The Aspiring School Leader Podcast

Dr. Donovan Smalls II

The Aspiring School Leader Podcast is the go-to show for educators ready to step into school leadership with clarity, confidence, and impact. Hosted by Dr. Donovan Smalls II, an assistant principal, best-selling author, and interview coach, this podcast helps aspiring school leaders get interview-ready & confidently land their first leadership role. Dr. Smalls supports educators with interview preparation, equipping them to step into new roles fully prepared and confident. Each episode delivers real-world insights, actionable strategies, and honest conversations about the challenges and opportunities that come with school leadership. Whether listeners are preparing for their first interview or already walking the halls as leaders-in-waiting, this podcast provides the tools and guidance they need to show up ready. For educators ready to elevate their impact beyond the classroom, this is the place to start. Ready to dive in? - Get my book Beyond The Classroom: https://tinyurl.com/mr23p86h  - Check out my Elevate Your Impact Interview Preparation Coaching Program: https://www.donovansmalls2.com/coaching  - Visit my website: https://www.donovansmalls2.com  - Email us at donovansmalls2@gmail.com 

  1. 2d ago

    Episode 39: How to Know If a School Leadership Job Is Right for You | Interview Tips

    A school leadership job is about more than getting an offer—it’s about finding the right school, district, and leadership environment for you. In this episode, Dr. Donovan Smalls II shares how aspiring school leaders can evaluate a leadership opportunity before saying yes. Chapters: 00:00 You’re Interviewing Them, Too 02:33 Know What You’re Looking For 07:12 Ask Questions That Reveal the Culture 09:33 Remember the Value You Bring When preparing for a school leadership interview, it’s easy to focus entirely on proving yourself to the interview panel. But remember…you’re interviewing them, too. This episode will help you approach your next leadership interview with confidence, clarity, and discernment, by learning how to: ✅ Evaluate whether a school leadership job is right for you ✅ Ask questions that reveal the school’s culture ✅ Understand whether the district supports leadership growth ✅ Recognize the value and experience you bring to the table You’ll learn how to determine whether a school leadership position aligns with your long-term goals, leadership growth, values, and ability to make a meaningful impact on students, staff, and families. If you need personalized support with your leadership interview preparation, let’s explore 1:1 coaching below. 👉🏾 1:1 Leadership Interview Coaching: https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching 📘 Beyond the Classroom https://shorturl.at/74Bgy About Dr. Donovan Smalls II: Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Donovan Smalls II helps aspiring school leaders become interview-ready, strengthen their leadership confidence, and confidently land their first school leadership role. Streaming on: 📺 YouTube 🔗 https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts 🔗 https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify 🔗 https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr 🔔 Subscribe for weekly videos on Leadership Interviews, Assistant Principal Interviews, School Leadership, Educational Leadership, Interview Preparation, Leadership Development, and Career Growth for aspiring school leaders. #SchoolLeadership #LeadershipInterview #InterviewPreparation #AssistantPrincipal #AspiringSchoolLeaders

  2. Aug 10

    Episode 38: How Qualified Candidates Can Stand Out in Leadership Interviews

    School leadership interview success takes more than experience and qualifications. In this episode, Dr. Donovan Smalls II shares 3 powerful leadership interview strategies to help aspiring school leaders answer with confidence, reduce interview anxiety, and position themselves as the leader a district wants to hire. Two candidates can have similar experience, qualifications, and resumes—but one gets the job while the other doesn't. Often, the difference isn't experience. It's strategy. ⏱️ Chapters: 00:00 — Why Qualified Candidates Fail Leadership Interviews 01:56 — Strategy #1: Know the District Before You Sell Yourself 06:38 — Strategy #2: Think Beyond the Question 09:27 — Strategy #3: Control the Narrative If you're preparing to land your first school leadership role, this video will help you: ✅ Research the district before you sell yourself ✅ Connect your experience to the district's goals and needs ✅ Understand what interview questions are really designed to reveal ✅ Answer unexpected leadership interview questions with confidence ✅ Use frameworks instead of memorizing answers ✅ Reduce interview anxiety and communicate your leadership more effectively ✅ Control the narrative and leave the interview with a clear leadership message 🎯 Ready to Prepare for Your Leadership Interview? If you have a strong resume and the experience to lead, but need additional support preparing for your next school leadership interview, Dr. Donovan Smalls II's 4-week interview preparation coaching program, Elevate Your Impact, can help you: • Clarify and confidently communicate your leadership story • Practice scenario-based leadership interview questions • Receive real-time coaching and targeted feedback • Complete a full one-on-one mock leadership interview 👉🏾 1:1 Leadership Interview Coaching: https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching 📘 Beyond the Classroom https://shorturl.at/74Bgy About Dr. Donovan Smalls II: Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Donovan Smalls II helps aspiring school leaders become interview-ready, strengthen their leadership confidence, and confidently land their first school leadership role. Streaming on: 📺 YouTube 🔗 https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts 🔗 https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify 🔗 https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr 🔔 Subscribe for weekly videos on Leadership Interviews, Assistant Principal Interviews, School Leadership, Educational Leadership, Interview Preparation, Leadership Development, and Career Growth for aspiring school leaders. #SchoolLeadership #LeadershipInterview #AssistantPrincipal #InterviewPreparation #EducationalLeadership

  3. Aug 4

    Episode 37: 3 Things Hiring Committees Want to Hear in Leadership Interviews

    Leadership Interview Tips for Aspiring School Leadership Interview Success. Learn what hiring committees want to hear in leadership interviews. You don't need a stronger resume. You need stronger interview answers. The candidates who consistently earn leadership roles aren't always the most experienced—they're the ones who clearly communicate how their leadership changes outcomes for teachers, students, and the entire school community. If you're preparing for your first leadership interview, these three principles will completely change how you approach your next interview. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **INSIDE THIS EPISODE** 00:00 | The mistake that weakens great interview answers 00:24 | Why hiring committees think differently than candidates 03:08 | Principle #1 — You shouldn't always be the hero 06:18 | Principle #2 — Think beyond your classroom 12:16 | Principle #3 — Put students at the center of every answer 14:24 | The interview framework every aspiring school leader should remember ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **WHY THIS MATTERS** Hiring committees aren't simply looking for someone who can manage a school. They're looking for someone who can develop teachers, inspire people, and improve student outcomes. That's the difference between sounding qualified...and sounding like the leader they're ready to hire. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **IN THIS VIDEO, YOU'LL DISCOVER** • The three things hiring committees actually want to hear • Why talking about yourself too much weakens your interview answers • How to communicate leadership impact instead of accomplishments • How to connect classroom success to school-wide leadership • The mindset shift that separates teachers from future school leaders • Why student-centered leadership creates unforgettable interview answers • How to position yourself as someone who develops people—not just manages them ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **ONE IDEA TO REMEMBER** Great leadership interviews aren't about proving how impressive you are. They're about proving how many lives your leadership will improve. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **ABOUT DR. DONOVAN SMALLS II** Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Donovan Smalls II helps aspiring school leaders strengthen their interview skills, communicate their leadership story with confidence, and successfully transition into their first leadership role. Beyond the Classroom https://shorturl.at/74Bgy Interview Coaching https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching  ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ LISTEN & CONNECT YouTube https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m Apple Podcasts https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k Spotify https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Subscribe for weekly content on leadership interviews, assistant principal interviews, school leadership, educational leadership, leadership development, interview preparation, and career growth for aspiring school leaders.

  4. Jul 27

    Episode 36: The #1 Interview Mistake Aspiring School Leaders Keep Making

    Preparing to land your first leadership role? This episode reveals the #1 mistake aspiring school leaders make and how a student-centered leadership approach can help you stand out with interview committees. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **CHAPTERS** ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 00:00 – The #1 Interview Mistake 00:24 – Why Most Leadership Interview Answers Fall Short 03:08 – Principle #1: Stop Making Yourself the Hero 06:18 – Principle #2: Connect Classroom Impact to School-wide Impact 12:16 – Principle #3: Make Students the Center of Your Leadership Philosophy 14:24 – Three Principles That Transform Interview Answers 14:51 – Leadership Interview Coaching ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Many aspiring school leaders miss out on leadership opportunities—not because they lack experience, but because they communicate leadership the wrong way. In this episode, you'll learn three practical leadership interview principles that will help you answer interview questions with confidence, demonstrate student-centered leadership, and leave hiring committees with a lasting impression. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **WHAT YOU'LL LEARN** ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✔ The #1 leadership interview mistake aspiring school leaders make ✔ Why hiring committees look beyond leadership skills and experience ✔ How to stop making yourself the hero in your interview answers ✔ How to connect your classroom experience to schoolwide leadership ✔ Why student-centered leadership creates stronger interview answers ✔ How to develop a leadership philosophy that hiring committees remember ✔ How to communicate leadership impact instead of listing accomplishments ✔ What separates great teachers from great school leaders during interviews Great interview answers don't just explain **how you lead.** They explain **who benefits from your leadership.** ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **About Dr. Donovan Smalls II** ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Donovan Smalls II helps aspiring school leaders become interview-ready, strengthen their leadership confidence, and confidently land their first school leadership role. 📘 **Grab Beyond the Classroom** https://shorturl.at/74Bgy 🎯 **1:1 Leadership Interview Coaching** If you're preparing for your first leadership role and want personalized interview coaching, learn more here: https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ **Listen & Connect** ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 📺 YouTube https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔔 Subscribe for weekly videos on **Leadership Interviews, Assistant Principal Interviews, School Leadership, Educational Leadership, Interview Preparation, Leadership Development,** and **Career Growth** for aspiring school leaders.

  5. Jul 20

    Episode 35: Why don't you get the job even with a great resume? | Interview Tips 2026

    Preparing for an assistant principal interview or school leadership interview but still not getting hired? In this episode, discover why hiring committees often reject highly qualified candidates—and what they're actually looking for during an interview. How to communicate your leadership experience, demonstrate real impact, and answer interview questions in a way that builds confidence and trust. 0:00 - The Harsh Truth About Great Resumes 1:01 - Your Resume Isn't the Problem (The Savior Misconception) 2:53 - Principle 1: Don't Tell Them What You Did, Tell Them Why It Mattered 6:20 - Principle 2: Translate Your Experiences Into Leadership (Influence vs. Authority) 9:36 - Principle 3: Every Answer Should Reinforce Your Leadership Identity 11:00 - The Closing Challenge: 3 Questions You Must Ask Yourself Learn: ✔ Why a great resume isn't enough to get hired ✔ The biggest interview mistakes aspiring school leaders make ✔ How to turn your experience into leadership evidence ✔ What hiring committees really want to hear ✔ 3 powerful interview principles to help you stand out ✔ How to build a strong leadership identity during an interview 👤 About Dr. Donovan Smalls II Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Smalls helps aspiring school leaders get interview-ready & confidently land their first leadership role. 📕 Grab Beyond the Classroom → https://shorturl.at/74Bgy 🎯 1:1 Leadership Coaching is available for aspiring school leaders who want to strengthen their interview skills and confidently transition into administrative roles: 👉🏾 https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching 🎧 Listen & Connect 📺 YouTube: https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify: https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔔 Subscribe for weekly content on school leadership interviews, leadership development, and career growth strategies. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ #InterviewTips #LeadershipInterview #SchoolLeadership #CareerGrowth #InterviewPreparation #LeadershipSkills #AssistantPrincipal #AspiringLeaders

  6. Jul 13

    Episode 34: THE 5 INTERVIEW MOVES THAT HELP YOU LAND YOUR FIRST SCHOOL LEADERSHIP ROLE

    THE 5 INTERVIEW MOVES THAT HELP YOU LAND YOUR FIRST SCHOOL LEADERSHIP ROLE You can prepare your answers. You can practice your delivery. You can walk into the interview feeling confident. But if you’re not positioning yourself as a leader… you won’t get hired. Because every hiring panel is asking one core question: Can you step into leadership—and solve problems at a systems level? In this episode, Dr. Donovan Smalls II breaks down 5 powerful interview readiness moves to help aspiring school leaders stand out, communicate their leadership identity, and confidently land their first leadership role. If you’re preparing for your first school leadership interview, this video will help you shift your mindset, strengthen your responses, and show up as the leader they’re looking for. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ TIMESTAMPS: ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 00:00 Intro – Why Most Candidates Don’t Get Hired 01:45 #1: Study the School & District Like a Leader 04:32 #2: Tighten Your Leadership Story 07:22 #3: Translate Experience into Leadership Impact 10:56 #4: Prepare for Scenario-Based Questions 14:57 #5: Ask Questions Like a Leader ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ WHAT YOU WILL LEARN: ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ➤ How to prepare for your first school leadership interview ➤ What hiring panels are really evaluating (beyond your answers) ➤ How to position yourself as a systems-level thinker ➤ How to turn classroom experience into leadership impact ➤ How to answer scenario-based interview questions with confidence ➤ What questions to ask that make you stand out as a leader ➤ The mindset shift required to land your first leadership role Strong candidates don’t just answer questions. They demonstrate leadership, judgment, and impact. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ About Dr. Donovan Smalls II Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Smalls helps aspiring school leaders get interview-ready & confidently land their first leadership role. 📕 Grab Beyond the Classroom → https://shorturl.at/74Bgy 1:1 leadership coaching available for aspiring school leaders: https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Listen & Connect 📺 YouTube https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Subscribe for weekly content on school leadership interviews, assistant principal interview tips, and career growth for aspiring school leaders. #SchoolLeadershipInterview #AssistantPrincipalInterview #AspiringSchoolLeaders #InterviewPreparation #EducationalLeadership

  7. Jul 6

    Episode 33: 3 Mindset Shifts Aspiring School Leaders Need Before Their Next Interview

    Most aspiring school leaders don’t struggle in interviews because they lack degrees or experience. They struggle because they are preparing for the WRONG interview. They spend hours memorizing and scripting the "perfect" textbook answers. And that exact approach is why so many great candidates sound robotic and miss out on the job offer. In this episode, Dr. Donovan Smalls II breaks down the 3 critical mindset shifts you must make before your next interview to stand out, sound authentic, and claim your seat as a leader. If you are preparing for your first assistant principal, supervisor, or administrative role, this breakdown will completely change the way you prepare. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ TIMESTAMPS: ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 0:00 Intro – The Biggest Mistake Aspiring School Leaders Make 5:43 Shift #1: From Memorizing Answers to Collecting Evidence 10:03 Shift #2: From Preparing Answers to Preparing Stories 13:00 Shift #3: From Impressing the Committee to Building Trust ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ WHAT YOU WILL LEARN: ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ➤ Why memorizing interview answers makes you sound like a robot ➤ How to shift from perfect scripting to collecting real leadership evidence ➤ The power of quantitative vs. qualitative data in your responses ➤ How to build a "Story Bank" that fits multiple interview scenarios ➤ Why building deep trust with the committee beats a performative interview ➤ How to show vulnerability, reflection, and authentic leadership ➤ The number one thing a principal needs to see before giving you the keys to the building Strong candidates don’t just memorize answers. They demonstrate leadership readiness through trust and evidence. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ About Dr. Donovan Smalls II: Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Smalls helps aspiring school leaders get interview-ready & confidently land their first leadership role. 📕 Grab Beyond the Classroom → https://shorturl.at/74Bgy 1:1 leadership coaching available for aspiring school leaders who want to strengthen their interview skills and confidently transition into administrative roles: https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Listen & Connect 📺 YouTube https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Subscribe for weekly content on school leadership interviews, leadership development, and career growth strategies.

  8. Apr 1

    Episode 32: Great Interview, But No Job Offer? Listen to This!

    GREAT INTERVIEW BUT NO JOB OFFER? WHAT YOU NEED TO UNDERSTAND You walked out of your interview feeling confident. You did your homework, rehearsed your responses, and spoke with care. Yet, the position slipped away. Now, you're left with a nagging question… what happened? The reality is, it isn't always about a misstep on your part. In this episode, Dr. Donovan Smalls II offers insight into a frustrating reality: even when an interview goes well, a job offer isn't guaranteed. He also outlines steps you can take to boost your prospects. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ TIMESTAMPS: ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 00:00 Intro – You Did Everything Right… So What Went Wrong? 03:03 Reason #1: It Wasn’t Your Interview… It Was Timing 05:34 Reason #2: Fit Matters More Than You Think 08:37 Reason #3: Don’t Let One Interview Define You ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ WHAT YOU WILL LEARN: ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ➤ Why great interviews don’t always result in job offers ➤ The role of timing and factors outside your control ➤ Why “fit” matters more than qualifications ➤ How hiring decisions really work behind the scenes ➤ The biggest mistake candidates make after rejection ➤ How to refine your interview skills without losing confidence ➤ What you should focus on to land your next leadership role You didn’t fail. You’re just not at the right opportunity yet. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ About Dr. Donovan Smalls II Assistant Principal | Best-Selling Author | Interview Coach Dr. Smalls helps aspiring school leaders get interview-ready & confidently land their first leadership role. 📕 Grab Beyond the Classroom → https://shorturl.at/74Bgy 1:1 leadership coaching available for aspiring school leaders who want to strengthen their interview skills and confidently transition into administrative roles: https://donovansmalls2.com/coaching ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Listen & Connect 📺 YouTube https://urlgeni.us/youtube/channel/L0Y2m 🎧 Apple Podcasts https://tinyurl.com/mv7f683k 🎧 Spotify https://tinyurl.com/4wydt4nr ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Subscribe for weekly content on school leadership interviews, leadership development, and career growth strategies. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ #InterviewTips #JobInterview #LeadershipInterview #CareerGrowth #InterviewPreparation #GetHired #LeadershipSkills

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About

The Aspiring School Leader Podcast is the go-to show for educators ready to step into school leadership with clarity, confidence, and impact. Hosted by Dr. Donovan Smalls II, an assistant principal, best-selling author, and interview coach, this podcast helps aspiring school leaders get interview-ready & confidently land their first leadership role. Dr. Smalls supports educators with interview preparation, equipping them to step into new roles fully prepared and confident. Each episode delivers real-world insights, actionable strategies, and honest conversations about the challenges and opportunities that come with school leadership. Whether listeners are preparing for their first interview or already walking the halls as leaders-in-waiting, this podcast provides the tools and guidance they need to show up ready. For educators ready to elevate their impact beyond the classroom, this is the place to start. Ready to dive in? - Get my book Beyond The Classroom: https://tinyurl.com/mr23p86h  - Check out my Elevate Your Impact Interview Preparation Coaching Program: https://www.donovansmalls2.com/coaching  - Visit my website: https://www.donovansmalls2.com  - Email us at donovansmalls2@gmail.com 

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