The current school environment creates stressors for principals preventing them from being instructionally-focused leaders. This project determined current stressors perceived by principals that interfere with their ability to provide instructional leadership and strategies they use to manage those stressors so they are able to focus more time on instruction. This project utilized a mixed-method, non-experimental survey as the research plan to gain deeper understanding into the topic of principal stressors that interfere with instructional leadership, and strategies utilized to mitigate those stressors. The mixed-methods approach for this project included a survey with quantitative questions to collect principal perceptions regarding stressors that interfere with instructional leadership. Building principals from various levels in public schools were surveyed to identify principal perceptions of current stressors along with coping strategies they use to deal with those stressors. In addition, individual interviews through a virtual platform were conducted with a cross section of building administrators from around the state. Qualitative questions were used for the interviews using a convenience voluntary sampling to probe for deeper explanation of their choices. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com.bibliotheek.ehb.be/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]