A Process for Creating Alignment, Structure, and Transparency
When Implementation Teams and other stakeholders are clear about their purpose, membership, processes, and ways of work from the outset, they are better able to avoid misunderstandings and engage in more focused work.
To protect, engage and guide the work of Implementation Teams, early on it is helpful to create Working Agreements. Working Agreements ensure the Team has the necessary:
- “Face time” to work as a whole Team plus time for task-oriented small group work between meetings
- Timely access to relevant and reliable student academic and behavioral data as well as implementation fidelity data
- Clarity of the role of the Team and its members
- Reminders of the focus of the work and of the agreed upon ways of work when the work gets complicated
- Connections to teams horizontally within an organization (i.e., teams across the school or teams across the district) that serve different and distinct functions; and vertically within the education system (classroom to capital)
Activity: Implementation Team
Team Working Agreements
Implementation Teams use Working Agreements to provide clarity about the work of the team, help the team stay ‘on mission’, and orient new members. Use this activity with your team to organize and articulate working agreements.