Insights on Conflict, Leadership, and Governance
Practical perspectives for leaders navigating high-stakes situations. These pieces draw from three decades of experience in public school governance, executive leadership, and conflict mediation.
“Speak Up, Work It Out”: Why Teaching Students to Mediate Their Own Conflicts Is the Most Underused Leadership Strategy in K-8 Schools
The most underused conflict resource in a K-8 school is already in the building. It is the students, and peer mediation teaches them to use it well.
The First Conflict of the Year Sets the Tone for All the Others
It is rarely the biggest conflict of the year. It is just the first one, and how it gets handled sets the norm for every conflict that follows.
The Work of Repair: What Governance Recovery Actually Requires
Repair is different from resolution. It requires acknowledgment, structural change, time, and a way to measure whether the relationship is recovering.
Policy vs. Practice: Where Governance Actually Breaks Down
A policy manual is a record of what the board intended, not a description of what the board actually does. Mixing those up is where the trouble starts.
Bruce publishes regularly on conflict, leadership, and governance through the Conflict in Plain English series on Substack. Subscribe below to receive new pieces directly.