Most people are trying to accomplish goals that are important to them, their group, and their organization. Sometimes we take actions that can unintentionally make others feel left out or uninformed. We take steps with the group’s good in mind, but forget to bring others along with us. Failing to communicate can lead to hard feelings and setbacks in carrying out your important work. Many of the actions we’re trying to take would not be a problem if we communicated about them effectively with others.
I understand. I’ve moved forward with well-intentioned ideas, only to find out others saw my actions as trying to move on without their support.
We’ve looked at ways to try to prevent this communication problem. And with the help of researchers Bowmen and Deal and Marla Israel, the Director of Student Learning at Stevenson High School, we think we might have found a better way.
The CAIRO Process
The process that we’ll talk about is called CAIRO. Cairo is the capital of Egypt and a town in southern Illinois (pronounced Kayrow I believe). CAIRO is also a communication process. Here are the components:
Consulted: Who needs to be consulted? For whatever action step you have, who’s advice do you need? Who can provide helpful information before you move forward with your plan?
Approve: Who needs to approve that particular action? Who can free up resources to your help your task move forward?
Informed: Who needs to be informed about the task? They don’t need to be consulted or approve the action step, but they need to know about it.
Responsible: Who is responsible for carrying out the task?
Out of the Loop: Who doesn’t need one more email in their inbox?
You can use this process with corporations, high school schools, districts, or universities.
Brief Training on CAIRO
This five-minute video will guide you through a process for reflecting on places where you have struggled with communication. It will also provide you with the opportunity to develop a plan to address some of the problems you may have found. You can use this video on your own, as part of professional development, or as coaching support for a team.
Link to Powerpoint (link)
Examples
Here is a sample CAIRO planning from a high school: (Word Doc)
Here is a blank version for your use: (Word Doc)
For More Information
For more information, check out chapter seven about CAIRO and effective communication in our book: Implementing Systematic Interventions A Guide for Secondary Teams (check out the book here)
You also can see Bohman and Deal’s book Reframing the Path to School Leadership (link): A Guide for Teachers and Principals, the source where we initially learned about CAIRO.
Thanks to Marla Israel for teaching us about this process in our early research on high school positive behavior support.
By using CAIRO, you can avoid issues such as miscommunication or a lack of communication. If you do not consider how you communicate your action steps, you may find yourself in a negative feedback loop. This issue is frustrating for you, your team, and your community. With CAIRO, we hope you’ll find yourself moving from stepping on people’s toes with your planning to getting the feedback you need to support your work.
We would love to know your thoughts about CAIRO or any other process you use to support your community’s healthy communication processes. Please leave a comment below with your thoughts.