Hiring School Principal- 5 Steps To Get It Right

April 19, 2023, 4:58 p.m.

What is the most difficult process in the employment scenario? It is a subjective question to deal with, right? But for job recruiters, the hiring or the recruitment process seems the most complicated. The whole process requires a lot of patience.

In earlier times, recruitment meant just finding the right talent for a vacancy. But, now the concept has become broader and it involves finding the right persons who can do the job by thoroughly enjoying it and want to stay with the organisation throughout its development. And we must consider the fact that acquisition of the right talent is the major gear up for the progress of any organisation. This becomes especially important for schools, which are the backbone of any society.

Here we’ll discuss the steps and procedures involved in the hiring process of a School Principal.

The process starts with Principal candidates submitting applications to school committees, whose members then select the potential interviewees. Then the candidates meet with committee members, and if there's interest in moving forward, applicants are then called back for formal interviews or meetings with school administration teams.

Screening phase

This is the first stage. It deals with the paper screening section, the procedure of carefully reviewing and rating all the resumes received. A scoring system is used for this screening process and then the results are compared with the qualifications of the relevant staff.

Interview phase

Then comes the interview phase. It is a kind of filtering stage which involves an in person meeting between the prospective candidates and the concerned authorities to get an insight of their instructional leadership and capabilities.

Panel discussion phase

Those candidates who successfully complete the screening interview session have to then go through a panel discussion phase. There is an interview panel comprised of teachers, parents, a supervisor, a fellow principal, and a school board member who asks some set of open-ended questions to the candidates.

The Debrief Session

The panel discussion phase is then followed by the debriefing session. They serve as good opportunities for all those in the recruitment process to share their views and opinions on the prospective clients. Each panel member has to give the name of a person to be eliminated from the candidate list and the reason for elimination.

Welcoming session is usually the final phase and the most important session of a school principal hiring process. Here the school has to organise an event to introduce the new selected candidate for the position of school principal. The new hire gets acquainted with his or her administrative colleagues in this stage. Once a candidate gets selected for the position of school principal, the required background checks are done, salary negotiations are discussed and finalised before the setting up of the welcoming session. This has to be reviewed and approved by the board of education before planning the welcome event.

The recruiters for any job should check some very important things of the candidates before the actual selection process. The first and foremost thing is the educational background of the prospective candidate. Then comes the verification of his or her job history and relevant experience. It is always good to get an idea of the candidate's greatest accomplishment. The selection process becomes very smooth if the candidates can well explain their greatest strengths. One Of the most important questions to ask a prospective candidate for a great school principal is why does he/she feel that he/she is a good candidate for this role.

Here we’ll conclude by giving an important note to the recruiters- 'hire character & train the skill, then everything will be right'.