SCHOOL LEADERSHIP means navigating the immense pressure of April hiring. While it's tempting to fill vacancies with certified bodies to avoid an August CLASSROOM CHALLENGE, this creates a devastating hidden cost.

On today's episode, we explore why a culture clash hire is a three-year crisis. Adam Busch breaks down why the "grownup dynamics" are the true challenge in any building, and why your strongest tool against TEACHER STRESS and building EDUCATOR RESILIENCE is strategic, culture-focused hiring.

Listen to learn:

• The 4 specific interview questions that reveal coachability and vulnerability (better than any resume).
• Why "rigid" experience is a bigger risk than a lack of credentials when trying to shift school practices.
• How to use "vulnerability interviewing," the "hallway walk," and mock PLCs to let your team culturally vet new hires.
• How to strategically use AI (and the ForwardEd Network tool) to define your team's needs and build precise, targeted interview questions.

This episode is essential listening for any principal, department head, or team lead trying to protect their building's climate and future. Hiring is an act of hope—learn how to find purposeful, purposeful teammates who make the work lighter.

Sponsored by: Grundmeyer Leader Services – www.grundmeyerleadersearch.com AWB Education and Media – www.awbeducation.org ForwardEd Network – www.forwardednetwork.com

From the AWB studios, this is your weekly Morning Boost, brought to you by AWB Education.

We are proud to be featured on the Forward Ed Network.

Advancing Voices, Shaping Education.

Let's get ready to boost your week.

Good morning and welcome back to youo Morning Boost.

I'm so glad you are here with us this morning on this wonderful Wednesday.

Now, usually we start with a story or a moment of reflection before the music.

But today I wanted that music to be our starting line.

Because for many of you principals, department heads and teacher leaders, you are all standing at a different kind of starting line this week.

I mean, it's April 15, and for the rest of this country, today is all about looking backward because it's tax day.

But in the World of Education, April 15th feels like a strange paradox.

While we might be filing papers for last year, our heads are already firmly planted in next year.

This is the big selection.

This is the window where the future of your school culture is actually decided.

You've seen the folders on your desk, the digital files in your inbox, resumes, dozens of them.

And there's a specific kind of pressure that hits right about now.

It's the pressure to get the spot filled.

You see a certification, you see three years of experience and you think, if I can just get this person signed, that's one less thing on my plate for August.

But we have to talk about the hidden cost of that short term relief.

Because a vacant classroom is a temporary problem, but a culture clash.

Higher is a three year crisis.

I've said this many times to do administrators over the years and it's a truth that will never fade.

Kids are easy.

Adults are hard.

Think about that for a second.

We spend our degrees learning how to manage student behavior and differentiate instruction for 8 year olds or 16 year olds.

We can handle a tantrum in the hallway or a missed homework assignment.

Those are the challenges that we signed up for, but the weight that actually keeps a leader awake at night.

It's the adult dynamics.

It's the friction between grownups that stalls the mission for the kids.

Today we are looking at how to move from hiring for compliance to hiring for culture.

We are going to look at why the perfect candidate on paper is often the biggest risk to your team's health and how to use that specific non traditional move to spot the right fit before they ever sign a contract.

You're listening to your morning Boost let's get to work.

This segment of your morning Boost is sponsored by Grundmire leader services.

They believe that great schools start with great leaders, and they are here to help you find a perfect fit for your district, transform your school's future with the right leader at Helm.

Visit grunmeerleader search.com to learn more.

Grunmeer Leader Services Transforming Education One Leader.

At a Time when we sit down in that interview chair, we usually start with the same baseline.

Tell us about your philosophy on education or walk us through a typical lesson.

They know the buzzwords.

They know they're supposed to say student centered and relational.

But culture isn't built on buzzwords.

It's built on behavior, and especially behavior under pressure.

Think about the last time a team meeting went sideways.

Was it because someone didn't know how to write a learning objective?

Probably not.

It was likely because of a lack of coachability.

I remember a hiring committee that I sat on a few years ago where a candidate had a resume that was essentially I mean, it was a work of art.

They had every credential.

But when we asked about a time they failed, they couldn't name one.

They were so polished that there was no room for honesty.

We hired them anyway.

And then within six months, that teacher had alienated their entire team.

And really it was because they refused to take any feedback.

That experience taught me that we need to stop interviewing for competence, which is what the resume already tells us, and instead we need to start interviewing for vulnerability.

A teacher who can't admit where they need to grow is a teacher who will eventually stall your building's progress.

To dig deeper into this, try asking a hard feedback question instead.

Ask them to tell you about a piece of feedback that they received last year that actually hurt their feelings.

Not just professional feedback, something that stung.

Then ask them to walk you through the 24 hours after they heard it.

What did they do?

You can also look for their building move.

Ask them when what they do when they walk into a teacher's lounge and the energy is negative, do they pivot the conversation or do they exit the room?

The answer tells you exactly how they will contribute to your climate.

Beyond those immediate reactions, we also have to weigh coachability against credentials.

We often look for five or ten years of experience as a safety net, thinking that they won't need as much support from us, but in my experience that can lead to rigidity.

Is your team currently in a place where you need a guardian of the past, or do you need an architect of the future?

If you are trying to move toward new practices, a highly experienced hire who is set in their ways is actually a massive cultural hurdle.

Consider a middle school math department.

You might have two candidates, one with 12 years of experience and a My Way or the highway reputation, and another who is a second year teacher who admits they had to completely unlearn their grading philosophy three weeks into the semester because it wasn't working for kids.

The second candidate is likely the culture ad they possess the mindset that keeps a school from stagnating.

A great way to test this is the unlearning question.

Ask something like what is something you used to believe deeply about in education that you no longer believe?

What changed your mind?

If they can't think of anything, they might be the brick wall that you're trying to move.

You can even take this a step further with something that I call the real time pivot.

During the interview, after they answer a question about a lesson or a strategy, say something like I really liked your focus on student choice there.

However, our building is currently struggling with ensuring that choice doesn't lead to a lack of rigor.

If I told you that we needed you to tighten the scaffolding on that lesson while keeping the choice, how would you adjust that?

Right now, what we're looking for isn't a perfect pedagogical answer.

We're looking at their eyes.

Do they light up because they like the challenge of a puzzle?

Or do they tighten up because they maybe feel criticized?

This simulation move allows you to see if they can think on their feet or if they are married to a script.

Just remember, the world of education literally changes every Tuesday afternoon.

If a candidate can't pivot in an interview room, they likely won't be able to pivot in a PLC meeting when the data shows that their students just aren't growing.

Now, moving forward, it's important to remember that hiring shouldn't be a solo sport.

If you are a principal, listening to this involving your teachers isn't just a buy in, it's about cultural vetting.

We often have, well, token teachers that are on panels who really don't feel empowered, but they are the ones who will stand in the hallway with the person every single day.

They have the peer level radar that an administrator just often lacks.

Your teachers shouldn't be looking for who they Want to eat lunch with.

They really should be looking for who is going to help carry the load on the hard days.

I saw a team once use a mock PLC meeting as a part of the interview, and I thought this was a genius idea.

They didn't just ask questions.

They handed the candidate a set of some redacted student data and they said, we're stuck on why these three students aren't moving.

We've tried X, we've tried Y.

Hey, let's join a conversation for 10 minutes here.

Then the teachers just started talking.

They watched the candidate.

Did they use I language?

Did they use we language?

Did they jump in to help?

Or did they just sit back and wait to be told what to do?

Most importantly, did they respect the expertise already in the room?

A culture killer hire often comes in with an I'm here to save you attitude.

A culture ad hire comes in with a how can I contribute attitude.

You can also empower your team with the peer question.

Let them ask, what is one thing you need from a teammate when you are having a terrible day?

And what is one thing you can't stand from a teammate in that same moment?

This reveals their relational needs immediately.

And don't underestimate the hallway walk either.

Have a teacher walk the candidate to the exit and then think about it.

How do they treat the students as they passed?

Did they acknowledge the custodian?

Did they.

Did their interview masks slip off the minute that they left the office?

I remember one teacher a few years ago telling me we did this.

Had to walk them all the way out to the parking lot, and they said, you know what?

They were great in the interview room.

But the second we hit the hallway, they started complaining about how small the classrooms were.

That teacher saved us from a year of negativity.

When you give your staff a voice in the hiring process, we aren't just giving them a task.

We're giving them the authority to protect their own workspace.

Now, I want to talk about a tool that many of us are using, but few of us are using it strategically in a space like this.

And that's AI.

We ask them because they're safe and they're compliant and the HR department likes them, but they rarely get us the information that we actually need.

But before we can just jump to AI to generate better questions, we do have to answer a fundamental question ourselves.

Do we even know what we need we often go into an interview looking for a good fourth grade teacher, and that's way too vague.

AI can help us narrow our focus if we treat it as a thinking partner rather than a shortcut.

So Instead of asking AI to give me 10 interview questions, try a tiered approach.

First, define the cultural gap in your team.

Tell the AI tool I'm hiring for a high school English team.

It's incredibly strong in content knowledge, but currently struggles with collaboration and openness to feedback.

What are five personality traits that would complement this team without causing friction?

Notice I didn't even say anything about give me questions yet.

We are still just trying to define the type of person that we need.

I typed that exact prompt into AI and it gave me diplomatic communication and resilient optimism.

Now, okay, that's not bad.

Probably a little buzzwordy for me, but I can work with that.

Then I asked for the questions.

I said, now write three past action interview questions that would force a candidate to prove they have diplomatic communication during a disagreement with a veteran colleague.

What I'm doing here is moving from generic to surgical.

We are using the AI tool to help identify that missing puzzle piece that's in our building's adult culture.

Because if the adults are her, like I said before, we need to be incredibly precise about the types of adults that we are bringing into our fold.

Now, if you're listening to this and you're thinking, I love this idea, but I don't have time to engineer the perfect prompt right now.

We've got you covered.

Head over to the Forward Ed network website@www.forwardadnetwork.com and we've built an AI tool that's specifically for this purpose.

It's designed to help school leaders bridge that gap between what we think we need and the actual questions that reveal it.

I worked with a principal recently who was hiring for a department that they've become very siloed, and we used AI to generate a conflict resolution simulation.

We told the AI tool to describe a scenario where a new teacher wants to try a project based learning unit, but the rest of the team wants to stick to the traditional textbook.

Ask the candidate how they would navigate this without making their colleagues feel judged.

The AI gave us a scenario that hit home so effectively that the teachers on the committee later remarked to their principal how it kind of captured the exact tensions that they're facing in their own meetings.

It got to the heart of the matter because we first identified the need before we asked for the tool.

Where is your kid headed after high school?

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We are seeing a lot of career shifting right now and there's a difference between a candidate who is running towards your school and a candidate who is running away from their last one.

A candidate who spends the entire interview talking about how toxic their last building was.

That's a huge red flag.

Now, while their last building might have been difficult, a culture builder focuses on what they learned, not just how the system affected them or failed them.

I once interviewed someone who was clearly burnt out.

They were brilliant, but their why was gone.

They kept saying, I just need a change of pace.

If we hire a change of pace candidate, we aren't just building a high performing culture.

We are.

We might be building a waiting room.

We want the candidate who points to a specific mission of our school and says, I want to be here because you're doing this work.

Finally, this is for those of you who aren't just signing the contracts.

Maybe you're the teacher on the committee or the one mentoring the new hire.

You have a leadership role in this.

You are the cultural onboarder.

When a new person joins a team, they are like a new organ being transplanted into a body.

The team will either accept them or reject them.

And in many times, how we assisted that transplant will affect how that person accepts us or rejects us.

Fit doesn't just mean someone who looks and thinks like us.

In fact, that's the opposite of a healthy culture.

Fit means someone who shares our values but brings a different perspective.

Before your next interview, sit with your team for 10 minutes.

Ask, what is the one cultural trait that we are currently missing?

Do we need more joy?

Do we need more accountability?

Then interview specifically for that missing piece.

And when the hire is made, don't just hand them a key.

Assign a culture buddy.

Their job is to explain the unwritten rules and the small building level wins.

Help them speak the language that only your staff knows.

Help them catch up on the inside laughs and the mission that you are all truly carrying.

And each and every day as we wrap up this Wednesday morning, I want to leave you with one thought to carry into your building today.

Hiring is an act of hope.

Every time you bring someone new into your school, you are making a bet on the future.

You are saying, I believe this community is worth protecting and I believe you have something to add to is so easy to get cynical in the month of April.

It's easy to feel like you're just a body finder and a teacher shortage.

But don't sett for fine.

Don't settle for certified.

Your teachers deserve a teacher who is coachable.

Your colleagues deserve a partner who is team first.

And you deserve a coworker who makes the work lighter, not heavier.

Because at the end of the day, we know the truth.

The kids are easy, but the adults are hard.

And if you spend time now trying to find the right adults, everything else becomes just a little bit easier.

Take an extra five minutes with that resume today.

Use AI to refine your questions, ask the hard question, watch the hallway walk, and then trust your gut when it tells you that polished isn't the same thing as purposeful.

You're doing the hard work of building a future one hire at a time and that is some of the most important leadership that you are ever going to do.

Thanks for being part of the work.

And again, thank you for spending your time with us here on your Morning Boost.

We appreciate everything that you do for your students and your community.

We will talk with you again next week.

That concludes another episode of youf Morning Boost, an AWB education production.

To find more incredible content, be sure to check out other amazing education shows on the Forward Ed Network where they are truly advancing voices and shaping education.

Join us again next week.

Until then, keep boosting your impact.