Open Apology Letter to LinkedIn Community
D. Scott Schwartz, M.Ed.
Author | Education Thought Leader | I am helping School Leaders Build 21st Century Schools (check out my website for more info)
If you want to be a real leader in the 21st century, it's necessary to apologize for the mistakes you make and show how you are correcting them and moving forward. Since 2011, I have been teaching 21st century leadership skills to teachers, principals, parents and community members.
One of the key objectives of 21st century leadership skills is self-reflection. What most people don't realize about reflection skills is that you must CELEBRATE your accomplishments and achievements first BEFORE you look at the mistakes you might have made.
I try and self-reflect at least monthly. Here's what I discovered in my last self-reflection.
My Accomplishments:
My Mistakes:
Here's what I'm doing to correct those mistakes:
First, I had to take a day and admit that I need to slow down. When the Pandemic hit and every single school in America shut down, it was GO TIME for me! There was no time to waste. I have a lot of friends in the K12 system and I wanted them to know I was there for them--no matter what.
Back in 2019, I was reading and reviewing district Covid safety plans and giving advice and recommendations pro-bono to school districts across the country. I was texting with friends that are superintendents and principals about how to make sure students didn't feel disconnected or abandoned by their teachers or the school.
But it's 2022. The Pandemic is over, the crisis is behind us and I need to slow down.
When I'm in crisis mode, I tend to move very quickly. Other people can understand that because we are all in this together. But when the crisis is over, moving too quickly is actually rude and insensitive to people. That's not what I wanted to do, so that's bad on my part.
Which brings me to the next thing I'm going to correct. I was not LISTENING to what people were telling me. And as a 21st century leader, there is no excuse for NOT listening. Listening is one of the key objectives of 21st century leadership skills.
What people were telling me is that the impression I was giving online was the OPPOSITE of who I was in real life. I heard them, but I wasn't listening to what they were saying. Here again, that was a mistake on my part.
What I love about America is that everyone has the freedom to speak their mind. What happens sometimes is that we lose sight of the LISTENING part of Freedom of Speech.
Do we really have Freedom of Speech when everyone is talking over each other?
This is why doing self-reflections is part of my routine. This is why 21st century leaders MUST do reflections at least monthly. This way you can catch mistakes before they get out of hand or they tear you down.
How many times have you looked back and said, "I wish I would have known?"
That's why it's so important to do 21st century reflections. I hope you can see my reflection and apply it to your life. The purpose of my account here on LinkedIn is to help professionals GET AHEAD in their careers. If you want to make more money, get a promotion or further your career, I want to help.
And I have been doing research on how to be successful in the 21st century for the last 20 years, so I KNOW a thing or two about doing that. So why am I not just helping people?
Good question and that's what I had to answer for myself in my reflection.
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Lastly, I had to admit that my jokes are NOT landing. LOL :)
When you do accurate self-reflection there comes a moment when you must look in the mirror and be honest with yourself. When I realized that my jokes were not landing, I just laughed at myself.
That's right. I didn't laugh at you, I laughed at myself. Who am I kidding? I am not a standup comedian. Why on earth am I trying to tell jokes online? If we ever meet in person, I promise you my jokes are actually funny. But the reason they are funny is because we are laughing TOGETHER.
What happened is that I got caught up in the hysteria of social media. There are thousands of really BIG accounts on Twitter and Instagram that poke fun at teachers, schools, students and America. And for some unknown reason--that's why I self-reflected--I thought that's what I should be doing too!
The truth is that all of those accounts are pointless and harmful. Real satire forces us to look at reality and question it. Toxicity makes us look at reality and HATE it. If you look at a post, meme or joke on social media and you get mad, triggered or laugh AT the subject, not WITH THEM--that's the definition of toxic.
I was falling into that trap. And for that I am truly sorry.
I have spent the last 20+ years helping people. I have conducted more research on how to fix schools than anyone else in the country. In fact, I was recognized in 2017 as an expert 21st century educator. So why would I do the opposite on social media? It makes zero sense to me, which is why that was a huge RED FLAG when I was doing my self-reflection.
I have changed a lot of things on my account on LinkedIn. I changed the Banner Photo, I changed the About Me. And I will be posting MORE AND MORE about how you can learn from my mistakes.
My nickname is The School Doc because I analyze situations and diagnose problems. That's what I do, not TELL JOKES!! What was I thinking?
The 21st Century Self-Reflection Process
The reason I do monthly self-reflections is to uncover the issues I might not be seeing on a daily basis. As you can see, I recognized my accomplishments first. And I have done a lot of work over the last 18 months. It's important to recognize yourself. It's not like you wake up everyday and do NOTHING!! Don't minimize what you do every single day.
But it's also very important that you are fully honest with yourself about the mistakes you make. I think this self-reflection is going to unlock where I'm going.
I am a successful person. I know how to be successful as well, but that doesn't mean things come easy for me. As you can see, sometimes I move too quickly, I try to be funny, I lose sight of what I am really trying to achieve. And that can happen to anyone. Maybe it's happened to you too?
It's important you learn how to do self-reflections the right way, so that it's helpful and constructive and not destructive. The worst thing that can happen after a self-reflection is you feel defeated or negative. Then something went wrong with your self-reflection. After every self-reflection I feel inspired and motivated to do better. And I will do better, I promise!
This account is all about helping you grow and succeed in your career. That's why I'm on LinkedIn. I want to be part of the solution, not the problem. That means, I need to share more ways to help you advance your career, get a raise or a promotion or find a path to your American Dream.
If you want to follow your dreams, follow my account.
Right now, you can get access to two FREE Webinars that I did for Leaf Academy in 2021 that talked about 21st century leadership skills. They are completely FREE to watch and learn with. Both have PDF downloads and they will give you a good overview of what you need to know.
If you want to take the first step toward learning 21st century leadership skills, you can register right now for the Beginner Leadership 101 course, which will teach you the six objectives of leadership. Inside this 21st century leadership course, you will get five learning modules, five video lessons and five lesson activities. See you at Leaf Academy!