Research Papers & Manuscripts

"LEADING TEAMS OF LEADERS: WHAT HELPS TEAM MEMBER LEARNING?"

The first paper from the Connecticut Superintendents project is called, "Leading Teams of Leaders: What Helps Team Member Learning?"  Professor Higgins' co‐authors on this paper are Lissa Young, Jennie Weiner, and Steven Wlodarczyk (from the Connecticut Center for School Change). This paper focuses on the extent to which coaching by superintendents and team members helps or hinders team member learning. Team member learning is one key indicator of team effectiveness. When individuals are learning, they are engaged in the work and so, much more likely to sustain and continue reform efforts. Multi‐level analyses of these data show that coaching that focuses on the team’s task fosters team member learning, whereas interpersonal coaching (e.g., that focuses on resolving interpersonal conflict) does not. Further, leader coaching (that of the superintendent) is less influential when compared to the powerful effects of peer coaching. Leader coaching contributes positively, but only when there is little peer coaching evident among team members. These results lend insight into both who should provide help to teams that are striving to implement an instructional improvement strategy and what kind of help they should provide.

Higgins, M.C., Young, L.V., Weiner, J.M., Wlodarczyk, S., (2009). Leading Teams of Leaders:  What Helps Team Member Learning?, .Phi Delta Kappan, V. 91, No. 4, 41-45.

"LEARNING TO SUCCEED AT SCALE"

This article directly extends Professor Higgins' work on career imprinting to the context of charter management organizations. In this article, she and co-author, Rick Hess examine the dark side of career imprinting. Drawing explicitly on her research in  biotechnology and her book, Career Imprints, she and Rick Hess show how charter management organizations (CMOs) such as KIPP have engaged in socialization and training practices that promote the development of an entrepreneurial career imprint. Human resources practices, such as launching employees into inner city school districts with minimal training, promote the development of entrepreneurial skills and habits of mind. However, if taken too far, they caution, extreme “stretch assignments” could cause burnout among budding leaders, undermining opportunities for innovation and growth as talented individuals decide to leave. Further, given the success portrayed in the media of many of these practices, the temptation is great for charter management organizations (CMOs) to simply copy and repeat practices – to move into execution mode, rather than organizing themselves to learn. In this paper, Professor Higgins and Rick Hess suggest that what appear initially to be strengths of entrepreneurial career imprinting can turn into weaknesses if not attended to. They therefore argue that in order to “grow smart” and sustain their success at scale, CMOs will need to engage in reflective practices that call into question some of their initial assumptions about talent management and leadership development as they grow.

Higgins, M.C., & Hess, F. M. (2009). Learning to succeed at scale. Journal of School Choice, 3(1), 8-24.

"NEVER QUITE GOOD ENOUGH: THE PARADOX OF STICKY DEVELOPMENT RELATIONSHIPS FOR ELITE UNIVERSITY GRADUATES"

This study directly extends Professor Higgins' prior research on leadership development and mentoring to the education context. In this article, she examines how retaining ties to one’s elite graduate school may actually undermine one’s sense of progress. Using multi‐level modeling techniques, she shows that the more one’s  developmental network is made up of peers from graduate school over time, the lower one’s career-related self‐efficacy. Her study suggests that surrounding oneself with high‐achieving peers, rather than diversifying one’s network, may actually lower self‐perceptions, leading to the feeling that one is “never quite good enough.” This work has implications for the ways in which students in higher education programs are advised. 

Higgins, M.C., Dobrow, S., & Chandler, D. (2008). Never quite good enough: The paradox of sticky developmental relationships for elite university graduates. [Special Interdisciplinary Issue on Mentoring].Journal of Vocational Behavior, 72,207-224.

"MENTORING ACROSS BOUNDARIES IN EDUCATION"

This volume examines three aspects of mentoring in education: formal mentoring programs, informal mentoring programs, and developmental networks. Professor Higgins and her co-authors are taking the lead in the third section on developmental networks. The guiding theme across all three sections of the book is the consideration of mentoring across boundaries including race, gender, and organizational boundaries. They will contribute two of the chapters in the developmental networks section, both of which are empirical. One chapter examines the antecedents to different kinds of developmental network structures and the other examines the dynamics of developmental networks using ten years of longitudinal network data (with Shasa Dobrow). Professor Higgins' contributions suggest avenues for future research and practice on developmental networks. All of the chapters have been written and are now being edited; they anticipate submitting the manuscript for review in early 2010.

Willie, C., McGowan, E., Blake-Beard, S., & Higgins, M. (2009). Mentoring across boundaries in education: Discovering new sources of learning. (manuscript in preparation).

"KNOWING HOW TO HELP: A CRITICAL SKILL FOR SCHOOL LEADERS"

This paper builds upon Professor Higgins'  dissertation work and offers insight into how school leaders can give helpful help to teachers. Based upon her dissertation research, she proposes that school leaders such as principals have at least two levers available for ensuring that the instructional “help” they provide is actually “helpful” to teachers. The first is to find ways to enhance teacher self‐efficacy when providing feedback and the second is to decrease the evaluative nature of the context in which help is given. These two levers influence an individual’s ability to actually attend to the advice that is given. No matter how good the “what” of the advice, “how” it is delivered can significantly impact the likelihood of implementation. These insights were informed by Professor Higgins' dissertation work and by discussions she had with participants in the Strategic Education Research Partnership with Boston Public Schools this year. 

Higgins, M.C. (2009). Knowing how to help: A critical skill for school leaders. (under review).

"PLATINUM PASSPORTS"

This article builds upon Professor Higgins' Building Career Foundations study of the HBS  Class of 1996. The article will update John Van Maanen’s influential piece published in 1983 in Review of Higher Education on the socialization practices at MIT’s Sloane School of Management and Harvard Business School. In this paper, Professor Higgins and her co-authors explore how these last twenty years have actually led to a convergence in the two MBA programs, as evidenced by the structure, content, and practices of the two programs as well as the students’ career placement upon graduation. Professor Higgins joined this team as an expert on  Harvard Business School (HBS) practices and the work she had done through the Building Career Foundations project with the HBS Class of 1996. Her theory of career imprinting suggests that like other forms of organizations, universities can leave an indelible marker on the leadership development of young adults and so, shape career trajectories in important ways. The paper is in draft form currently, and the team expects it will be under review in early 2010.

Lizeo, E., VanMaanan, J., & Higgins, M.C. (2009). Platinum passports.  (in preparation for submission).

"MAKING MENTORING WORK IN EDUCATION"

This paper integrates what is known from organizational theory about what makes mentoring effective with specific examples of these ideas put in practice in education programs. This paper will be targeted toward a practitioner audience in education and advocate that practitioners take a multiple mentoring perspective 

Higgins, M., & McGowan, E. (2009). Making mentoring work in education. (in preparation for submission).