Gary Livingston met Marvin Edwards when they both worked for the Topeka, Kan., school district in the 1980s. Edwards was superintendent and encouraged Livingston to try for increasingly more challenging jobs in the district. He did, and Livingston eventually succeeded Edwards as superintendent when Edwards moved on.

Livingston considers Edwards one of his most influential mentors because he encouraged him to venture out into the non-education community.

When Edwards first became superintendent in Topeka, he wrote letters to 200 community organizations offering to meet with every one of them; half took him up on the offer. Why is this tactic so important to good leadership?

Edwards, now teaching in the educational leadership program at Aurora University in Illinois, explains, “You make marks quickly when you are known as a person who is not afraid to come to them. People view you differently if you are out rather than a person who stays in the office. People need to experience you.”