Become a more well-rounded director by:
Leveling UP your skills in each of the 'Four Food Groups'.
Ensure you have a well-rounded program by:
Delegating areas where you are weak to those on your staff who are strong.
Early in our careers we each begin to discover which aspects of our job are easy and which are the ones we would rather avoid.
Some directors are really good at delivering a vibrant lesson and rehearsing their band while being very poor at organizational skills. Others are very organized, both in their lesson planning and in the administration of their program but struggle to keep up with the demands of communicating with parents and school admin.
While we all have our strengths and weaknesses, we must each strive to better ourselves in every aspects of our job if we are to truly become a well-rounded band director. Unfortunately, the reality is that leveling up every skill takes time and all too often, when push comes to shove, we either delegate entire aspects of our job to other staff members or we avoid those aspects altogether, leading to the dangerous potential for a variety of breakdowns in our program:
Poor Communication Skills lead to:
confused parents, scheduling conflicts for concerts and events, and upset administration.
Poor Organizational Skills lead to:
confused directors, late or missing paperwork, and upset administration (plus upset bookkeepers, counselors, and front office staff).
Poor Lesson Planning Skills lead to:
confused students, disjointed and haphazard learning, and a program without goals or purpose.
Poor Lesson Delivery Skills lead to:
bored students, low-quality performances, and a program spiraling toward failure.
A functioning band program needs a healthy dose of each element to thrive. Therefore, as the directors in charge of our programs, it is vital that we constantly strive to improve our own skills in each of the 'Four Food Groups'.
While we always try to balance teaching duties among directors based on pedagogical knowledge and skills, we also know that it makes every director (and the program) better if all teachers improve their pedagogy on each instrument.
Why not approach the administrative side of our job in the same way?
We should delegate administrative duties to the other directors on our staff, playing to their strengths, while guarding against splitting things up entirely. To give one director the entire weight of the communication and organizational duties and another the entire weight of lesson planning and delivery would be shortchanging both directors of potential growth and limiting communication and program unity.
In an ideal world, every director should have a role to play in each of the 'Four Food Groups'. That is because, once you move toward a balanced approach like this, you might start to see your band program developing into one that will:
meet the needs of your community with more parents who feel well-informed than not and an administration that worries less about angry parent emails and trusts your ability to run your program.
meet the needs of your school staff with regard to paperwork, finances, and planning, building trust and respect with the people who matter most on your campus.
meet the educational needs of all your students, keeping them engaged in the learning with concrete goals, drive, and purpose.
and lastly, meet your needs and the needs of your fellow directors, keeping everyone happy, fulfilled, and stress-free ( or as near to stress-free as is possible in our profession ... 😬 )
⬇ Click below to dive-in to each of the Food Groups ⬇
😁 Learn to level up your skills and Explore how TECHNOLOGY and AUTOMATION can help! 😁
