Conclusion, Contributions, and Suggestions 6 123 3. How can distributed leadership in school teams be described and measured by applying a social network perspective? 4. How can differences in distributed leadership between collaborative innovation-oriented teacher teams be understood from multiple sociocultural context levels? We continue this conclusion section with an overview of these four studies. Each of these empirical studies contributes to answer the main research question. In the next section, we discuss the contributions of this dissertation to (distributed) leadership theory and the notion of collaborative innovation in schools. Methodological considerations of the studies are brought forward. In the final section, suggestions for future research and practice are presented. We close this chapter with a final remark on the merits of this dissertation. 6.1.2. Overview of the empirical studies 6.1.2.1. Leadership by school principals and teachers in collaborative innovation Chapter 2 presents our investigation of both horizontal and vertical working relations in relation to collaborative innovation.We addressed the research question: Howdo horizontal and vertical working relations in school affect collaborative innovation practices? Using a mixed-methods design, multilevel analyses were applied to questionnaire data gathered among teachers of 157 schools and qualitative analyses of interview data from interviews with teachers of 20 schools. With regard to horizontal working relations, teachers indicated the importance of wanting to work together (Collaborative mindset) and learn from each other (Learning attitude) in a safe environment (Safety) for collaborative innovation. Furthermore, regarding vertical working relations, teachers mentioned the important role of coach-teachers (Stimulator) and school principals (Leader) and that school principals need to share responsibilities with teachers (Sharing responsibilities). Based on a multilevel analysis of what affects collaborative innovation, we found that school principals who stimulated teachers to improve education collaboratively and were involved in the collaborative process themselves enhanced collaborative innovation practices. Lastly, we found that teachers experience that both school principals and coachteachers need to be actively involved to enhance collaborative innovation practices. At the same time, we indicated that teachers and school principals involved in horizontal and vertical working relations do not necessarily nor simply result in collaborative innovation. We studied school principals’ leadership in collaborative innovation in Chapters 3 and 5 and (coach-) teachers in Chapter 4.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTk4NDMw