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Session 3. Getting Buy-in and Working with Resistance
Objective. Identify who must support your pilot, write a one-page pitch for the principal, and answer colleagues' resistance with listening and a small next step.
A good idea needs people. Colleagues have to cooperate, the principal has to agree, and pupils have to feel that the change is for them. Teachers often meet doubt and take it personally, or bypass it and pay later. This session treats support and resistance as part of the design of an innovation: who needs to say yes, what each of them cares about, and how to turn a 'no' into information and a small next step.
Key ideas
Who needs to say yes
- List the people who are affected or who decide: the principal and the deputy for studies, the colleagues of your subject or grade, the head of the methodological association, pupils and, where school rules require, parents.
- For each person write what they care about and the one thing you ask of them. The principal may care about results and safety; a colleague about workload; pupils about fairness.
- Ask early. Hearing about your pilot from someone else, or after it has begun, makes people feel bypassed, whatever the idea.
The one-page pitch for the principal
- Six parts: the problem and its evidence; what you will try (one change, which class, how many weeks); what it costs in time and money; risks and how pupils are protected; the one thing you ask; when you will report.
- Keep it humble and specific. 'I would like permission to try X in 7A for five weeks and report to you on 20 May' is easier to say yes to than 'this will transform our school'.
- Do not ask for money or staff before a small trial, do not name pupils or compare colleagues, and do not promise results. Promise to measure and to report honestly.
Resistance is information
- Behind 'no' there is usually one of five things: no time, a bad earlier experience ('we tried it'), fear of being judged, a different view of what works, or a real risk you have not seen. Find out which one.
- Many senior colleagues have seen ideas arrive and vanish. Their doubt is earned experience, not stubbornness. Respect it, and ask what they learned.
- Sometimes the resistance is right. If a colleague points to a real risk, change your plan. That is how pilots become better.
The four-step reply
- LISTEN without interrupting. REPEAT back what you heard in your own words: 'You are saying the extra marking would take your evenings.' People calm down when they feel understood.
- ASK a question that opens a way forward: 'What would make it safe to try one lesson?' OFFER a small step and a date: 'Come and watch one lesson, then decide.' Small steps lower the risk.
- Never mock, never say 'you are afraid of change', never go around a colleague to the principal as a threat, and never claim results before you have data. Let the pilot's results do the persuading.
The four-step reply
What people are protecting
Behind resistance there is usually something people value: their time, their sense of competence, a routine that works, or their trust after an earlier initiative was dropped. A colleague who says 'we tried it' may be protecting herself from another wasted effort. A principal who hesitates may be protecting pupils and the school's reputation. When you name what is being protected, you can respond to it directly.
This is why listening comes before answering. Asking 'what happened last time?' often reveals a concrete, fixable cause such as marking load or an unclear aim, and shows the colleague that you take her experience seriously.
Ask for one thing at a time
Large requests invite large refusals. Ask the principal for permission for one change in one class for a stated number of weeks and a report on a date. Ask a colleague to watch one lesson, or to try one routine for two weeks. Each small yes builds trust and gives you something real to show.
Say plainly what the change will not do: it will not lower the standard, it will not add marking for others, and it will not be shown as a comparison of teachers. Naming limits early is a sign of honesty and removes common fears before they grow.
Examples from the classroom
A one-page pitch in Bukhara
Scene. Malika wants to pilot self-check slips in Grade 9. Her first draft to the principal says the method will transform the school. A colleague suggests cutting it to one page: the problem (18 of 32 pupils lose marks for missing units), the plan (one change in 9B for five weeks), no cost, the safeguards, and one request, permission to start on 10 April and report on 20 May. The principal agrees the same day.
Insight. A specific, small and low-cost request is easy to approve.
'We tried that' in Tashkent
Scene. At a methodological meeting, a senior teacher says exit tickets failed in 2015. Aziz does not argue. He asks what happened, repeats that collecting tickets from 120 pupils took her evenings, and asks what would make it safe to try again. She says fewer pupils. Aziz offers a plan for one class of 30 with slips that he prepares, and a ten-minute review on the fifteenth.
Insight. Listening revealed the real concern, and the small step answered it.
Telling the pupils in Fergana
Scene. Dilnoza is trying a new homework routine in Grade 6 in Fergana. At the start she tells the class why: she noticed many pupils could not start the tasks, and she wants to try a different way for five weeks. She asks for their honest opinions in week three on a slip. Pupils feel respected, and two useful suggestions about timing come back.
Insight. Pupils are stakeholders too; explaining and asking improves both support and the design.
Common pitfalls
- Presenting the idea to everyone at once without asking the principal first.
- Treating doubt as stubbornness instead of as information.
- Asking for money, staff or a smaller class before any small test has been done.
- Promising results before there are data.
Pitch the Principal, Answer the Doubt
- Open the Activity Kit. Pairs (10 min): read the SAMPLE pitch in Table B. Find at least five weaknesses and say what you would write instead.
- Trios (10 min): fill the stakeholder map in Table A for your own pilot. For each person write what they care about and your one ask.
- Alone (15 min): write your one-page pitch for the principal in Table C, using your pilot plan from Session 2. Keep it to six parts and under 200 words.
- Second activity, trios (22 min): role-play in three rounds of 7 minutes. One person is the teacher with the pilot, one is a colleague with a resistance card from Table D, one observes with Table E. Rotate roles. Use made-up colleagues, not real ones.
- Groups (8 min): observers share the phrases that worked best in the four-step reply and the one trap they saw (arguing, rushing to a solution, pressure). Write three sentences you will really use.
- Alone (5 min): write your school-based task from the Kit.
Your facilitator will guide you through this activity in the session.
Questions to discuss
- Whose support do you most need and have you asked that person yet?
- Which card was hardest to answer, and what was behind it?
- Which small step could you offer a sceptical colleague in your own school this week?
Reflect
- When did a colleague last say no to you? What was behind it?
- Have you ever been the sceptic? What would have helped you to say yes?
- What would your principal need to see on one page?
Try it tomorrow
- List your stakeholders and write one sentence on what each cares about; ask the principal one specific question.
- Have one four-step conversation with a sceptical colleague and write down the small step you offered.
- Tell your pilot class in two sentences why you are trying something new and what you will ask them in week three.
Further reading and links
Ask early, write one page, listen before you answer, and offer a small step with a date.