Most CEOs start their leadership journey believing they have to carry everything. They push, pull and drag the organization forward through sheer force. It works for a while until the company grows, the demands multiply and that heroic model collapses under its own weight.
Dr. Karla Johnson learned this lesson the hard way over a 30-year rise from physics teacher to CEO of the Pennsylvania Leadership Charter School (PALCS), one of the largest and most innovative online K–12 schools in the country. Her transformation holds lessons every CEO should hear.
She put it bluntly: “Leadership is not how much I can do, but how much I can get done.”
That mindset shift changed everything for her team, her organization and her ability to scale.
Letting Go of the Micromanager Mindset
Karla didn’t step into leadership gently. Early in her career, she thought the role meant being out front at all times, making every decision, overseeing every detail.
That style eventually broke.
And it forced her to adopt a mindset she wishes she had learned sooner: collaboration isn’t optional, it’s structural.
“I needed to be the person out front… the micromanager. That’s what I believed leadership to be. Now I know leadership is not how much I can do, but how much I can get done with the use of my entire team.”
She became the kind of leader who distributes authority instead of hoarding it. And her organization grew stronger because of it.
Growth Hits Different When You’re a School
In business, 60% growth in one year is a high-class problem. In education, it’s a near catastrophe.
When the pandemic hit, PALCS enrollment surged from 3,000 students to over 5,000. That kind of explosion doesn’t simply strain operations, it overwhelms people.
Karla watched the organization respond heroically… but not sustainably.
“We were not prepared for what was about to happen… we didn’t hire staff right away and we hired a lot of people at one time. I would not recommend doing that.”
Scaling isn’t just adding capacity. It’s building the infrastructure that allows people to thrive during the surge.
Karla now sees that preparation as the difference between growth and burnout.
Scaling Yourself: The 30-Year Journey
Karla’s leadership evolution didn’t happen in a straight line. It happened classroom by classroom, role by role, each time she found a way to stretch her skills.
The turning point came early: she was assigned to assist an assistant principal instead of teaching physics. The unexpected exposure to administration changed her trajectory.
“I was three weeks into a teaching assignment and had taught no classes… but I was getting a ton of administrative training.”
She kept chasing every opportunity to build leadership muscle, teacher liaison, union representative, director of academics, director of operations, principal, chief academic officer, stacking skills layer by layer.
This wasn’t ambition. It was preparation.
Why Leadership Requires Stepping Into Discomfort
Karla encourages her students and her team to “go forward, go boldly, go lead.” That message wasn’t written for them. It was written from her own experience.
She had to learn to speak up, take the stage and push past introverted tendencies. Leadership required presence even when it didn’t feel natural.
“You have to put yourself in situations where you have an opportunity to lead… and understand the people you are trying to lead.”
Scaling the organization meant scaling her identity.
Technology Isn’t the Future of Education. Prepared Students Are.
Long before AI became a national debate, PALCS was already thinking about it. By the time other districts were banning AI tools, Karla understood that prohibition was pointless; students would use it anyway.
More importantly, she saw something others missed: AI was already shaping the workplace.
“The best thing we can do is not shun AI, but study it… teach students how to appropriately use it, and teach our staff how to appropriately use it.”
Their approach? Treat AI as a supportive tool, not a replacement teacher. Equip students with fluency, not fear. And build a research and development arm inside the school to stay ahead of what’s coming next.
This is what real educational leadership looks like: preparing students for the world they will enter, not the one adults grew up in.
The Future Belongs to Collaborative Leaders
Karla’s story is a reminder that leadership isn’t defined by how much you personally accomplish. It’s defined by your ability to create an environment where others perform at their best.
- She didn’t scale by doing more.
- She scaled by trusting more.
- She scaled by growing herself as fast as her organization grew.
That is the modern CEO’s job.
I’m Glenn Gow. I coach CEOs who want to scale through collaboration, clarity, and disciplined leadership. On my podcast, I reveal the strategies top leaders use to grow bigger, faster, without carrying the weight alone.
Listen to the full episode of The Scaling CEO with Dr. Karla Johnson for a grounded, practical view of leadership, growth, and the future of AI in education.
