1. What we know about effective school leadership and what it means
LDS/RTU SUMMER SCHOOL 2008
Leading Learning in Diverse Contexts
What we know about effective
school leadership and what it means
for you and your schools
August 2008
Geoff Southworth

2. Leadership matters 3 things matter to children and young
people’s educational growth
parental engagement with learning
quality of teaching
leadership
Only leadership can bring the 3 together
Geoff Southworth

3. Seven broad points we now know:
Context matters
The core tasks of school leaders are clear
Learning centred leadership is critical
Distributing leadership matters
School leadership is hard work and rewarding
Leadership in schools are changing
Leadership development and succession planning have never been more important
Clear communication – short, plain, good design, beyond print
Geoff Southworth

4. Context matters [1] Effective leaders know & understand their contexts
They are ‘contextually literate’
Recognise contexts change all the time
- School cultures
- Toxins & nutrients
- Contexts change over time
Geoff Southworth

5. Context matters [2] Almost all successful school leaders draw
on the same repertoire of leadership
practices
It is in the ways leaders apply these
leadership practices – not the practices
themselves – which demonstrate
responsiveness to, rather than dictation
by the contexts in which they work
Geoff Southworth

6. Reflections & questions
Does this analysis of context make sense to you?
What are your contexts like?
How do you know and understand your contexts?
Geoff Southworth

7. The core tasks are clear
Build a vision and set direction
Understand and develop people
Redesign the organisation
Manage teaching and learning
Geoff Southworth

8. Vision & a sense of direction
A compelling vision
‘To lead’ means having a sense
of direction
Geoff Southworth

9. Vision & a sense of direction
If you do not know where you are
going, every road will lead nowhere (Henry Kissinger)
Geoff Southworth

10. Leadership & Management
Both matter:
Management is essentially about ensuring
things work smoothly
Leadership is about going somewhere
They work in combination:
Too much management = running smoothly
on the spot
Too much leadership = running all the time
and all over the place
Geoff Southworth

11. Leadership & Management
You manage things; you lead people (Grace Murray Hopper)
Geoff Southworth

12. Compelling Vision For children, parents and the community
And for staff
Followership rests on a compelling vision
It persuades us all to come along with the
Leader
You have to be able and prepared to articulate
the vision –to persuade; to remind colleagues
Geoff Southworth

13. Compelling Vision (2) “Work is about daily meaning as well as
daily bread; for recognition as well as cash;
in short, for a sort of life rather than a
Monday through Friday sort of dying… we
have the right to ask of work that it includes
meaning, recognition, astonishment and
life” (Studs Terkel)
Geoff Southworth

14. Compelling Vision (3) Leaders make meaning, provide recognition
and acknowledge all with whom they work.
The tests of a vision are :
Is it shared?
Is it adopted
JFK on a visit to NASA
Geoff Southworth

15. Reflections & questions
 What is your vision for the school? (statement or key words)
How does that vision reflect your school’s context?
Where in the school might I find out what the vision is if you were not there?
How well do others know and understand the vision?
Geoff Southworth

16. [3] Learning-centred leadership
is critical
The core work
What distinguishes school leadership
from other forms of leadership
Geoff Southworth

17. [4] Distributing leadership matters
School leadership has a greater influence on
schools and pupils when it is widely
distributed.
Some patterns of leadership distribution are
more effective than others.
Laissez faire forms of distribution not as
effective as more co-ordinated patterns
Geoff Southworth

18. Distributing leadership matters
One of the barriers to distributed leadership is how
leadership distribution is viewed by principals and
teachers. If it is viewed as delegation then it is likely
to be met with resistance by teachers not wanting
to undertake more work. If principals and heads
equate distributed leadership with an erosion of
their power it will be perceived as threatening and
therefore unlikely to happen.
Alma Harris, 2008
Geoff Southworth

19. Distributing leadership matters
Too few people will be interested in becoming leaders
and too many talented staff will burn out if we persist in
the hero model of leadership – authoritative in every
situation, knowledgeable in every field, accountable for
every action: polished, and perfect… This model is deeply
rooted in our culture and many job holders conspire
themselves to perpetuate it – gaining secret short term
satisfaction from sacrifice, troubleshooting, being in
demand, even martyrdom (HayGroup, 2007)
Geoff Southworth

20. None of us is as smart as all of us.
Distributing leadership matters
3 other things:
None of us is as smart as all of us.
The lone ranger is dead.
Warren Bennis
Transformational power = leaders as ‘transformers’
Upping the voltage of others
Making the school much more powerful
Team-based leadership: Is your team a high
performing team?
Geoff Southworth

21. Reflections & questions
On a scale of 1 to 10 how would you score the distribution of leadership in your school?
What is the sum total of leadership effectiveness and impact in your school?
Geoff Southworth

22. School leadership is hard work
and rewarding
Complex, accountable & relentless
No end to the work
It is ‘greedy’ work
Look after yourselves
Seek support
Track the rewards
pupil progress & achievements
staff development & growth
Enjoy the challenges
Don’t forget to look back and see how far
you have come
Geoff Southworth

23. School leadership is hard work
and rewarding
It’s tough, it’s a challenge, but because of
the difference we make to children’s lives –
day in and day out – it has to be the very
best job in the world.
(Headteacher 2007)
Geoff Southworth

24. Leadership in schools is changing
New forms are emerging in England & other countries
Many leaders working beyond their own schools
New leaders – school business managers
Team-based leadership
Geoff Southworth

25. Leadership development & succession planning have never been more important
The demographic challenge
‘Churn’ and ‘backwash’ effect
Growing tomorrow’s leaders today
Identify talent and develop it
Geoff Southworth

26. Leadership development & succession planning have never been more important
“Talent isn’t fixed unless you believe it is…
talent depends on how a person is managed
or led.”
Pfeffer & Sutton, 2007
Geoff Southworth

27. Leadership development & succession planning have never
been more important
All of us in this room are here because someone
believed in us.
The only thing a person needs to be a leader is
the opportunity to lead.
Create lots of opportunities for others to lead
and make sure each and every one of these
opportunities is a learning opportunity as well.
Geoff Southworth

28. Leadership development & succession planning have never
been more important
The function of leadership is to produce
more leaders, not more followers
Ralph Nader
Geoff Southworth

29. Leadership skills and qualities are important too
A small handful of personal traits explains a high
proportion of variation in leadership effectiveness.
The most successful school leaders are open-minded
and ready to learn from others. They are flexible
rather than dogmatic in their thinking within a system
of core values, persistent (e.g. in pursuit of high
expectations of staff motivation, commitment, learning
and achievement for all), resilient and optimistic (Leithwood et al, 2006)
Geoff Southworth

30. Leadership traits and qualities
These can be:
Learned and developed
Practised and evaluated
Looked for when appointing / promoting
Geoff Southworth

31. Leadership qualities Leaders make a difference positive and negative
No one wants to follow a cynic
Leadership never more needed
than at times of change
And these are times of change
All of you want to bring about
changes in your schools
Vision, passion, reservoirs of hope, belief
Geoff Southworth

32. Geoff Southworth

33. Some thoughts and reflections
“Excellent companies provide two things simultaneously,
tough environments and very supportive environments.” (Tom Peters)
Staff development, like pupil development, is all about
human potential and human potential is the greatest
natural resource the world possesses.
Push, drive, be resilient, focused and determined, but
also remember to:
Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle (Plato)
Geoff Southworth