For the uninitiated in “management speak”, management by walking about (or MBWA as it is more commonly called) may seem to be a rather bizarre management concept and certainly not one that many regard as a key element of good management.
Yet, for most good managers and school principals, it is an important part of their daily routine. At its simplest level, MBWA is about the manager getting out of his office and walking about the organisation as a means of getting to know first-hand what is going on. It usually goes with an open-door policy because both MBWA and an open-door policy are management approaches aimed at bringing a manager closer to employees who fall under his/her area of supervision.
For the head of an organisation, it is about bringing him/her closer to all employees, not just those who are members of the senior management team. When a head has an open-door policy, it implies that any member of staff is welcome to enter whenever the manager’s door is open for an informal discussion on any work-related issue.
As the main purpose of MBWA and an open-door policy is to bring the manager or head closer to the people who do the work, this management model seeks to avoid the problems normally associated with strongly hierarchical management structures.
The concept seems to have originated as part of the management strategies developed by Edward Deming, an American management expert, who worked closely with Japanese business and manufacturing organisations, particularly Toyota, considered to be the founder of the Total Quality Movement (TQM) and of Lean Manufacturing.
It has now become an element in the management strategies of top business leaders across the world and has been found to be particularly helpful when organisations are faced with change and uncertainty. This is because the MBWA makes the organisation’s managers and leaders more visible and available to staff and customers. Because of their greater availability, these leaders can dispel rumours and provide greater clarity about the organisation’s new vision and strategies.
For the principal of a school, MBWA means getting out of your office on a regular basis — at least once a day — and walking through the school. It is about having informal discussions with teachers, cleaners, pupils and parents as you wend your way through the school and, most of all, it is about learning first-hand what really goes on in your school.
Initially, if your predecessor did not practise MBWA, there may be a degree of suspicion about your purpose. People will think that you are checking up on them or even spying on them. In some ways you are. People should come to school with a purpose: to teach and to learn or to create and maintain the kind of environment that promotes teaching and learning. If this is not what they are doing, then it is important that you know and understand why this is so.
The purpose of MBWA, however is, not to catch people doing what they should not be doing but rather to discover what they are doing that is good and to learn from them about the obstacles that prevent them from performing to the best of their ability those tasks that have been entrusted to them.
Therefore it is important to be open and empathetic when engaging those you meet and talk to. The idea is to gather information, to understand how systems work in practice and who is doing the work that matters. Your purpose is not inspection and it is not to criticise or correct.
It is also important to cover all areas of the school at different times of the working day: the last thing you want to happen is that your staff perceive you to have favourites or that you attend and support certain functions or activities more than others. Initially, you may find that staff members are a little anxious when you approach them in your rounds but that will soon disappear if you approach them in the way we have suggested.
The benefits will come when they discover that not only are you listening to them but also that you are willing to intervene on their behalf and to support their constructive suggestions about things that can be done to improve their effectiveness.
Your senior management team, in particular, may find your decision to manage by walking about a little disconcerting. Their concerns will relate to their fear that you may be muscling in on their turf and in doing so perhaps undermining their authority. To some extent, these fears are justified but that should not prevent you learning first-hand how your school functions.
What you must avoid, however, is bypassing the seniors in making decisions about things that formally fall under their areas of responsibility. The best way to avoid this is to make sure that you engage them in the same sort of information discussions in your walking about as you would with any other member of staff.
Encourage them to be open about any management and leadership problems they may be experiencing, share what you have learned in your wanderings with them and remember that you have a responsibility to grow them as managers and leaders. Encourage them to do as you do and to spend some of their management time walking about.
There is one other person who may find your decision to include MBWA in your management strategy annoying and that is your secretary. Most good secretaries and personal assistants believe that bosses should stay in their offices so that they can mother and control them.
They want you to be there to deal with phone calls and mail and all the other mundane chores that are the nightmare of many heads. And if you are good and do as you are told they will bring you coffee and even an occasional slice of cake when it is a staff -member’s birthday. If this is the situation, and all else fails, complain of a sore back from all the sitting and explain that you have been told that a brisk walk is the best thing for it.
MBWA is not a fad or an excuse not to do the paperwork that is the inevitable lot of any principal or manager. It is a management strategy that has been around for a long time and one that continues to be part of the daily routine of good managers everywhere.
Do it properly and with purpose and you will not only learn more about your school than you could have learned in any other way, you will also improve communication within the school, increase the morale and motivation of your staff, earn their loyalty and respect and even improve your physical and mental health. Try it, it works!
Alan Clarke is former headmaster of Westerford High School in Cape Town and author of the Handbook of School Management and the Handbook for School Governors.
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