The Principal’s Guide to Conflict Management
By Jen Schwanke
(ASCD, 2024 – Learn more)
Reviewed by Dennis Schug
In The Principal’s Guide to Conflict Management, veteran school leader Jen Schwanke takes on one of the most challenging realities of a principal’s work: conflict management and conflict resolution.
From hallway flare-ups to high-stakes disagreements among adults, conflict is a constant presence in schools. Rather than avoiding or reacting to it, Schwanke argues leaders must learn to manage conflict with clarity, empathy, and a steady hand.
This book provides the tools, examples, and mindset shifts necessary to help principals not just survive conflict but transform it into opportunities for growth and stronger school communities.
Credibility and candor
Schwanke’s voice brings credibility, candor, and humility to each page. A longtime teacher, principal, and district leader, as well as a frequent writer for Educational Leadership, she understands that conflict in schools isn’t abstract – it’s lived daily.
The school leader who successfully addresses, navigates, and resolves conflict is one who is courageous and confident in confronting them with a clear mindset and authentic and proven strategies.
What distinguishes this book is how Schwanke combines real-world sensibility and frameworks, scripts, and strategies that deliver with the reassuring tone of someone who has “been there.”
What’s in the book
The book is organized into three broad sections that mirror a principal’s journey with conflict: understanding it, managing it in the moment, and leading beyond it. Schwanke frames each chapter with realistic scenarios, questions for reflection, and guiding principles that help leaders apply the ideas immediately.
Schwanke acknowledges conflict is inevitable and often healthy. She normalizes it by citing types of conflict – whether between colleagues, with parents, or involving students, and encourages leaders to identify root causes rather than symptoms. Examples of school-based conflicts include disagreements on process, opinions of a student’s performance, teaching philosophy, teaching style, and parent input. She writes, “Conflict is a signal, not a failure. It points to something important that needs to be addressed.”
Problems may be positive and productive or negative and damaging. It’s the principal’s job to learn and know when and how to get involved in resolving problems. Schwanke offers a measure she finds helpful in assessing the potential for problems to escalate and affect schools on a wider level: “The Four Tens” rule, which asks, “Will this conflict matter in 10 minutes? Ten hours? Ten Days? Ten Years?”
Strategies for resolution is the heart of the book. Schwanke offers clear steps to intervene and resolve conflict through a process to mediate conflicts: Anticipate, Analyze, Act. She walks readers through practical approaches to common situations, with clear steps and words to use both as ways to set our mindset and to calmly manage interpersonal tension that may escalate between parties.
Schwanke shares what she calls “pause points” – moments when leaders can slow the escalation by asking clarifying questions, reframing the issue, or simply listening. She doesn’t sugarcoat; sometimes the best move is a hard conversation or decisive action. But her emphasis is always on fairness, dignity, and professionalism. And this begins with the principal being engaged in a mindset of productive focus that sets the groundwork for successful mediation.
Leading in the midst of conflict widens the lens. It’s where “the rubber meets the road.” It is here where Schwanke shows how principals can use conflict to strengthen culture. School culture can make all the difference if principals have focused on building trust before conflict erupts, modeled healthy disagreement, and helped teachers develop their own conflict-resolution skills.
Schwanke reminds us that conflict management isn’t about “winning” arguments but cultivating a climate where disagreements are handled respectfully and productively. Successful conflict management is about communication that is smart, clear, and that happens often. As Schwanke writes about one assistant principal’s mantra: “All behavior is communication and every communication adds value”.
The charts, lists, and sample language that fill this book give it a ready-to-use quality. For example, a “Conflict Self-Assessment” invites principals to reflect on their own tendencies, asking vital questions such as, “Do you avoid conflict? Overreact? Default to authority?” Another helpful tool is a step-by-step “Conflict Conversation Framework,” which outlines how to open, navigate, and close difficult conversations. These examples represent the invaluable resources to which the author gives readers access. (There’s also a book study guide at Schwanke’s website.)
Why I recommend the book
In one standout chapter on parent conflicts, Schwanke offers scripts for responding to accusatory emails – examples that any school leader will recognize. Instead of reacting defensively, she models responses that acknowledge emotion, clarify facts, and reframe toward collaboration. Similarly, her guidance on staff conflicts includes “phrases that de-escalate,” such as “Help me understand what you need” or “Let’s agree on what success looks like for both of us.” These are simple and powerful tools for daily leadership.
What resonated most is Schwanke’s insistence that conflict management is not an add-on skill – it is the work of leadership. Her discussion of “culture-setting through conflict” reframed my own thinking: how a leader responds to conflict, whether calmly or reactively, sets the tone for the entire school. In my experience, this rings true. Leaders who lean into conflict with openness and consistency have staff members who are more likely to follow suit, creating potential for healthier professional relationships.
I also appreciated her balance between pragmatism and hope. She acknowledges the exhaustion of handling repeated disputes, yet she continually pulls back to the larger purpose: helping students learn and grow in a supportive environment. “If we manage conflict well,” she writes, “we model for our students what it means to work through challenges with integrity.” That line reminded me that conflict management isn’t just about adults but also about the examples we set for our students.
Jen Schwanke’s The Principal’s Guide to Conflict Management is both a practical handbook and a reassuring companion for school leaders. With its structured chapters, ready-to-use tools, and deeply humane perspective, it offers guidance for navigating the conflicts that inevitably surface in schools – and for turning those conflicts into opportunities to strengthen culture.
For new principals, it’s a playbook. For veteran leaders, it’s a reflective mirror. For anyone in school leadership, it’s a reminder that conflict, handled wisely, can be a catalyst for trust, growth, and lasting change.
Dennis Schug serves as a middle school principal on Long Island, New York. Previously, he was an assistant principal and an elementary school teacher in co-taught classrooms for 13 years. A principal since 2010, he has served as Suffolk County Middle Level Principals’ Association (SCMLPA) President and a New York State Middle School Association (NYSMSA) regional representative, advocating professional sharing at the middle level between counties and regions.
Schug prioritizes building learning organizations focused on communication, collaboration, learning, leadership, and relationships. An avid consumer of MiddleWeb resources, he eagerly learns, applies, and shares what he learns with staff and colleagues.
