I recently heard a football coach say something that I haven’t been able to shake.
He was describing what researchers call a commitment continuum. On one end are people who are resistant. They actively work against what you’re trying to accomplish. Move a little farther along and you find the reluctant. They’ll do what you ask, but they aren’t exactly bought in.
In the middle are the compliant. They show up. They do what they’re asked to do. And at the end of the day, they go home.
Beyond them are the committed, people who consistently go above and beyond. And then there are the compelled. Those are your rock stars. They aren’t simply doing the work; they’re reinventing it.
The coach looked at that continuum and said something I didn’t expect: “Give me a team full of compliant players, and we’ll win some games.”
I thought he was going to say committed.
But the more I thought about it, the more his answer made sense. Give a coach a group of players who show up every day, run the offense, run the defense, and consistently execute the game plan, and that team has a chance to win.
And that got me thinking about our schools.
Are We Building Everything for the Rock Stars?
I’ve been a district leader. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sent a message to principals that sounded something like this: “Send me one third-grade teacher from your campus. We’re going to bring everyone together and build something.”
Who do principals send? Their rock stars.
So, we fill a room with our most committed, compelled, above-and-beyond teachers. They create something amazing. Then we send it back to campuses and say: “Great. Now everybody do this.”
And sometimes it falls apart.
Maybe the problem isn’t the teachers. Maybe the problem is the system.
What if we’ve been designing systems around what our most committed people are willing to do rather than what the majority of our people can reasonably do?
Simple Isn’t the Goal. Doable Is.
I was recently talking with a district about PLCs.
They wanted teachers to analyze incoming student data, plan engaging Tier 1 instruction, assess students, analyze those results, develop intervention plans for students who hadn’t mastered the content, provide acceleration for those who had. Great stuff.
So, I asked a simple question: “How often do your teams collaborate?”
Once a week. For 45 minutes.
There’s the problem.
We sometimes build expectations that require teachers to consistently go above and beyond the time and resources we’ve actually given them. Then, when they can’t meet those expectations, the message they receive – whether we intend it or not – is: You’re not doing enough.
I don’t think we need to make the work simple. There isn’t much about education that is simple. I think we need to make it doable.
That’s a different question. Doable asks:
Can the real people doing this work accomplish what we’re asking with the time, resources, skills, and capacity they actually have?
If the answer is no, perhaps the people aren’t the problem. Perhaps we need to go back to the drawing board.
Confidence Grows When People Can Win
I recently worked with a group of social studies leaders who told me they were losing teachers in December. Teachers were putting their keys on the desk and saying, “I’m done.”
I told them, “I don’t think you’re losing them in December. I think you’re losing them in October. They’re just giving you the keys in December.”
So, I asked the team to list everything a social studies teacher needed to do to be successful in their district.
They filled the chart paper. It was all good stuff. And it was too much.
So, we started crossing things off.
What is foundational? What absolutely has to happen? If a first-year teacher could become really good at just a few of these things, would we consider that teacher successful?
Eventually, we narrowed the list to a few foundational practices. That’s where confidence begins.
When people are asked to do a long list of things and never feel particularly good at any of them, they begin to wonder whether they’re cut out for the work.
But give people a few important things they can actually accomplish, and something changes. They begin thinking: I can do this.
And maybe – just maybe – they decide they want to keep doing it.
That’s Soulful Leadership
For me, this is what soulful leadership looks like.
A soulful leader creates systems that are doable for the real people in the organization. A soulful leader honors the fact that some great employees want to do excellent work – and then go home and love their families. A soulful leader doesn’t lower the standard. Instead, they get relentlessly clear about what matters most. And then they have the courage to say no to some good things so their people can become ridiculously good at the most important things.
Your rock stars will still be rock stars. They’ll innovate. They’ll stretch. They’ll add their own magic. Don’t put a lid on them.
But don’t build an organization that requires everyone to be a rock star just to survive. Build one where good people can show up, understand what’s expected, do meaningful work well, and experience success.
Because when the work becomes doable, something else starts happening.
People become confident. They rediscover some joy. They begin believing they are enough for the work in front of them.
And maybe they stay.
Wouldn’t that be a beautiful thing?
Justin Richardson is an educator, author, and keynote speaker with Waymaker Leadership Development, where he supports teachers, school administrators, municipalities, and business leaders across Texas and beyond. With a passion for people, he helps leaders grow through professional learning and coaching. In 2021, he earned a doctorate in Educational Leadership, and his research on spiritual leadership practices has been featured in the Journal of Ethical Educational Leadership.