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Leaders Go to School on Business Practices

Boston

Lots of districts like to think they have close-knit leadership teams. But few school leaders can say they’ve ironed their clothes together, which became a morning ritual for a group from San Francisco that spent a week at the Harvard Business School here this summer.

Joined by similar teams from seven other large districts, they camped out in dorm-like quarters while engaging in the kind of deep thinking about organizational change that, while common among captains of industry, is rare for most school administrators.

The workshop was part of the Public Education Leadership Project, a 2-year-old initiative meant to inject a dose of corporate sense into the way school systems are run. During the intense week, participants discussed case studies, attended lectures, and drafted action plans—some of which already...