This article provides key findings from a study of 30 principals working in charter and conventional schools in two northeastern states. It aims to inform policy makers regarding how principals could more positively influence teacher quality. It focuses on the following questions: (1) What influenced how principals hired, assigned, evaluated, and provided professional development?; (2) What constraints and opportunities affected the ways they carried out these tasks?; and (3) Do the ways in which principals carried out hiring, assignment, evaluation, and professional development differ by context? Three key findings emerge: (1) Principals reported more latitude on some human capital functions than others; (2) Some principals felt more constrained than others in efforts to hire, assign, evaluate, dismiss, and develop teachers; and (3) Whether charter or conventional, schools that were smaller, enrolled elementary students, exhibited a strong identity according to principals, and were supported in key ways by their districts seemed to offer principals fewer barriers to conducting important human capital processes. Policy makers can take the following steps to address each issue: (1) Rethinking resources for professional development and teacher compensation; (2) Decreasing contractual limitations to raising teacher quality; and (3) Reducing cultural and interpersonal impediments to efforts to raise teaching quality.