I came across The Good Principal a few days ago while looking for something completely unrelated to what I’m about to share.
Ended up reading several confessions instead. Some made me laugh, others made me wonder if we all work in the same school.
Anyway, I thought I’d share mine too.
I’ve been a principal for six years, with 18 years altogether in education. You can use Mark if a name is needed, but I’d rather keep my identity private.
There’s this one phrase I hear at school almost every day.
“Just one quick question.”
I don’t know what it is about those five words, but lately I feel myself getting irritated before the person even finishes asking.
And the funny thing is, I used to be the one saying it to my principal when I was still teaching.
I still think that, actually.
But lately I’ve been noticing something else.
It’s usually not the big crisis that destroys my day.
It’s the small things.
The things nobody thinks are going to take time.
The things that arrive with the words:
“Just one quick question.”
That happened to me again last week, and by the end of the day I remember looking at my desk wondering how I had been busy for hours and still hadn’t finished the thing I was trying to do in the morning.
So I’m sending this because I’m curious if other principals experience the same thing.
Not the emergencies.
The tiny interruptions that somehow eat the whole day.
Mine started at the door.
“Sir, just one quick question.”
I should’ve known.
I should’ve known the moment she said quick.
There is no such thing as a quick question in a principal’s office.
Not really.
Sometimes the question is quick.
It’s the answer that opens five other things.
She was holding a folder, so already…
not a good sign.
I had maybe fifteen minutes before a meeting and I was trying to finish an email I had already started three times.
“Sure,” I said.
Because what else do you say?
She sat down.
That was my second clue.
Quick questions usually don’t sit.
She asked about one activity.
Simple enough.
Then while I was answering, she said:
“Actually, Sir, while I’m here…”
There it is.
The trap.
Now we were talking about another teacher.
Then a schedule.
Then a parent concern.
Then whether the district had already sent an update.
At some point I looked at the clock.
Eleven minutes gone.
And I still had not answered the original question.
I don’t even remember how that happened.
This is something people outside schools probably don’t understand.
One question can carry an entire ecosystem behind it.
“Can we move this activity?”
Okay.
Why?
Because another schedule changed.
Why did that change?
Because a teacher will be out.
Who is covering?
Nobody yet.
Has the parent been informed?
Not yet.
Did the district approve this?
I think so.
Can you check?
And suddenly I’m not answering a question anymore.
I’m managing a small government.
She kept talking.
I kept saying things like:
“Okay.”
“Let me check.”
“I’ll get back to you.”
That phrase should honestly be printed on the wall of every principal’s office.
I’ll get back to you.
Half my life is getting back to people.
The teacher finally stood up and said:
“Thank you, Sir. Sorry, that took longer than I thought.”
I looked at the clock.
Twenty-seven minutes.
Twenty-seven.
My meeting started in three.
The email was still unfinished.
I had somehow agreed to check four things.
And the original “quick question”?
I still needed to confirm the answer.
I just sat there for a second thinking…
what exactly just happened?
Then my phone buzzed.
Message from another teacher.
“Sir, quick question.”
I swear I laughed.
Actually laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because of course.
Of course it was a quick question.
I didn’t open it.
Not yet.
Went to the meeting.
Came back.
Opened the message.
It was one sentence.
Finally.
A real quick question.
I answered in maybe twenty seconds.
Then another message came immediately.
“Thank you, Sir. Also…”
No.
Absolutely not.
I put the phone down.
The funny thing is, I do it too.
I say “quick question” to people all the time.
Usually because I know they’re busy and I’m trying to make my request sound small.
So maybe that’s what everyone is doing.
We all know everybody is busy, so we shrink the question before we ask it.
Quick question.
Small concern.
Just one thing.
Can I bother you for a second?
Then we sit down and unpack our entire lives.
I’m not mad about it.
Okay, sometimes I am.
But mostly I think it’s just school.
Nothing arrives alone.
A schedule is connected to a teacher.
A teacher is connected to a class.
A class is connected to students.
Students are connected to parents.
Parents are connected to complaints, requests, forms, permissions, explanations…
You ask one thing and suddenly there are twelve people hiding behind it.
That afternoon, another staff member came in.
“Sir, can I just ask something quickly?”
I looked at him.
He looked at me.
I think he saw something on my face because he started laughing.
“Actually Sir, never mind. I’ll come back tomorrow.”
Best decision anyone made all day.
I told him:
“No, go ahead.”
He hesitated.
“You sure?”
No.
I was not sure.
But he asked anyway.
And yes.
It took twenty minutes.
At this point I think we should just ban the word quick.
Replace it with something more honest.
“Sir, I have one question that may accidentally become a meeting.”
At least then I can prepare.
I’m joking.
Mostly.
But there are days when the “small” things are what eat the whole day.
Not the big decisions.
Not the emergencies.
The little things.
One quick question.
One signature.
One clarification.
One person stopping by.
One message.
One favor.
One thing after another until suddenly it’s late afternoon and you’re looking at the thing you were supposed to finish that morning.
Still there.
Waiting.
And you think…
I swear I worked today.
I was here.
I did things.
Lots of things.
I just have no idea where the day went.
Probably somewhere inside a quick question.
That’s really why I’m sending this.
I don’t want staff to feel like they can’t come to me.
I also don’t want every small question to automatically become whatever my next thirty minutes are.
I’m still trying to figure out the middle ground.
How do you stay approachable without turning every interruption into an unscheduled meeting?
And how do other principals tell the difference between something that really needs to be handled now and something that can honestly wait until later?
I’d like to hear how other school leaders manage it.
Especially the ones who somehow leave school before dark.
Thank you for giving us somewhere to talk about the ordinary parts of the job too.
Sometimes those are the parts that wear you out the most.
— Mark
FROM THE GOOD PRINCIPAL’S OFFICE
Hi. Mark, thank you for sharing your story.
I think you put your finger on something very real:
the question is often quick. The consequences of answering it are not.
That is why these interruptions can feel so deceptively small.
Someone standing at your door does not think:
“I am about to rearrange the next thirty minutes of the principal’s day.”
They think:
“I just need one answer.”
And usually they are telling the truth.
The problem is that one answer often depends on three other things.
A schedule.
A person.
A policy.
A parent.
A piece of information you do not have yet.
So what arrives as a question becomes a chain.
That is not really anyone’s fault.
It is how schools work.
Everything is connected.
But if every connected question gets unlimited access to your time, then the work that requires uninterrupted thinking gets pushed later and later.
Usually until the building is quiet.
That is probably why so many principals say:
“I finally got some work done after everyone left.”
Which is a strange thing to say when you have technically been working all day.
The issue is not that nothing happened.
A great deal happened.
You answered.
Clarified.
Redirected.
Checked.
Promised.
Scheduled.
Solved.
Followed up.
The problem is that much of that work was reactive.
You did not choose it.
It arrived.
And reactive work has a way of making the day feel fragmented.
You can work continuously and still feel like you never properly started.
That is where I think a small boundary can make a big difference.
You do not need to make yourself inaccessible.
You may simply need to stop treating every opening line as an unlimited invitation.
For example:
“I have five minutes before my next meeting. Give me the main question first.”
That one sentence immediately creates a boundary.
Or:
“Is this one question, or do we need ten or fifteen minutes for this?”
It may sound almost funny, but it forces both of you to recognize what the conversation actually is.
Or:
“I want to hear the rest of this, but I can’t do it properly right now. Can we continue after lunch?”
That is not dismissive.
Actually, it may be more respectful than pretending you have time and then spending the whole conversation watching the clock.
You can also separate receiving the issue from solving the issue.
Someone asks:
“Can we move this activity?”
Your response does not necessarily need to become an immediate investigation into schedules, staffing, parent notifications, and district approval.
Sometimes the answer can simply be:
“Leave the details with me. I need to check a few things before I answer.”
Now the question has entered your system without taking over the entire moment.
That distinction matters.
Because right now it sounds like every question automatically becomes:
I must resolve this now.
Maybe it does not.
Some questions deserve an answer now.
Some deserve an acknowledgment now and an answer later.
Some deserve their own conversation entirely.
Learning to separate those three categories may protect a surprising amount of your day.
There is another part I would not overlook.
You said you use the phrase “quick question” too.
Most of us do.
It is almost social shorthand for:
“I know you are busy and I am trying not to sound demanding.”
So perhaps the phrase itself is not the enemy.
The real problem is that nobody knows how large the conversation is until it starts.
That is why being explicit about time can help.
“I have five minutes.”
“I have ten.”
“I need to leave at 10:30.”
“If this is bigger than that, let’s schedule it.”
Those statements are useful because they remove the awkwardness.
The other person knows the limit.
You know the limit.
And if the conversation grows, there is a natural point to stop.
Without that, both people can keep adding:
“Actually, while I’m here…”
until the original question has somehow developed its own agenda.
There is also a leadership habit worth checking here.
Do people bring you things they could resolve without you?
That is a different problem.
Some questions genuinely require the principal.
Others reach the principal because it has simply become normal to ask.
If you notice certain categories repeating, maybe there is an opportunity to clarify decision-making authority.
Who can approve what?
Who handles which schedule questions?
What can teachers decide without checking with you?
When does something actually need your sign-off?
That is not about pushing people away.
It is about preventing the principal’s office from becoming the answer to every uncertainty in the building.
Because if every small ambiguity travels upward, you eventually spend your entire day resolving decisions that could have stopped somewhere else.
And there is another question you can ask at the end of the day:
How much of today actually needed me?
Not:
How much happened?
A lot happened.
But how much specifically required the principal?
That can be revealing.
Maybe most of it did.
Schools are complicated.
But maybe some of it did not.
And if the same small issues keep reaching your office, that may be less of a time-management problem and more of a system problem.
Still, even with perfect systems, people are going to stop you.
Teachers will remember something while walking past your door.
Staff will ask while they have you.
Someone will say:
“Actually, one more thing.”
That is not going away.
So perhaps the goal is not eliminating the quick question.
It is preventing every quick question from becoming an accidental meeting.
Your time has to have edges.
Otherwise the smallest request in the building can keep expanding until it fills whatever space you have.
And if you protect nothing during the school day, the predictable result is that your concentrated work gets moved into your personal time.
Late afternoon.
Evening.
Weekend.
That is a high price to pay for being endlessly accommodating during the day.
So the next time someone says:
“Just one quick question,”
maybe smile and say:
“I have five minutes. Let’s see if we can keep it quick.”
And if it stops being quick?
Schedule the rest.
That is not poor leadership.That is a principal recognizing that the twenty people who may need her later also deserve a leader who still has some attention left.
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