In this episode of Build Momentum, Sarah and Katie are joined by edtech pioneer Michael Horn. Michael is the co-founder of and a distinguished fellow at the Clayton Christensen Institute, a nonprofit think tank dedicated to Disruptive Innovation, and an adjunct lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Michael has won numerous awards for his insightful work, serves on a range of advisory boards, and is the author of books such as “From Reopen to Reinvent: (Re)creating School for Every Child,” ”Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns,” “Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools,” “Choosing College: How to Make Better Learning Decisions Throughout Your Life,” and “Goodnight Box.”
Some Questions We Ask:
In This Episode, You Will Learn:
Quotes:
“Know your expertise. Lean into that expertise. And make insights out of that expertise. That’s number 1. Second, be humble. You have a lot to learn from everyone you connect with. Third, be authentic. If a theory on which you’re drawing doesn’t have a perspective on something, say that. Know your limits.”
“I think the biggest regret in that book is that we named it “Choosing College” as opposed to something a little catchy and more encompassing—but lesson learned, right? The idea was like, ‘Hey, step back and think about what progress you're trying to make. What's the outcome you're really seeking?’ And if you can understand that, then all of a sudden, you realize college isn't the only pathway anymore to get from A to B. ”
“We're seeing more pathways open up that empower students. It's really positive. It's putting kids at the center. It's giving families more options. I think AI tools are going to create more pathways, and I think we're going to see more districts create their own pathways and portfolios of different school types that power students to learn whatever they want and to chase their dreams in exciting ways.”
Connect with Michael:
LinkedIn
Website
Books
Stay in touch with Sarah Williamson:
Free Case Study Guide
SWPR GROUP Website
LinkedIn
Stay in touch with Chad Bolser:
LinkedIn
About "The Secret to Transformational Leadership," which Sarah co-authored with Dr. Quintin Shepherd:
Transformational Leadership Secret website
Purchase the print or ebook
In this episode of Build Momentum, Sarah and Katie are joined by edtech pioneer Michael Horn. Michael is the co-founder of and a distinguished fellow at the Clayton Christensen Institute, a nonprofit think tank dedicated to Disruptive Innovation, and an adjunct lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Michael has won numerous awards for his insightful work, serves on a range of advisory boards, and is the author of books such as “From Reopen to Reinvent: (Re)creating School for Every Child,” ”Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns,” “Blended: Using Disruptive Innovation to Improve Schools,” “Choosing College: How to Make Better Learning Decisions Throughout Your Life,” and “Goodnight Box.”
Some Questions We Ask:
In This Episode, You Will Learn:
Quotes:
“Know your expertise. Lean into that expertise. And make insights out of that expertise. That’s number 1. Second, be humble. You have a lot to learn from everyone you connect with. Third, be authentic. If a theory on which you’re drawing doesn’t have a perspective on something, say that. Know your limits.”
“I think the biggest regret in that book is that we named it “Choosing College” as opposed to something a little catchy and more encompassing—but lesson learned, right? The idea was like, ‘Hey, step back and think about what progress you're trying to make. What's the outcome you're really seeking?’ And if you can understand that, then all of a sudden, you realize college isn't the only pathway anymore to get from A to B. ”
“We're seeing more pathways open up that empower students. It's really positive. It's putting kids at the center. It's giving families more options. I think AI tools are going to create more pathways, and I think we're going to see more districts create their own pathways and portfolios of different school types that power students to learn whatever they want and to chase their dreams in exciting ways.”
Connect with Michael:
LinkedIn
Website
Books
Stay in touch with Sarah Williamson:
Free Case Study Guide
SWPR GROUP Website
LinkedIn
Stay in touch with Chad Bolser:
LinkedIn
About "The Secret to Transformational Leadership," which Sarah co-authored with Dr. Quintin Shepherd:
Transformational Leadership Secret website
Purchase the print or ebook
Hello, and welcome to build momentum, a show where we explore thought leadership and education. I'm Sarah Williamson, the founder of SWPR Group.
Katie Lash:And I'm Katie Lash, the director of the East Central Educational Service Center.
Sarah Williamson:Together, we explore how to leverage key partners, your constituencies, and the media to authentically impact your organizations and the leaders who champion them. We can't wait to get started. So let's dive into today's show. Okay, on today's episode, we're so honored and thrilled to have Michael Horn with us. Michael is one of the pioneers in edtech. And we can't believe you're on our show. Thanks for joining us, Michael. Welcome.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, thanks so much for having me. It's a delight on my end,
Katie Lash:Michael, I'm excited. We've never met in person, but I know of you everyone knows of you, I do believe. But would you start off by sharing with listeners for maybe the few that don't know, tell us about your journey in education?
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, sure. You know, look, I had a public policy and writing background and frankly, went to business school to escape it as the story goes. And while there, I took Clayton Christensen's class on innovation, and he happened to have this opportunity to write a book with him about applying those ideas to public education. And through happenstance, you know, he signed me up, and we co authored what became Disrupting Class. And then, you know, he said, it'll take a year to write and then it took two years to write, and we founded the Christensen Institute together. And then like, every day, you're waking up, and you start being like, How can I help create a system in which every single student can build their passions and fulfill their human potential, and it becomes addictive, it becomes a way of life. So I led the Christensen Institute for about a decade wrote some more books than joined a venture studio that was creating education companies in both higher ed and K 12. I called Entangled Ventures, we got acquired by Guild and then I left in June of last year, and just really now spending my time on the thought leadership side, right, just trying to create more vision for people who are reinventing coming out of the pandemic, in particular, through the writing podcasts and advisory work with education organizations.
Sarah Williamson:Yeah, you're the perfect guest for the show, thought leadership and education. I love it. Okay. So, Michael, I have to tell you, when I started working at a PR agency in my 20s, in Portland at Hill & Knowlton at the time, effects learning was one of my first accounts, and the account supervisor said, you have to read this book, Disrupting Class, this required reading for doing this account. So I did, and you totally nailed it with that book. So fascinating to see. And by the way, it's so funny, I talk about this on a lot of podcasts. But at the time, online learning was the rage and pitching the CEO of Apex Learning to the media was, it was I just landed story after story after story. I mean, it was like rich for conversation, and everyone wanted to speak to her about it. And now it's oh my gosh, it's so difficult to get anyone to speak with you with all of our clients, because it's so noisy. But so funny back then, but it seems like this is a parallel moment where disrupting class was on the heels of online learning. And now we're on the heels of AI. So I want to hear what you have to say about that. What you think about what this moment in education?
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, no, I totally agree with the insight. And first, let me just say like, I should probably do the apology tour if they made you read Disrupting Class before you got started. And but I also know, you know, when you were helping Apex Learning out they had that amazing CEO, Cheryl Vedoe, is just so thoughtful and insightful about education. She was a huge help to us as well, of course, correcting some of the things we thought were right, and so forth. But yeah, I think the current moment AI, look, it's doing things that I didn't think was possible. This quickly, is what I would say, you know, the opportunity to empower students to create things. Everyone's worried about the plagiarism side, I think that's the wrong question. Like, how do we use it as a research assistant, as an editor to uplevel student work and empower students to do more and create more, I think the opportunities are incredible right now with it. And then you think about how AI is going to lower the cost and expertise required to create learning materials and content, just the ability, you know, forget about, like, sort of flat video, if you will, like we can create animations, we can create simulations, we can create, you know, yes, fake video, but like, it's amazing to all of a sudden create really low cost engaging content about nearly everything, which is further going to empower learners to be able to acquire content knowledge, then apply it on the other side with AI. So I think the opportunities are pretty revolutionary. Every student, you know, over the next odd years, it's feels like we'll have a set of tutors alongside them to help them along in their learning, which is really the you know, that was the dream, I think of disrupting class was that every student would basically have a tutor. And it now seems like it might be something that's possible. I think the big question is always is will it be in our public schools? Will they adapt? Or is this going to happen outside of schools and it's sort of the way kids will learn on their own and inform More times where maybe the emerging microscopes. I'm not sure we know the answer to that question, but I just think it's a tremendously exciting time. And we're gonna see a lot of interesting advances right now.
Sarah Williamson:Yeah, absolutely. Totally agree. I'm sure Katie has a lot to say about that.
Katie Lash:Oh, yeah. Well, I'd so funny. Just earlier today, I was on a call about I used Chat GPT this past weekend to write a grant proposal. And I was like, it was so amazing, because it didn't take away from like, I still had to put my own thoughts in it and my creativity, right, but so it didn't stop that I still had labor involved. But gosh, it was so much better when I wasn't focused on like, typing certain words versus like, I can do so much better. So anyway, we're just talking about a teacher, I was on a webinar and the teacher was sharing that she used it to write lesson plans. And she was saying how fantastic it is. And so dear question about it coming into public education, I think that it will, the question in my mind is like COVID made us shift very quickly into, like, learning tools that we probably would not honestly in some ways wouldn't have tried it unless we had to, then we had to write, the question will be in this moment. Do we have to? I don't know. So it will we move as fast and then AI itself is going to just move so fast. As soon as I learned Chat GPT, we're gonna see 50 more things. I mean, we already are seeing that like self and so fast. So I think that public education, my own opinion, is I think we'll see us try. I think can we move fast enough is the question. Right? And so, yeah, it's fascinated me.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, I largely agree with that. Yeah.
Katie Lash:Yeah. Like, why would we not try? It's so amazing. It's so amazing.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, well, that's the thing, right? Like, I just think you're gonna see teachers are already using it, they're getting the hang of it, they're realizing that, you know, I'm not one of these people that believes all jobs are going to be replaced by AI, I think the real opportunities are going to be the augmentation, humans coming alongside the AI to do amazing things. So that means we actually got to teach the kids coming through the system, the principles of these and how to use them, it doesn't mean that everyone needs to be able to build them, but to be able to use it productively, I think is going to be a key competency for the future. And so I actually, I like you, I have confidence that our schools will do that. I think the question is, will the schools make full use of empowering students with them, right? So like, if you want to race ahead, and you're learning and go at your pace, because like, you're just gobbling up the content that you in the AI powered tutor are working on? Like, that's awesome, right? Like in Sarah, you want to stop and go deep on a certain topic, because like, you're geeking out on that, and like, I'm struggling with something. So I'm gonna hang back a little bit like, we ought to have that personalization and real mastery based feel. And I think that's where, like, you know, the paradigm of the way schools have always worked, is going to clash right with this technology. And so we're just gonna have to see how that plays out. Like, will it really change as David Tyack And Larry Cuban famously said, you know, the grammar of schooling, or are we sort of going to let schooling Co-op the technology? And there's no question in my mind, though, we're going to use it and it's going to be deeper, better learning experiences at the minimum. And that's really exciting, I think for everyone.
Katie Lash:So exciting. So exciting. Well, I know you recently released a book From Reopens To Reinvent, so recreating a school for every child, I feel like that's what you're just describing, but love to understand if and how you think districts are gonna continue to innovate. Now, you went there already. But tell us about your book.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, absolutely. You're right. You're teasing the book quite well. But the message of the book was like, we all went into the pandemic, and we're like, okay, whatever comes out of this, we're not going to go back to the way things were. And then sort of piece by piece exhaustion by exhaustion, terrible school board meeting by terrible school board meeting, a lot of places sort of got sucked back to the way they were ensure they're using like digital devices or digital content to do what they might have done on a blackboard or a whiteboard before, but still, fundamentally, it's not like revolutionising a lot of the practices. And so from reopened to reinvent really is, is I would say, a cry to educators to say, here's a playbook for how you can really change the system to prioritize the success of each and every child. And half of it is like here, ideas that Michael Horn thinks would make schools better. So you alluded to it mastery based learning more social opportunities during the learning itself, more project based learning things of that nature. And then half of it is like, even if you disagree with what Michael Horn says, like each community ought to be going through this design process to really think through what do we want our students to be prepared for in the future? What's the purpose? And what are the things that we're going to have to tackle? And then a little bit of change management in the end, because I think one of the things that I perceive and I'll just pick on social emotional learning for the moment, you know, we've always accepted that social emotional learning was an important part of schools like learning executive function skills, and how to have a growth mindset as you're learning and things of that nature. But as we've tried to introduce it as a quote unquote thing or a fad, right, in some ways, we've gotten blowback on that, and so I think it's trying to help have educators say like, here's the change management process to bring your community along with you. And really figure out like how you're helping not just the students, but also the parents make progress, like, you can't treat them as something that's outside of the system. Now, you really have to innovate together. And here's a playbook for doing that for the things that are important to you.
Sarah Williamson:Yeah. And I saw you recently interviewed Kareem,
Michael B. Horn:Yes,
Sarah Williamson:I love him. He's a client of ours, Modern Classrooms Project
Michael B. Horn:H e's great. He's great. Yeah,
Sarah Williamson:He's fantastic. And he's doing a really, he has such a fascinating approach to mastery based learning. So he is, I feel like schools really need to consider adopting what he's doing, because it's transformational.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah. And he has such a good message around making it bite sized for the teachers and then creating the discomfort in the school system, right by like, hey, all your fifth grade teachers are doing mastery based learning right in their modern classrooms. And then all of a sudden, that kid gets to sixth grade. And they're like, wait a minute, why are we all learning the exact same thing at the exact same pace? Oh, like, I'm in this different place. And he's like, look, that tension, I think, is important, because we want to spark those conversations. And I think we've seen that play out in some districts like Los Altos public schools in California, they were one of the early pioneers with Khan Academy back in 2010. So back in the early era of online learning in schools, right, and they started in their fifth grade. And then pretty soon, the fourth grade teachers and parents were like, um, why are the fifth graders gonna get it? We're not. And that was great, right? It's spread through the school, that blended learning design. We've seen it in Middletown, in large city of Middletown, in New York, like similar thing. They started at a grade level in the elementary schools. And pretty soon, either side of them, they're like, wait a minute, why are the kids getting to do these things in your class? Like, how come we can't do that too, and bit by bit, they expanded out, I think they started in third grade there and then went to second and fourth, and then first and fifth. And you know, over three, four years, you've transformed school and you if you can keep it in place, then you can transform a community.
Sarah Williamson:Yeah, it's interesting, that bottom up approach, it's kind of different than that district wide implementation coming from the top. It's the teachers kind of inspiring other teachers. I love that.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah. And I think one of the big messages from, you know, one of the big messages but also a fair criticism of From Reopen To Reinvent is this is not a master plan from like, top down. Like this is not like the at scale policymakers do this, right. It's really community by community, very grassroots driven, bottoms up innovation. And I've just from what I've seen, I've just reached the conclusion, that's the only way we're going to make progress is like really having that difficult but important community conversation about what are we trying to achieve for our kids, and then building from there, frankly, once you start to build commonalities so that we're innovating with each other, not to someone and for better or worse, that's just what I've concluded is really the only way we're going to make progress is embrace that pluralism, that's part of our, you know, we have a pretty big country with a lot of people with a lot of opinions, let's embrace it instead of fight it.
Sarah Williamson:Yeah, we're gonna be uncomfortable throughout that process.
Michael B. Horn:But we are and that's okay, right. Like, we can work, we can work together. And I think if we don't start with the solution, but instead we start with, what's the real struggle we're having? Like, why is this not working for you? And really, you know, what Amanda Ripley would call deep listening really understand people's perspective, be really empathetic on that. And then we can start to say, okay, like, if that's the problem, this community over here has done this, like with this start to, you know, then we can start solution seeking to unlock progress. But I think sometimes we start with the solution before we've really all like sat with the problem together.
Sarah Williamson:So true. Are you looking to build brand awareness and expand your impact as an organization, but maybe you're struggling to find the ROI with your general marketing and PR efforts? It could it be time to try something a little different. At SWPR Group, we approach every organization through the lens of how we can help them add the most value to the conversations that are happening in education today, for one of our clients, the Institute for education, innovation, this led to the launch of Supe's choice, an award that we co created to build incredible brand awareness and his firmly established organization as an industry leader, driving impact, growth and awareness on every level. What will your success story be? Let me know when you're ready to get started. Reach out at Sarah with an H sarah@swpr-group.com. We look forward to hearing from you. Yeah, Katie, I bet you agree with that.
Katie Lash:Yeah. Michael, every time we do this, I keep thinking about I want to know you not on this call right now, because we're working on so many projects right now that are that and just like, all of the ways are the right way in some way as we do this work, right? Like there's 50 different ways to get to the right answer, and like lifting voices or what's going so well. It's so important to This like, what you're just saying what this community is doing. You don't have to do the same thing. You have to make it. It has to be grassroots. It has to be what your community needs. But also just like ideas sharing, like TED talk is not like their brand ideas were spreading. That's what this all is. Yes.
Michael B. Horn:That's what I did. That's exactly what No, but I think you're exactly right, right, like we want there is no one size fits all way to design a school, there's no one size fits all way to serve a student. There's no one size fits all way to serve a parents and family. And we've got to enjoy and embrace that multiculturalism in some ways, right of our communities. And there are a lot of really good ideas around the country. And if we can pull in tweak and adjust them for the different contexts, we can really make some cool progress. And it's not like, Oh, gee, this is the best practice for doing X. Like, that's not the right way. It's like, can we find inspiration from these different places and realize it's possible I was with a bunch of districts a few weeks ago, this point, and maybe even a couple months ago, and they were like, I just feel like no one's innovated in elementary school. And I was like, Are you kidding? Like, here's 20, you know, examples? And they're like, oh, wow, like, that's some inspiration. I was like, okay, just like, look at them and see what you want to pull from? And what's really addressing the thing that you're struggling with when you make a statement like that?
Sarah Williamson:This broad sweeping statements? Yes, exactly. I like it. Okay. So Michael, while we're on the topic of all of your books, your many books, I know, you also authored a book on Choosing College and making better life learning choices. So I would love to talk about how we're seeing this shift in what students are doing post high school and these new pathways that are developing. So I would love to hear your thoughts about that.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, it's so interesting right now, right? Because like COVID hit and all of a sudden, over a million students didn't show up to college, basically, over a couple years. And some of them we're not totally sure what's happened. So we're trying to figure that out. I suspect a lot of them jumped into the workforce, frankly, because really, all of a sudden, this moment, yeah, we're I mean, we're in this moment, right? Where, like, employers cannot hire enough people rapidly, right? It's a really interesting time. And then all these alternative pathways started emerging. And they've been emerging to be fair for a decade now. But they've started it feels like to become more mainstream. And I think what's happening is this families of all stripes, like I hear it in my cushy, Harvard, MIT professor community of Lexington, Massachusetts, and I hear it when I'm on the road, families coming up to me and being like, college is so expensive. Is this what I need to do for my kid? And I think the answer is maybe not because there's college alternatives that emerged like Marcy labs school out of Brooklyn, or some of these boot camp programs that maybe stack into a college over time, but don't start that way, or apprenticeship programs that are emerging, or frankly, just like getting some work. And then some of these employers now pay for college or other educational programs. And you can start to stack these different industry certifications in a variety of ways. So you know, you start with a Salesforce administrator certificate, you move into Facebook marketing, you move into like, you can start to piece these things together in different ways to really represent a set of skills that you're acquiring, and then actual work experience. And so I think we're starting to see that. And, you know, frankly, when we wrote choosing college, it wasn't just about college at the time, we were already pointing to a lot of these college alternatives. So I think the biggest regret in that book is that we named it choosing college as opposed to something a little catchy and more encompassing, but lesson learned, right? But I think the idea was like, hey, step back and think about what do you try it, like, what's the progress you're trying to make? What's the outcome you're really seeking. And if you can understand that, then all of a sudden, you realize college isn't the only pathway anymore to get from A to B. And I think the really exciting thing is that Americans are starting to pick up on that. And it's not that a college degree might not be important, at some point. It's not that a college degree is not valuable. I think once you have it, it is quite valuable. But it's also the case that we know like almost 50% of students don't complete a four year degree within six years. It costs a lot of money. And like, if that's going to be you, that's a really bad investment, you'd be way better off going through one of these certificate programs, apprenticeships, getting some real work experience, learning about what you like and don't like, and then getting some more skills on top of that. And that can be a very rewarding path as well. And, you know, I hope the country becomes more embracing of it, frankly. Yeah,
Sarah Williamson:I couldn't agree more.
Katie Lash:We definitely have I mean, certain situation, my husband, I were just talking about this, right. Like we were of the era of like, everybody is going to college, you don't really have a choice. And obviously our families instilled the pieces of that in us too. Right. But and I think it was the right answer for both of us as educators and whatnot. But all of that to say like, it's not the choice for everyone, and so many folks in that era when it shouldn't have gone and that's okay, that is okay. And now they're facing, like student loan debt problems that they get Get out of that they've never even used it anyway, because we knew we knew in high school, like not all of us need to do, right. But anyway, it's so interesting to reflect on that, like the shifts and the eras of which this has been message differently and how that really did influence how schools behaved, and therefore how students behave. It's so interesting, but sorry, as we talked about that that's a whole other conversation for a different day. But as we talked about this, what are you most hopeful about where we're going in education and what we can achieve? And to support student learning? What do you see?
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, I mean, I get really excited, because I think going back to your first question about AI, right, like, we're seeing more pathways open up that empowers students. And I think there's been this whole micro school movement in the K 12 realm, that I think it's really positive. Like it's putting kids at the center, it's putting families and giving them more options, I think the AI tools are going to create more pathways, I think we're going to see at some point more districts respond, frankly, and create their own pathways and portfolios of different school types, which will be or, you know, schools within schools, right, that power students to really have more ability to learn whatever they want, and to really chase those dreams and some exciting ways. And then that extends all the way into the post secondary space, like you said, right, there is going to be college still. And that's going to be a fantastic choice for many people. And it's not that we're saying it's bad. But there are other pathways that we ought to embrace as well. And I think we're just going to see a flourishing of them, which from my druthers, that's really exciting. And I guess the other piece of it, I think, is, you know, what people worry about is that in the 1960s, and 70s, and so forth, when we sort of had other pathways for kids, we often segmented those by gender, or by race, or by income level. And we said, oh, you can go to the VOC tech. And, you know, you because you're a white male, like you get to go on to college, right, or something like that. And I think the really exciting moment about now is like, we don't need to make these like rigid groove, like designations of someone. And I argue, every single student in high school ought to be having career and vocational exposure, like they don't want to be everyone. So that even if they do the college thing, like they're going in with a much clearer idea of what really gives me energy, you know, what might I want to do? Like, what is my purpose, right? And things like that. And they get to make the choice, not some counselor or teacher to say, like, actually, that's not the pathway for me, I've met other people, I've built social capital, and I'm gonna go this other pathway. But I think the really exciting thing is that increasingly, because of all the tools out there, we can empower students to make those choices themselves.
Sarah Williamson:Absolutely. For sure. I'm a graduate of a CDC program where career Vocational Center where I took auto mechanics while I was in school, I was fun, learn how to change tires,
Michael B. Horn:I'm a little jealous that you know, so.
Sarah Williamson:Okay, so I want to finish up, oh, what Katie, are we gonna say,
Katie Lash:I was gonna share, I like personal passion project, my husband, and I own an old historic building, and like, I really need to find brick masons. And that is like, where are they? Right? And like, I will pay them golds. Because like, that is going to be a much better paying gig. But where are they? So anyway, I just reflect on that, like we do, are the folks that are in some of those roles are aging out, and we're gonna need them. And somebody who needs that moment has set themselves up for a lifetime of a lot of success. So just things you don't think about? We're seeing that moment right now.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, and I agree. And I think in society, we've done we shortchange those folks, right, we sort of say that the knowledge that they build is somehow lesser, I don't know, like the ability to lay a foundation and create an entire structure. I don't know about you, that seems like incredibly useful, and the sense of, you know, skills and art and architecture, and like all the things that come together in that, like their observations. As you all know, I'm having my house renovated right now, like the conversations with those guys on the job and like their insights about how to think about space and how you move through space. Like, it's brilliant. I wish I could think the way that they did. And so we just I think it stinks that we have, in some ways, look down our nose at those occupations over the last generation. I'm not sure we did before that but over the last generation, to your point, Katie, like we have the college for all sorts of mentality I think we did. And that's really a shame, I think.
Sarah Williamson:Exactly. Well, I want to finish up with one final question about thought leadership and education. Michael, you have done some incredible things throughout your career. You've really built a powerful platform where you share your message and other people listen, do you have insights that you can share for the listeners of this podcast, leaders of companies, leaders with school districts who are looking to build their own profiles? Any thoughts or perspectives on that?
Michael B. Horn:That's a great question. You know, In some ways I was just so lucky because I got to stand on the theories of a literal and figurative giant and Clay Christensen, right, that sort of gave us some perspective on what we were talking about. And so I think that's part of it is like, know, your expertise, lean into that expertise, and then make insights out of that expertise is number one. Number two, I think is, this is I don't know, it comes from Clay, like his example. Be humble, like you have a lot to learn from everyone that you connect with. And if you can take in the information and listen and ask good questions. That's just more information you gain for your next talk, your next article that you put out whatever your platform is, right, like you gain so much insight from listening and embracing the ideas of others. And then third, I would say, be authentic. And I don't just mean to you, but if like, you know, the theory on which you're drawing or the research that you use your lens on the world doesn't have a perspective on something like say it? You know, that's a really good question. I don't have a perspective on it, sort of know your limits, and then really dig in. But I think those are the three things that I would say, I know, there's some thought leaders out there that make their buck out of vilifying the other. I just don't think that's what we're trying to do. I think everyone brings something to the table in this pursuit, and I get it. Some interests work against others, but like, I think they have good interests at heart. We just have to understand them more deeply and then reorient the organizations or models in which they work.
Sarah Williamson:Great answer. Oh, it's been such a pleasure having you on the show today, Michael, thank you. Where can our listeners find you and most importantly, buy your books?
Michael B. Horn:Oh, well, I love that the books are obviously on Amazon From Reopen To Reinvent. Choosing College, or wherever you buy your books, there's the indie booksellers. And Barnes and Noble probably wants a shout out. But those are the easiest ways. If it's a district leader, I should say. And is a bulk purchase, contact me I'm happy to work on bulk rates and things of that nature to get a little less money on the book price. And then in to follow me, you know, my substack future of education, Michael B. Horn is probably a great way. You can sign up for that at my website, MichaelBHorn.com. Or on Twitter, things like that are are always you can keep up with the latest and greatest. And frankly, I've just had a blast, not just getting to talk to folks like you but also getting to lift up the voices of all these entrepreneurs and people like Kareem doing amazing stuff. You've learned a ton from those conversations. So if others get something out of it great. I certainly get a ton out of it. So selfishly, I get to keep doing it.
Sarah Williamson:I love it. Oh, thanks so much, Michael, thanks for joining us.
Michael B. Horn:Yeah, thank you.
Sarah Williamson:If you're looking for more of this thought leadership goodness for your organization, you're in the right place. Visit us at swpr-group.com To learn more about how we work with education organizations and their leaders, superintendents and influencers to increase your impact. Again, that's swpr-group.com. Thanks for tuning in today and we will see you next time on Build Momentum.