The Power of the Right Advisor with Dr. Matthew Montgomery
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:21:21]
Yeah, no, I. I absolutely do. And I think that people wondered why I wanted to go after the Ph.D. because that’s not what I really wanted to do. I chose the Ph.D. because I thought it would be the most rigorous pathway to achieve this goal and it would open the most doors for whatever I want to do when I grow up. And I hope I’m asking that question for my whole life. And that that’s what drew me to the degree weather. And I don’t make a big difference in lot. It certainly did make a difference for me to get a superintendency because I had had one for a long period of time. It was really my own, you know, personal goal and plight for I don’t know if it’s just self-torture or not, but I wanted to pick the most rigorous option because I thought I would grow the most, and I certainly did. But it was it was unconventional to steal your word. I did not fit into the boxes or into the mold. And that created strife with the people who were trying to support me on that journey.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:22:32]
The traditional people who were trying to support you because you mentioned. Correct. The mentor before was very traditional. And there’s nothing wrong with that at all. She was a good person, well-intentioned, but. It’s hard to say this in a way that doesn’t come across as insulting, and I don’t want it to. But basically there’s just kind of a lack of awareness that there is another way to do things. This is how I grew up and this is how you’re going to grow up. Is kind of the mentality. And, yes, there’s a certain amount of that where you need to be able to display that you can do the same things that your predecessors did. Otherwise, the degree gets diluted and watered down over time and we don’t want that. But at night it doesn’t. Just because you met the bar in terms of graduating doesn’t mean you have to go on and do the same things they did for their life. You can be a superintendent and go on to do other things in the future and be every bit as valuable to society and all of that as your professor helped you graduate. And so I think that’s why it clicked when you had a superintendent who was overseeing your work more so than a researcher or an academic.
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:23:43]
And I will tell you that I think that during the time when she was advised to meet that way, I was lost. And I I don’t know that I was as dedicated as I should be. So while she was advising me that there was a level of work that I was providing for whatever reason, that was helping me shake that opinion. So I by no means rest want to say that there was anything wrong with the conversation or that it was even not warranted. It’s just that’s where we were. And I think that that conversation that ultimately catapulted me to be able to finish it. So I have no ill will about that. And I own the level of work I was producing at that time and not making any excuses for it. I will tell you that also after that conversation and I licked the wounds, there were a couple of people that came into my life that had Ph.D.s were superintendents who became close friends, who mentored me in addition to my chair and without. I think they are the ones that made it possible in tandem with the chair. So I found other people in my role with Ph.D.s who had done it, who said, Matt, we will meet with you weekly, bi-weekly, monthly. Send me what you’re writing. Just keep writing and we’ll talk through it. I had some friends that were willing to do that, so I almost had that support support network that came together and coalesced with a new chair that made the difference for me.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:25:18]
And I think that’s also very important. It is in everything that we do in life. You need kind of role models and mentors and people to look up to have been there before you and to see that there are other people who’ve gone through essentially what you’re trying to go through right now and been successful and come out the other side. It gives you this tangible sense of hope that I can do it, too, as opposed to when you’re being you know, when you’re being mentored by someone who is an academic, a traditional doctor, so to speak. Traditional doctoral student who turned into an academic. That disconnect there. It makes you maybe a little despondent that I’m not seeing anybody representing me in this process. And so if I’m not represented in this process, I don’t know that I can do it. Does that click for you at all? Does that sound right?
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:26:11]
Because they gave me the inspiration and inspiration that it can’t be done and you can’t be in this role and you don’t have to take a traditional approach when it’s over. And maybe more importantly, they had firsthand experience of what I was going through once the act of writing happened. And they can say, yes, this is supposed to be this terrible. And yes, it will look as your soul is dying. And I’m not trying to be overdramatic, but I think your soul does die a little bit in this process because you realize that it’s not all your work. It’s a it’s a combination of a lot of people’s viewpoints. And you have to be a master negotiator to figure out what is what’s a hill to die on, what’s not, and how do you blend the committee’s worth of viewpoints and feedback and still stay true to your vision? They they helped make that possible because there are times where you can’t sugarcoat it. It’s just terrible. And there are times when my time line and I think this just helped me grow as a as a thinker and as a human. My time line meant nothing. And as a superintendent and as an educator, a leader of an organization, I very much used to being in control of my environment to some degree. And I don’t have control. And I mean, there are times when I was not demonstrating success and I have never felt so poorly about my writing than in this process, it’s just a breaking down or a wearing down of of you as a human. And it’s not so much as if you’re smart. This is just my viewpoint. OK. So everybody has their own. But I think this exercise is not an exercise in. Are you smart? I think it’s assumed that you have some level of intelligence before you get in. This is an exercise in how many times you get up after you’ve been pushed down.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:28:15]
You made a number of really important points there. Number one, you had people around you who had been through this before. And one of my students from the early days of Dissertation Done her dissertation was actually on the types of support you need to complete a dissertation when you’re not immersed in a university community. So if you’re not a traditional doctoral student there at a desk yet, you left your job and you’re just, you know, sitting at a desk with other graduate students pounding out your dissertation. If you’re not in that environment, then there’s no normality what you’re doing at all. You probably don’t know anybody else who’s doing what you’re doing in that case and to have other people around you who can emotionally tell you. Yes, it’s it’s terrible now, but it’ll get better. And you can believe them because they’ve been there before. They know what they’re talking about is really important. But then why was it terrible? Well, it’s because you weren’t a doctor when you started the dissertation process, because that dissertation process is transformative and you’re, in a sense, a different person when you finish it. So when you talk about, you know, you’re at your soul dying. It’s an interesting way of saying it. But it’s it’s it’s you know, in a sense, you have a, quote, child that you were, you know, in this doctoral journey is is giving way to an adult in this doctorial journey. And I talked about this this transition of being able to conduct research, being able to stand on your own feet and all those sorts of things. But then you mentioned that the complication is not just you want to go out there and do this on your own. Now you have to do it in front of the committee of people and come to this realization, either explicitly or implicitly, that the dissertation isn’t actually yours, it’s theirs. You’ve got to get them to be happy with it. In order for you to graduate, then that was your happy end or not. Once they say it’s good, then you’re done. But but like you said, trying to keep your vision while simultaneously getting this to the point where they will all approve it and they will all be happy with it is a skill set to its time.
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:30:25]
And so I have a couple. Yeah, I have a couple of things that I can rattle on just about what you just said. One, I think that if you if you’re in I don’t know if you’re familiar with an Enneagram. So the Enneagram is a personality test that’s been done for since the beginning of time. And they’re I’m an eight and a grad, which is called the Challenger, which is really good sometimes and really bad. And Enneagram personality is different from others where it tells you your shortcomings. And once you’re aware of your shortcomings and you can try to be a better human because of it. So as a challenger, I have a really hard time with somebody telling me what to do. And if I disagree with it, then it just amps up about 100 times. So I had to learn to let things go and to pick my fights very quickly. And there was almost a little bit of a defeatist attitude for me because I I knew I had to do that. And I felt like at times, not at the end, but at times during the journey, that this wasn’t my work. And and that was it was hard for me to reconcile with. And I eventually came out of that to realize it was my work. But there was still a lot of jockey. The second thing I say is I would say is that when you talked about this, you know how you change as a human. And I use the the your soul does a little bit. Maybe a better way to say it is that there was somebody talking about a book called Courage, Dear Heart, and I haven’t read it yet. Talked about there’s a biologist who’s writing and it talks about in the journey from Caterpillar to a butterfly. Go back to my science geeky, OK? When if you were to cut open the cocoon, it’s a protein soup. So everything kind of dissolves and it reforms into the butterfly. So the dissertation phase, you become a protein soup and you’re in this kind of chaos. And then you come out as a completely different person without being overly dramatic. But there are so many things that change because of this exercise of who you are. Like, reprograms you in some way.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:32:25]
Yeah. And I think that there’s a lot of that, you know, looking at the world in a different way and looking at problem solving in a different way, looking at information that you’re provided in a different way. And your job as superintendent, you may have gotten to be a very critical consumer of information already. But going through the Ph.D. process, you you have to be a very critical consumer of information. And so a lot of those things. Yeah, you’re right. Develop. And you are you’re very different in a lot of ways. After you’ve gone through that process and analogy, I have to your previous point about it, feeling like it wasn’t your work in a sense. I like to tell students that you should think of yourself as a homebuilder, that literally a hammer nails the builder. But you’re building a home custom, building a home for a buyer who is paying for it. And it’s not a spec home that you make the way you want to make it. It’s got to meet their specifications. And so although it’s yours, and if you’re working, you’re putting the blood, sweat and tears into it. It’s got to be the way they want it or else it doesn’t doesn’t happen. Same as if you were like the clothes designer and you’re building a suit of clothes, but you have to tailor it to fit just right. That’s kind of the sense your name’s on the label, your names. You’re the builder. Your name’s on the title page of your dissertation. But in a real sense, the owners are going to be the committee. And it’s a tough thing to deal with during parts of the process. Absolutely. But if you can accept that kind of mentality and kind of yield a little bit, which I think like you, it’s hard to do sometimes, especially when you’re passionate about something. But if you can sort of professionally match from the dissertation and get it out there and deliver it as a professional, you can get through that process a little bit more easily. And. And then you can do what you want to do it afterwards. You don’t have a committee once you get that D.R. Title, you’ll have a community or you want to do anymore.
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:34:20]
Right. It’s a it’s the beginning, not the end. Yeah. And yeah, you know, the best dissertation is a done dissertation, as they say.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:34:30]
So you mentioned that that that you’re in the process of taking your dissertation work and sort of popularizing it. I know that down the line there’s there’s a book that that you’re interested in. You’re working on a blog currently. Tell us a little bit about about that. What’s what’s been happening since you graduated?
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:34:50]
So right now. So there’s a quiet, calm. I don’t know that I like it so. I’m playing it cool with my district during the pandemic and things are relatively stabilized right now, thankfully, so I’m not going on what when I say that we’re in school five days a week, which is not common across the country. But we’re doing it and we’re demonstrating cautious success.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:35:22]
Tell us a little bit more about that, I want to get to what we were talking about. Tell us a little bit more about that. Because I know that there are going to be superintendents and principals who are listening in on this. And you mentioned that you were in a conference recently where you got to see some different ways people are handling it. What can you tell us about that right now?As we are still in this pandemic at this point.
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:35:39]
So I think this is one of the challenge, most challenging things that I’ve ever experience as a leader, and I think many leaders would echo that same statement. And I will say that there’s not a one size fits all and your are have the pleasure of serving a unique community. And that is nuanced. And every leader is just trying to be the best. Yesterday, I served on a small panel of one district that was all remote, one district that represented a hybrid plan. And I represented five days a week. And we each had compelling reasons of why we had selected as a community that mode of instruction. Our district has decided that five days a week all in is something that would fit our needs in the area of Ohio that we are that I’m serving in. And we have 87 percent of our population coming to brick and mortar five days a week with three feet social distancing, all the masks of cleaning protocols and temperature screenings and all of those elements. But we’re in week five of instruction right now. And I’m knock on wood one more time. We’ve had zero positive cases and zero kids in quarantine from community spread out, from school communities spread. So we’re lucky in many ways. But I also think that the community is taking this seriously because it is a group effort and we have a system built up that we can transcend from all in to hybrid or in every other day model and then all remote should then the cases and the quarantining increase, which could happen. But, right now things are going cautiously well and it never feels like it.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:37:20]
You have the right to say that at this point to one week to week it’s in you maybe you don’t know, but five weeks in there, there’s something happening there. There’s some good news to get five weeks in.
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:37:30]
Yes, I hope so. And I think that there are districts that are all remote that are doing really well. And those districts that are hybrid, that are doing really well, it’s very I don’t think that it is in our best interest to compare and contrast from one district to the next, because I think that every district has its unique needs and everybody has to find what works well within their community and then develop a plan that meets it. So that’s interesting because right now it feels like it’s coming where that’s concerned. It hasn’t been called since March. The second thing is that we’re just finishing a four year, eighty-six million building project. And that just is it’s in the tail end. So that’s calmer as well. And then the dissertation is over. So I’m kind of left with what am I. What’s that? Got my day job right. Which I love dearly. But I’m wondering what’s next. And I have some idle time and I don’t do very well in an idle situation. My wife will tell you it’s never good when I’m idle. I always get myself in trouble. Like, if there’s not a crisis, I’ll create one just for fun to see what happens. It’s not an endearing quality.
Dr. Russell Strickland [00:38:38]
So we have that in common as well. I have a I don’t remember who it was. I remember listening to someone talk that some different psychological archetypes and I hadn’t heard this before, but he identified one of those archetypes as being the hunter. So you talked about this in terms of like early hunter gatherer society. What types of people did we have that then? And one was the hunter. And the hunter is always on the hunt. If you, you know, make the kill and everybody is eating great. But it’s time for the next hunt. That’s kind of how I feel. I remember seeing people, you know, winning the Super Bowl with World Series or something. They’re so incredibly elated. And it’s like they’re all in that moment right there. And I just know if I was there, I’d be like, OK, we gotta do this again next year. That would be my issue rather than this, you know, presence. And so I liked hearing that talk because it made some sense to me why I quit in some cases, like.
Dr. Matthew Montgomery [00:39:36]
I just died trying to enjoy the calm. And so what I’m focusing on right now is, is there a way to turn the dissertation into a book? Yeah. So I’m talking with some folks that can help me in that area. And my research was on. What is the effect of superintendent vision on digital learning? And it coincides with. So when this was defended in May, we’re in the throes of the pandemic. We’re still in the throes of pandemic. What districts were faced with the challenge of going brick and mortar to remote or all digital in a matter of days? So I am hoping to intertwine the pandemic with that importance of vision and how it’s transforming schools while I’m letting that kind of when I’m throwing that idea out into the universe. I’m also doing I’m trying to blog about what I’m thinking right now. So there’s time for me to just write about any given topic. And I post those on Twitter and LinkedIn, but it’s just random. Topics like this week’s blog is going to be on social media and our role as parents and as teachers and educators for not only ourselves, but for the folks that we serve. So I recently watched the Netflix document The Social Dilemma, and it really just spurred conversations in my own house and also in the school house to figure out what it means for us. We’re still giving speeches to parents that say you can monitor your child’s social media accounts. You have the ability to do so. And as crazy as this sounds, they don’t need to have a social media account. So it’s an interesting world that parents are trying to live in. Myself included. And also as an educator. So I’m using that blog as the space for me to just generate thoughts about, you know, it’s helping me to write. And it’s also allowing me to wrap my head around some ideas that are swirling in my head.
