Momentum: get your mass moving!

Momentum is a powerful tool for a leader; if you can get it going in the direction you want it to go. It can also be your foe if you it is going the wrong direction and you are not able to stop it. As a school leader, you can see this happening often. An initiative comes along that really makes sense, it’s working and people can see the results. The more people join in, the more the movement picks up steam and you are really move it. The effort has gained momentum. You can also see something fall apart and spin out of control even faster.

Sir Issac Newton’s first law of motion is: an object in motion, tends to stay in motion. Momentum is defined as mass times velocity. The more mass you get moving, the stronger the momentum, Think of a freight train that weighs millions of pounds. The heavy engines take time to build up speed, and once its move it, the system is very efficient to move heavy freight long distances. But all that mass moving at 60-80 miles an hour does not turn or stop well. Train tracks are engineered for wide turns and long stop times to come to a stop. It’s because of the momentum that has been created.

Jim Collin’s applied this principal in Good to Great when he described the fly wheel. That large heavy object in a machine that take effort to get moving, but once it does, takes less to maintain and its mass carry’s the momentum. The leader just needs to apply regular pressure on that wheel to keep it in motion.

Here are a few examples to illustrate the principle:

I was a school superintendent in a rather remote California rural district when the pandemic of 2020 started. I had heard about the illness in other parts of the world and was watching it progress. Then in March of 2020, like a wave that swept the earth, everything came to a halt. Even though the science and recommendations about exposure were given, the fear overtook everything and schools closed. In my county, there were two cases of people that had visited another country and those two were isolated. It did not matter, everything closed instantly. Fast forward 18 months and that closed state took massive energy to get us reopened. We had to create momentum in a positive direction to reopen our schools. By March of 2022, the mask mandate in California was lifted and schools were starting to appear more normal. That momentum has taken another 3-4 years of effort to return to pre-pandemic levels Unfortunately, not everything has and some progress has slowed to a “new normal”.

However, there are other great examples of momentum where the right effort at right time has propelled us forward. In my current superintendent role, my district has instituted system-wide both Professional Leaning Communities (PLC) initiative and the Multi-Tiered System of Support (MTSS). And, these were done at the same time, and completely with all the bells and whistles. After two years of focus and no other major initiative, the momentum is picking up. All the indicators are going on in the right direction. We just need to keep pushing the “fly-wheel” to keep the momentum going the right way. This also means, we don’t let up, and we don’t fall asleep at the wheel.

Leaders will find that if you can get a positive mass moving the direction you need it to go, all you have to do is keep giving it a little and persistent nudge in that direction. Velocity will come, but you have to get that mass moving.