William A. Sommers of Austin, Texas continues to be a learner, former teacher and principal, author, leadership coach and consultant. Bill has come out of retirement multiple times to put theory into practice as apprenticeable. 

Bill has been a consultant for leadership coaching, cognitive coaching, adaptive schools, leveraging polarities, brain research, poverty, habits of mind, conflict management and classroom management strategies. He was also on the Board of Trustees of the National Staff Development Council, now known as Learning Forward, for five years and was president for one year. In addition to serving graduate faculties in several universities, Dr. Sommers has been a program director for an adolescent chemical dependency treatment center and on the advisory board of a halfway house for 20 years. 

Bill has authored and co-authored over 10 books, his latest are “Creating Talent Density: Accelerating Adult Learning”, “Responding to Resistance: Thirty Strategies to Manage Conflict in Your School”, “Nine Professional Conversations to Change Our Schools: A Dashboard of Options”. 

Bill and his colleague, Skip Olson, launched the website www.LearningOmnivores.com which includes educational posts, new rules, and book reviews. Bill is a practitioner who integrates theory into helping leaders get better. Dr. Sommers continues to coach school and business leaders using The Stakeholder-centered Coaching developed by Marshall Goldsmith. 

 

In this episode Dr. Gaye Lang and William A. Sommers discuss:

• Using the platinum rule to build equity
• Leading by example 
• Supporting the underdogs 
• When the “best practice” doesn’t work

 

Key Takeaways: 

• Each person has different needs. Treat them not as how you want to be treated but as how they want to be treated. Think about what they would need to be the best leader that they need. 
• The leader must first practice and embody equity, checking each policy and organizational action to see if any are against their desire to be equitable. Then the staff must be held accountable in the same way.
• Recognize and appreciate the underdogs, reward the people that were able to beat the odds. Think about what can be done to make sure that the underdogs get what they need in order to succeed. In the same way, be mindful of which voices are yet unheard, bring them in the conversation. 
• The “best practice” doesn’t work for everybody so a teacher has to make time and make an effort to understand what will help each student learn. Don’t leave anybody behind.  

 

“Model what you believe. Communicate through words, deeds, actions. Build relationships. Creativity: don’t tell anybody there’s only one way to do something. Have emotional agility. ” - William A. Sommers

 

Connect with William A. Sommers:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/BillSommers8 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-sommers-a971b3169/ 

Website: https://learningomnivores.com 

 

Connect with Dr. Gaye Lang:

Don’t forget to subscribe to the show, so that you don’t miss a single episode; and please leave a rating and review. I would greatly appreciate it. 

Follow our show on Facebook and check out our Website for more details and to engage with our podcast community. You can also follow Dr. Lang on LinkedIn.

Download Three Vital Practices to avoid a potential lawsuit for free by clicking this link: www.WorkplaceRestorativePracticesInc.com  

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gaye-lang-1735761b5/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gaye.lang.779/

 

KEY WORDS: 

Diversity, inclusion, equity, tolerance, racism, bias, implicit bias, and explicit bias.  

Show notes by Podcastologist: Justine Talla

 

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