Collaborate to alleviate stress and elevate success! The demands on today's principals can be overwhelming in their complexity. More than ever, it is critical for principals to engage in meaningful collaboration empowering staff, parents, community members, and students with a voice in making decisions and making a difference. By drawing on the collective wisdom of the school's stakeholders, principals can promote a sense of shared conviction and responsibility for heightened levels of success-and this guide will help you get there. It offers a proven three-phased collaborative leadership approach, covering best practices for: Team building-including 10 characteristics of successful teams, "25 Questions" exercise, and team assessments; Action research-highlighting the three forms of action research, plus steps for implementation; and Shared decision making-with emphasis on developing teacher leaders. This fifth volume of a seven-part leadership series features reader-friendly tools including: Insightful questionnaire and response analysis Case study with reflective questions "What You Should Know About" sections framing each chapter Self-Assessment resources "In-basket Simulations" exploring real-life examples