timjumpclarke

Leadership Scenarios

With a new structure / personnel of a wider Leadership Team since September 2021 we have spent time discussing, exploring and developing our shared understanding of leadership and management both generally and within our school context.

1. At the start of the Spring term 2022, we explored and analysed a range of hypothetical Leadership Scenarios.

For each Leadership Scenario we considered:

• Perceptions
• Challenges
• Solutions

Feedback from leaders is that they found the conversations beneficial: as they were grounded in practical real life examples; opened up in depth and rich dialogue about numerous possible interpretations and solutions; helped us to gain a better collective understanding of ourselves as a Leadership Team.

2. Previously to this, during the Autumn term 2021: we’ve looked at and discussed evidence based summaries / posters about leadership.

See examples below which come from a range of sources.

The discussions have included:

• Reflecting and self-evaluating our own collective and individual leadership styles, strategies and strengths. Referencing and celebrating examples of other colleagues within the team.
• Considering how we can, and why we must, role model by living out a school Values and Vision on a daily basis.
• Developing evolving processes and systems: both for us as a team, and for the whole school community.
• Discussing how we can utilise coaching style approaches to help support and challenge our teams and the staff as a whole to improve the impact for our children.
• Analysing the standards and progress of our learners, and how we can deploy staff and interventions in targeted and strategic ways.

3. Finally, we have also introduced regular Learning Conversations and continued Coaching conversations.

The Learning Conversations have enabled all colleagues within Phase Teams to celebrate successes together, but also to share challenges faced and to collectively consider alternative solutions and agree next steps to trial.

The Coaching Conversations have provided leaders ring fenced time to openly share issues and challenges, which they choose to focus on, within a trusting and confidential conversation. They are then supported to consider future options / strategies, and choose which actions they will undertake.

Feedback from staff for both these approaches has been in the main positive: with staff appreciating the time given for the conversations, and that their ideas / opinions and being valued.

The Prioritising Twenties

How to do less and work smarter, have fewer priorities and greater empowerment, leading to inspirational outcomes and thriving as a community?

Reflecting on the streamlining of actions and priorities due to the impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic, and reading “Back on Track” by Mary Myatt has left me feeling more strongly than usual that the aim for the 2020s ought to be to prioritise more rigorously, simplify more strategically and question all aspects of our processes, policies and routines to evaluate whether they genuinely help to achieve our core purpose and school values.

Our school (Cornerstone CE Primary in Hampshire, UK) is about to start our final term on our 1FE temporary (for 8 years) site, before moving to our new 3FE brand new purpose built home. This will obviously mean an increase in pupils numbers, and the staff team, and new models of distributed leadership and management over the coming years. Here are some of my reflections on getting “Back on Track”.

Essentialism.

Love, Forgiveness and Hope and the clear, strong and agreed Values embedded in our school community. These Values and twinned with our Vision statement of ‘Growing an Inspirational Learning Community‘, which we have defined and exemplified as a school.

As a school we regularly return to and review our Values. Discussing with the children what they mean to them and their lives, and how we all show these in our daily conversations, actions and reactions. Our Pupil Voice Groups have created school rules aligned to our Values and review these every few years.

As a staff team we spent time together in 2019 discussing and debating what we wanted Cornerstone to be growing into by 2024, 3 years after our move. What were the strengths and positives we wanted to keep and build upon? What might have become redundant and need to be eliminated? Staff are asked to consider each year what contribution they can make: both individually and to the school.

Key to this ongoing professional discussion, is that our Values and Vision are our core: and as our why are unchangeable. But the what we do and how we do it, will be regularly evaluated and revised so that they serve our key purposes.

The Case for less.

Relocating as a school community is an ideal opportunity to consider what equipment and resources really serve our core purpose: our Values and Vision. What do we actually use? What actually helps? What after only 8 years has already started collecting dust? There are only a certain number of packing boxes and there won’t be unlimited space, even inside a bigger building!

However it is more importantly about systems, processes and policies that we have developed and evolved as a school over the past 8 years. These have served us well, and for the most part have been developed collectively as a staff team and a school community. However which of these will transfer and scale up in a new building and site successfully, which will need further adaption and evolution for refinement, and which will need to be left behind and not ‘packed’

Trust.

Through conversations, staff and family surveys it appears that children, staff and families have high levels of trust in each other in our school community. Not all the time of course, and at times ideas, actions and decisions are rightly questioned and at times changed. However generally our community has a good level of trust in our openness and integrity to listen, reflect and respond on our mistakes.

Staff are trusted to use their professional knowledge, skills and intuition for the wellbeing, learning and growth of our learners: and regularly do so to support our Values and Vision. We have developed a supportive ethos of coaching and mentoring, Pupil Achievement Meetings are genuinely about discussing how we ‘as a school’ can support the learners and the Performance Management process always aspires to be supportive and developmental.

After our relocation we will grow from a 1FE to a 3FE (192 to 650+ pupils). This growth of new children, new families, new staff, new leaders…will require lots of time invested in nurturing open, positive and professional relationships if trust is going to remain a strength. It is also crucial that a culture of ‘Original Cornerstone’ and ‘New Cornerstone’ is allowed to take route. These will undoubtedly be a significant challenges for all leaders and staff in the school

Humans first, professionals second.

This links strongly to the need to nurture open, positive and professional relationships. Particularly given the uncertainty and challenges of the past 18 months, and the challenges of relocating and growing a school community: it is imperative that as leaders we mindful and supportive of the people in our staff team.

The strengths and successes of our school so far have come from collective efforts, experiences and expertise. The time and focus put into a range of CPD opportunities, mentoring and coaching have helped our team to grow and have a sense of choice and voice in their professional development journey. As new staff join our team they will bring new ideas, strengths and contributions. We need to maintain our collective ‘Inspirational Learning Community’ approach, in which we all see ourselves as learners, who are intrinsically motivated to keep improving and doing a better job for the benefit of our learners and the school as a whole.

Challenges will be new staff understanding and trusting this ethos so they engage with it fully, for new and growing leaders to continue to develop and nurture this ethos, and at times for radical candour conversations to value people but encourage and inspire them to greater efforts and impact.

“High challenge: low threat” as Mary Myatt titled one of the most useful and influential books I have read about educational leadership.

Leadership and fewer things.

I have often thought that we can over think and over complicate our work in schools. I have previously blogged about it at Simplifying Effective Education : where I focused on the priorities of:

1. Positive relationships
2. Engagement of learners
3. High expectations

These I think will be crucial for us as we continue in the Prioritising Twenties.

As leaders in schools I might add that ensuring we remain fully focused on:

1. The central purpose of our Values and Vision
2. Nurturing positive, professional, trusting relationships
3. Empowering staff to invest in the essentials
4. High levels of challenge, aspiration, support and reflection