COSERE | 89 Problem-solving models adapted to school leadership General problem-solving models must be modified to consider factors unique to educational environments as well as school leadership-specific strategies. • The School Improvement PDCA Cycle The Plan-Do-Check-Act Cycle is a simple 4-step methodology that is based on, as its name suggests, a continuous loop of planning, doing, checking, and acting. The PDCA Cycle was developed by management consultant Dr. William Edwards Deming back in the 1950s to identify why some processes were not working as hoped. Since then, his methodology has become highly popular for formulating theories about what needs to change and testing them in a continuous feedback loop. It is still used today by a wide range of organisations, including school institutions. Planning: defining the problem and a hypothesis about possible causes and solutions. • Identify and understand the problem at stake. • Explore the information available and try to seek more information by surveying stakeholders involved in the problem at stake. • Define a potential solution and the objectives you want to reach to consider the problem as resolved. Make them measurable, as you will return to them in the Checking stage. Doing: piloting the potential solution. • Test out the potential solution to understand whether your proposed changes can enable you to achieve the desired outcome. At first, favour a small-scale pilot experiment. • Gather feedback that evaluates the effectiveness of changes. They will be useful in the next step. Checking: evaluating the results. • Analyse your pilot project’s results based on the criteria that you elaborated in the Planning phase. Evaluate whether you met your objectives or not. • If you consider your objectives were not met, go back to the step Planning and carry out other hypotheses of causes and solutions. Conversely, if you estimate you met your objectives, move to the next step, Acting.
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