Why I Flattened My School

After watching my high school's academic departments struggle with creativity while organized according to a traditional department chair model, I began to wonder if the hierarchical department structure might be the obstacle preventing greater collaboration and creativity among my faculty. After much consultation, contemplation, and research on organizations like IDEO and Zappos, to name just a few, I grew increasingly convinced by the anecdotal evidence suggesting that flat organizations tend to foster creativity and collaboration better than hierarchical ones. With this in mind, I set out to make a radical change.

I. The Problem

Over the last several years, I've become increasingly convinced about the importance of both creativity and collaboration in American schools, and in my school specifically. In my search for the key to both creativity and collaboration, I read numerous articles and nearly as many books on the topics. I shared my enthusiasm with my faculty and encouraged them to cast off the chains of tradition and try new things, to collaborate about new ideas for educating our kids, and to innovate and redesign some of the things we've done successfully for years. Most loved the notion of collaboration and creativity, and we all agreed that the two traits would be important in our students' future. Somehow, though, collaboration and creativity lacked staying power with the faculty, even though we often discussed how we should model these traits for our students. Perplexed, I went back to reading -- and what I found gave me a new outlook on my conundrum.

II. A Potential Solution

After reading several articles about the internationally-known design firm IDEO, I immediately ordered and read two books, The Art of Innovation and Creative Confidence, the latter of which rocked my organizational world. In Creative Confidence, authors Tom and David Kelley describe the remarkable environment that thrives at IDEO, where collaboration and creativity happen in a flat setting. Put simply, all designers working on a project at IDEO operate on a level playing field with no hierarchy so that new ideas are encouraged, all ideas are given equal consideration, and all opinions are valued. Even when the company's founders join a team for a project, hierarchy goes out the window.

Intrigued, I found articles about other organizations, such as Zappos, that have experienced terrific collaboration and soaring creativity because of flattening. The more research I did, the more evidence I discovered pointing to the same thing: in a flat organization, collaboration and creativity happen often and in meaningful ways, self-starters thrive, teamwork increases, and ideas come out of the woodwork.

III. The Decision

I began to wonder if this radical idea possibly could work in a school setting. Could a high school with traditional academic department chairs transition successfully to a flat model with no department chairs, where department members generated ideas and made decisions collaboratively minus the department chair hierarchy? To be clear, our department chairs were neither stifling nor dictatorial. However, the collaboration and creativity within the academic departments did not reach the level we all seemed to agree that our students would need for success in the remainder of the 21st century. I first approached some of my more creative teachers and they, predictably, seemed encouraged by the idea. I next approached a few of my department chairs. After I explained how I envisioned departments working in a flat school, they began to warm to the idea. I also approached some of the executive-level leaders of the entire school (we are PK-12), including my head of school, and all encouraged me to continue working toward that end. After more reading and more in-depth conversations with my most trusted team members, we made the decision to move the high school toward becoming a flat organization.

IV. The Preparation

I knew that faculty who had never worked in a flat organization would need plenty of support and training if this experiment were to have any chance of success. Therefore, before I shared my plan to flatten the school, we began collaboration training. During several professional development and in-service sessions on campus, I led my faculty through a number of collaborative exercises in which we sought solutions for existing challenges and brainstormed about ideas we might like to try in the future. To provide a template for the collaborative work, I shared IDEO's 7 Tips for Better Brainstorming, and focused especially on "defer judgment," "encourage wild ideas," and "build on ideas of others." Once I sensed the faculty growing more comfortable with the process after a few months of collaborative sessions, I finally shared my plan to flatten the school and go all-in on the untapped potential of my dedicated teachers.

V. The Outcome

Stay tuned for how this experiment turns out. As the school year wound down recently, we headed into summer anticipating a flat school upon our return in August. We spent part of each of the last two teacher days in department meetings recapping what we'd learned about collaboration, discussing a recent Edutopia post about collaboration in schools, and looking ahead to what collaboration and creativity sans department chairs would look like next year.

I believe we are as prepared as we can be for this new adventure, and I'm excited about the possibilities, but I also know we will need more training and support along the way. During the school year, I will document our challenges and successes -- and we're sure to have both -- so that I can give a midyear report and update you on our new, flat school.

Have you had a similar experience in your school? Please tell us about it.