How do leaders generate a learning climate that yields favorable organizational outcomes? To address this question, we offer and test a model linking charismatic leadership with the team-emergent states of shared vision and trust within the team, as predicting organizational learning climate, and long-term assessments of organizational outcomes by key stakeholders. We examined this model in a sample of 69 Arab elementary schools in Israel using multiple sources of raters, predicting long-term assessments by key stakeholders of respective schools (parents and superintendents) at 2 points in time: 1 year and 3 years following the survey of the teachers. In line with our expectations, we obtained an overall, indirect effect between charismatic leadership and organizational learning climate. We also found support for both the direct and indirect effects of leader charisma through trust within the team on organizational learning climate and school outcomes. Although charismatic leadership predicted shared vision among team members, shared vision did not predict organizational learning climate, and hence, our proposed mediating effects of shared vision on organizational learning climate and outcomes were not supported. We discuss both theoretical and practical implications for the effects of leaders on learning processes and outcomes.

Keeping experienced and competent teachers in schools is becoming an important challenge for school leadership. Hence, this research tested an innovative model which explored the direct and indirect relationship between principals’ instructional leadership, collective teacher efficacy, a shared vision, and a teacher’s intent to leave their profession. Data were collected from a survey of 1700 teachers from 130 Jewish and Arab elementary schools randomly selected from the database of the Israeli education system. To test the proposed multilevel model, we conducted multilevel structural equation modeling. The analysis confirmed that collective teacher efficacy and shared vision emerge as prominent mediators between principals’ instructional leadership and a teacher’s intent to leave. Regarding the differences between the two sectors (Arab and Jewish) that exist in the Israeli education system, collective teacher efficacy, as well as shared vision, played a mediating role between instructional leadership and a teacher’s intent to leave in the Jewish elementary schools, while in the Arab elementary schools, only collective teacher efficacy played a mediating role between instructional leadership and a teacher’s intent to leave. This study adds to the body of research directed at identifying administrative support and work-related factors that may decrease a teacher’s intent to leave and are amenable to leadership intervention.

Purpose Organizational learning (OL) has been conceptualized as a critical component in school change processes. Nevertheless, OL in the school context is still somewhat obscure and difficult to comprehend, thus it is rarely translated into operational structures and processes and later permanently sustained. The purpose of this study is to present the organizational learning mechanisms (OLMs) framework as an institutionalized arrangement for collecting, disseminating, analyzing, storing, retrieving and using information that is relevant to the performance of school systems. Design/methodology/approach First, the authors examine the previous research on OLMs as a conceptual framework for OL in schools; then the authors present the various validated measures of OLMs in schools; and finally, the authors suggest implications for principals, as well as future explorations of the issue. Findings While the literature on OL in schools acknowledges the mystification of the term and the difficulty in translating it into operative procedures in dynamic and complex contexts, OLMs, as an integration of structural and cultural frameworks, are conceptualized as scaffolding for the development of learning schools. Originality/value The OLMs’ (structural and cultural) framework of information processing may help schools develop and sustain learning communities aimed at fostering the continuous growth of students and faculty members alike.

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PurposeThe study aims to test an innovative model that explores the direct and indirect relationships between principals' innovative behavior, climate of organizational learning and a teacher's intent to leave his or her school and take a voluntary absence.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from a survey of 1,529 teachers from 107 Arab elementary schools randomly selected from the database of the Israeli educational system. To test the proposed multilevel model, we conducted multilevel structural equation modeling (ML-SEM).FindingsThe analysis confirmed that organizational learning climate is a prominent mediator between principals' innovative behavior and a teacher's intent to leave and his/her voluntary absence.Originality/valueThis research advances our understanding of leaders' innovative construct in an educational context and adds to the body of research directed at identifying administrative support and work-related factors that may negatively relate to a teacher's absenteeism or intent to leave and are amenable to leadership intervention.