Developing a strong feedback and team culture

Even more than in other forms of education, parents at a Jenaplan school are closely involved in their children’s development. Within this type of school, Sandra Bertrand wanted to deepen the way her team of teachers worked together.

How MyDrives works

Sandra: ‘Out of personal interest, I had already come into contact with MyDrives earlier on. When I became headteacher of De Krullevaar 4.5 years ago, during the coronavirus period, I immediately asked the school board whether I could use MyDrives for the team of teachers. That was allowed. Among others, Max Stultiens, managing partner of the MyDrives MyHabits MyMatch total methodology, then took us through how MyDrives works, including an explanation of the seven-colour theory on which MyDrives is based. At the time, we also carried out individual MyDrives analyses, which were then combined into a team profile.’

Many ‘green’ teachers

Max: ‘With Sandra at the front as a true MyDrives ambassador, we recently completed a long programme to give the feedback and team culture at De Krullevaar an extra boost.’ Sandra: ‘Many of our teachers have a predominantly green, that is, social and harmonious, drive. As you might expect within education. Their conflict-avoiding nature sometimes made it difficult for them to give one another somewhat sharper feedback. Especially given the pitfall of ‘green’ people: they tend to gossip or complain when communication doesn’t go entirely as they would like. Once we had made that pitfall clear to everyone, we were able to take steps to stop falling into it.’

MyHabits

Max: ‘All the teachers then took part in the MyHabits coaching programme. MyHabits is specifically designed to break through habitual behaviour. To achieve this, one-to-one conversations were held with the teachers. They also received text messages with various assignments to support the behavioural development they themselves had in mind. For someone with a predominantly green drive, an assignment might read, for example: today, say ‘no’ to a colleague who asks you for something, without justifying yourself.’ Sandra: ‘Every now and then, as headteacher, I also have to show decisive ‘red’ behaviour. That costs me quite a bit of energy, because red is not a dominant colour in my personal colour profile. The small, concrete assignments helped me to learn new behaviour.’

Today, say ‘no’ to a colleague who asks you for something, without justifying yourself.

Better communication, collaboration and performance

Sandra: ‘Once you know which coloured lens someone else looks through, you can make use of that in a positive way. Take the planning for the new school year. Blue, the colour of highly structured people, is also an energy drain for me, so to speak. That’s why I’m happy to leave that planning to a ‘blue’ colleague who is naturally more skilled at it. All in all, the communication within our team has gained more depth through taking part in MyDrives and MyHabits. As a result, we work together better and perform better. I also promote the total methodology to other schools, by the way. They’re enthusiastic about it and pick it up straight away. That’s clear proof that the methodology works.’

AI applications and systemic coaching

Sandra: ‘Max and his colleagues are now working on adding AI applications to the total methodology. That’s hugely interesting, and it’s something I’d like to explore further in the coming period. I also want to find out whether systemic coaching could be of added value for De Krullevaar.’ Max: ‘Systemic coaching is a natural extension of the MyDrives approach of getting to know yourself better and understanding others better. From this perspective, systemic coaching looks not at individual people, but at the mutual relationships between people and a group. This is to identify what kind of dynamic prevails within that group, so that, there too, you can grow stronger as an organisation.’

High-performance organisation

Sandra: ‘Following on from that, Max and his colleagues also really know what it takes to build a high-performance organisation. That’s something we want to keep growing towards at De Krullevaar in the future. We’ll keep working together. No doubt about it.’