Handbook 9-22-01.

doc
Chapter prepared for publication
In Leithwood et al.,
The Handbook of Research in Educational Leadership and Administration Vol. II
9/22/01

What Do You Call People with Visions?

The Role of Vision, Mission and Goals in School Leadership and Improvement

Philip Hallinger
Vanderbilt University
and
Ronald H. Heck
University of Hawaii at Manoa

Abstract

Numerous reviews of studies of school leadership, school effectiveness, school improvement

and organizational change cite vision, goals and mission as key factors explaining the differential
effectiveness of organizations. Thus scholars have frequently called for school leaders to
develop clear school missions and to exercise visionary leadership. Policymakers have
mandated school leaders to implement accountability systems based on goal-setting and
appraisal.
Yet, despite the predominance of these strategies it remains unclear how to approach this
domain of research and practice. Both in research and practice these three related terms are often
used synonymously. In this chapter we assert that this tendency ignores the different theoretical
foundations and assumptions underlying these constructs. Moreover, we further contend that
researchers have unwittingly colluded in this by failing to provide sufficiently clear operational
distinctions among the terms.
This chapter seeks to provide conceptual clarity and methodological direction to the topic of
schools goals by reviewing theoretical and empirical research. The review covers literature on
vision, mission and goals from education, public and private sectors. We also provide an
illustrative analysis that seeks to show a promising direction for the future study of these
constructs. The chapter concludes by reaffirming the theoretical and practical potential of this set
of variables, but also calls for more systematic distinction among these constructs in future
empirical studies.

Throughout the 20th century, research on organizations focused attention on the role of
vision, mission and goals in organizational effectiveness (Barnard, 1938; Drucker, 1995;
Gouldner, 1959; Gulick, 1948; Kotter, 1996). During the second half of the century, educational
scholars found that instructional outcomes are enhanced when staff have clear goals and
maintain a sense of common purpose (Deal & Peterson, 1990; Edmonds, 1979; Leithwood, 1994;
Purkey & Smith, 1985). Similarly, studies of successful corporations often report a clear
mission--goals that are understood and shared by participants (Deal & Kennedy, 1982; Peters &
Waterman, 1982).
At a general level of discussion, these findings are intuitively sensible; however, closer
examination suggests that the concept of an organizational goal is not so easily captured (Perrow,
1961, 1968). Indeed, research confirms that organizational goals often do not conform to the
image presented by the excellence and effectiveness studies especially in schools and private
sector organizations (March & Olsen, 1976; Weick, 1982).
Scholars operating from alternative frameworks characterize goals, especially in schools,
as multiple, ambiguous, unstable, and often conflicting. In an earlier review of the principals
role in school effectiveness and improvement, Hallinger and Heck concluded:
[U]nder the conceptual heading of purposes, researchers included a wide
variety of operational measures: teachers educational expectations, the
framing of educational purposes, principals clarity in articulating a
vision, the substance of the schools mission, consensus on goals, and the
principals role in goal- setting processes. . . . Yet, researchers often used
vision, mission, and goals synonymously in discussions of leadership.
They also tended to operationalize them quite differently in empirical
investigation. This lack of conceptual clarity is problematic in that the
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terms have different theoretical foundations and point towards alternate

conceptualizations of how leaders influence school outcomes. (1996, p.
32)

In this paper, we seek to unpack the alternate conceptual foundations of vision, mission, and
goals as bases for understanding school effectiveness and school improvement. Literature from
both business and education sectors forms the basis for the review. In addition to examining the
theoretical basis for these terms, we also review empirical data in order to better illuminate the
different roles these concepts play in efforts to promote school improvement.
Readers are, however, forewarned that the empirical literature is often of limited assistance
for the very reason that researchers have not defined the constructs clearly. As part of this
review, therefore, we also offer examples of directions in which this research might proceed. In
our first example, we use structural equation modeling to re-analyze a study on leadership
influence, organizational functions, and outcomes. In our second example, we demonstrate the
use of multilevel modeling with longitudinal data in a study where we attempt to link school
effectiveness and school improvement research.

Vision, Mission and Goals in School Improvement:

Conceptual Issues
In this section we begin the process of unpacking the conceptual foundations of these
related terms. We assert that until scholars distinguish more clearly among these terms and their
underlying assumptions, it will be difficult to craft appropriate strategies for either empirical
study or practice.
The Role of Vision in School Improvement
3

What do you call people who have visions? a) insane, b) religious fanatics, c) poets, d)
mystics, e) leaders. Depending on your frame of reference, one or all of the above would be
correct. After decades of mistrust concerning notions of charismatic leadership, a new notion of
visionary leadership crept into popularity during the 1980s and 1990s. This was often termed
transformational leadership by proponents (e.g., Bass, 1985; Leithwood, 1994). This approach
to leadership sought to describe and explain the manner by which organizational and political
leaders appeared to profoundly influence their constituencies. Its application has spread beyond
the political arena into business and schools. A central facet of transformational leadership is the
notion of vision.
Vision as an avenue of influence in school improvement. Personal vision refers to the values
that underlie a leaders view of the world, and in this case, education. The use of the word vision
is not accidental. A vision enables one to see facets of school life that may otherwise be unclear,
raising their importance above others.
The foundation of vision is moral or spiritual in nature. For example, the use of vision in
religious contexts suggests the notion of a sacred calling from within the individual. While
secular education disavows formal religious practice in schools, education itself remains
fundamentally a sacred craft in which we offer service to others. Education is a moral enterprise
(Barth, 1990; Bolman & Deal, 1992a; Deal & Peterson, 1990; Fullan, 1993; Fullan &
Hargreaves, 1992; Hallinger, 1996; Sergiovanni, 1992).
A vision, by its nature is a source of inspiration for ones life work. It is not by nature
measurable or bound to a timeline. It draws its power as a well-spring of personal motivation that
can act as a catalyst to action for oneself and potentially for others.

Roland Barth (1993), among the most articulate proponents of vision as an inspiration for
educational leadership, claims that personal visions grow out of the values we hold most dearly.
He suggests several questions that may clarify an educator's personal vision:

In what kind of school would you wish to teach?

What brought you into education in the first place?

What are the elements of the school that you would want your own children to
attend?

What would the school environment in which you would most like to work look like,
feel like, and sound like?

If your school were threatened, what would be the last things that you would be
willing to give up?

On what issues would you make your last stand? (Barth, 1996, personal
communication)

The power of a personal vision lies both in its impact on one's behavior and its potential to
energize others. A clearly formed personal vision shapes our actions, invests our work with
meaning, and reminds us why we are educators. When a personal vision is shared by others, it
can become a catalyst for transformation (Barth, 1990; Bolman & Deal, 1992a, 1996; Hallinger,
1996).
Empirical study of vision. The inspirational facet of a personal vision received the most
attention in the earlier leadership literature, especially in the context of charismatic leadership.
More recent scholarship in educational leadership, however, has identified additional avenues
through which vision may have an impact on schools. This has focused on the transformational
model of school leadership (e.g., Leithwood, 1994; Leithwood et al., 1998; Silins, 1994). For
example, research on administrative problem-solving links personal vision to expertise in
5

problem solving and decision-making (e.g., Hallinger, Leithwood, & Murphy, 1993; Leithwood,
Begley, & Cousins, 1990, 1992; Leithwood & Steinbach, 1995).
Teachers and principals make thousands of decisions daily, often without the data needed to
make informed choices. Leithwood and colleagues found that leaders with clearly articulated
personal values are often more effective problem-solvers. When tackling the messy problems
often faced in schools, the visionary leader's values became substitutes for information
(Leithwood et al., 1992). Clearly defined personal values allowed principals to identify important
features hidden within swampy problem situations. This provides a sounder basis on which to
formulate solutions. It is also enabled the principals to take a more consistent approach to solving
diverse problems by linking problem interpretation to core values.
Personal vision has also been identified as an important facet underlying organizational
learning (Caldwell, 1998; Hallinger, 1998; Leithwood, 1994; Leithwood, Jantzi, & Steinbach,
1998; Senge, 1990). Within the model of a learning organization, the capacity of a school to
learn new ways of thinking and practicing is tied intimately to its capacity to envision a new
future. As Leithwood and colleagues note, This dimension [vision] encompasses practices on
the part of the leader aimed at identifying new opportunities for his or her school and developing
(often collaboratively), articulating and inspiring others with a vision of the future (p. 80).
Vision becomes an especially important condition underlying organizational learning
during times of rapid change (Drucker, 1995; Hallinger, 1998; Kotter, 1996; Senge, 1990). Those
changes that most influence schools today originate in the environment (e.g., technology,
migration trends, system and government policies). This suggests that in the future principals and
other school leaders will need to focus at least as much attention outside the schoolhouse as
inside. School leaders must be able to discern emerging trends in the environment and link these
future possibilities with past traditions within their organizations.
6

This will become an increasingly necessary function of school leadership as the pace and
scope of change quicken in the environment of schools. Moreover, if responsibility for school
management continues to devolve to the schoolhouse, principals will need to take on even more
of CEO-like functions. Primary among these is visioning: looking ahead to the future and
scanning the environment for change forces coming to schools from the outside (Bolman &
Deal, 1992a, 1992b; Deal & Peterson, 1990; Hallinger, 1996, 1998; Leithwood, 1994).
Caldwell (1998) draws a similar linkage between the personal vision of a school leader,
school learning, and school improvement. He refers to a variety of dataquantitative and
qualitativesuggesting the importance of vision, though he emphasizes the need to use a small
v in referring to the concept. To support this view, Caldwell references research conducted by
Johnston (1997) on learning focused leadership. In the context of her case study, Johnston
described the role of vision.
The principal was clearly influential but, at the same time, was regarded
as a team player. She was particularly adept at demonstrating what the
current reality was while exposing the school to a vision of what could
be. She articulated the creative tension gap and indicated the way
forward. In the process the school was infused with an energy and
optimism not often seen in schools at this time. The idea that all within
the school should be leaders captures the notion of leadership of teams. .
. (Johnston, 1997, p. 282; cited in Caldwell, 1998, p. 374)
Caldwell (1998) also notes research conducted by Hill and colleagues (Hill & Rowe, 1996)
that provides further support for vision as an important construct in understanding school
improvement:

Hill contends that principals have a central, if indirect role by

helping to create the pre-conditions for improvement in
classrooms, including setting direction, developing commitment,
building capacity, monitoring progress and constructing
appropriate strategic responses (Hill, cited in Caldwell, 1998, p.
372).
Several other studies have also demonstrated the role of vision in school improvement. For
example, Mayronwetz and Weinstein (1999) determined that vision was important in the
successful adoption of change. They found that redundant leadership performance by individuals
in different organizational roles demonstrated a widely-shared vision for successful change
efforts. Moreover, Leithwood and colleagues (1998) determined that vision building affected
school culture. More specifically, leadership helped to foster the acceptance of group goals.
Kleine-Kracht (1993) also found that one successful means of principal influence on the staff
was through building consensus surrounding the schools program and its goals for
improvement.
A vision can also identify a path to a new future, a strategic dimension of leadership. A
vision can assist a leader in becoming a more effective problem solver by helping to sort and find
the most important problems. Finally, a vision can identify the critical paths for change and
organizational learning. Although, this discussion has focused specifically on the vision of the
school leader, it is readily apparent that vision connects quite directly to the second related
construct, organizational mission.
Organizational Mission in School Improvement
An organizational mission exists when the personal visions of a critical mass of people
cohere in a common sense of purpose within a community. Several characteristics of a mission
8

are notable here. First, like "vision," the word "mission" derives from the religious sector and
connotes a moral purpose or sacred quest. The spiritual element of a mission fulfills a human
need for meaning and purpose that transcends organizational types. It is the moral character of a
mission that reaches into the hearts of people and engages them to act on behalf of something
beyond their own immediate self-interest. The power of a mission lies in the motivational force
of engaging in a shared quest to accomplish something special, not just in having a productivity
target. In education, it is not uncommon for teachers to feel a calling to their work, again
connoting a mission or moral challenge.
Mission as an avenue of influence in school improvement. In the general organizations
literature, mission is sometimes referred to as cathectic goals. As suggested in the foregoing
discussion of mission, cathectic goals are symbolic (Bolman & Deal, 1992a, 1992b, 1996). In
theory mission serves as a source of identification and motivation for a group of participants
(Deal & Peterson, 1990; Dornbusch & Scott, 1975; Hallinger, 1996).
Cathectic goals stand in contrast to cognitive goals, which describe timelines and
measurable ends that may be achieved. A mission is first and foremost a symbolic expression of
the organization's values (Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Deal & Peterson, 1990; Peters & Waterman,
1982; Steiner, 1979). As a symbolic statement of purpose, the organization's mission is generally
articulated in an overarching fashion. By doing so leaders can encompass a relatively wide range
of organizational interests and values (Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Bolman & Deal, 1992b, 1996;
Deal & Peterson, 1990; Drucker, 1995; Kotter, 1996; Mintzberg, 1998; Perrow, 1968; Weick,
1976, 1982).
The theoretical basis for understanding the power of mission lies in human motivation
(Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Bolman & Deal, 1996; Cartwright & Zander, 1968; Drucker, 1995;
Handy, 1994). Organizational theorists posit the constructs of compliance and commitment as
9

contrasting factors in human behavior (Mohr, 1973; Warriner, 1965). It is relatively easy for
managers to force staff to comply with simple rules and regulations. However, in the absence of
sustained pressure, individual and group behavior often reverts to its previous state or displaces
the defined goal in favor of alternative goals (Grusky, 1959; Fullan 1993; Lindblom, 1959;
March & Olsen, 1976; Meyer & Rowan, 1977; Perrow, 1968; Raia, 1965; Ridgeway, 1956;
Warriner, 1965; Weick, 1976, 1982)
Achieving commitment to group goals, while more difficult, is generally viewed as a key
factor in organizational effectiveness (Cuban, 1984a, 1984b; Drucker, 1995; Mohr, 1973;Kotter,
1996; Perrow, 1968; Senge, 1990; Steiner, 1979; Warriner, 1965; Weick, 1976, 1982). Where a
mission exists, staff will take greater responsibility for managing their own behavior and making
decisions consistent with common norms (Given, 1994; Jacobsson & Pousette, 2001; Jantzi &
Leithwood, 1993; Larson-Knight, 2000; Leithwood et al., 1998; Senge, 1990; Silins, Mulford,
Zarins, & Bishop, 2000).
This type of commitment to a shared vision of education has been a hallmark of the school
effectiveness and improvement literature of the past two decades. For the purposes of
understanding school improvement, we are especially interested in how shared vision mission - develops and is sustained. An organizational mission may emerge from varying sources. The
catalyst may be the personal vision of an individual leader (Bolman & Deal, 1992a, 1996; Deal
& Peterson, 1990; Hallinger, 1996). Alternatively, it may emerge over time out of the shared
experiences and aspirations of a community of people (Barth, 1990; Fullan, 1993).
Barth (1990) eloquently argues that a mission must symbolize what is in the hearts of the
staff, students and parents if a leader is to expect whole-hearted commitment. As an example, he
asserts that teachers and principals do not jump out of bed and rush to their classrooms to teach
to, practice for, and remediate after standardized tests. In other words, the cognitive goal of
10

raising student test scores, while a legitimate statement of an organizational goal or objective,
does not represent a mission. It is not a symbolic statement of values that will inspire and
motivate the people responsible for its achievement. Thus, Barth stresses the linkage between the
source of school goals, the resulting commitment towards shared action, and their subsequent
achievement.
Other scholars writing on school improvement emphasize the manner by which a shared
vision may grow and be maintained over time within the culture of a school (Crandall et al.,
1986; Deal & Peterson, 1990; Fullan, 1993; Fullan & Hargreaves, 1991; Larson-Knight, 2000;
Leithwood et al., 1994, 1996, 1998; Marks et al., 2000; Seashore-Louis & Miles, 1990;
Rosenholtz, 1989; Sheppard & Brown, 2000; Silins et al., 2000; Stoll & Fink, 1992, 1994). For
example, Crandall and colleagues (1986) argue that commitment to change often grows through
the active engagement of staff in common activities. A shared vision or mission may then
emerge out of collegial activity. This observation lies in contrast to the earlier prescriptive
literature that assumed that goals must be defined first at the top of the organization.
Internationally, a number of projects have examined the role of shared vision in school
improvement. The Effective Schools Project in Ontario (Stoll & Fink, 1992, 1994) began as an
attempt to bring in the results of school effective research into schooling practices in Canada. In
improving schools, attention was paid to developing clear decision-making structures that
emphasized collaborative planning, risk taking, and the development of a shared vision for the
schools future (Teddlie & Reynolds, 2000).
Similarly, in the early 1990s, the Improving the Quality of Education for All (IQEA) project
involved 40 schools in Great Britain (Hopkins & Ainscow, 1993). The projects mission focused
on building conditions in schools that can sustain improvement in the teaching-learning process
(i.e., building organizational capacity). The project was built around six propositions including
11

clear vision shared by all and leadership that is distributed to a number of individuals and groups,
identified priorities and planning around those priorities, stakeholder involvement, staff
development, coordination and communication processes, and inquiry and reflection (Hopkins &
Ainscow, 1993).
This emergence of a shared vision about the schools mission may even occur in the absence
of strong leadership (Deal & Peterson, 1990; Fullan, 1993; Fullan & Hargreaves, 1992;
Kleine-Kracht, 1993; Larson-Knight, 2000; Smylie & Hart, 1999). Contrary to the earlier thrust
of this literature, personal visions of the future are not the exclusive domain of principals or other
formal leaders (Barth, 1993). Fullan and Hargreaves assert, the vision of the principal should
not drown out the voices of the teachers (p. 32).
Leithwood and colleagues (1998) provide empirical support for the balancing act that leaders
play in fostering a shared vision:
This leadership dimension . . . [is] aimed at promoting cooperation among
staff and assisting them to work together toward common goals. Although
there was at least one teacher comment from every school affirming their
principals role in goal [mission] development, most of the comments
simply indicated that the principal initiated the process, was a member of
the goal-setting committee, or asked for input. . . One of the teachers in
that school said, we all seem to want the same things. . . were kind of
working towards the same goals. (p. 72)
This same point is also made time and again in the general leadership literature of the past
decade. Influential writers such as Bass (1985), Drucker (1995), Hamel (1997), Kotter (1996),
and Peters (1987) have all emphasized the linkage between rapid environment change and the
limitations this imposes on a unitary conception of leadership. For example, Hamel claims: In
12

fact, its at the top of the organization that people are most blind. One of the challenges is that
top management is learning slower than the world is changing. So we have to look to others for
that creative spark. It is difficult to predict where it will come (Hamel, 1997, p. 5)
Empirical study of mission. Research on successful business organizations also notes the
importance of a clear organizational mission. Successful organizations have a coherent set of
values that are known to members of the organization and its environment. This value set defines
the principles for which the organization stands. Peters and Waterman (1982) found that
"virtually all of the [successful] companies ... had a well-defined set of guiding beliefs" (p. 281).
In successful companies, the mission is broadly defined, allowing room for innovation within a
general framework. As they argue, "The power of the value is in large measure that it encourages
practical innovation to carry out its spirit to the full" (p. 56). This finding was supported by other
work in the corporate sector (Bass, 1985; Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Deal & Kennedy, 1982;
Drucker, 1995; Kotter, 1996; OToole, 1995; Schein, 1996).
Mission first received emphasis as a fundamental component of the schooling process
through publication of the effective schools studies in the 1970s and 1980s (Brookover &
Lezotte, 1979; Edmonds, 1979; Edmonds & Frederiksen, 1978; Rutter et al., 1979). The early
studies within this literature referred to the schools mission in a variety of terms: establishment
of performance standards, clear focus on basic skills, general agreement on program,
commitment to student achievement, explicit and recognizable focus on instruction, clearly
stated goals and objectives, emphasis on accomplishing reading and math objectives, staff
consensus on the values and aims of the school as a whole, general sense of educational purpose,
and pervasive and broadly understood instructional focus (Hallinger & Heck, 1996a). In all
cases, however, the idea was conveyed that successful schools have an orientation that focuses
staff attention on improving student learning.
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In more recent years, researchers have continued to study the contribution of mission to
school improvement, employing a variety of methods and theoretical assumptions (Hallinger &
Heck, 1996a, 1996b, 1998). Thus, a considerable body of empirical studies has accumulated
since 1980 which incorporated school mission as a focal variable in effective program
implementation and academic improvement (Andrews & Soder, 1987; Bamburg & Andrews,
1990; Brewer, 1993; Caldwell, 1998; Cheng, 1991a, 1991b, 1994; Edmons, 1979, 1982;
Edmonds & Frederiksen, 1978; Goldring & Pasternak, 1994; Hallinger & Murphy, 1986;
Hallinger, Bickman & Davis, 1996; Heck, 1992, 1993; Heck & Brandon, 1995; Heck et al.,
1991; Heck & Marcoulides, 1996; Hill & Rowe, 1996; Janzti & Leithwood., 1993; Krug, 1992;
Leithwood, 1994; Leithwood et al., 1990, 1993 1998; Seashore-Louis & Miles, 1990;
Marcoulides & Heck, 1993; Pang, 1998; Rosenholtz, 1990; Sammons et al., 1995; Scott &
Teddlie, 1987; Silins, 1994; Uline, Miller, & Tschannen-Moran, 1998).
Goldring and Pasternak (1994) found that the principals role in framing school goals,
establishing a clear mission, and gaining staff consensus were stronger predictors of school
outcomes than other instructional or managerial activities (e.g., allocation of time, control or
influence). Notably, within their framework, goals were conceived more broadly than simply as
academic achievement. The important variables included emphasizing good citizenship, personal
growth, good work habits and learning skills among students and securing staff agreement about
educational goals.
Hallinger and colleagues (1996) found that establishing a clear school mission was a key
avenue through which principals influence school effectiveness. In their study principal
leadership was significantly related to the presence of a clear school mission. It was through this
avenue that principals shaped teachers expectations and students opportunity to learn in the
school. Both academic focus and staff consensus were conceptualized as part of a constellation
14

of systemic variables comprising school mission. This path of indirect effects had a measurable
impact on the reading achievement at the elementary school level.
Additional supporting evidence for the importance of this component to productivity is
provided by Leithwood (1994), Jantzi and Leithwood (1993), Heck (1993), Krug (1992), Bolman
and Deal (1992a), Pang, (1998), and Uline et al. (1998). These studies reinforce the key role
principals play in coordinating the schools mission, with its goals, its curriculum, and a plan to
assess attainment of its goals. Moreover, in the Brewer (1993) and Hallinger et al. (1996) studies,
high performance expectations emerged as a potentially potent source of influence on outcomes.
These variables were related to the principals ability to stimulate innovation and flexibility as
well as to higher productivity in terms of restructuring the organizations goals and achieving
school outcomes.
Similarly, Uline and colleagues (1998) tested a structural model that examined the
relationship of leadership to effectiveness and found that expressive activities of school leaders
(i.e., sense of mission, goal setting, goal attainment) were positively related to school
effectiveness. Krug (1992) also found that mission was one leadership area that was positively
related to teacher satisfaction and student commitment to learning. Moreover, Bolman and Deal
(1992a) noted that symbolic dimensions of leadership (i.e., focusing in part on leader sense of
mission and vision) had the strongest relationship to leadership effectiveness.
In their study of effective and typical elementary schools, Hallinger and Murphy (1986)
discovered that even within the instructionally effective schools, there were differences between
how principals employed goals. Some used explicitly defined school goals as instruments for
coordination and control. Other principals sought to establish and maintain a general direction
for the school, but they employed goals in a more generative manner building upon and
reinforcing important purposes that emerged from the staff and community. These observed
15

differences appeared to be related to contextual characteristics of the school such as the

socioeconomic status of students.
Notions of shared vision that have gained currency in recent years posit an explicit
linkage between mission, commitment and an increased capacity for organizational learning and
change (e.g., Bass, 1985; Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Kotter, 1996; Leithwood et al., 1994, 1998;
Senge, 1990). Within an organizational learning model, the mission-building function of the
leader takes on a slightly different flavor. Here the leader seeks to stimulate people to arrive at
new (and higher) goals for personal and professional development. In fact, Leithwood et al.
(1998) suggested that the strongest influence of principal leadership on outcomes is through
vision building and fostering commitment to group goals. These in turn lead to an increased
capacity for innovation.
Leithwood and colleagues (1993) provided evidence of small effects of principal behavior in
this domain. They found that principal vision, group goals, high expectations, individual support
have effects on several in-school processes such as goal formulation, school culture, teachers,
policy and organization. In turn, these influence school improvement outcomes including
commitment to professional change, achievement of school reform goals, policy and
organizational change.
Finally, Wiley (1998) investigated the relationships among principal leadership, professional
community and school improvement using multilevel modeling. Her results are of special
interest because they derive from a particularly sophisticated modeling of leadership effects. She
found:
This evidence suggests that transformational leadership with
minimal professional community is influential in facilitating
improvement of student achievement in mathematics in a school,
16

while professional community is an influential factor only in

combination with above average transformational leadership.
(Wiley, 1998, p. 14)
Wileys analysis is interesting in two respects. First, her findings reinforce the importance of
vision as a behavioral attribute of successful school leadership. Leaders who were able to
articulate their visions for learning were able to contribute to learning even where the degree of
professional community was not high. Second, leaders who were able to foster shared vision via
development of a professional community created a synergy that had even greater effects. The
conceptual and methodological frameworks laid out in this study are good examples for other
researchers in this domain.
Goal Setting in School Improvement
A goal represents the gap between the current status and a desired future state. It is
something one would like to accomplish, or a state of being that he or she would like to attain.
American sport legend, Yogi Berra once remarked, "If you don't know where you're going, you
probably won't know when you get there." Goals clarify where people intend to go, and how they
will know when they have gotten there.
In contrast to vision and mission, a goal is a functional, and more narrowly drawn target.
Points are scored when a football is kicked between the goal posts or a hockey puck passes into
the goal. As used in education, goals may describe the state that a school wishes to achieve by
the end of the year in relation to student learning, attendance, graduation rates, school climate, or
community satisfaction. In the workplace, success is often defined by whether or not the school's
functional goal has been achieved (Honig, 1984).
Consequently, organizations often specify goals in measurable terms. This fosters
accountability, as goals indicate what will be measured and rewarded. The classic example of a
17

goal-oriented approach in organizations is management by objectives (Carroll & Tosi, 1973;

Crown & Rosse, 1995; Honig, 1984; Hoy & Miskel, 1982; Kimpston, 1982; Mali, 1975;
Odiorne, 1965). Unlike a vision or mission, the power of a goal or management objective lies not
in its inspirational power but in its ability to focus the attention of people on a limited frame of
activity (Dornbusch & Scott, 1975; Hoy & Miskel, 1982; Jacobsson & Pousette, 2001; Steiner,
1979). Goals do not derive their motivational power from spirit but from focus, reward and
sanction.
A distinction between the school effectiveness and school improvement research traditions is
apparent with respect to the investigation of goals. In school effectiveness research, goals have
often been operationally defined in general terms such as clear goals and high expectations.
As noted earlier, publication of the effective schools identified a clear academic mission as a
key component of school effectiveness.
Policymakers came to view this as a key point of leverage for school improvement and
devised ways of conveying this to school leaders through training and policies (Barth, 1990,
1993; Edmonds 1979, 1982; Honig, 1984; Purkey & Smith, 1985). Scholars and practitioners
subsequently translated this work into school improvement programs and practices that drew
widespread attention and dissemination during the ensuing period (e.g., Brookover et al., 1982;
Edmonds, 1982; Honig, 1984; Lezotte & Bancroft, 1984; McCormick-Larkin & Kritek, 1982). It
is not inaccurate to say that developing a clear school mission soon became a new leadership
mantra for superintendents and principals.
Notable critiques of this approach were forthcoming (e.g., Barth, 1990; Cuban, 1984a,
1984b). These critiques focused in part on the assumptions of rational organization behavior
made by proponents of the goal-setting strategy. These critics questioned whether educational

18

organizations really met the assumptions of rational embedded in the goal transmission approach
to improvement (Cuban, 1984a).
In contrast, school improvement research has been more focused on how schools can move
toward greater productivity over time (Barth, 1990; Cuban, 1984a; Fullan, 1993; Seashore-Louis
& Miles, 1990; Ouston, 1999; Stoll & Fink, 1992, 1994; Teddlie & Reynolds, 2000). Outcomes
have been generally conceptualized more broadly, for example, as increased academic
performance, or included perceptions such as teacher commitment to, agreement with, or
resistance to proposed changes. Within the British context, a debate ensued over the possible
goals of education against the limited official goals as part of the process of implementing
improvement (Teddlie & Reynolds, 2000).
As Ouston (1999) argued, there was no reason for the theory and practice of changing and
improving schools to be related to the research on school effectiveness--in fact, many theories of
change were built on quite different foundations. Where the effectiveness literature emphasized
clear mission and clearly-defined goals, the school improvement literature also included the
importance of vision, school culture, leadership, and pedagogy. These were examined in
somewhat different ways, however. In the school improvement literature, greater emphasis was
placed on how school leaders facilitated staff planning, goal setting, and self-evaluation.
Unfortunately, there was rarely any attempt to develop a dynamic model of school processes that
might indicate how improvement would be accomplished within differing school contexts.
Moreover, the focus was often the school, despite knowledge of the importance of classroom
effects and the need to change teacher practices (Creemers, 1994; Marks, Seahsore-Louis, &
Printy, 2000; Teddlie & Reynolds, 2000).
Goal-setting as an avenue for school improvement. Earlier it was noted that a theory of
human motivation provides the logic for understanding the impact of cathectic goals and mission
19

on school improvement. Proponents of goal-setting, as the term is used here, start from a
different theoretical premise, often called a rational-bureaucratic model (Bolman & Deal, 1992b;
Scott, 1983). From this perspective, cathectic goals lack the specificity necessary to guide the
behavior of participants (Dornbusch & Scott, 1975; Honig, 1984; Kimpston, 1992). They only
represent general conceptions" of desired end states.
In this view, the overall aim of the organization is goal attainment. In order to influence
organizational behavior, these theorists contend that a leader must translate the mission (i.e.,
cathectic goals) into cognitive goals. These specify desired outcomes for organizational
participants and activities (Carroll & Tosi, 1973; Crown & Rosse, 1995; Deniston, Rosenstock,
& Getting, 1968; Dornbusch & Scott, 1975; Hoy & Miskel, 1982; Kimpston, 1982; Mali, 1975;
Steiner, 1979). Organizational goals in turn are developed into sub-goals for organizational units
(e.g., schools, departments or classrooms).
Specificity, clarity, and measurability in goals make it easier to translate intentions into
activities and evaluation criteria (Carroll & Tosi, 1973; Dornbusch & Scott, 1975; Latham &
Wexley, 1981; March & Simon, 1958; Odiorne, 1965; Steiner, 1979). Thus the general
organizational goal is transmitted down through the organization in the form of an accountability
system.
Several decades ago, Raia (1965) suggested that goal-setting systems are based, "upon
the belief that performance in an organization is directly related to the extent to which its
objectives are understood and accepted by the individual members" (see also Barnard, 1938;
Deniston, Rosenstock, & Getting, 1968; Gulick, 1948; Haberstroh, 1965, Huse & Kay, 1981;
Kimpston, 1982; Likert & Seashore, 1963; Odiorne, 1965; Peters & Waterman, 1982). Strategic
planning and goal-oriented accountability systems are termed "rational" because they assume a
"means-end" relationship between organizational goals, behavior, and outcomes (Davis &
20

Stackhouse, 1977; Deal & Celotti, 1977; Deniston, Rosenstock, & Getting, 1968; Dornbusch &
Scott, 1975; Etzioni, 1960; Gross, 1969; Haberstroh, 1965; March & Olsen, 1976; Mintzberg,
1994; Pounder, Ogawa, & Adams, 1995; Scott, 1981; Simon, 1947; Warriner, 1965).
Zald (1963) provides a synopsis of how goals are intended to influence organizational
performance from the rational-bureaucratic perspective:
First, goals limit the attention of members of an organization to a
certain object by defining what action is organizationally
relevant. Second, the practices or technological processes that are
required to achieve specific goals impose restrictions on the
activities of personnel and on the distribution of resources. They
thus affect such basic social phenomena as the division of labor,
communication patterns, and authority structures. Third, goals
are centrally involved in the adaptation of organizations.
Whether or not goals are achieved affects the ability of the
organization to command resources and legitimization from the
larger society, and thus, by providing rewards, affects the
motivation and commitment of personnel. (p. 207)
Thus, goals originate at the institutional level and filter down through the organization. In
the rational model, the task of management is to ensure that goals are tightly coupled to
activities. Managerial and organizational effectiveness are measured by the degree to which
goals are achieved (Deniston, Rosenstock, & Getting, 1968; Etzioni, 1960; Friedlander & Pickle,
1968; Georgopoulos & Tannenbaum, 1957; Haberstroh, 1965; Kimpston, 1992; Latham &
Wexley, 1981; Mintzberg, 1994; Likert & Seashore, 1963; Lotto, 1983; Mohr, 1973; Parsons,
1960; Pounder et al., 1995; Price, 1968; Steers, 1975; Zald, 1963). This scenario reflects the
21

rationale behind the state-driven approach to school improvement that has predominated in the
U.S, the U.K. and several other nations since the early 1980s.
Empirical studies of organizational goal-setting. The role of goal setting and attainment
in organizations has drawn considerable attention from researchers. Over the past several
decades, school researchers have applied a variety of organizational frameworks to the study of
goal processes (Blase, 1993; Bolman & Deal, 1992a; Cheng, 1991a, 1991b; Griffiths, 1999;
Gunn & Holdaway, 1986; High & Achilles, 1986; Hoy, Tarter, & Bliss, 1990; Kelley & Protsik;
1997; Maehr, Midgley, & Urdan, 1992; Pounder, Ogawa, & Adams, 1995; Snyder & Ebmeier,
1992; Uline, Miller, & Tschannen-Moran, 1998). Several studies (e.g., Hoy et al., 1990; Pounder
et al., 1995; Snyder & Ebmeier, 1992) examined school leaders role in goal setting and goal
attainment as part of several organizational functions based on Parsons (1960) work.
Parsons (1960) organizational framework focused on adaptation (the ability to control
relations with the environment), goal achievement (defining objectives and mobilizing resources
toward attainment), integration (level of existent social solidarity and coordination), and latency
(cultural patterns, motivations and commitment). This model was applied to schools by Hoy and
Miskel (1987). Other studies utilized portions of the general framework and investigated its
relationship to school leadership (Cheng, 1991a, 1991b; Gunn & Holdaway, 1986; High &
Achilles, 1986).
For example, in one preliminary use of this model in school settings, Hoy et al. (1990)
investigated the relationship between organizational climate and aspects of school health
(principal influence, support, academic emphasis, morale) on school effectiveness. They
determined that acceptance of organizational goals and commitment was related to aspects of the
schools overall health. Snyder and Ebmeier (1992) also used the Parsons (1960) model to

22

investigate empirical linkages among the organizational functions, principal leadership, and a set
of intermediate school process variables.
Pounder and colleagues (1995) also used Parsons (1960) framework in examining
relationships among the leadership influence of individuals (i.e., principals, secretaries, teachers
alone, teachers in groups, people in the school community) the four organizational functions, and
several measures of school effectiveness (i.e., student achievement, perceived organizational
effectiveness, student absenteeism, and staff turnover rates).Their results of their series of
proposed path models (i.e., consisting of direct and indirect effects but without corrections for
measurement error) suggested first that overall leadership influence varied across schools.
Perceptions of leadership influence were invested in different sets of individuals and groups to
varying degrees and the amount of leadership influence also varied.
Second, leadership was associated with school performance in an indirect sense in their
model (i.e., primarily through its relationship to goal achievement and latency). In these models,
they determined that latency had a direct relationship to perceived effectiveness. Goal
achievement and integration significantly affected student achievement and goal attainment also
significantly affected student absenteeism. Moreover, leadership influence was indirectly related
to achievement and absenteeism through goal attainment.
Third, the roles that people were in made some difference in how leadership affected
organizational processes and outcomes. The authors concluded that organizational leadership
affected organizational performance by shaping the organization of work and by building
commitment.
The authors also noted a couple of puzzling findings with respect to their framework.
First, while leadership was positively related to social integration (i.e., organize, coordinate, and
unify the schools work), integration was negatively related to student achievement in their path
23

model. Because integration should also measure the extent to which the school shares a common
sense of purpose, it would seem that social integration and goal attainment should be positively
related to outcomes. For example, integration and goal attainment were positively correlated in
their correlation matrix. Another puzzling finding was that the leadership of individual teachers
was not related to organizational conditions or measures of school performance. For this finding,
the authors argued that it might have been due to unit of analysis problemsthat is, the analysis
was conducted at the school level and not the individual teacher level. We re-visit some of these
puzzling findings in a re-analysis of their work later in the chapter.
As is apparent from this discussion, many more of these previous empirical studies using a
quantitative approach to data analysis have adopted a technical-rational perspective on
organizations (Ogawa & Bossert, 1995). With respect to the goal setting aspect, for many years,
the logic behind so-called rational, systematic procedures for goal-setting was considered
unassailable. It reflected the dominant paradigm within the field of management and went largely
unquestioned.
However, over the past half-century, this model has been on the receiving end of numerous
critiques in the organizational literature for the assumptions it makes about human behavior (e.g.,
Lindblom, 1959; March & Olsen, 1976; Mintzberg, 1994; Perrow, 1961, 1968; Ridgeway, 1956;
Warriner, 1965; Warner, 1967), as well as in the educational management literature (Cuban,
1984a; Davis & Stackhouse, 1977; Kirst, 1975; Meyer & Rowan, 1977; Ogawa & Bossert, 1995;
Pounder et al., 1995; Snyder & Ebmeier, 1992; Weick, 1976, 1982). Still more recently,
empirical investigations of transformational leadership such as those conducted by Leithwood
and his colleagues (1993, 1994, 1998), have begun to test alternative frameworks concerning the
avenues by which leadership may influence school organizations.

24

In general, empirical studies of organizational goal-setting in action reveal that the

assumptions of rationality embedded in this chain of logic do not hold up in the behavior of
people and organizations (March & Olsen, 1976; Perrow, 1968; Thompson, 1967; Weick, 1976).
In practice, there is considerable slippage between the intent of managersas formulated in
cognitive goalsand the actions of people in the organization (e.g., Lindblom, 1959). Moreover,
goal-setting has a number of unintended consequences that can further limit their impact or even
create dysfunctional outcomes (Cuban 1984a; Drucker, 1995; Gouldner, 1959; Grusky, 1959;
Kirst, 1975; Mintzberg, 1994, 1998; Perrow, 1961; Ridgeway, 1965; Weick, 1976).
While it is not the purpose of this chapter to provide an extended analysis of this issue, a
brief explication of this critique is necessary. Organizations, especially those that operate in the
public sector, find it difficult to narrow their focus down to a single goal (Davis & Stackhouse,
1977; Deal & Celotti, 1977; Mintzberg, 1994; Lindblom, 1959; Simon, 1964; Warriner, 1967;
Weick, 1976, 1982). In education, even the generally accepted emphasis on student achievement
is only generally accepted (Weick, 1982). The exceptions are many and varied as achievement
represents only one of a number of important educational goals.
Efforts to create a clear mission may succeed at the level of cathectic goals, but the process of
transforming this into specific statements of measurable outcomes can distort intent and create
conflict over priorities. As we have suggested, the operationalization of mission and goals has
also differed within the research traditions focused on school effectiveness (e.g., behavioral
items such as the principal establishes clear, narrowly-focused academic goals) and school
improvement (i.e., where the translation of goals into activity may be viewed as a process that
unfolds over time).
Organizational goals, especially in the public sector, shift over time as a result of trends in
the environment and the changing interests of an ever-changing group of stakeholders (Cohen &
25

March, 1976; Davis & Stackhouse, 1977; Deal & Celotti, 1977; Meyer & Rowan, 1977; Perrow,
1968; Thompson, 1967; Thompson & McEwen, 1958). Changing student populations, uneven
and changing participation among parents, and shifting priorities at the government level all
complicate a schools attempts to define a stable set of goals.
Public sector goals are often so difficult to measure that the very attempt to measure them
creates dysfunctional consequences (Ridgeway, 1956; Warner, 1967; Zald, 1967). Larry Lezotte
summarized this last criticism as applied in schools: The good thing about goals and
measurement is that what gets measured, gets done. The bad thing about it is, what gets
measured gets done (personal communication 1990). There is a long history inside and outside
of education that verifies the human tendency to reduce ones expectations after a goal has been
reached. This was a valid criticism of minimum competency testing and also applies to goal
setting. This tendency lies in contrast with the notion of the quest that underlies the vision
construct.
School improvement programs often promote goal setting as a vehicle for action
planning. This responds to the desire for a rational process that can be clearly conveyed,
delivered, and monitored. While goal-based approaches meet the organization's need for
accountability, goal setting often fails to inspire people to meet a more fundamental need--to act.
This suggests that influence imposed from the top down is most powerful when formulated
within a mission statement that focuses attention on the values the organization hopes to
promote. The specification of objective measurable goals, though theoretically facilitating
linkage to activities, can impede as well as promote attainment of the organization's overall
mission. This recalls our earlier discussion of the dysfunctional consequences of goal
specification: goal displacement, distortion of job priorities, inconsistent standard setting,
ignoring goals that are less easily quantified.
26

Other Directions
Our review of the literature on vision, mission, and goals suggests that researchers have not
yet been able to distinguish clearly among these concepts. Moreover, they have not been able to
integrate this in as well with other types of process variables. There are also a number of
methodological problems that have made these efforts more difficult. Recently, we provided
analyses of quantitative and qualitative methods used in studying school leadership (Hallinger &
Heck, 1996b; Heck & Hallinger, 1999). We encourage the use of qualitative approaches in
defining and clarifying differences between these concepts, as well as in studying how vision,
mission, and goal-setting processes may unfold over time in schools (see Dillard, 1995 for one
recent example).
With a more complete set of tools at their disposal, future quantitative researchers should
attend to the problems associated with measurement error and the multilevel nature of schooling.
While there are several advantages to using these techniques, there have been few investigations
that actually demonstrate their advantages over several practical difficulties (e.g., obtaining the
data, using the correct computer software). In this section, we demonstrate possible applications
of two newer quantitative techniques (structural equation modeling, multilevel modeling) to the
investigation of how leadership may impact school processes and outcomes.
Structural equation modeling (SEM) has a number of advantages over multiple regression.
Most importantly, it allows the investigation of more complex theoretical formulations including
those with direct, indirect, and reciprocal effects. This allows the incorporation of mediating
effects, such as those between leadership and school outcomes. Because many organizational
processes such as leadership, goal setting, commitment, and satisfaction cannot be directly
measured, we must define them indirectly through measuring a set of their observed
27

manifestations. Through this technique, researchers can retain sets of correlated indicators in the
model (e.g., several measures of organizational processes or outcomes). Moreover, because
measurement error can be included in defining a construct such as goal setting, the accuracy of
the models structural parameters are improved (Muthn, 1994; Raudenbush & Simpson, 1999).
A limitation, however, is that most SEM software currently available was designed for singlelevel analyses (e.g., student level or school level), making the testing of multilevel models with
SEM more difficult..
Multilevel modeling encourages the investigation of theoretical models where variables can
be specified at different levels of a data hierarchy (e.g., students within classes within schools).
This allows the researcher to examine variation both within and between units and provides a
framework for specifying variables that explain this variation at their correct levels. The
multilevel specification therefore results in estimates of model parameters that have been
corrected for any similarities that exist among individuals in the same organizational setting.
Failure to adjust for these similarities can produce significant parameters in the model where
there should not be any. This is because when these similarities among individuals exist, in
single-level analyses the standard errors associated with the models parameters will be
underestimated. Because the significance level of a parameter is tested with a t-test (i.e., the ratio
of the parameter to its standard error), underestimation leads to the calculation of a larger t-ratio
than would be produced in a multilevel analysis.
An Illustration and Elaboration of Pounder, Ogawa, and Adams (1995)
For illustrative purposes, we draw on data from Pounder et al. (1995) to demonstrate how
SEM might be used in research on goal-setting. As the reader may recall, Pounder et al. (1995)
estimated a series of path models involving the leadership influence of various individuals and
groups, organizational processes, and outcomes. Their results suggested several puzzling
28

findings. First, while principal leadership influence was positively related to social integration,
integration was negatively related to student achievement. This suggested to the authors that
principal leadership was indirectly but negatively associated with the performance of students on
standardized tests. This was contrary to the theoretical framework, which hypothesized that
leadership should enhance the social integration of schools, which enhances their performance.
Second, the leadership of individual teachers was not related to any organizational conditions or
measures of school performance. The authors argued that this may be due to unit of analysis
problemsthat is, the analysis was conducted at the school level and not the individual teacher
level.
Another possible explanation for some of the puzzling findings might be the nature of the
analytic technique used. A significant limitation of path analysis is that it does not incorporate
measurement error into the model. Researchers have suggested that incorporating measurement
error into the analysis of organizational processes through the use of latent (underlying) variables
can result in more refined views of the relationships between hypothesized constructs (Heck &
Thomas, 2000; Muthn, 1994). Another explanation for their findings might be that variables
that could be theorized to belong together (i.e., the four organizational functions) were treated as
separate variables in separate path models. In a structural equation model, for example, these
separate functions (e.g., adaptation, integration, latency) could be defined in one model as an
latent organizational process variable consisting of the four separate variables. To demonstrate
this possibility, we reconstructed Pounder et al.s (1995) leadership model using structural
equation modeling (SEM), as opposed to path analysis.
Consistent with their theoretical model, we specified three latent variables--a leadership
influence variable (i.e., the amount of influence each individual or group possessed), a school
process variable consisting of Parsons four dimensions (i.e., adaptation, goal achievement,
29

integration, latency), and an outcome variable (i.e., perceived effectiveness, student achievement,
absenteeism, staff turnover).1 The proposed model was tested with LISREL 8.3 (Jreskog &
Srbom, 1999). The model fit the data reasonably well (GFI, CFI = .90).

Insert Figure 1 About Here

The parameter estimates are summarized in Figure 1. For the measurement model, the
outcome and process indicators all loaded significantly on each latent variable. For leadership
influence, the amount of principal influence (Prin) and the secretarys influence (Sec) did not
load substantively on the leadership influence variable; however, teacher influence alone
(Teach), a group of staff members (Group), and a parent-community group (Parent)
substantively defined the leadership influence dimension.
Turning to the structural effects (which are corrected for measurement error), organizational
leadership affected organizational processes directly and significantly (.58), and the process
variable affected outcomes significantly (.66). It is important to note that all of the organizational
process indicators (e.g., goal achievement) contribute to explaining outcomes. Leadership did not
significantly affect outcomes directly, but there was a significant indirect relationship (.38),
through organizational processes (not tabled). We caution, however, that the relationship
between the organizational process variable and the outcome variable is likely a bit weaker than
indicated in the figure, owing to the specific relationships among the observed indicators
adaptation, goal achievement, and perceived effectiveness. Finally, the coefficients in

1
It should be noted that in Pounder et al.s data, the goal achievement and adaptation variables were defined
as subsets of the perceived effectiveness variable. Hence, there is some multicollinearity present that likely inflates
the relationship between organizational process and outcome latent variables to some extent. Our primary concern in
presenting the analysis, however, is demonstrating the potential for examining leadership, organizational processes
such as goal achievement, and outcomes in one simultaneously-estimated structural equation model.
30

parentheses represent variance in the constructs that is unaccounted for by the variables in the
model. This suggests the indirect influence of leadership and the organizational process variables
do a good job of accounting for variance in the outcome measures.
Perhaps our new analysis can help resolve some of Pounder et al.s puzzling findings. First,
their results indicated that integration was negatively related to student achievement. This
suggested to the authors that principal leadership was indirectly, but negatively, associated with
the performance of students on standardized tests. In contrast, our modeling of their data shows
that after incorporating measurement error into the model, social integration contributed
positively to defining organizational processes and, hence, to explaining outcomes. However, it
was the weakest of the measures of organizational processes (.20). Thus, our results indicated
that leadership was positively (and indirectly) related to outcomes, as the theoretical model
hypothesized.
Second, Pounder et al. (1995) determined that the leadership of individual teachers was not
related to any organizational conditions or measures of school performance. In contrast, our
analysis shows that the influence of individual staff members alone had a positive and significant
relationship in defining leadership influence, although the size of the loading was small (.24).
This suggests that leadership influence of individual teachers (as well as groups of faculty and
parents) indirectly affected school outcomes.
From our analysis, we can conclude that Pounder et al.s (1995) data are congruent with
theories suggesting that both task performance and relations among organizational members are
important in influencing outcomes. Leaderships influence on outcomes is mostly indirect
(Hallinger & Heck, 1996a). In this example, the structural model provides a more complete test
of the theory by providing simultaneous estimation of a series of equations that Pounder et al.
estimated separately. The analysis also reveals a way in which goal attainment might be
31

integrated with other types of process indicators (i.e., adaptation, integration, latency). As we
suggested previously, there is a need for continued effort to determine how goal setting (and
subsequent attainment) might relate to other types of school processes. Parsons (1960)
conceptualization provides one model of organizational processes that might be useful in this
regard. A final advantage is that the structural paths between the constructs are corrected for
measurement error, allowing a more accurate appraisal of the effects of leadership influence on
the intervening and outcome variables.
A Single-level and Multilevel SEM Comparison
In the next case, we examine a structural model of variables comprising student background,
academic experiences, school context and processes, and outcomes in a multilevel framework. In
particular, we were interested in determining how the quality of school processes such as goal
setting, academic expectations, and school climate affect school outcomes and school
improvement. To demonstrate some of the conceptual and technical advantages of multilevel
modeling, we first analyze the data at a single level, choosing in this case the individual-student
level.
In this study, data about the quality of school processes in their school were collected from
parents, teaching staff, and students in 122 elementary K-6 schools. The six indicators used were
conceived as defining Parsons (1960) four organizational processes. Adaptation was defined by
several items measuring the schools relationship to the home (Home) including, for example,
communication, parent involvement, and parent decision making). Integration focused on the
academic emphasis of the school (Academics), for example, classroom teaching processes,
instructional techniques, student time on task, and teacher collaboration. Latency was defined by
items measuring school climate (Schclim); for example, safety, caring attitudes, and staff
cohesiveness.
32

The final domain, goal attainment, was defined through three indicators. Leadership and goal
setting (Leadgoal) included the items that measured the process of goal setting, resource
utilization, and evaluation of progress toward meeting goals. Example items were focusing on
student achievement as the schools top goal, having a shared understanding of the schools
mission and goals, having administrators who work with teachers, students, and parents to
develop the schools improvement plan, sharing leadership roles between administration and
staff, having sufficient resources that are utilized for effective instruction, and creating an
effective ongoing system for evaluating the schools progress toward its goals. Monitoring
student progress (Monprog) included, for example, feedback, effective diagnosis of learning
problems, and types of assessments used. High expectations for student achievement (Highexp)
included staff expectations, school standards for achievement, the range of curricular skills
presented, and teacher communication. The information collected for each process indicator was
found to be quite reliable across the groups of respondents (see Heck, 2000, for further
discussion).
To develop the single-level structural model, the process data were combined with other
information about schools (i.e., teacher background, school size, school socioeconomic
indicators, student academic improvement between grades 3 and 6, and student composition (i.e.,
background, academic success, standardized test scores). It is important to note that a forcedchoice over the unit of analysis (e.g., individual student or school level) creates a number of
conceptual and technical problems. For example, features of schools and their processes must be
ascribed to individuals. To illustrate this problem, while there are 123 schools, the size of each
school is entered into the analysis as a variable for the 6970 students in the sample.
The school contextual indicators retained in the final model presented in Figure 2 were
school SES (S-SES) and large school size (Lsch, defined as having over 600 students). The
33

student background variables were age, minority status, gender, low socioeconomic status (Low
SES), special education status (Sped), and previous academic experiences (i.e., students scores
in reading, language, and math in third grade). The outcome variables were student achievement
in grade 6 (i.e., total reading, math, and language standardized test scores) and student
improvement gains between grades 3 and 6 (i.e., represented as read G, math G, and language G
in Figure 2). These two outcome variables were conceived of as correlated, but not causally
related (i.e., through a single-headed arrow) because the improvement variable contained slope
coefficients that describe the improvement students made on the three standardized tests (i.e.,
reading, math, language) between grades 3 and 6.

Insert Figure 2 About Here

For comparative purposes, we tried to define the single-level and multilevel models to be as
similar as possible in terms of the structural relationships between variables in the model. For the
single-level model, the fit indices suggested that the proposed formulation did not fit the data
well. One commonly used index to describe model fit is the chi-square, which describes the
discrepancy between the observed and model-implied covariance matrices (i.e., with larger
coefficients indicating ill-fitting models). In this case, the chi-square coefficient was large for the
number of model-implied constraints (10,827.9 for 161 degrees of freedom). Moreover, the ratio
of chi-square to the degrees of freedom was 67.3 to 1(i.e., from a practical standpoint, these
ratios should be considerably below 5 to 1).
As summarized in Figure 2, the observed indicators all were substantively related to their
latent variables (with loadings ranging from .29 to .97). This suggests that the indicators
represent adequate measures of the factors. Turning to the structural relationships, the school
34

process variable was almost entirely unrelated to school outcomes (.02) in the single-level
model. Even though it was still significant (p < .05), because its significance level was
determined from the large sample size of individuals (N=6970) as opposed to the number of
schools, the substantive effect of the school process variable was almost entirely lost when the
analysis focused on the learning of individual students. The process variable was weakly found
to be related to school improvement gains, however (.29). The effect of school SES on outcomes
was also quite small (.10), most likely due to multicollinearity between school SES (S-SES) and
individual student SES (Low SES) within the same single-level model. School size was
unrelated to outcomes (.01). These results underscore that contextual relationships may be
considerably underestimated (or entirely washed out) when they are disaggregated to a lower
unit of analysis. We mention these contextual variables specifically because their impact can be
noted to be very different when a multilevel model is formulated. Finally, by examining the
coefficients in parentheses in Figure 2 we can determine that the variables in the model
accounted for 74 percent of the variance in student achievement (with 26% due to other sources
and random error).
The multilevel version of this model was then specified. The between-level model consisted
of the two previous contextual indicators (S-SES, large school size). In addition, it included two
additional school variables that can be defined through the multilevel technique (i.e., percent of
minority students and percent of special education students). These variables are computed from
the numbers of students within each school as part of the multilevel SEM analysis. They allow
more refined investigations, for example, of the effects of being a low-SES student in a highSES versus a low-SES school. The school process variable and the school improvement variable

35

were also defined at the school level.2 The within- school model consisted of the set of student
composition variables defined in the previous single-level model.

Insert Figure 3 About Here

The proposed model was determined to fit the data much better than the single-level analysis
(chi-square = 265.3 for 192 degrees of freedom). For example, the chi-square to degrees of
freedom ratio was only 1.38 to 1. Readers may notice the difference in the number of degrees of
freedom in the two models (161 in the single-level versus 192 in the multilevel model). Positive
degrees of freedom (which are required to test a models fit to the data) result from having more
than enough available variances and covariances in the data matrix than the number of model
parameters to be estimated (a model-fitting condition called over-identification). Even though the
structural paths are basically the same in the two models, the larger number of degrees of
freedom in the multilevel model results from the greater number of over-identifying constraints
in the multilevel model relative to the number of parameters estimated.
The model parameters are summarized in Figure 3. First, notice that the variables were easily
defined at their proper level of the data hierarchy. For example, the school six process indicators
(measured at the school level) all loaded substantively on the process latent variable, suggesting
the indicators serve as good measures of the construct. These ranged from .56 (leadership and
goal setting) to .97 (high expectations for achievement).

Currently, it is not possible to model random slopes that measure the effect of 3rd grade learning on 6th
grade learning across schools with SEM. These effects can be assumed to vary across schools; that is, some schools
are more effective in raising students performance in the three academic areas measured. We addressed this
problem by first estimating the 3-6 grade achievement slopes for each school with multilevel regression and then
entering the slope residuals into the between-group portion of the multilevel SEM. Positive slope residuals represent
schools where students are making better-than-expected progress, or gains, between grades 3 and 6, given the set of
student composition variables.
36

Second, it is important to note that in this formulation, the school-level effects tend to be
larger, and the significance of the school-level parameters can be calculated correctly on the
proper sample of 123 schools. For example, we found that organizational processes were
significantly (and moderately) related to school student-improvement gains (.48) between grades
three and six (as opposed to .29 in the single-level analysis), and more substantially related to
school outcomes (.21). Recall that in the single-level model this latter coefficient was only .02.
School SES had a relatively large effect on outcomes (.70). In contrast, in the single-level model
its relationship to individual-level outcomes was only .10, in part related to multicollinearity with
other variables in the model (e.g., student SES). School SES also affected school improvement
gains (.57) and exerted a smaller effect (.31) on school process (i.e., schools with higher SES
communities had stronger school processes). Importantly, therefore, we can also note a small,
but significant, indirect effect (.15) of school SES on improvement (through the mediating
school process variable). This finding suggests that students in higher SES settings had greater
outcomes and improvement gains between grade 3 and grade 6 than their counterparts in low
SES schools, even after controlling for individual student background within schools. The effect
of socioeconomic status, therefore, compounds within more complex model formulations.
Finally, it should also be noted that the standard errors for the school parameters were much
larger (and, therefore, more accurate) in the multilevel model than in the single-level model. This
is because the standard errors in the school part of the model are calculated on the sample size
sample size of 123 schools instead of 6970 students.
Overall, our proposed model provides a demonstration of how separate within- and
between-school models can be combined in one simultaneous multilevel analysis to assess direct
and indirect effects of variables measured at different levels of the data hierarchy. This can begin
to reveal how these separate sets of variables affect a range of processes and outcomes. As we
37

suggested, the multilevel specification provides an analysis that yields more accurate parameter
estimation because it overcomes several technical (and conceptual problems) associated with
single-level analyses (e.g., variables defined at improper levels, incorrect standard errors owing
to incorrect sample sizes, multicollinearity). Despite the difficulty of obtaining the needed data,
multilevel techniques may hold significant benefits for researchers interested in the investigation
of organizational processes such as leadership and goal setting.

Toward Future Research on Vision, Mission and Goals in

School Leadership and Improvement
This chapter was envisioned as a first step in extending findings from a previous review
of research on principal leadership and school improvement (Hallinger & Heck, 1998). The
focus was on how schools translate purposes and intentions into practices that influence school
effectiveness and improvement. The ideas presented in this paper are by no means complete.
Rather, the goal was to begin to lay out a conceptual framework that might guide future studies
of goals and school improvement.
While the focus of the chapter was conceptual, not methodological, we have also noted
the potential of methodology to help untangle some of the conceptual issues presented here. To
date, the conceptual muddiness of investigations of goals has made the issue of methodology
almost irrelevant. Conceptual clarity must be achieved first. Allow us, however, to identify some
useful methodological directions that have emerged from this literature and would prove fruitful
in exploring the issues identified in this review.
In the literature reviewed in this paper, the closest any researchers have come to
untangling the effects of a rational model of school improvement as compared to a cultural
systems model (i.e., vision and mission-oriented) is the work of Leithwood and colleagues at
38

OISE (1993, 1994, 1996, 1998) and Silins (1994). These researchers have compared leadership
processes in school improvement using transactional (a variant on a rational model) and
transformational (a variant on a symbolic model) leadership perspectives.
Wileys (1998) research studying transformational leadership and professional
community offers another useful approach that could be adapted for exploring the issues in this
paper. While the purpose of the latter studies differ somewhat from the focal variables in this
paper, their findings suggest interesting interactions between these styles of leadership. They
conclude that leadership styles in school improvement are not simply an either/or phenomenon.
Moreover, these studies provide examples of how researchers might empirically study such
interactions (see also Hallinger & Heck, 1996a and Heck & Hallinger, 1999 for discussions of
relevant methods).
The analysis presented in this chapter leads towards the belief that successful
organizations are driven by their sense of common mission more than by clear goals. Gross
(1969) suggests, the open system theorists "may underestimate the contribution that rational
decision-makers within organizations make in choosing the goals of organizations rather than
being limited to the demands of the market" (p. 279). Or as Goldsmith and Clutterback (1997)
observe, Values are a great help in establishing relationships. They provide a cohesion of
identity for distant operations. But values on their own are like a fly-wheel without a shaft--they
need to be attached to the engine of the organization. Operating principles provide the link (p.
42).
Both theoretically and practically, there is bound to be some interaction between the goalsetting function and mission building, even if one does not necessarily depend upon the other. As
Milbrey McLaughlin (1990, p. 13) of Stanford University has observed: You cant mandate

39

what matters to people, but what you do mandate does matter. Brian Caldwell (1997) has
described the approach taken to goal setting in the Australian state of Victoria:
There is a curriculum and standards framework for all primary and
secondary schools, local selection of staff, and an accountability scheme
that calls for the preparation of annual reports to the community. . . Each
school has a charter that reflects commitments to meeting local needs and
priorities as well as those of the state as a whole. (p. 2)
There is potential for increasing the impact of school improvement in this domain. A
firmer understanding of the relationship of goal setting to mission building will enable
practitioners to gain more from the time spent on school improvement. This is a theoretically
rich and practically viable avenue that warrants continued exploration. There are a variety of
perspectives to take toward research production and coordination in this area. These include not
only different methodological perspectives, but also considerations of the relationship of
researchers to practitioners (and the subjects themselves) in studying how mission building may
contribute to school improvement. We believe that the next step is to further define the mission
and goal indicators as part of these leadership and school processes, as well as to determine how
school communities engage in these processes and how this engagement may influence school
improvement.

40

Figure 1

41

Figure 2

42

Figure 3

43

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