The relationship between the agile leadership characteristics and the crisis management skills of primary school principals

The aim of this research is to reveal the relationship between primary school principals' agile leadership characteristics and crisis management skills according to teacher perceptions and to examine them according to some variables. The universe of the research consists of teachers working in public primary schools in the Central and Tatvan districts of Bitlis province in the 2022- 2023 academic year. The study population of the research consists of 27 primary schools and 466 teachers with 10 or more teachers in the Central and Tatvan districts of Bitlis province. Since it was aimed to reach the entire study universe of the research, sampling was not used. Two different scales were used in the research, namely the "Marmara Agile Leadership Scale" developed by Özgenel and Yazıcı (2020) and the "Crisis Management Skills of Primary School Principals" scale developed by Aksu and Deveci (2009). According to the findings obtained from the research, Independent Samples T Test and Anova test, which are parametric tests, were applied. Tukey test was used to reveal the sub-dimensions of the difference between teachers' opinions. It was concluded that the agile leadership scale differs according to the variables of the current principals working time and the number of students at the school, and in the Crisis Management Skills Scale, it was concluded that it differs according to the variables of marital status, working time with the current principal and the number of students in the school. Pearson Correlation analysis was conducted to determine the relationship between the agile leadership characteristics of primary school principals and their crisis management skills, and it was concluded that the relationship between them was positive. Simple linear regression analysis was conducted to determine the level of prediction between primary school principals' agile leadership characteristics and crisis management skills. Based on the findings, it was determined that agile leadership predicted crisis management skills. In line with the research results, it may be recommended to reduce the number of students in crowded primary schools and organize in-service training for school principals to increase their management skills and agile leadership capacities, especially during crisis periods.