Relational Rhythms - Investigating Longitudinal Advice Networks of a Leadership Team During Reform

Oct 15, 2026

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Relational Rhythms investigates how advice networks in a districtwide leadership team form and evolve during educational reform in a U.S. public school district in California. The study addresses structural, relational, and cognitive factors shaping advice relationships over four time points. Using stochastic actor-oriented modeling, it finds that hierarchical triadic structures consistently matter, with close friendships and self-efficacy remaining significant across the reform. Leaders prefer advice within workplace levels, yet cross-level ties are critical in the reform’s middle phase.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages20

Reading Time50 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Organizational conditions and hierarchical structures in reform

Interpersonal networks as mechanisms for systemic change

Advice-seeking networks and knowledge sharing

Prior network research in education

AERA Open January-December 2025, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 1–20 DOI: 10. 1177/23328584251316469 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© The Author(s) 2025. [https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero) Relational Rhythms: Investigating Longitudinal Advice Networks of a Leadership Team During Reform Yi-Hwa Liou National Taipei University of Education Jasperina Brouwer University of Groningen Alan J. Daly University of California, San Diego Yong-Shiuan Lee Feng Chia University This study addressed the limited research on advice networks in educational reform by examining structural, relational, and cognitive factors that shape the formation of advice relationships within a districtwide leadership team in the United States. Using stochastic actor-oriented modeling, we investigated a longitudinal set of leadership data at four points in time in one public school district in California during its reform process. Hierarchical triadic structures consistently played a key role in advice relationships. Close friendships and self-efficacy were significant factors throughout the reform. Leaders preferred advice within their workplace level (homophily), but cross-level ties were critical during the reform’s middle phase. This study underscores the importance of fostering both within-level and cross-level advice-seeking relationships, making advice sources visible, and leveraging experienced leaders to guide colleagues, thereby enhancing self-efficacy and supporting cohesive reform efforts. Keywords: educational reform, leadership, networking, organization theory/change, longitudinal studies Introduction For decades, school systems worldwide have sought to create organizational conditions that support educational change and improvement (Daly & Finnigan, 2016; Finnigan & Daly, 2012; Honig et al., 2017; Leithwood et al., 2020; Spillane, Hopkins, & Sweet, 2018) . In the United States, many reform efforts leverage the role of school districts in promoting systemic change, implicating not only district leaders in improvement work but also school principals who lead reform on the front line (Honig et al., 2017) . However, these change efforts are often enacted within hierarchical school and district structures, which may inhibit teamwork and reduce communication efficiency and innovation (Daly & Finnigan, 2016) . A growing body of research on school and district reform has emphasized the role of interpersonal relationships necessary for systemic change in overcoming often siloed working conditions (Daly & Finnigan, 2016; Finnigan et al., 2021; Spillane, Hopkins, & Sweet, 2018) . Interpersonal networks are powerful tools, capable of redefining work boundaries and supporting change across systems (Daly & Finnigan, 2016; Kilduff & Krackhardt, 2008) . They allow leaders to access, disseminate, and mobilize reform-related resources (i.e., knowledge, information, and practice), which are critical to organizational innovation, learning, and adaptation to change (Farrell & Coburn, 2017; Finnigan & Daly, 2012) . Therefore, leveraging relational networks that facilitate expertise and knowledge sharing is an important line of inquiry in studies of change. Understanding the mechanisms that drive knowledge sharing and creation related to change is crucial, and adviceseeking networks are key to these processes (Lazega et al., 2012; Spillane, Shirrell, & Adhikari, 2018; Spillane et al., Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License ([https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and

FAQs

What research problem does the study address?

It addresses limited research on advice networks in educational reform by examining factors that shape how advice relationships form within a districtwide leadership team.

How does the study analyze advice networks over time?

It uses stochastic actor-oriented modeling to analyze longitudinal leadership data collected at four points during a reform process.

Which factors were consistently important for advice relationships?

Hierarchical triadic structures consistently played a key role, and close friendships and self-efficacy were significant throughout the reform.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Pentious