The Power of 1%

We’ve hit the time of the year where things seem to be speeding up more than slowing down. We are working hard to stay the course on the good work happening this school year while also planning for summer learning and what is needed for next school year.

And we are tired. Or at least I am tired.

And certainly, that’s just part of it, and we have to just keep at it. But we can’t keep at all things with our fullest energy at all times. Not to mention, as I state in Legacy of Learning, “Not everything is worth our highest level of effort.”

I was recently at the BASA Women in Leadership conference, and I found myself getting self-conscious in a session that I was co-leading. I recognized when I was connecting with this group that nothing I was sharing was novel or something they had never heard before. And even though I had organized this conversation to be one of mutual sharing and dialogue, I still felt almost embarrassed. Who was I to be facilitating this?

But I think this is where things fall a part for many of us. When we have this belief that what we share has to be revolutionary, extreme, an almost fairy tale.

But in a world of endless distractions, what is revolutionary is our commitment to make small moves consistently even when they feel a bit old hat.

I call these “Mosquito Moves” in my book because they can seem to small and inconsequential and yet, when we all do our part, these moves can up to significant gains.

I was first inspired to consider small daily moves after reading Chris Field’s book, A Billion Hours of Good where he explains that 14 minutes is 1% of a 24 hour day. In this book, he challenges us to use our 14 minutes for the greater good. And later, I discovered James Clear and his book, Atomic Habits. Habit formation work is powerful stuff.

This had me thinking about 1% of a work day = 4.5 minutes. And 1% of a 50 minute class period = 30 seconds.

Imagine if an entire staff committed their 4.5 minutes a day or 30 seconds each bell to an impactful instructional move and did so every day for an extended period of time. Even when we didn’t feel like it. This kind of radical commitment and consistency on something that requires little time and effort on our parts can lead to incredible growth.

On a staff of 150, if every person makes this commitment, this one decision alone could lead to an improvement of 150%.

I don’t know if the math is mathing here, but you get the idea.

It’s not necessarily extreme actions that will change our schools and this world. It’s our tenacious commitment to making small moves consistently.

And something about that brings me peace.

What small moves will you be tenaciously committed to until the end of the school year?