Hey Ruckus Maker,
Most principal problems aren't problems of effort.
They're problems of fog.
I had a coaching call this week with a veteran elementary principal — sharp, collaborative, the kind of leader teachers genuinely like — and he came in frustrated about a piece of feedback on his staff survey.
"Communication follow-through."
He didn't agree with it. In his mind, half the emails he was getting were stupid. Things he shouldn't be dealing with. Things someone else should handle. So he didn't respond.
And here's the thing — he was right. He shouldn't have been dealing with most of those emails.
But forty minutes into the call, we found the actual problem.
It wasn't the emails.
It was something invisible. Something most principals are doing right now without knowing it.
I wrote up the full session as a Coach Notes case study on Substack — including the three tools we built together to solve it. Usually coach notes are premium content, but today it’s free. Principal Appreciation Day felt like the right moment to make it open to everyone.
You can read it here:
Keep Making a Ruckus,
Danny
P.S. Happy Principal Appreciation Day, Ruckus Maker
