developed. No organigram existed previously for the organisation, which is representative of a lack of consideration of the global structure of the organisation, even from senior management, who instead concentrate on the day to day running of the business and the individual aspects inside the organisation as opposed to the whole. This is often found in small businesses, as exemplified by Evans (2005).
Interviews
The aim of this paper is to use interviews of various stakeholders to help develop a deeper understanding of the organisation, to be able to develop the role of the new coordinator. Three interviewees were chosen as being main stakeholders:
Semi-structured interviews (Burman, 1994:50) were chosen as the research method, so as to allow the interviewees to express themselves freely on the issues raised in the interview, but also to give enough structure for the data to be useful and comparable.
All the interviewees were asked if they were prepared to take part in the research, and informed that the interview would be recorded but that if they were not happy with anything that the recording could be stopped and erased and that they should feel free to stop the interview at any point. They were also offered the possibility to read the finished paper, if they wished.
Three lists of questions were written to serve as a guide for the interviewer (Appendices 2-4), with similar questions to allow comparison, but not identical, to understand the different perspectives of the participants.
The director
The interview with the director (D) was in two stages -firstly to gain a greater understanding of the organisation, including its history, and secondly to examine the organisation in the light of the new coordinator role. The first point to note about this interview is that the director seemed to enjoy talking about the history of the school, talking for 10 minutes on the subject in a 30 minute interview with an average length of turn of 3 minutes 30 seconds when talking about the history of the school. This shows the danger of going off subject, not leaving enough time for other points more important for this research as the history was intended to be background information. Only 5 minutes was spent talking directly about coordinators. This is a point which was taken into consideration for the subsequent interviews, to focus primarily on the core area.
The established coordinator
C has worked for the school since it was set up and has been a coordinator since the role was established. She reported feeling nervous about the interview and asked to see the questions beforehand to help her answer, which was done.
The teacher working with the new coordinator
During the preparation of the interview, but before the interview took place this teacher announced her leaving the school, to return to the UK. Thus this interview also has some characteristics of an exit interview, where the interviewee may feel more free to talk about problems in the organisation.
Analysis
In order to analysis these interviews, summaries were made of the interviews to isolate key points, which were highlighted, and then key points form the recordings were transcribed (see appendices 5-7). These transcriptions were compared to find points of agreement and disagreement. These points are then used to help define the role of the new coordinator.
Comparative analysis of the interviews
Quality of teaching
For D and C the quality of the teaching is one of the key factors in the success of the school. Here referring to the history of the school:
D: “…the school grew because we were offering quality language teaching to children…”
C: “I think it’s been successful, down to, hopefully the high standard of teaching.”
And here to the present needs:
D: “The quality has to be there, because this school is based on quality teaching.”
It is interesting to note that this is not mentioned by T. Both D an C understand the historical importance of quality teaching. T on the other hand comes from the point of view of someone doing their day to day job, without thinking of the competitive edge, to produce a delighted customer. This emphasis on quality could be transmitted from senior management to teachers by the coordinators, making the coordinators responsible for quality.
This idea is reflected by C when talking about new teachers:
“As I see my role it’s to help new teachers with material, with ideas, to give back-up, for teacher training”
Although at the moment, this seems to be more for preventing bad work, rather than producing high quality. This is seen in C’s comment:
“The idea at the moment is that we’re there for helping teachers with specific age group related problems for teaching.”
Here talking about resolving problems. Transforming this acceptable quality into high quality in the school has come about in the past because of the people, as D comments: “We’ve been lucky enough to get the right people.”
Which T agrees with:
“…[D]’s quite lucky to have some of the people he’s got working there who care about things as much as they do…”
This “luck” combined with a lack of serious competition, as expressed by C:
“There’s not very much competition for kids,”
combine to make the school the market leader for young learners in the town. In an increasingly competitive market, however, there is a need to ensure that the quality is guaranteed. This will be increasingly difficult as the school grows, as D observes:
“The school is expanding…and now with fourteen teachers it’s not so easy to guarantee quality teaching and it’s, I don’t want this school to become too management orientated. I think it would lose it’s nice little family school atmosphere.”
This emphasis on quality could come from the coordinators. D’s warning about losing the family atmosphere leads us to the next point -care.
The school philosophy - care
Part of the reason for the school’s success is the caring philosophy, which combines with T’s previous point about the right people.
D concurs:
“I think one of our successes is that we really care about young children.”
This is reflected by C’s comment:
“The child comes first is D’s philosophy. I think that that’s true.”
T finds this in the atmosphere of the school:
“I like the fact that it’s the concentration on the family atmosphere.”
D sees it as an important part of coordinating (I = interviewer):
D: “There is a certain ethic I would like to give to co-ordinating.”
I: “What would you say that ethic is?”
D: “That ethic is to care...care and concern…I see that in coordinator’s jobs as well.”
Thus the coordinators should transmit the ‘care’ ethic to the teachers to maintain the family atmosphere in the school as it grows.
Delegation
As the school grows, there is more of a need for delegation. The introduction of coordinators is a reflection of this, as D says:
“It’s a problem of time. I don’t have time to help teachers plan their lessons.”
And
“While I am directly involved in the specialist teaching, the need for a coordinator isn’t really there.”
As D is now involved a lot less directly in the teaching, and doesn’t have the time to help teachers with planning, the role of coordinator is needed.
D recognises the importance of delegating, saying:
“Delegating is fundamental. I have done that. So as I say, although perhaps my character tends to be yes I’d like to control everything that goes on, because it’s my school, it’s my second family… But you must delegate.”
Although he recognises that he finds it hard. This is also seen by C, but in more negative terms:
“I think D finds it difficult to delegate.”
And
“D is trying to take on too much.”
This is a reflection of one of the biggest management problems in the school -D being too busy. This was noted by all three interviewees:
T: “The weak points. I think that the organisation is quite poor. I think that D should be more available.”
C: “Weak points…communication between D and teachers, there’s sometimes a breakdown in communication there because D is so busy.”
D: “I don’t have enough time, and that is a management problem. I think I should be following teachers more closely. The contact with most teachers is fine because we see each other almost every day. It might just be ‘hi, how are things?’ but we do see each other, the contact’s there, but not with all the teachers some teachers who don’t work here, there’s not much contact with them”
And D again:
“I want everyone in the school to do things my way. Probably not having enough time is also positive in the sense that I therefore delegate, I let people do their own thing. If I had more time perhaps I wouldn’t.”
Here D sees this lack of time as having positive aspects, although as C and T observe, this is a weak point. D makes the point that his lack of time makes him delegate, but it could be more positive to delegate more, for example delegating routine tasks, to give him more time. Coordinators could help by taking on some of the tasks currently carried out by D, related to their courses, for example dealing directly with the office with regards to exam enrolments, and course timetabling at the start of the year,
without going through D. This would require training and experience for the coordinators. This would also help with the communication problems noted by C and T above, by making D more available.
New teachers
Many comments were made by C and T on the subject of new teachers in the school:
C: “I think it would be a positive thing to be a bit more present, particularly with new teachers, to check they are planning their lessons properly, and to watch some of the lessons that they actually teach.”
C: “For new teachers I think probably a little more structure is needed, and that’s why we’ve recently come up with the idea of coordinators for different age groups. I think that for new teachers that they do need to know that there is a particular person that they can go to talk about specific problems for specific age groups.”
C: “I think the school can appear to new teachers and parents as being badly organised and unprofessional.”
C: “The season starts September October, everybody gets immediately busy, sorting out courses, getting courses off the ground, it’s a very busy period and that is probably the period when new teachers need the most help, and it happens to coincide with the busiest time for D and all the coordinators.”
C: “I see it [coordinating] very much as helping out new teachers, teacher training.”
All of T’s comments are about her experiences when she first started at the school:
T: “I probably needed, before I started teaching here, for example, more indications for how to
behave.”
T: “I think that somebody when they first come in, so that they appear more professional …I think that they should be given more advice on things like these.” (on discipline) T: “I did feel a little bit lost last year.”
The comments from T show the need to help and guide new teachers, particularly if they have no experience with young learners. C’s remark about the reason for coordinators shows that this is the intention, although it is not yet working in practice. One reason for this could be C’s comment about the coordinators being too busy at the start of the year.
Coordinators
C tells us that her role as a coordinator is still undefined, but she has ideas:
“The role of coordinator, we are still trying to sort that one out because it is new for us. As I see my role it’s to help new teachers with material, with ideas, to give back-up, for teacher training, to give moral support as well. Yes, that will help easy the pressure off D.”
Here she also notes the beneficial effect that coordinating should have on D, which should then filter down to the other staff, and also leave D more time to concentrate on strategic management. C highlights the main challenge in coordinating – time:
“Finding time … It doesn’t always fit in with other people’s timetables.”
T also has some ideas for coordination:
T: “I think there should be some kind of standardisation between courses.”
T: “I think that guidelines need to be created for the secondary school courses”
T: “Maybe some kind of sharing of materials and sharing of ideas.”
T’s ideas are a little different from C’s, in that C is reactionary – providing help when needed, whereas
T’s ideas are more proactive, requiring extra work from the coordinators which may be difficult to
motivate given the time constraints mentioned by C. If these measures were taken, however, it could be
easier for new teachers to be trained and feel less “lost” than T was.
Summery of analysis
Defining the role
Pugsley (1992) gives us an interesting definition of the role of the ‘academic manager’, which fits in with many of the points made in the interviews. She summarises the role as:
One measure already in place is the coordination of mock exams to ensure that all teachers are conducting the same mock exam at the same time. This allows for comparison between courses to identify needs for particular groups, in particular exam areas, but it can also be extended to identify training needs for teachers, if there are consistent weaknesses in certain areas, which can be addressed in teacher training sessions, specific to the exam.
Pugsley’s second point is being followed, in that course books have been selected for all of the courses, rather than leaving planning and material choice totally to teachers. There is a danger that this standardisation will discourage teacher creativity, so careful selection of material, following Sheldon’s
(1989) checklist for course book selection, along with teacher training to ensure that teachers are equipped to follow the basic material, but to select other material when necessary. This fits in with Pugsley’s third point. Along with training, observation is another underused tool for teacher development.
D mentions that he would like to observe teachers, but does not have time. This could be performed by the coordinators, to supervise teachers, although this often has negative effects, as Sheal (1989) notes. He suggests that teachers themselves take part in observation. This would then help to reduce the judgemental aspect of observation, and become a powerful tool for staff development. This is, however, time consuming and either staff are paid, which becomes prohibitively expensive, or staff use their free time. In a school where the staff ‘care’ this could be possible, but would have to be administered with tact, perhaps asking teachers to volunteer, and to observe one other teacher and the same teacher observe him/her, to reduce the stress of being observed by D, or the coordinator. This programme could be administered by the coordinator.
Standardisation becomes more important as the school grows, to ensure quality. In this sense coordinators become a sort of “technostructure” (Mintzberg, 1993:15). Coordinators do the following to certain aspects of the work of teachers: “design it, plan it, change it [and] train people”, although in a small organisation the coordinators are also teachers, so they are not removed from their own decisions. These aspects include material choice, curriculum design, monitoring staff to ensure quality and teacher training.
Reasor (1986) warns of the danger of the administrator becoming separated from staff, focusing on rules and procedures. This is an important consideration in a school where the family atmosphere is important, but possibly under threat as the school grows. The coordinators must avoid becoming administrators, continuing to provide help and support to the teachers.
Job Description
These points can now be combined to help write a job description. Gan and Kleiner (2005) tell us:
“The key to writing an effective job description is to first identify the essential functions of the position.”
An anonymous author (2003) adds that the requirements in the description should actually say what the post holder will do, which may seem obvious, but is very often lacking. Gan and Kleiner also talk about the importance of identifying the necessary skills for the job.
Distilling all of the points from the interviews and literature into a few short phrases produces the following job description:
Coordinate PET and FCE courses to ensure quality teaching in the following way:
Skills required:
The fifth point about staff development could include setting up an observation programme. The sixth point builds in flexibility to the post, in line with Gan and Kleiner (2005:52). This could arise if, for example, an inexperienced teacher finds, ten minutes before the lesson that there are no CD players available when she has a listening lesson planned and needs help to re-plan last minute.
Appraisal
As well as helping define the new post, job descriptions are a valuable tool for appraisal. This is particularly important for a new post, to judge whether or not the post itself has been and will continue to be valuable for the organisation and also evaluate the performance of the post holder. In many small businesses formal appraisal is not seen as necessary as the owner-manager knows the staff well. This is seen even more with middle management, as the owner-manager works very closely with the middle
manager (Kotey and Sheridan, 2004:481). Formalising the process a little more would bring the benefit of a concrete comparison between the purpose of the job and the day to day practice. The job description could be used for this in an interview with the director on a yearly basis, combined with a 360° appraisal method getting the opinions of the teachers working with the coordinator. In reality, given that all the coordinators work closely with the director, and the director’s main problem is one of time, appraisal of coordinators is likely to become a series of informal conversations with the director, and an informal “is there anything that we can organise better?” to the teachers from time to time. These can, however, be very valuable in the organic development of the post, if the points made in these conversations are applied. A formal appraisal system does not exist in the school. This could in the future be set up and ran by the coordinators, possibly in conjunction with teacher observation. Given the caring/family culture of the school this could be seen as positive by staff, but tact would need to be used in order not to upset experienced teachers, and to distract from the staff development aspects of any observation programme.
Management of change
The introduction of the new post is a positive way to manage the growth of the organisation, however the introduction of any new post and changes to that post need to be managed carefully in order to avoid problems. Benton (2001) warns of the dangers of poorly managed change – confusion, dissatisfaction, and low morale. The new post must be developed in a way to avoid theses problems both for the post holder and for teachers working with the coordinator. Benton suggests a strategy called CARE:
This fits with the school family culture and can be used throughout the organisation, from D to the coordinators and from the coordinators to the teachers, to facilitate change, including the introduction of the points made in this paper. The writing of this paper is part of the process of training for the new coordinator and the process of researching and writing has helped to create a greater understanding of the organisation. For this to be of benefit to the organisation as a whole, this paper will be discussed with D and C, to consider these ideas.
One of the most important areas of coordinating is training. In the past much of the training was carried out by the director, but this is now being transferred to the coordinators. This is in line with the study of Kotey and Sheridan (2004:480) where it has been observed that as a business grows the training functions are passed from “the owner-manager to middle management.”
Benefits for the organisation
There are many potential benefits to the organisation if these points are adopted. Quality teaching can be encouraged, which will help to delight customers, and thus encourage them to return. Staff will be able to speak to the coordinator about small problems, instead of the director, which will have the double benefit of an answer being given as the coordinator is more available than the director, and giving the director more time to deal with more important problems and to focus more on strategic
management. The biggest problem still remains, though – time, with the new coordinator teaching full-time and studying for this MSc this will always be a limiting factor in what can be done. One possible solution could be to give a reduced teaching schedule to coordinators, but the costs and benefits of this would need to be considered carefully by the director in the future. Other aspect for future research in the organisation could include the development of appraisal and observation programmes.
The title of this paper is “Expectations, desires and reality: the use of staff interviews to develop a new coordinator role in a private language school.” We have seen through the interviews the expectations of the director and the desires of the teacher for the new post, and the reality of the established coordinator. Time will tell as to which of these expectations and desires will become reality for the new post.
Word count: 4438
References
Author unknown. 2003. Why job descriptions are so necessary for your payroll staff. IOMA's Payroll Manager's Report 3/4:5-8
Benton, S. 2001. A four-point plan for creating a healthy workplace climate. Canadian HR Reporter 14/7:G9
Burman, E. 1994. Interviewing. In Banister, P., Burman, E., Parker, I., Taylor, M., and Tindal, C., Qualitative Methods in Psychology: A Research Guide. Buckingham: Open University Press
Evans, C. 2005. Small Businesses -an opportunity for Administrative Managers. The British Journal of Administrative Management December 2005/January 2006:14-15
Gan, M. and Kleiner, B.H. 2005. How to Write Job Descriptions Effectively. Management Research News 28/8:48-54
Kotey, B. and Sheridan, A. 2004. Changing HRM practices with firm growth. Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development 11/4:474-485
Mintzburg, H. 1993. Structure in Fives – Designing Effective Organisations. New Jersey: Prentice Hall
Pugsley, J. 1992. The rise and call of academic management. ELT Journal 45/4:313-319
Reasor, A. W. 1986. ‘Dominant administrative styles of ESL administrators’. TESOL Quarterly 20/2: 338-43.
Sheal, P. 1989. Training classroom observers. ELT Journal 43/2:92-104
Sheldon, L.E. 1989. Evaluating ELT textbooks and materials. ELT Journal 42/4:237-246
Please see PDF for appendices
Abstract
This paper examines the organisation of a small language school, in particular with regard to a newly established post of coordinator. Interviews were conducted with principle stakeholders with different perspectives – the school director, an experienced coordinator and a teacher working with the new coordinator on the subject of coordination in the school. These interviews were then analysed in order to develop the new coordinator role. A consideration of important points of the role of the academic manager is then related to the school. These points are then tied together to produce a job description for the new post. Appraisal of the new post, and of the whole school is then looked at, followed by a discussion of how to manage the changes suggested. The paper concludes by looking at the benefits for the organisation of the new post.
Full text:
EMT ASSIGNMENT
Expectations, desires and reality: the use of staff interviews to develop a new coordinator role in a private language school
MSc/Diploma in TESOL, English Studies, Aston University
JANUARY 2006
Introduction
This paper examines the organisation of a small language school, in particular with regard to a newly established post of coordinator. Interviews were conducted with principle stakeholders with different perspectives – the school director, an experienced coordinator and a teacher working with the new coordinator on the subject of coordination in the school. These interviews were then analysed in order to develop the new coordinator role. A consideration of important points of the role of the academic manager is then related to the school. These points are then tied together to produce a job description for the new post. Appraisal of the new post, and of the whole school is then looked at, followed by a discussion of how to manage the changes suggested. The paper concludes by looking at the benefits for the organisation of the new post.
Background
The school was founded in 1992, in the north of Italy, specialising in young learners. When the school was founded there was only one full time teacher (the owner) and two part time. The school has gradually grown over the years, and now has a staff of fourteen, consisting of nine full time teachers, two teachers/secretaries, two part time/occasional teachers and one secretary/cleaner. The school offers three main types of courses:
- inside courses -inside the school with two to six students, leading to the Cambridge ESOL exams -Starters, up to CAE
- outside courses -in local mainstream schools, from nursery schools up to high schools, sending mother tongue teachers to work with local teachers providing spoken English lessons. These courses last from ten weeks, up to the whole school year of thirty weeks.
- individual courses for both young learners and adults.
The school has grown to be the market leader in its town for young learners, but the growth of the school has lead to several organisational challenges, one of which will be discussed here. As the director felt that it was no longer possible for him to do everything he formed an advisory committee to help with strategic planning, resembling Mintzberg’s (1993) strategic apex, and appointed coordinators to look after quality management of various age groups of students. Many of the school’s students have grown up attending the school, so after the thirteen years that the school has been running, children who started at the age of five are now eighteen. This has caused an expansion of the number of courses over the years as this first intake has progressed through the school with now approximately the same number of courses at each age group. This has meant that the high school courses, leading to the PET and FCE exams, have recently expanded, so a new coordinator was needed to help organise these courses. This new post has recently been appointed, but has no job description, or definition. This has lead to the organisation represented by the chart in appendix 1. This chart was created by the author, and refined throughout the course of this project as his understanding of the organisation developed. No organigram existed previously for the organisation, which is representative of a lack of consideration of the global structure of the organisation, even from senior management, who instead concentrate on the day to day running of the business and the individual aspects inside the organisation as opposed to the whole. This is often found in small businesses, as exemplified by Evans (2005).
Interviews
The aim of this paper is to use interviews of various stakeholders to help develop a deeper understanding of the organisation, to be able to develop the role of the new coordinator. Three interviewees were chosen as being main stakeholders:
- the director, as he appointed the post, and owns the organisation.
- an established coordinator, as she has worked for the school for many years, so understands the organisation well, and also understands the role of coordinator.
- a teacher working with the new coordinator, as the development of the role will directly affect her job.
Semi-structured interviews (Burman, 1994:50) were chosen as the research method, so as to allow the interviewees to express themselves freely on the issues raised in the interview, but also to give enough structure for the data to be useful and comparable.
All the interviewees were asked if they were prepared to take part in the research, and informed that the interview would be recorded but that if they were not happy with anything that the recording could be stopped and erased and that they should feel free to stop the interview at any point. They were also offered the possibility to read the finished paper, if they wished.
Three lists of questions were written to serve as a guide for the interviewer (Appendices 2-4), with similar questions to allow comparison, but not identical, to understand the different perspectives of the participants.
The director
The interview with the director (D) was in two stages -firstly to gain a greater understanding of the organisation, including its history, and secondly to examine the organisation in the light of the new coordinator role. The first point to note about this interview is that the director seemed to enjoy talking about the history of the school, talking for 10 minutes on the subject in a 30 minute interview with an average length of turn of 3 minutes 30 seconds when talking about the history of the school. This shows the danger of going off subject, not leaving enough time for other points more important for this research as the history was intended to be background information. Only 5 minutes was spent talking directly about coordinators. This is a point which was taken into consideration for the subsequent interviews, to focus primarily on the core area.
The established coordinator
C has worked for the school since it was set up and has been a coordinator since the role was established. She reported feeling nervous about the interview and asked to see the questions beforehand to help her answer, which was done.
The teacher working with the new coordinator
During the preparation of the interview, but before the interview took place this teacher announced her leaving the school, to return to the UK. Thus this interview also has some characteristics of an exit interview, where the interviewee may feel more free to talk about problems in the organisation.
Analysis
In order to analysis these interviews, summaries were made of the interviews to isolate key points, which were highlighted, and then key points form the recordings were transcribed (see appendices 5-7). These transcriptions were compared to find points of agreement and disagreement. These points are then used to help define the role of the new coordinator.
Comparative analysis of the interviews
Quality of teaching
For D and C the quality of the teaching is one of the key factors in the success of the school. Here referring to the history of the school:
D: “…the school grew because we were offering quality language teaching to children…”
C: “I think it’s been successful, down to, hopefully the high standard of teaching.”
And here to the present needs:
D: “The quality has to be there, because this school is based on quality teaching.”
It is interesting to note that this is not mentioned by T. Both D an C understand the historical importance of quality teaching. T on the other hand comes from the point of view of someone doing their day to day job, without thinking of the competitive edge, to produce a delighted customer. This emphasis on quality could be transmitted from senior management to teachers by the coordinators, making the coordinators responsible for quality.
This idea is reflected by C when talking about new teachers:
“As I see my role it’s to help new teachers with material, with ideas, to give back-up, for teacher training”
Although at the moment, this seems to be more for preventing bad work, rather than producing high quality. This is seen in C’s comment:
“The idea at the moment is that we’re there for helping teachers with specific age group related problems for teaching.”
Here talking about resolving problems. Transforming this acceptable quality into high quality in the school has come about in the past because of the people, as D comments: “We’ve been lucky enough to get the right people.”
Which T agrees with:
“…[D]’s quite lucky to have some of the people he’s got working there who care about things as much as they do…”
This “luck” combined with a lack of serious competition, as expressed by C:
“There’s not very much competition for kids,”
combine to make the school the market leader for young learners in the town. In an increasingly competitive market, however, there is a need to ensure that the quality is guaranteed. This will be increasingly difficult as the school grows, as D observes:
“The school is expanding…and now with fourteen teachers it’s not so easy to guarantee quality teaching and it’s, I don’t want this school to become too management orientated. I think it would lose it’s nice little family school atmosphere.”
This emphasis on quality could come from the coordinators. D’s warning about losing the family atmosphere leads us to the next point -care.
The school philosophy - care
Part of the reason for the school’s success is the caring philosophy, which combines with T’s previous point about the right people.
D concurs:
“I think one of our successes is that we really care about young children.”
This is reflected by C’s comment:
“The child comes first is D’s philosophy. I think that that’s true.”
T finds this in the atmosphere of the school:
“I like the fact that it’s the concentration on the family atmosphere.”
D sees it as an important part of coordinating (I = interviewer):
D: “There is a certain ethic I would like to give to co-ordinating.”
I: “What would you say that ethic is?”
D: “That ethic is to care...care and concern…I see that in coordinator’s jobs as well.”
Thus the coordinators should transmit the ‘care’ ethic to the teachers to maintain the family atmosphere in the school as it grows.
Delegation
As the school grows, there is more of a need for delegation. The introduction of coordinators is a reflection of this, as D says:
“It’s a problem of time. I don’t have time to help teachers plan their lessons.”
And
“While I am directly involved in the specialist teaching, the need for a coordinator isn’t really there.”
As D is now involved a lot less directly in the teaching, and doesn’t have the time to help teachers with planning, the role of coordinator is needed.
D recognises the importance of delegating, saying:
“Delegating is fundamental. I have done that. So as I say, although perhaps my character tends to be yes I’d like to control everything that goes on, because it’s my school, it’s my second family… But you must delegate.”
Although he recognises that he finds it hard. This is also seen by C, but in more negative terms:
“I think D finds it difficult to delegate.”
And
“D is trying to take on too much.”
This is a reflection of one of the biggest management problems in the school -D being too busy. This was noted by all three interviewees:
T: “The weak points. I think that the organisation is quite poor. I think that D should be more available.”
C: “Weak points…communication between D and teachers, there’s sometimes a breakdown in communication there because D is so busy.”
D: “I don’t have enough time, and that is a management problem. I think I should be following teachers more closely. The contact with most teachers is fine because we see each other almost every day. It might just be ‘hi, how are things?’ but we do see each other, the contact’s there, but not with all the teachers some teachers who don’t work here, there’s not much contact with them”
And D again:
“I want everyone in the school to do things my way. Probably not having enough time is also positive in the sense that I therefore delegate, I let people do their own thing. If I had more time perhaps I wouldn’t.”
Here D sees this lack of time as having positive aspects, although as C and T observe, this is a weak point. D makes the point that his lack of time makes him delegate, but it could be more positive to delegate more, for example delegating routine tasks, to give him more time. Coordinators could help by taking on some of the tasks currently carried out by D, related to their courses, for example dealing directly with the office with regards to exam enrolments, and course timetabling at the start of the year,
without going through D. This would require training and experience for the coordinators. This would also help with the communication problems noted by C and T above, by making D more available.
New teachers
Many comments were made by C and T on the subject of new teachers in the school:
C: “I think it would be a positive thing to be a bit more present, particularly with new teachers, to check they are planning their lessons properly, and to watch some of the lessons that they actually teach.”
C: “For new teachers I think probably a little more structure is needed, and that’s why we’ve recently come up with the idea of coordinators for different age groups. I think that for new teachers that they do need to know that there is a particular person that they can go to talk about specific problems for specific age groups.”
C: “I think the school can appear to new teachers and parents as being badly organised and unprofessional.”
C: “The season starts September October, everybody gets immediately busy, sorting out courses, getting courses off the ground, it’s a very busy period and that is probably the period when new teachers need the most help, and it happens to coincide with the busiest time for D and all the coordinators.”
C: “I see it [coordinating] very much as helping out new teachers, teacher training.”
All of T’s comments are about her experiences when she first started at the school:
T: “I probably needed, before I started teaching here, for example, more indications for how to
behave.”
T: “I think that somebody when they first come in, so that they appear more professional …I think that they should be given more advice on things like these.” (on discipline) T: “I did feel a little bit lost last year.”
The comments from T show the need to help and guide new teachers, particularly if they have no experience with young learners. C’s remark about the reason for coordinators shows that this is the intention, although it is not yet working in practice. One reason for this could be C’s comment about the coordinators being too busy at the start of the year.
Coordinators
C tells us that her role as a coordinator is still undefined, but she has ideas:
“The role of coordinator, we are still trying to sort that one out because it is new for us. As I see my role it’s to help new teachers with material, with ideas, to give back-up, for teacher training, to give moral support as well. Yes, that will help easy the pressure off D.”
Here she also notes the beneficial effect that coordinating should have on D, which should then filter down to the other staff, and also leave D more time to concentrate on strategic management. C highlights the main challenge in coordinating – time:
“Finding time … It doesn’t always fit in with other people’s timetables.”
T also has some ideas for coordination:
T: “I think there should be some kind of standardisation between courses.”
T: “I think that guidelines need to be created for the secondary school courses”
T: “Maybe some kind of sharing of materials and sharing of ideas.”
T’s ideas are a little different from C’s, in that C is reactionary – providing help when needed, whereas
T’s ideas are more proactive, requiring extra work from the coordinators which may be difficult to
motivate given the time constraints mentioned by C. If these measures were taken, however, it could be
easier for new teachers to be trained and feel less “lost” than T was.
Summery of analysis
- Quality is vital for the school. This needs to be transmitted by the coordinators.
- The culture of the school is caring, both for students and staff. This too needs to be transmitted by coordinators.
- One of the school’s week points is D’s lack of time. More delegation is needed to help.
- New teachers need help to fit in to the school culture and with practical teaching issues.
- Coordinators should provide training and support for teaching and discipline problems.
- One of the problems with coordinating is a lack of time, especially at the start of the year.
Defining the role
Pugsley (1992) gives us an interesting definition of the role of the ‘academic manager’, which fits in with many of the points made in the interviews. She summarises the role as:
- responsibility for the establishment and monitoring of sound teaching and learning programmes;
- the proper selection and use of materials and hardware;
- the in-service monitoring and development of staff.
One measure already in place is the coordination of mock exams to ensure that all teachers are conducting the same mock exam at the same time. This allows for comparison between courses to identify needs for particular groups, in particular exam areas, but it can also be extended to identify training needs for teachers, if there are consistent weaknesses in certain areas, which can be addressed in teacher training sessions, specific to the exam.
Pugsley’s second point is being followed, in that course books have been selected for all of the courses, rather than leaving planning and material choice totally to teachers. There is a danger that this standardisation will discourage teacher creativity, so careful selection of material, following Sheldon’s
(1989) checklist for course book selection, along with teacher training to ensure that teachers are equipped to follow the basic material, but to select other material when necessary. This fits in with Pugsley’s third point. Along with training, observation is another underused tool for teacher development.
D mentions that he would like to observe teachers, but does not have time. This could be performed by the coordinators, to supervise teachers, although this often has negative effects, as Sheal (1989) notes. He suggests that teachers themselves take part in observation. This would then help to reduce the judgemental aspect of observation, and become a powerful tool for staff development. This is, however, time consuming and either staff are paid, which becomes prohibitively expensive, or staff use their free time. In a school where the staff ‘care’ this could be possible, but would have to be administered with tact, perhaps asking teachers to volunteer, and to observe one other teacher and the same teacher observe him/her, to reduce the stress of being observed by D, or the coordinator. This programme could be administered by the coordinator.
Standardisation becomes more important as the school grows, to ensure quality. In this sense coordinators become a sort of “technostructure” (Mintzberg, 1993:15). Coordinators do the following to certain aspects of the work of teachers: “design it, plan it, change it [and] train people”, although in a small organisation the coordinators are also teachers, so they are not removed from their own decisions. These aspects include material choice, curriculum design, monitoring staff to ensure quality and teacher training.
Reasor (1986) warns of the danger of the administrator becoming separated from staff, focusing on rules and procedures. This is an important consideration in a school where the family atmosphere is important, but possibly under threat as the school grows. The coordinators must avoid becoming administrators, continuing to provide help and support to the teachers.
Job Description
These points can now be combined to help write a job description. Gan and Kleiner (2005) tell us:
“The key to writing an effective job description is to first identify the essential functions of the position.”
An anonymous author (2003) adds that the requirements in the description should actually say what the post holder will do, which may seem obvious, but is very often lacking. Gan and Kleiner also talk about the importance of identifying the necessary skills for the job.
Distilling all of the points from the interviews and literature into a few short phrases produces the following job description:
Coordinate PET and FCE courses to ensure quality teaching in the following way:
- Provide support for new teachers
- Conduct periodic teacher training sessions
- Select course material
- Coordinate mock exams
- Encourage and monitor staff development
- Deal with any other course/didactic problems
Skills required:
- Interpersonal – be able to help teachers who may be under stress
- Organisational – to coordinate courses, staff and training programmes
- Flexible – to deal with unforeseen problems
- Knowledge of the PET and FCE exams
The fifth point about staff development could include setting up an observation programme. The sixth point builds in flexibility to the post, in line with Gan and Kleiner (2005:52). This could arise if, for example, an inexperienced teacher finds, ten minutes before the lesson that there are no CD players available when she has a listening lesson planned and needs help to re-plan last minute.
Appraisal
As well as helping define the new post, job descriptions are a valuable tool for appraisal. This is particularly important for a new post, to judge whether or not the post itself has been and will continue to be valuable for the organisation and also evaluate the performance of the post holder. In many small businesses formal appraisal is not seen as necessary as the owner-manager knows the staff well. This is seen even more with middle management, as the owner-manager works very closely with the middle
manager (Kotey and Sheridan, 2004:481). Formalising the process a little more would bring the benefit of a concrete comparison between the purpose of the job and the day to day practice. The job description could be used for this in an interview with the director on a yearly basis, combined with a 360° appraisal method getting the opinions of the teachers working with the coordinator. In reality, given that all the coordinators work closely with the director, and the director’s main problem is one of time, appraisal of coordinators is likely to become a series of informal conversations with the director, and an informal “is there anything that we can organise better?” to the teachers from time to time. These can, however, be very valuable in the organic development of the post, if the points made in these conversations are applied. A formal appraisal system does not exist in the school. This could in the future be set up and ran by the coordinators, possibly in conjunction with teacher observation. Given the caring/family culture of the school this could be seen as positive by staff, but tact would need to be used in order not to upset experienced teachers, and to distract from the staff development aspects of any observation programme.
Management of change
The introduction of the new post is a positive way to manage the growth of the organisation, however the introduction of any new post and changes to that post need to be managed carefully in order to avoid problems. Benton (2001) warns of the dangers of poorly managed change – confusion, dissatisfaction, and low morale. The new post must be developed in a way to avoid theses problems both for the post holder and for teachers working with the coordinator. Benton suggests a strategy called CARE:
- Clear direction and support
- Adequate and appropriate training
- Recognition and reward
- Empathy
This fits with the school family culture and can be used throughout the organisation, from D to the coordinators and from the coordinators to the teachers, to facilitate change, including the introduction of the points made in this paper. The writing of this paper is part of the process of training for the new coordinator and the process of researching and writing has helped to create a greater understanding of the organisation. For this to be of benefit to the organisation as a whole, this paper will be discussed with D and C, to consider these ideas.
One of the most important areas of coordinating is training. In the past much of the training was carried out by the director, but this is now being transferred to the coordinators. This is in line with the study of Kotey and Sheridan (2004:480) where it has been observed that as a business grows the training functions are passed from “the owner-manager to middle management.”
Benefits for the organisation
There are many potential benefits to the organisation if these points are adopted. Quality teaching can be encouraged, which will help to delight customers, and thus encourage them to return. Staff will be able to speak to the coordinator about small problems, instead of the director, which will have the double benefit of an answer being given as the coordinator is more available than the director, and giving the director more time to deal with more important problems and to focus more on strategic
management. The biggest problem still remains, though – time, with the new coordinator teaching full-time and studying for this MSc this will always be a limiting factor in what can be done. One possible solution could be to give a reduced teaching schedule to coordinators, but the costs and benefits of this would need to be considered carefully by the director in the future. Other aspect for future research in the organisation could include the development of appraisal and observation programmes.
The title of this paper is “Expectations, desires and reality: the use of staff interviews to develop a new coordinator role in a private language school.” We have seen through the interviews the expectations of the director and the desires of the teacher for the new post, and the reality of the established coordinator. Time will tell as to which of these expectations and desires will become reality for the new post.
Word count: 4438
References
Author unknown. 2003. Why job descriptions are so necessary for your payroll staff. IOMA's Payroll Manager's Report 3/4:5-8
Benton, S. 2001. A four-point plan for creating a healthy workplace climate. Canadian HR Reporter 14/7:G9
Burman, E. 1994. Interviewing. In Banister, P., Burman, E., Parker, I., Taylor, M., and Tindal, C., Qualitative Methods in Psychology: A Research Guide. Buckingham: Open University Press
Evans, C. 2005. Small Businesses -an opportunity for Administrative Managers. The British Journal of Administrative Management December 2005/January 2006:14-15
Gan, M. and Kleiner, B.H. 2005. How to Write Job Descriptions Effectively. Management Research News 28/8:48-54
Kotey, B. and Sheridan, A. 2004. Changing HRM practices with firm growth. Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development 11/4:474-485
Mintzburg, H. 1993. Structure in Fives – Designing Effective Organisations. New Jersey: Prentice Hall
Pugsley, J. 1992. The rise and call of academic management. ELT Journal 45/4:313-319
Reasor, A. W. 1986. ‘Dominant administrative styles of ESL administrators’. TESOL Quarterly 20/2: 338-43.
Sheal, P. 1989. Training classroom observers. ELT Journal 43/2:92-104
Sheldon, L.E. 1989. Evaluating ELT textbooks and materials. ELT Journal 42/4:237-246
Please see PDF for appendices
| emt_project.pdf |
