Designing: schedule and sample

The second stage is ‗designing‘. The design of the interview schedule was considered around the aims of the research considering first process then outcome, but the question format required consideration. As there were descriptive and exploratory elements to this research, the sequence of questions was determined. In the schedule,

the descriptive process elements were considered first. This was to set a context for the remaining exploratory discussion which would focus on the claims about outcomes. This, it is argued, allows a rapport to be built before more qualitative, exploratory questions were raised and to allow a structured thought process with a chronological flow by discussing mentoring from the first meeting onwards.

The design of the interview schedule used a blend of closed and open ended questions.

The closed questions were either ‗yes/no‘ or required the respondent to select one or more of a choice of options through the use of response scales. It was felt that the use of a response scale would allow answers to be categorised, collated and then used to give a general picture of how mentoring was used by those involved. Prompts or follow up questions could then be used to allow respondents to elaborate upon their answers or clarification could be sought.

True scaling that associates qualitative constructs with quantitative metric units¹¹ were not felt to be appropriate, as no inference was sought between the answers offered and any other construct. Uni-dimensional forced choice response scales were used to categorise the data. The response scales selected here were adjective and adverbial only using a numerical analogue scale as a final summary of overall value. The frequency response scale used was; ‗never‘, ‗sometimes‘, ‗usually‘ and ‗always‘. In this type of scale, the meaning of a word in question, e.g. ‗often‘, is only dependent upon the relationship to the other adjectives described e.g., ‗never, rarely, sometimes and often‘ as opposed to ‗sometimes, often, very often and always‘ therefore the four options for frequency responses were kept consistent throughout the interviews.

Survey methodologies assume a common discourse of shared meaning amongst people.

To anchor the discourse to familiar statements, the skill sets detailed in the Standard for Headship were used in an attempt to categorise the work of a headteacher and thus allow responses to be made against these areas of work which could then be collated.

As detailed in 2.3.4, the SfH is the only nationally agreed leadership standard, hence template, to evaluate development. The Standard for Headship delineates the work of headteachers into five areas of professional action: leading and managing learning and teaching; leading and developing people; leading change and improvement; managing resources and building community. My experience of mentor training and learning from

11 Examples are summative scales (Likert 1932), cumulative scales (Guttman 1944), equal-appearing interval scales (Thurstone and Chave 1929) or semantic differential scales (Osgood 1957)

the mentees‘ review day led to ‗nuts and bolts issues‘ and ‗personal issues‘ being included in the response options. ‗Nuts and bolts issues‘ was a term which derived from the exploratory stages of this study as some mentees found it difficult to categorise some areas of discussion under the professional actions of the Standard for Headship.

‗Nuts and bolts‘ referred to issues related to day to day running of a school, basic information which was often factual – two examples given in discussion with Mentees were ‗what colour of travelling expenses form was needed‘ and ‗who to phone about a wasp‘s nest‘. Neither of these could be specifically categorised within the professional actions of the Standard for Headship so the ‗Nuts and Bolts‘ response category was created. This also allowed a judgement of importance over the issues discussed which might be revealing. Experience from the mentoring programme and from the literature review also suggested that personal issues were sometimes raised. To allow learning about this aspect of mentoring to emerge, ‗Personal Issues‘ was added as a response category.

This study set out to explore formal mentoring using the definition of Kram (1985) to consider the kinds of processes and functions that can take place and the types of approaches which fall under the mentoring ‗umbrella‘ (2.4.2). To assist in creating a shared meaning, a response scale for the approach taken by the mentor was created.

This decision was taken after discussions with participants at mentor training and the mentees‘ review day where there was evidence of confusion over language describing the spectrum of ‗helping conversations‘ -specifically in trying to differentiate coaching and mentoring. The options within the response scale, and associated explanations, were designed with two experienced colleagues who both acted as coaches and mentors in the business world, through our shared experiences of the CSLA mentor training for headteachers, the National CPD team publications and the literature on concepts of coaching and mentoring. This response set included four conversational techniques that could be used within a mentoring relationship and was tested during the preparatory study. The response set used the following terms: telling (directing); coaching (helping you find your own solution); collaborating (working together on a problem) and counselling (exploring personal issues).

Open ended response items were also felt to be valuable as interviewing offers further opportunities to interpret the experiences proffered or explore issues of increased complexity, where a predetermined response scale may not cover all possible reactions.

The open ended response items had no predetermined categories; those being interviewed would therefore answer in their own words. An example of this would be;

‘How do you decide on what issues you are going to discuss?‘ Some questions sought

descriptive information at first, then, depending on the response, a follow up question which sought greater explanation.

The indicative interview schedule used to generate data for this study is offered in Table 4¹²

Indicative Interview Schedule

Welcome, introductions, purpose

1. Our records show that your formal mentoring started in **; are you still in contact with your mentor?

2. How many times have you met?

3. Where do you meet?

4. When, in the day, do you meet?

5. How long are your meetings, on average?

6. The policy says that the first meeting is very important and gives some tips on what to cover. How did the first meeting go for you? How did you feel about mentoring before and after that first meeting?

7. Do you create a plan for the meeting, or agenda, beforehand?

8. How and when do you decide on what issues you are going to discuss?

9. How often do you (does the mentee) take away an action plan to be implemented before the next meeting?

10. Is there any advice you would give, or tips, that you would give to new mentors?

11. What advice could you give to the authority regarding the way mentoring is arranged in the CSLA? Is there any comment you would like to make about the policy

arrangements or matching – do we get that right?

12 Continued overleaf

12. Issues discussed in meetings in terms of SFH skillsets

‗I would like to ask you about the areas of your / your mentee‘s job that you explored during your mentoring sessions. To learn about aspects of the job where mentoring might help, I would like us to refer to the school leadership skillsets as outlined by Standard for Headship (SfH). If I read out these areas to you, could you give an indication how often you focussed about these areas of work within the mentoring conversation.

I would like you to reflect on any things that you have learned in your mentoring sessions which you think will stay with you and help you in the future....

If I could ask you within which of the SfH skillsets you have been helped most by your mentor?

14.

Mentee only

Have your mentoring sessions been useful to you in carrying out your job?

Have your mentoring sessions affected your behaviour as a HT? Have they helped in terms of confidence, stress levels etc? Exemplars of professional actions?

In what way? Examples?

15. Have you tended to use a particular mentoring style?

Or, to mentees

Has your mentor used a particular mentoring style within the conversations?

Telling (directing)

Coaching (helping you find your on solution) Collaborating (working together on a

problem)

Counselling (exploring personal issues)

16.

Mentor only

In terms of your own development, have your sessions with your mentee had an influence on your own practice/mindset?

Did you anticipate this effect?

17. How valuable has the mentoring programme been for you compared to other leadership and management support that is available from the authority?

i.e. courses, the role of the school QIO, SQH.

18. Would you recommend mentoring to a colleague who was thinking of joining the mentoring programme?

19. Overall, on a scale of one to 10, with 0 as the most negative and 10 as the most positive, where would you place your overall experience of mentoring?

Table 4 Indicative Interview Schedule