School Leadership in the 21st Century

Second edition

Education reform continues to be a dominating feature of education in the

UK and many other countries throughout the world. As a result of this,
it is now more important than ever that headteachers and other school-
teachers develop the skills that will enable them to lead and manage their
responsibilities effectively.
In School Leadership in the 21st Century all the major aspects of school
leadership are discussed, including:

• Strategic and ethical dimensions of leadership

• Leading and managing change
• Leading and managing staff in high performance schools
• Information for student learning and organisational learning
• Transformation of schools in the 21st century

The authors of this completely updated and revised edition have addressed
the new standards and competency frameworks, making this an essential
read for all headteachers and aspiring headteachers on NPQH or LPSH
courses and anyone else with an interest in school leadership.

Brent Davies is Professor of Leadership Development at the University of

Hull.
Linda Ellison is Senior Lecturer in Educational Leadership at the University
of Nottingham.
Christopher Bowring-Carr is a Lecturer and Consultant in Educational
Leadership and Management at the University of Hull.
School Leadership in the
21st Century
Second edition

Developing a strategic approach

Brent Davies, Linda Ellison and

Christopher Bowring-Carr
First published 1997
by Routledge
This edition published 2005
by RoutledgeFalmer
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
RoutledgeFalmer is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
Selection and editorial material © 1997, 2005 Brent Davies, Linda Ellison and
Christopher Bowring-Carr; individual chapters © their authors
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested
ISBN 0-203-46341-2 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-47162-8 (Adobe eReader Format)

ISBN 0–415–27951–8 (hbk)
ISBN 0–415–27952–6 (pbk)
This book is dedicated to
Mike Billingham and Max Sawatzki,
outstanding educationalists
Contents

List of figures ix
List of tables xi
Notes on contributors xiii

1 Introduction 1

Part I
The dimensions of leadership 5
2 The strategic dimensions of leadership 7
3 The ethical dimension of leadership 17
4 The competent leader 32

Part II
Leading strategic change 53
5 Leading the strategically focused school 55
6 Leading and managing change 72
7 Leading and managing staff in high performance schools 93

Part III
Leading learning 109
8 Leading learning 111
9 Information for student learning – assessment for learning:
the profile 126
viii Contents

10 Information for organisational learning – establishing a

coherent, rigorous and workable system of self-evaluation 139
11 Resourcing learning 165

Part IV
Leading transformation 183
12 The transformation of schools in the twenty-first century 185

References and further reading 206

Index 216
Figures

2.1 A model of strategic leadership 16

4.1 Competence, competency, standards and core competence
in combination 34
5.1 A model for developing a strategically focused school 57
5.2 Sequential and parallel development approaches 59
5.3 People interaction and development processes 61
5.4 Short-term viability and long-term sustainability 68
5.5 The strategic architecture of the school 70
6.1 Self-esteem changes during transition 74
6.2 Organisation iceberg 77
6.3 Force field analysis: two schools wishing to combine
resources in the form of some teacher expertise and
accommodation 86
6.4 Micro-political mapping 87
7.1 Five levels of leadership 96
7.2 The paradigm shift 99
7.3 Restructuring (a) the system and (b) the school 99
7.4 School reorganisation: (a) the previous arrangement and
(b) the new arrangements at Huntingdale Primary School,
Western Australia 100
7.5 The 360 degree feedback model 107
11.1 The funding stream 167
11.2 OfSTED judgement on value for money for schools A and B 174
11.3 Dimensions of governance 177
12.1 A gestalt design for creating schools for the knowledge society 195
12.2 The Intelligence Pyramid 203
Tables

4.1 The expression of a competency 38

4.2 Competencies for the future 39
4.3 Examples from standards for overall competence 41
4.4 Draft units for an MSC function 43
4.5 McClelland’s motivations 46
4.6 The manager model for first- and second-level managers 47
4.7 Leadership and management competencies 47
4.8 The models of excellence 48
4.9 Capabilities and competencies 49
7.1 Distinguishing leadership and management 94
10.1 Methods of collecting and analysing data 144
10.2 The contents of the School Improvement File 146
10.3 The School Improvement File 148
10.4 Our first system: overview: monitoring and evaluation matrix 158
11.1 Financial benchmarking 175
12.1 One vision: the blueprint 188
12.2 Blueprint for leadership in the transformation of schools 205
Notes on contributors

Dr Brent Davies is Professor of Leadership Development at the University

of Hull. He is also Special Professor at the University of Nottingham
and a Faculty Member of the Centre on Educational Governance at
the University of Southern California. Brent spent the first ten years
of his career working as a teacher in South London. He then moved
into higher education as an authority on leadership and management
development programmes for senior and middle leaders in schools. He
was Director of the International MBA in School Leadership at Leeds
Metropolitan University, moving to the University of Lincolnshire and
Humberside to establish the first Chair in Educational Leadership and
create the International Educational Leadership Centre in Lincoln. He
moved to the University of Hull in 2000 to establish the International
Leadership Centre. In 2004 he moved within the University to become
a research professor in leadership development at the University of Hull
Business School. He has published extensively with 16 books and 60
articles on leadership and management, including ‘The New Strategic
Direction and Development of the School’ (2003, RoutledgeFalmer),
‘The Handbook of Educational Leadership and Management’ (2003,
Pearson), and ‘The Essentials of School Leadership’ (2005, Sage). He
has two current research interests: strategy and strategic leadership,
focusing on creating the strategically focused school; the emerging
public/private sector in education in the USA and the UK.
Linda Ellison is a Senior Lecturer in Educational Leadership at the
University of Nottingham where she leads programmes in educational
leadership and management and is Director of the Postgraduate Studies
International Summer School. She has worked with a great many UK
LEAs, heads, teachers and schools and with school district staff,
principals and teachers in a variety of countries such as Chile, Australia,
Canada and Hong Kong. Linda has a number of national and inter-
national research projects in the area of school leadership, such as those
on the strategically focused school, home–school links via the school
xiv Contributors

office, and heads’ lives. She has written a wide range of books and papers
on school leadership and management and is joint series editor of
Routledge’s School Leadership and Management series.
Christopher Bowring-Carr taught English in England, Italy, Kuwait, and
Turkey. He was an education officer in Leicester, a principal in the USA,
and an HMI for 15 years. He then moved to Northern Ireland, was a
research officer at the University of Ulster, and after that was a consul-
tant, and a tutor on MA and MBA courses with the Open University,
the University of Leicester and the University of Hull. He has now
retired and lives in Madeira.
Mick Brookes is Headteacher of Sherwood Junior School in Nottingham-
shire. Previously he was Head of a Primary School in Lincolnshire
(1978–1985). Mick also worked on secondment with the LMS team in
Nottinghamshire (1993/4) and was National President of the NAHT
(2000/1). He is currently a national consultant for School Finance.
Professor Brian J. Caldwell is Managing Director of Educational
Transformations Pty Ltd in Melbourne, Australia and Associate Director
of iNet (Global) (International Networking for Educational Trans-
formation) of the Specialist Schools Trust in England. From 1998 to
2004 he served as Dean of Education at the University of Melbourne.
His previous appointments include Head of Education Policy and
Management at the University of Melbourne and Head of Teacher
Education and Dean of Education at the University of Tasmania. He
has served as Wei Lun Visiting Professor at the Chinese University of
Hong Kong, and Visiting Professor at the National College for School
Leadership in England. His international work over the last decade
includes presentations, projects and other professional assignments in
or for 32 countries on six continents. He is co-author of books that have
helped guide educational reform in a number of countries, most notably
the trilogy on self-managing schools.
Dr Barbara J. Davies has extensive experience in primary school leadership
and management. After graduating from Oxford University, Barbara
taught in primary schools in Oxfordshire, West Germany and West
Sussex. She took up her first headship in West Sussex followed by her
second in North Yorkshire. She was a Senior Lecturer at Bishop
Grosseteste College in Lincoln, working in initial teacher education
before specialising in leadership and management in the primary sector
at the University of Lincolnshire and Humberside, where she was a
course leader for a Masters degree in leadership and learning.
Subsequently she returned to primary headship in Nottinghamshire
before taking up her current post as Headteacher of Washingborough
Foundation Primary School in Lincolnshire. Barbara gained a Masters
 Contributors xv

degree in Educational Management in 1994 and completed her Doctorate

in Educational Leadership at the University of Hull in 2004. Her thesis
is focused on developing the strategically focused primary school. She
has published a number of books and articles in the field of educational
leadership.
Viv Garrett is a consultant in educational leadership and was, until recently,
Principal Lecturer in the Division of Education at Sheffield Hallam
University. Her special areas of expertise are professional development
for school leadership and the leadership and management of change.
She has extensive experience in these fields both in the UK and overseas.
She is a tutor on the National Professional Qualification for Headship
and the Leading from the Middle Programmes for the National College
for School Leadership, and is also working with the General Teaching
Council on the development of the Teacher Learning Academy.
Max Sawatzki worked as a popular and successful international consultant
on effective leadership until his sudden death in 1998.
Peter Smith taught in Nottinghamshire for 37 years, 19 as a primary school
headteacher. Following extensive work with other schools through the
school’s Beacon role, Peter now works as an External Adviser and NPQH
tutor in the East Midlands.
1 Introduction
Brent Davies

Since the publication seven years ago of School Leadership for the 21st
Century, considerable change has enveloped the educational world. In the
UK, the elections of the ‘New’ Labour Government have resulted in many
policy initiatives and structural changes impacting on school leadership.
Most significantly, the creation of the National College for School
Leadership (NCSL) has given both a national focus and national resources
to the development of leadership in schools. Linda Ellison and I have been
pleased with the popularity of the book and gratified by the number of
reprints. When the publishers Routledge (now RoutledgeFalmer) invited
us to write a second edition we were delighted. However, the delight
turned to apprehension with the realisation that it was not possible to
rewrite the original edition but it was necessary to create a completely
new book with different chapters and new insights. This we have done and
we have renamed the book School Leadership in the 21st Century, engaging
our good friend and colleague Christopher Bowring-Carr to assist us.
Sadly, two of the contributors to the first edition have met untimely deaths
through illness. Mike Billingham and Max Sawatzki were outstanding
educators and in recognition of that we have dedicated this rewritten book
to them. Max’s outstanding chapter is the only one retained in full from
the first book; it was, and remains, a classic.

‘THE LEADERSHIP DEBATE’ AND OTHER CHANGES

This new book is set against the backcloth of significant developments
in the field. The NCSL has put forward ‘Ten school leadership propositions’
(National College for School Leadership 2001) which demonstrate a
significant broadening of the government’s previous views on effective
leadership. The wider academic community, both in the UK and over-
seas, has produced an increasing number of volumes on every type of
leadership. We do not intend to replicate every one of these many
perspectives but to take some key issues both in the type of leadership that
2 Introduction

the twenty-first-century school leader needs to deploy and in the specific

areas in which leadership is needed.

THE STRUCTURE OF THE BOOK

We have organised the book into four parts. Part I aims to provide readers
with a framework to review their own leadership and the leadership neces-
sary to develop their schools. It does not replicate the discussions about
the different theories of leadership but seeks to explore three perspectives
that leaders should have and that they need to develop with others in the
school. The first perspective, which is explored in Chapter 2, is that strategic
leadership, by most standard definitions, is forward-looking, seeking a new
future for the school and, to achieve this, the leaders in the school need to
develop a strategic view and strategic leadership skills. As well as taking
a strategic view, leaders are faced with a very turbulent environment
and have to make many decisions under pressure. In this environment it
is vital that decision-making is based on our second perspective, a sound
ethical basis. To this end the ethical dimension of leadership is examined
in Chapter 3. Concluding this first part of the book, we draw on the com-
petence and competency movements within leadership development in
Chapter 4. While the competency framework has been a dominant theme
over the past ten years with the adoption of that framework by many NCSL
courses, it is not without its critics. Although we consider that it is not the
only framework for effective leadership, it remains a core one. Of particular
value is exploring the distinction between competence, competency and
the much-used term ‘standards’.
Part II considers some of the major leadership challenges that schools
face and activities which must take place. The first challenge is that of
leading the organisation in a sustainable way, not just in the short term but
also over the medium to long term. In Chapter 5 the concepts of strategy
and strategic thinking as well as traditional concepts of planning are
reviewed in a completely new framework for establishing the strategic
direction of the school. This chapter is focused on what should be done
in order to establish a strategic process and approach which will enable
strategic leadership to flourish. It is inevitable that any strategic process
that takes the school from its present place to some future position will
involve a considerable amount of change. How to lead and manage this
change process is therefore the focus of Chapter 6. This is followed, in
Chapter 7, by a key insight into how we can lead and manage staff to
achieve the aims and objectives of the school.
Part III addresses the key issue of learning and the support for learning.
Chapter 8 seeks ways to avoid the problem of seeing leadership and
management as an end in itself and focuses on leadership in relation to
the core purpose of schools, learning. The informational approach used by
 Introduction 3

schools should promote deep fundamental learning rather than simple test
results. The next two chapters look at using information to support learning
in secondary and primary schools. The maxim ‘assessment for learning’
rather than ‘assessment of learning’ is critical in Chapter 9, while Chapter
10 focuses on information for organisational learning. Chapter 11 then
addresses how learning and the school are resourced by considering school
finance. While many school leaders may consider the ‘fair funding’ concept
to be an oxymoron and may feel that there is little room for manoeuvre
within current fiscal restraints, we do not consider that to be an accurate
picture. The advent of multiple initiatives from central government has
resulted in a bidding culture where resource management has become
both more significant and more complex, requiring leadership as well as
management dimensions.
The final section, as befits a book on leadership, is a profound and
insightful chapter which considers the future of the education system by
examining the need for transformation and the components of a blueprint
for the future of schools.
In meeting the challenge of creating the new book we have kept true to
the ambitions which we had for the first book. Those were to make it both
useful and accessible to practitioners, to provide leaders in schools with
insights and perspectives that would assist them in leading their schools
in a positive and creative way, and to be futures-orientated, seeing leader-
ship, like education, as a broadening and enlightening process and not a
reductionist managerial agenda. The way the book has been received by
leaders in schools has been very encouraging.
Part I

The dimensions of leadership

2 The strategic dimensions of leadership
3 The ethical dimension of leadership
4 The competent leader
The dimensions of leadership
2 The strategic dimensions of
leadership
Barbara J. Davies and Brent Davies

CHARACTERISTICS OF STRATEGIC LEADERS

Brent Davies, in Chapter 5 of this book, argues for the development of the
strategically focused school. Key to that strategic focus is the quality of
the strategic leadership in the school. If we are to support and enhance the
development of strategic leadership in schools, we need to be able to
build a framework of understanding of what strategic leadership might
comprise. This chapter will consider what organisational abilities and
individual characteristics can be associated with strategic leadership. The
chapter does not purport to describe a new form of leadership, such as
transformational or instructional leadership, but analyses the strategic
element in the leadership repertoire. It identifies characteristics of indi-
viduals who are successfully undertaking a strategic leadership role or
skill. However, there is a difficulty in isolating out the strategic element of
good leadership as B. Davies (2003: 303) has identified:

The difficulty in reviewing the literature, or interpreting the results of

my current research, is that it is not always easy to distinguish the
characteristics of ‘good leadership’ from those of ‘strategic leadership’.

The second difficulty to consider is whether we are talking only about

strategic leadership being associated with the formal leader of an organ-
isation, or about a broader base of individuals who contribute leadership
insights to the strategic process. In this chapter, we recognise that there
may be a number of individuals in an organisation who demonstrate a
strategic perspective or ability. Thus, we take the view of distributed
leadership (Bennett et al. 2003) which involves several individuals within
the organisation being involved with the strategy.
With these concerns in mind, the chapter attempts to draw out those
distinctive strategic elements of leadership. Strategy, as defined in Chapter
5, encompasses direction-setting, broad aggregated agendas, a perspective
to view the future and a template against which to evaluate current activities.
Leadership is defined by Bush and Glover (2003: 10) as:
8 The dimensions of leadership

a process of influence leading to the achievement of desired purposes.

It involves inspiring and supporting others towards the achievement
of a vision for the school which is based on clear personal and
professional values.

What successful activities or behaviours do strategic leaders engage in? To

facilitate discussion, we put forward nine factors associated with strategic
leadership. These are, first, those abilities to undertake organisational
activity and, second, individual abilities.
Strategic leaders have the organisational ability to:

• be strategically oriented;
• translate strategy into action;
• align people and organisations;
• determine effective strategic intervention points;
• develop strategic capabilities.

Strategic leaders have personal characteristics which display:

• dissatisfaction or restlessness with the present;

• absorptive capacity;
• adaptive capacity;
• leadership wisdom.

Each factor will be considered in turn.

Strategic leaders have the ability to be strategically oriented

This quality involves the ability to consider both the long-term future (Adair
2002, Beare 2001, Boisot 2003, Stacey 1992), seeing the bigger picture, as
well as understanding the current contextual setting of the organisation.
Strategic orientation is the ability to link long-range visions and concepts
to daily work. Korac-Kakabadse and Kakabadse (1998: 9) suggest that
‘visionary leadership is transformational by nature, and as such, quite
different from planning, which is a managerial or a transactional process’.
Javidon (1991), quoted in Korac-Kakabadse and Kakabadse (1998: 10),
suggests that ‘visioning depends on understanding existing realities
(culture, history, formative context) and developing a clear sense of direction
for the organisation’.
However, it is necessary to treat the concept of vision or visioning with
caution. Seeking to analyse trends and their meaning for the future of the
organisation can be seen as a good thing if it engenders debate and if future
scenarios become the basis for strategic conversations. Buley (1998: 216)
issues a timely warning when discussing the work of Schwenk (1997):
 The strategic dimensions 9

he argues that a powerful vision can actually do damage to an organ-

ization. In his view, by creating and communicating a clear vision,
and by creating conditions which require his ‘followers’ to commit
themselves to that vision, a leader is in danger of imposing uniformity
of thinking and of stifling healthy debate which can have dire conse-
quences. . . . Imposed values, he argues, destroy dissent and discussion
which are essential to creative decision making.

The importance of creating the strategy with others, and not just com-
municating it to others, may be the critical skill that strategic leaders deploy
in determining the strategic direction of the organisation, (Boal and
Hooijberg 2001; Kakabadse et al. 1998). Strategic orientation can be con-
sidered to be the establishment of an outward-looking organisation,
which builds an understanding of possible future directions, and involves
engaging in strategic conversations and debate to focus on the most
appropriate direction and approach.

Strategic leaders have the ability to translate strategy into

action
In addition to strategic leaders leading the creation of an appropriate
strategy for the organisation is the need to translate strategy into action by
converting it into operational terms. Kaplan and Norton (2001) argue that
this can be done by ‘strategy maps’ and ‘balanced scorecards’ and suggest
that such approaches ‘provide a framework to describe and communicate
strategy in a consistent and insightful way’ (p. 10). What strategic leaders
are able to do is step back and articulate the main features of the current
organisation, the strategic architecture of the school, and lead others in
defining what the future of the school and the new architecture will be. This
is a process that Tichy and Sharman (1993) call the rearchitecturing stage,
which involves identifying a series of projects that need to be undertaken
to move the organisation from its current to its future state. Tichy and
Sharman (1993) put forward a three-stage process that strategic leaders
are able to undertake, the components of which are:

• awakening;
• envisioning;
• rearchitecturing.

The awakening stage involves building an agreement within the school

that a continuation of the current way of working is inadequate if it wants
to be effective in the future. This may involve the process, described in
Chapter 5, of enhancing participation and motivation to understand the
necessity for change, through strategic conversations. The envisioning stage
is building a clear and understandable picture of what this new way of
10 The dimensions of leadership

operating looks like. This may initially involve the creation of strategic
intent (Hamel and Prahalad 1994) and building the capacity to achieve it.
Once this has been completed then the new architecture of the school will
emerge and be the organisational basis for action.
Many schools have strategies that are written in different sorts of formal
plans. Changing those strategies into action is very difficult. The key
assessment of a leader’s ability to operate in the strategic domain may be
to ask staff in the school how this week’s or this term’s activities fit into the
strategic plan or direction of the school. If the teacher can articulate, in broad
terms, where the school is going and what its priorities are, then strategy
will have been translated into action. If not, the gap between strategy and
action will remain. In our research, with leaders in schools, those who are
successful at leading strategy place a large emphasis on strategic awareness
and action.

Strategic leaders have the ability to align people and

organisations
This ability involves aligning individuals, or the school as a whole, to a
future organisational state or position (Davies, B. 2003; Gratton 2000; Gioia
and Thomas 1996). A key element of this ability is to encourage commitment
through shared values (Boal and Bryson 1988). It would seem that the
leader’s own personal values and ideas are paramount in this process and
the leadership skill involves making it real for others. Leaders therefore
need to understand themselves and the values they hold and be able to
nurture quality communication. DePree (1993: 99) classifies this ‘lavish
communication’ found in organisations with cultures ‘which promote truth
and do not suppress or limit the distribution of information’. Stacey
(1992) believes that strategy is as much about the creation of meaning for
all those in the school as it is about the establishment of direction. Critical
in this creation of meaning is the art of strategic conversation and dialogue.
Making a vision real for others needs skills of conviction and passion.
It involves emotion. Boal and Hooijberg (2001: 516) state that ‘strategic
leadership focuses on the creation of meaning and purpose for the organ-
isation’. Strategic leadership therefore is concerned with the ‘development
of the organisation as a whole which includes its changing aims and
capabilities’ (Selznick 1984: 5).
It is important to find a way to build a connection between thinking and
action. The concept of a learning organisation helps here: an organisation
of people who are attuned to changes and able to respond to them have
valuable insights into how individuals and groups learn and how to convert
this knowledge into organisational action. Pietersen (2002: 181) suggests
that all learning organisations have developed a ‘culture of giving’ which
‘fosters teamwork, experimentation, learning and knowledge sharing’.
 The strategic dimensions 11

More recent leadership theories focus on transformational and visionary

leadership, and they emphasise the interpersonal processes between leaders
and followers. Boal and Hooijberg (2001: 526) suggest that research into
transformational leaders stresses ‘such factors as intellectual stimulation’
and ‘inspiration’. Cheng (2002: 53) found two recurring elements of
leadership in various definitions: ‘first leadership is related to the process
of influencing others’ behaviour; and second, it is related to goal develop-
ment and achievement.’ This view is reflected in the previous discussion
on the process of strategy: leaders need the skills to be able to influence
people and their actions and they need to direct those actions through setting
goals and creating meanings. This has resonance with the perspective
of transformational leadership, where a leader is proactive about the vision
and mission, shaping members’ beliefs, values and attitudes while devel-
oping options for the future. Bass (1985) identified that transformational
leaders, in educational settings, motivate people to do more than they are
originally expected to do in any of the following ways:

Raising their level of awareness . . . about the importance and value

of designated outcomes. . . . Getting them to transcend their own
self-interest for the sake of the team, organisation or large polity.
. . . Expanding their portfolio of needs and wants from low level
(e.g. physiological or safety needs) to high level (e.g. esteem or self-
actualization needs).
(Bass 1985: 76)

Alignment is about altering attitudes, values and beliefs, all of which

influence the culture of an organisation to unify its sense of purpose and
direction.

Strategic leaders have the ability to determine effective

intervention points
Strategic leaders are able to define the key moment for strategic change
in organisations. This is a concept that Burgleman and Grove (1996) call
strategic inflection points. These are critical points in an organisation’s
development when it is possible to develop new visions, create new strate-
gies and move in new directions. We would call these strategic intervention,
or opportunity, points. The key here is knowing not only what to do
strategically but also precisely when to intervene and change direction. Boal
and Hooijberg (2001: 518) pose the question ‘does strategic leadership
matter?’ Their answer is:

Strategic leadership does indeed matter . . . it seems to us the real

question is not whether it matters but rather under what conditions,
when, how and on what criteria.
12 The dimensions of leadership

They believe that when a leader makes a decision is just as important as what
decision or action is taken, a concept considered by B. Davies (2003) through
the discussion about the double s-curve. Bartunek and Necochea (2000)
define ‘Kairos’ time as the ability to take the right action at a critical time.
Boal and Hooijberg (2001: 528) suggest that strategic inflection points
create a ‘kairotic moment’ and it is during these ‘moments that learning
and change are possible if only the leader possesses the discernment to take
notice and the wisdom to act’. B. Davies’ (2003) analysis of the double
s-curve and the appropriate point to make the ‘strategic leap’ to a new way
of operating is a useful model here. It may be that both insight and intuition
play a significant role in making the appropriate judgement. Strategic
leaders, therefore, have the ability to define not only what strategically to
change but also when strategically to change.

Strategic leaders have the ability to develop strategic

capabilities
Prahalad and Hamel (1990) use the term ‘core competencies’ while Stalk
et al. (1992) use the term ‘strategic capabilities’. The focus of much of central
government activities in most Western economies is to raise educational
standards by measuring student performance in annual tests. The danger
of this approach is that it focuses activity on short-term targets. Thus,
learning how to teach with the latest ‘literacy pack’ from the government
may improve teachers’ specific skills but for sustainability the organisation
will need to develop deeper strategic capabilities or core competencies.
These can be illustrated with the analogy of a tree, where the branches
represent the short-term abilities and the roots are the underpinning
fundamental capabilities of the school.
If the school is to develop and be sustainable in the longer term then
it needs to develop strategic capabilities. Examples of these would be
the fundamental understanding of teaching and learning, rather than the
ability to deliver the latest curriculum innovation; a problem-solving culture
rather than a blame culture for the staff; assessment for learning rather than
assessment of learning. Creativity in problem-solving and team-working
could also be considered resources that give the school deep-seated strategic
capabilities or abilities.
These abilities enable the school to meet new challenges successfully
by reconfiguring existing abilities and resources rather than having to seek
new ones. The questions that strategic leaders ask are: ‘What strategic
capabilities do I need to sustain and develop for the future?’ as well as ‘How
do I meet current challenges?’ By focusing on strategic capabilities, leaders
position themselves and their organisations to be sustainable and successful
in the longer term.
 The strategic dimensions 13

Strategic leaders have a dissatisfaction or restlessness with the

present
This restlessness involves what Senge (1990) describes as ‘creative tension’
which emerges from seeing clearly where one wishes to be, one’s vision,
and facing the truth about one’s current reality. Strategic leaders are able
to envision the ‘strategic leap’ that an organisation wants to make, while
acting as passionate advocates for change. Strategic leaders have the ability
to live with the reality that the organisational culture may not be as forward-
thinking as they are. They have the ability to live with the ambiguity of
not being able to change the organisation fast enough, with the ability to
maintain the restlessness for change and improvement. Individuals who
are able to do this challenge current ideas and processes to seek better ideas
and processes.

Strategic leaders have absorptive capacity

Cohen and Levinthal (1990) define absorptive capacity as the ability to
absorb new information and assimilate it, learn from it and, importantly,
to apply it to new ends. Hambrick (1989) argues that strategic leadership
occurs in an environment embedded in ambiguity, complexity and informa-
tion overload. It is important therefore for strategic leaders to recognise
new information, analyse it and apply it to new outcomes; leaders need
the ability to learn. Boal and Hooijberg (2001: 517) also call this ‘absorptive
capacity’ and argue that leaders ‘have a unique ability to change or reinforce
existing action patterns’ within the organisation. Strategic leaders should,
therefore, create an organisational context in which learning can take place.
This may make use of Argyris and Schön’s (1978) double-loop learning.
What is important is that strategic leaders filter out the unimportant and
make sense of the important for themselves and their organisations. The
critical nature of their position often means that their interpretation of
reality determines patterns of action within the organisation.

Strategic leaders have adaptive capacity

Black and Boal (1996) and Hambrick (1989) define the ability to change as
‘adaptive capacity’. Sanders (1998: 5) supports this view that strategic
leaders need the ability to change and learn through asserting that
‘mastering chaos, complexity and change’ requires new ways of ‘seeing and
thinking’. Whittington (2001: 43) suggests that ‘leaders need an enduring
sense of purpose and a continuous sense of motivation’. This can be seen
in Hitt, Keats and DeMaries’ (1998) term of strategic flexibility. In an era of
innovation and continuous learning, where success may depend on a
flexible strategic response, this is particularly important and may favour
14 The dimensions of leadership

the emergent strategy or the strategic intent approach. Linking to B. Davies’

(2003) concept of ‘strategic opportunism’, leaders position themselves to
take significant opportunities as they adapt to new information in a respon-
sive and proactive way. Leaders can adapt and lead new strategic directions
for the organisation if they have cognitive flexibility linked to a mindset
that welcomes and accepts change.

Strategic leaders have leadership wisdom

Wisdom may simply be defined as the capacity to take the right action at
the right time. In a perceptive presentation to the 2002 International
Thinking Skills Conference, Robert Sternberg articulated that leaders need
wisdom because:

• they need creative abilities to come up with ideas;

• they need analytical abilities to decide whether ideas are good
ideas;
• they need practical abilities to make their ideas functional and to
convince others of the value of their ideas;
• they need wisdom to balance the effects of ideas on themselves, others
and institutions in both the short and long run.

In addressing the nature of wisdom in more depth, he established that

wisdom is:

• successful intelligence;
• balancing of interests;
• balancing of time-frames;
• mindful infusion of values;
• balancing of responses to the environment;
• application of knowledge for the common good.

Further, he established that for successful intelligence there is a need to

combine practical intelligence, analytical intelligence and emotional intel-
ligence. This provides an insightful and challenging set of criteria for leaders
to develop in order to deploy strategic choices with wisdom and effective-
ness. Throughout this discussion about wisdom, the personal qualities
of leaders have been mentioned. To these we could add, for example, the
values they hold, the ability to inspire and stimulate, social intelligence,
the ability to be passionate. All of these qualities affect the way a leader
learns and is able to change. Boal and Hooijberg (2001: 532) suggest that
‘most leadership researchers agree that leaders need to have such important
interpersonal skills as empathy, motivation, and communication’. Bennett
(2000: 3) expands the importance of personal values:
 The strategic dimensions 15

If moral leadership is to be exercised and pedagogy re-engineered

with any degree of success, then future leaders will need a firm set of
personal values. No doubt many will have their own lists, but integrity,
social justice, humanity, respect, loyalty and a sharp distinction between
right and wrong, will all need to be included. Strategic relationships
will soon flounder unless such a value system is held with conviction
and exercised on a regular consistent basis.

Although not specifically included in Bennett’s comprehensive list, social

intelligence is important for strategic leadership because the processes of
decision-making, solution implementation and organisational improve-
ment are rarely free of emotion. Social intelligence includes having a
thorough understanding of the social context, and is defined by Gardner
(1985: 239) as the ability ‘to notice and make distinctions among other
individuals . . . in particular among their moods, temperaments, motiva-
tions and intentions’. Thus, a key component of social intelligence is the
ability to discern emotion both in self and in others. Gardner identifies this
as both intra- and inter-personal intelligence. The ability to connect the
involvement of others and to resolve conflicts will be increasingly vital in
a context of developing strategic relationships and finding creative
solutions. Bennett (2000: 4) also identifies the importance of strength and
courage, stating that ‘visionary projects, delivered with passion, will fail
unless the leader has the ability to counter adversaries and remain confident
until the conclusion has been reached’.

CONCLUSION
Much of the debate about leadership has been focused on transformational
leadership with an increasing emphasis on instructional leadership which
has been re-branded as ‘learning-centred leadership’. Although these are
very significant perspectives, there is a danger that learning-centred lead-
ership will be concerned with current approaches and outcomes. While
we would support this as it is the core rationale for a school’s existence
and purpose, we would argue that effective learning-centred leadership
needs to be set in a broader organisational and strategic context to be both
sustainable and effective in the longer term. To this end, the development
of strategic leadership abilities and characteristics plays a significant part.
A model of strategic leadership therefore can take the form illustrated in
Figure 2.1.
If schools are to sustain student performance and move on to deep
learning, rather than just addressing test-based short-term agendas, we
need to develop leadership capability that has a strategic dimension. This
chapter suggests a framework for identifying the components of that
strategic dimension for leadership development.
16 The dimensions of leadership

ORGANISATIONAL INDIVIDUAL
ABILITY CHARACTERISTICS

Configure strategic
orientation
Restlessness

Translate strategy
into action
Absorptive capacity
STRATEGIC
Align people
LEADERSHIP
and organisations
Adaptive capacity
Determine effective
intervention points

Leadership wisdom
Develop strategic
capabilities

Figure 2.1 A model of strategic leadership

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks are expressed to Carfax Publishing for giving permission for using
‘Strategic Leadership’ published in School Leadership and Management: 2004,
24 (1) as the basis for this chapter.

RESEARCH SPONSOR
The concepts in this chapter were developed as one part of the National
College for School Leadership (England) funded research project on
developing strategy and strategic leadership in schools. This project aims
at exploring in primary (elementary) and secondary (high) schools and
special schools the strategic sustainability and leadership aspects of edu-
cational organisations.
The dimensions of leadership
3 The ethical dimension
of leadership
Christopher Bowring-Carr

In this chapter, I look at the ethical dimension of leadership that needs

to be at the heart of a school or college, how that dimension might be
achieved, and how a school or college might operate if it follows logically
and consistently the demands of that ethical imperative. Let us begin by
establishing how the term ‘ethics’ is being used in this book. The Concise
Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Craig 2000: 256) states:

What is ethics? First, the systems of value and custom instantiated in

the lives of particular groups of human beings are described as the
ethics of these groups.

From this quotation we can see that a group of people, everyone in a school
or college for example, demonstrates through their values and customs
what the ethical code is to which they adhere. Sergiovanni (1992: 102) puts
it this way:

When purpose, social contract, and local school autonomy become the
basis of schooling, two important things happen. The school is trans-
formed from an organisation to a covenantal community, and the basis
of authority changes from an emphasis on bureaucratic and psycho-
logical authority to moral authority. To put it another way, the school
changes from a secular organisation to a sacred organisation, from
a mere instrument designed to achieve certain ends to a virtuous
enterprise.

Let us look at some of the characteristics of the ethical leader, but before
doing so it needs to be said that a school will not last very long with un-
ethical leadership, but it can, unfortunately, last quite a long time with an
ethically neutral leadership in place. The school, in those circumstances,
becomes an efficient processor of people. The message in this chapter is
that a very active, up-front stance on a clear ethical code is essential if the
school is to be a true community of learners.
18 The dimensions of leadership

What are ethical leaders, or leaders of ethically focused schools? They are
people who have, over time, refined and pared from the many experiences
encountered in and out of school, a quite small set of values that guide
and permeate every action. There is no separation between personal and
educational ethics. Above all else, they will be caring people working
to establish a caring community. They will be compassionate, looking to
protect and honour people. They will understand that there should be
no forced choice between the community and the individual because only
through the happiness and fulfilment of the individual can there be a con-
tented community, and a contented community will enable the individual
to flourish. They will be looking for ways in which to help every individual’s
growth and development, and enabling every individual to make choices
informed by virtue. They will eschew competition, putting interdependence
and mutual help in its place. They will not suffer from the current infatua-
tion with efficiency, and will shun the rush to measurement. They will not
ask, ‘Has Susan learnt X?’ but rather, ‘What has Susan learnt, what range
of learning approaches has she used, and has that learning helped her to
grow?’ They will know that to be human is to be fallible, and therefore, not
being omniscient themselves, will joyfully accept the humanness of others.
They know that there will be times when holding on to the basic values will
be very tough indeed, but there is no alternative.
What the leader does can be summarised as follows:

• initiating dialogues, discussions, debates on ethical issues, starting with

the collegium’s establishment of its bed-rock values;
• setting up and maintaining an atmosphere of open challenge and
questioning;
• dispersing leadership; there need to be project leaders from among
the staff and students carrying out action research into all aspects of
the school’s life;
• establishing and helping to maintain an active school/community
council, made up of staff, students, parents and other members of the
community. Such a council has to have real tasks to do, and needs a
budget. The council is the voice of the community;
• articulating and manifesting the ethical imperatives of the community
in talking to parents, staff, students, all outsiders;
• showing through day-to-day activities what is really important in the
place;
• showing that as learning is the core activity, then ethics are intimately
bound up with what helps learning;
• standing up for the community against arbitrary diktats from local or
central government, protecting it as far as possible against the wilder
and frequently contradictory demands of government;
• demonstrating that the community is interdependent;
 The ethical dimension 19

• showing and asking for total commitment;

• being flexible and living happily with ambiguity within the established
ethics;
• being passionate in advocating and celebrating an unpredictable
variety of learning outcomes;
• demonstrating at all times that caring for one another is the only way
a community can thrive.

The code, the covenant, that informs every activity in the school has to
be constructed by the group, with the leader taking the role of gatherer
and enabler. An ethical code is not handed down, cannot be taken off
the shelf, and cannot be imposed by an outside authority. It is the result of
continuous deliberation, but it cannot merely be deliberation. The code
of ethics emerges from discussion of what is, for the institution, the bedrock
of values and customs, and the values and custom (‘how we do things
around here’) are manifest in and reify the ethics. It is in the organisation
and resolution of these discussions that the leader plays a vital part. Let
there be no mistaking the difficulty of this process. Leaders rarely get the
chance to start with a tabula rasa. They are usually faced with a very dis-
parate group of people, including some who love the profession and want
to continue to expand and grow and others who merely want a quiet life,
to be told what to do, and to get out at 4pm relatively unscathed. Some
will be actively against any change and overtly or covertly will do anything
in their power to subvert the leader and the ideas. The ethically driven
leader will maintain momentum whatever the difficulties. The focus at first
will be on those who want to join in. Over time, others will join and slowly
all but the few will come to work in the new ways. Eventually, through
age or weariness or the desire to find a quieter way of life, the last few will
drift away or be so isolated by the remainder of the community that their
force will be spent.
The leader creates an atmosphere of trust, in which all in the organisation
can feel free to argue, propose, question, and challenge. The confident leader
encourages dispersed leadership so that anyone can form a sub-group,
investigate a particular aspect of the school’s life, research an abstruse point,
and then present the findings to the wider group. The leader then has to
judge when the discussions have gone on long enough, bring together
the disparate ideas, and then articulate the refined essence of what has
been said. However, such a dialogue is not, must not be, a one-off event.
Life changes too rapidly. Every aspect of the community’s life, its values,
its culture will be revisited and tested against the changing conditions.
Further, that dialogue will not always be calm and reasonable. There will
be conflict, but as long as that conflict occurs ‘in trust’, in an atmosphere
which accepts diversity and argument, then the inevitable conflict will be
creative. The aim is alignment, not conformity.
20 The dimensions of leadership

One forum for such discussions could be a Community Council. The term
‘Community Council’ is used rather than ‘School Council’ deliberately. I
believe that in the twenty-first century, a school cannot do all it wants
or ought to do for its students on its own. It needs to involve a network of
people, some remote and connected to the school by email or video, and
some closer, in the community from which the students come. I sketch out
what I think education might be for in Chapter 8 and certainly involve-
ment with a wide community is one aspect of a school’s activities. In a
Community Council there would be representatives from the students,
staff, parents, and members of the community. It should have a number
of functions in the day-to-day running of the school and in longer-term
planning, but the centre of its remit would be to act as the conscience of
the school, the place in which decisions are made on whether a course
of action, a planned activity, or an individual’s behaviour are within the
ethical code of the school. In such a forum the leader’s ethical stance would
be very much to the fore. S/he would be the voice of the school, representing
and articulating its best to the Council and hence to the school and com-
munity as a whole. It would be in this place that s/he would continually
ask before any plan or decision was finalised: ‘Is this in the best interests
of our students? Does this further our learning?’
Underlying all these discussions is one essential activity; everyone in
the school or college is participating in building a community of discourse.
Only when the organisation has a community of discourse will there be
a shared vocabulary, and only when there is a shared vocabulary will the
group be able to articulate its values in the knowledge that all in the group
mean the same thing when they talk of, at one level, an ‘equitable sharing
of resources’, or at another level, ‘profound learning’. In other words, until
there is a community with a mutually agreed language, no one can be sure
what one person means by ‘happy’, or ‘learning’ or ‘work’. When the
community of discourse is established, then the code of ethics can be agreed
upon. Once it is agreed on, then the leader’s role is to articulate and embody
that code. The leader’s role is to put into clear, unambiguous words the
carefully thought-through aspirations of the institution. It is essential that
whoever goes into the school, or meets representatives from the school in
other places or encounters the school in any of its guises on video or through
other media, consistently receives the same message as to what the school
stands for, and the person who embodies and reinforces that steadiness is
the leader. It is the leader who has the sensitivity to be aware if someone
or some action is beginning to sound a note that does not fit with the ethical
stance, and it is the leader who then has to intervene.
Achieving an ethical code with the community involved can be difficult.
Too often the mores of the community can be in stark contrast to those that
the school tries to adhere to. For instance, there are communities in which
getting your retaliation in first is the norm – the school’s stress on tolerance
 The ethical dimension 21

and gentleness can be seen as weakness. In fact, as experience in Northern

Ireland and other troubled places has repeatedly shown, the ethics of the
school can be in stark contrast to the ethics of the surrounding people. When
such a situation occurs, then the school can do nothing but hold tenaciously
to the core principles of care, gentleness and trust that give to the children
a chance for emotional security. Too often sections of the wider community
appear to lie or equivocate to suit a short-term political end. A school can
never do so. Too often sections of the wider community break a promise.
A school can never do so. And it is in such circumstances that the leader
will be tested. Always acting as representative of the school, the leader will
demonstrate over and over again the courage needed to stand for the
conscience of the school.
What, for a school, is the starting point in the creation of a code of ethics?
The school’s central purpose is learning, and everyone in the school or
college is a learner. Therefore, the attributes of learning must lie at the heart
of the ethical system. In the simplest terms, in a school anything that helps
or stimulates someone to learn is ethical. This statement is both very simple
and very complex. It is the outworking of the statement that is complex;
the concept is comparatively straightforward. It is quite simple to see that
an underlying consistent system of justice, an equality of rights and an
equitable access to resources are the bedrock of that covenant on which
the organisation is built. Overlaying those foundations are such things as
cheerfulness, fairness, optimism – approaches to life which invite learners
to join together in a mutually supportive community.
One of the attributes of learning is that its outcomes can rarely be man-
dated. By its nature, learning, by the individual or by the collective, is
unpredictable, so if the base for the ethical code of a school is learning,
then the leader must be able to live at ease with ambiguity and uncertainty.
The school which is formulaic and rigid in its surface demeanour is not a
learning school. The leader manifests the flexibility necessary for learners
to flourish.
So, at the heart of an ethical school is the school’s deliberate construction,
over time, of a code of ethics, and this construction is overseen and guided
by the leader. The code embodies the ethos of the school. The ‘Report of a
Survey of Provision for Education for Mutual Understanding in Post-
Primary Schools in Northern Ireland’ (Education and Training Inspectorate
2000: 7) puts it well:

A school’s ethos does not emerge by chance. It is the result of con-

sultation, careful planning, widespread support, and is lived by all. It
takes on its own momentum, but, even in the best practice observed,
it needs to be sustained by the school’s continuous reaffirmation of its
values.
22 The dimensions of leadership

We can, from this statement, derive a definition of ‘ethos’. It is that ethical

milieu within which young people and adults meet, learn and care for each
other.
In a time of very considerable flux, it is essential that the school, and in
particular the leader, articulates its code clearly. In previous generations,
it was a reasonable assumption that all connected with the school shared
a common set of values. These values changed only slowly and did not need
careful scrutiny because society was settled and changed only slowly.
Indeed, because there were these shared assumptions, the basic values were
rarely mentioned. The outward trappings, the sort of behaviour which
was expected, the types of clothes that were worn, the forms of greeting
and the deference to position were what was emphasised, but the reasons
for that way of behaving did not need articulation. Today, however, as is
shown in other sections of this book, the rate of change increases
exponentially, and that change affects not only the ways in which we live
our lives, but fundamentally the ways in which we interact with one
another. Therefore, a school needs frequently to re-articulate the code of
ethics through which it conducts its business. For example, our under-
standing of what is entailed in learning is deepening and changing, and
therefore we have to change the expectations within which we work
in order to accommodate this ‘new’ learning. It is the role of the leader to
sense when some aspect of the changing world makes a re-look at the code
necessary, and then to enable a small group to investigate and advise.
There is a spectrum of schools which runs from what can best be termed
the ‘bureaucratic school’ to the ‘ethically focused school’. Clearly, there
are a number of points along this spectrum; schools which are trying to
move from the former to the latter position will take time to shed ways
of working and attitudes which have become a part of the fabric over the
years. The first type is characterised by being hierarchical, driven by sets
of rules to which most in the institution have not contributed, and having
an atmosphere in which there is little trust. Inspection and supervision are
the main ways in which the day-to-day work of the school is controlled,
and the teacher as technician ‘delivers’ the curriculum. That metaphor, of
the teacher as postman, encapsulates all that is wrong with such a system.
To ‘deliver’ is to have no control over the contents of what is delivered, or
of its suitability for the individual learner. Such a position is at best ethically
neutral.
The ‘ethically focused’ school is essentially collegial with shared aims,
values and vision, and an acceptance that within those values and aims
there will be many ways of achieving the school’s goals. It is a community
which has moved from dependency, which one finds in the autocratic
school, through independence to interdependence. It is, as suggested above,
a caring place, in which teachers genuinely look after the students and each
other, and in which students grow to see that having a care for one’s fellows
 The ethical dimension 23

is right. It is also a school which encourages everyone to have a ‘voice’, an

articulated stake in the governance. Flecknoe (2001) uses the terms ‘pupil-
as-tourist’ and ‘pupil-as-citizen’. It is, of course, largely the ethos that causes
each of those stances but, by establishing an invitational community, young
people can be helped to change from one to the other. The former, the
tourist, merely passes through the place with little regard for anything
except his or her own benefit. The latter is involved, and is encouraged to
become more involved. The ‘pupil-as-citizen’ is a learner and teacher, a
mentor for other students, and is involved in the discourse through which
the school operates. Hayes (1990: 2) puts it well:

We draw most of our political concepts from those same Greeks. The
dominant theme is that of citizenship. The citizen (polites), a badge of
honour denoting entitlement to speak, to be consulted, to be heard
before decisions affecting him were taken. And such is the significance
of citizenship that only a foolish person could fail to participate. He was
called ‘idiotes’, the loner, the non-political, the etymological forerunner
of an ‘idiot’.

Greek citizenship, too, involved the concepts of ‘aidos’ and ‘dike’

– shame and respect. The force which kept the whole together was the
moral pressure of respect for oneself and one’s fellow citizens, and
shame at falling short of the standards thus set.

Other features of the ethical school are that it is a questioning school, a

reflective school. The leader will be the inspiration in that s/he will always
be questioning, always seeking out a way of doing things which better
enhances learning, and leading the reflective discourse that explores every
aspect of the community’s life. The school will have developed the habit
of examining, regularly, all aspects of its day-to-day running, and the
medium- and longer-term plans, seeking to ensure that at every point what
is happening and what is being planned fit with the ethical picture that
each member of the community has. It is a place in which not only the
students are expected to learn, and thereby grow and change, but also all
the adults in it as well. And this growth and change will mean that there
is an easy acceptance that not always will everything be right first time,
but that mistakes will be seen as potential growth points. The leader will
demonstrate an ease with uncertainty, and a recognition that making a
mistake is acceptable, provided that learning results from this, and provided
that the mistake is not repeated.
The school will, however, also be a place which acknowledges that there
are two sorts of mistake – ‘above-the-waterline mistakes’ and ‘below-the-
waterline mistakes’. The former are those sorts of mistake that affect the
superficial workings of the place, but do no harm to anyone – for example,
24 The dimensions of leadership

not filling in the register in the usual way, putting the date on the left-hand
side of the page rather than the right, wearing coloured socks if the uniform
suggests white. ‘Below-the-waterline mistakes’ are those which contravene
the fundamental ethics, which hurt or have the potential to hurt, someone.
So, a sarcastic remark, a dismissive comment on a piece of work, a racist
or sexist slur or stance, a dismissive attitude towards colleagues – those
would cut to the quick of the place and be unacceptable. Again, it is the
leader who has, over time, helped the community sift through what is
‘above-the-waterline’ and what is ‘below-the-waterline’, and then has the
responsibility of articulating that judgement.
That word, ‘unacceptable’ raises an important point. In an ethics-driven
school the business of dealing with a serious error would be undertaken
by the collegium, not by a ‘line manager’. To suggest that such incidents
should be dealt with by the collegium might seem naïve or even asking for
the impossible. It is, however, exactly what the quotation from Hayes above
is pointing to. It is my absolute conviction that once a mistake or an error
of judgement is dealt with in a hierarchical way, then the basic quality of
the institution will be impaired and it will revert towards the hierarchical
school described above. The problem facing schools today is that so many
agencies in the world outside the school believe that control, inspection,
‘naming and shaming’ are not only acceptable, but are essential ways to
control the education system. It must be admitted that it is far more difficult
to give trust when one is not trusted. However, the ethical organisation
learns to trust itself, because it trusts everyone within it, and relies little on
uninvolved outsiders to influence its proper self-regard.
As I have said, the ethically focused school has, at its heart, learning.
There has, first, to be an agreement on what is meant by ‘learning’, and for
the purposes of this chapter I will take a constructivist position. Such a
position emphasises, inter alia, process and that means that the community
recognises that good, warm but tough and challenging relationships are
the basis for all deep learning. One of the major tasks for the community,
therefore, is to ensure that those who in any way disrupt those relationships
will feel, through the explicit values explicitly articulated, the disapproval
of the community.
However, again because of the tight central control over what goes on
in schools, there is another problem that the ethical school has to confront.
The problem is that of lists. Barth (1990: 39) sums up the problem:

This conception of school improvement has led to an extraordinary

proliferation of lists. Lists of characteristics of the ‘effective principal’,
the ‘effective teacher’, the ‘effective school’; lists of minimal pupil
competencies and of behavioural objectives for teachers; lists of new
certification requirements, mandates, and regulations. The list logic has
begotten a list sweepstake to see whose is the best list . . . the list logic
 The ethical dimension 25

of educational change seems simple, straightforward, and compelling.

Its only flaw is that it does not seem to work very well.

He goes on, in developing that chapter, to point to the absolute need for
there to be a ‘learning community’ in which all ‘adults and children learn
simultaneously and in the same place to think critically and analytically
and to solve problems that are important to them’ (ibid.: 43).
Part of the list mentality is the notion that there is one clear method to
solve whatever problem the politicians are talking about today. Postman
(1996), in a discussion of the false gods that bamboozle educators, quotes
Mencken. That somewhat irascible commentator, in 1918, wrote:

There is no sure-cure so idiotic that some superintendent of schools will

not swallow it. The aim seems to be to reduce the whole teaching
process to a sort of automatic reaction, to discover some master formula
that will not only take the place of competence and resourcefulness in
the teacher, but that will also create an artificial receptivity in the child.
Postman 1996: 49

The ethical school, therefore, has to look to its own adults and students
and work out the best learning and teaching strategies for that community
and the best governance for it. The school will certainly come up with a
list; we all need lists for shopping, for sending cards at Christmas, for
preparing for a holiday, for shoring up the defences against imperfect
memory. However, they are our lists, designed by us for our benefit. They
are written in our language so that we understand them. They are not
mandated by outsiders, to be used as a checklist against which we can
be found to be at fault. In this chapter and in others we will suggest lists
of possible activities or attributes. They are not mandatory, of course, but
rather are there for the reader to choose from, adapt or ignore. The reader
can make of them what he or she wills. We are not a hierarchy, but rather,
it is to be hoped, we offer prompts and aids to deep learning.
It is ironic that we live in a country that has made the educational system
into a rigid hierarchy, with that same hierarchy proclaiming that it is in
favour of ‘learning’, seemingly unaware that shouting at people – telling
them to learn and to learn in this particular way, to be tested by that
particular test – is a futile exercise, and one that, as I explore in another
chapter, leads to memorisation, not learning. As part of this manic central
control which education has to suffer, there is an emphasis on specify-
ing ‘mandatory learning outcomes’. This is not the chapter for arguing
that the phrase is an oxymoron. Rather, the argument here is that the ethical
school has to recognise that as it is creating a garden, and is in the business
of nurturing, metaphors from business or the factory are inappropriate.
Through the deliberations mentioned earlier, the ethical school will establish
26 The dimensions of leadership

that its main purpose is the development of learners, interdependent

learners. It will, therefore, eschew the idea of specifying in mind-numbing
detail the outcomes of learning. Rather it will look to ways of sustaining
and encouraging learning by all in the community, removing any barriers
that hinder the learning. ‘Performance’ and certainly not ‘performance
management’ is not what is required; it is a vivid, wide and challenging
range of demonstrations of learning that the school is looking to.
This learning does not take place in a vacuum. There must be a purpose
for it and the crucial questions that schools will have to answer are: ‘Why
education?’ ‘What do we believe we are doing with and for these young
people?’ (A linear book is not the best way to describe a set of activities
that needs to go on simultaneously. What sorts of learning will be enabled
and encouraged, what sorts of ethics will inform everyday behaviour, how
a definition of the purpose of the institution is arrived at – these and the
other core values and aims of the collegium will be debated together, each
overlapping and informing the other strands.) Too often, not only in the
UK but elsewhere in the world, a good education has come to be equated
with a successful economy. We have indeed been told that the purpose of
schools is to prepare young people for the economy. This reductionist, and
deeply depressing, argument is out-of-date. It belongs to the machine
age, and that age is part of history. What we in the developed world need
from the education system is the creative, self-starting and self-supporting,
autonomous learner, emotionally intelligent, able to work in changing
teams, and above all else, someone who enjoys learning for its own sake.
Our schools are hampered in achieving those objectives. Indeed, in a recent
longitudinal study of post-primary students in Northern Ireland under-
taken by the National Foundation for Educational Research (Harland et al.
2000: 11), there is the statement:

According to teachers, while a minority of ‘more clued-in’ pupils ques-

tioned the validity and relevance of their learning, a more mechanical
compliance prevailed among the majority.

It might, cynically, be suggested that ‘mechanical compliance’ is what is

wanted by the government. It is not an attitude, however, that is wanted
if we are to have a civilised society.
So, what is education for? I would not suggest that I have all the answers,
though in many of the chapters in this book we offer an outline of the
range of what education should be undertaking. In part answer to the
question, I said, earlier, that the ethical school community is characterised
by caring. That caring cannot, in the longer term, be confined solely to the
school. The sense of guardianship will extend to the community around
the school. But a group cannot help to nurture itself and its immediate
neighbours without looking further, and perhaps in that looking we can
 The ethical dimension 27

begin to see what education might be for. It might be something to do with

helping to establish a world in which the disparities between rich and poor,
between the powerful and powerless are fewer, in which the planet itself
is better looked after, and in which power is ameliorated by compassion.
The leadership in the ethical school has, as part of its role, the need for
futures thinking. Bowring-Carr and West-Burnham (1997:136) write of the
‘Steward of the Boundaries’, and surely any look at what those boundaries
of our world at present encompass would give purpose to our education
system beyond the mere mechanical acquisition of information. The staff,
early on in the establishment of the ethical community, need to look beyond
the immediate and take into account the forces that will be affecting our
children in the next thirty to forty years. It needs to be able to demonstrate
how any activity in school fits in with the larger view. It needs also to be
able to demonstrate that it is encouraging those attitudes and expand-
ing those abilities that the students at present in the school will need in
order to be able to play an involved part in making their adult society less
rapacious than ours.
Trying to prepare our students to attempt to ameliorate the worst aspects
of the world might be said to be a totally irrational basis on which a school
builds its learning policy. However, step by step we might be able to
contribute to the betterment of our community, and we can work to create
a series of oases which manifest the best that we are and do within our com-
munities, and those oases might, in time, coalesce. Are we totally naïve if
we suggest that the ethics of the school community need to be a microcosm
of what will sustain the planet, rather than be a mirror of those forces which
at present are destroying it?
The school’s leadership also needs, vitally, to keep to the forefront of
the collective conscience that one of the over-riding aims of education is
to enable people to move from acquiring and memorising information, to
using that information to create knowledge, and then, and most impor-
tantly, through the application of discernment and experience to move on
to wisdom.
We need to look in more detail at what sorts of questions a school
community and its critical friends should ask to ensure that it is acting out
its professed values. Unlike spring-cleaning, such questioning should not
occur out of a sense of ritual at a particular time of year. At any one time,
some aspect of the school should be under scrutiny. I am avoiding the word
‘audit’, as in my mind there is something too numerical in the connotations
of the word. There is the feeling behind the word of being called to account
by an outside body, so passing the responsibility on to an agency which
has power but no personal investment in the school. Also, with the word
‘audit’, the risk is that we look for items which can be quantified, and as a
result those items take on a major importance. The sort of evidence that
we are looking for is more qualitative than quantitative.
28 The dimensions of leadership

One way of initiating the enquiry is to undertake pupil shadowing. There

is no tool as powerful as this to begin to get a feel for the place as experienced
by the student. It takes practice and a deal of sensitivity to begin to feel the
school as the student does. It needs openness on the part of the shadower,
the student, and those met during the course of the day. It needs what I
was saying earlier, the certainty that mistakes will be made which will be
starters for development and change, and not matters for blame. It also
requires a deal of tentativeness. We cannot be objective in our viewing;
it is not possible to say ‘I am a camera’. Further, simply by being an observer
we change what we observe. In the same way that no two people reading
the same text will take the same meaning from it, so no two people observ-
ing, say, a lesson will come away with identical comments and views on
it. There needs to be the opportunity for the observer to say to the observed
(the teacher of the visited class) something along the lines of: ‘I think that
what you were trying to do was x, and that most of the students were
with you.’ In the subsequent discussion some approximation of intent and
outcome might be agreed on. Similarly, the observer needs to be able to
ask the student if the impression that she was interested, involved, bored,
bewildered or whatever, was the right one. From such triangulation,
practised over time, the organisation can build up a detailed account of
the school’s activities.
The results of these observations need to be fed back to the collegium,
and the leader’s task is to help focus and filter the discussions, then articu-
late the findings, and then help explore what the next steps should be, and
then again articulate the conclusions. As the steward of the institution’s
conscience, it is not for the leader to find fault or award grades or marks
out of ten, but rather to come with colleagues to a decision as to what should
be done next – to promote what is deemed good practice, or to find how to
improve a situation which lets the community down.
I suggest that there are four areas on which the inquiries will be focused.
The first, as indicated above, is the area of the student’s everyday experience
of being in the institution. The second is the area of pedagogy. The third
is how well the links between the school and the community are being main-
tained and expanded. The fourth is an amalgam of the other three but needs
to be dealt with in its own right – whether or not the community as a whole
is sustaining its vision, being true to itself.
What I am trying to demonstrate by outlining the areas for inquiry and
suggesting, below, some of the questions to be asked, is how an ethics-
driven school moves on from the sorts of questions asked in an ethically
neutral school, one in which maintaining the institution and conforming
with externally imposed criteria are perceived to be the important con-
siderations. The school determined to act ethically does not look only at
the items of functionality – are the rules adhered to, are things done on time,
are messages clear and answered? The answers to such questions are
 The ethical dimension 29

needed, but they are only starting points. This school wants to inquire not
merely if the rules are being kept, but whether they are the right rules; not
if things are done on time, but whether these ‘things’ are worth doing at
all; whether what is being done answers the question: ‘Does what we are
doing match the ideal that we have set out in our vision statement and in
our expressed aims?’
The sorts of questions that will be asked in relation to the first area of
inquiry (the students’ everyday experience) could include:

• Which students are demonstrating success? In what ways is that success

being demonstrated?
• Which students are demonstrating difficulties? What sorts of difficulties
are they? Who is labelling them as ‘difficulties’? On what grounds? Can
these students (who are causing ‘difficulties’) be grouped, and if so
what does such grouping tell us?
• How are students demonstrating their knowledge?
• Are there students about whom we know little, who are quiet and
uninvolved? Can we find out why and if so work out what to do? Or
is it all right to be quiet?
• Do most of the students for most of the time look cheerful? How often
do we hear laughter?
• Are we sure that every student knows at least one adult in the school
to whom to turn in times of elation or trouble?
• How often do we enable students to work in teams?
• How often, and in what ways, are students involved in helping to run
this place? Could they do more?
• Are the students encouraged to use all their intelligences?
• Do our methods of assessing and valuing students’ efforts reflect our
aim to be mindful of the whole child?
• Are we encouraging students to refine their emotional intelligence?
How?
• What sorts of achievement are we celebrating?
• Do we give time to all our students for quiet reflection every day?
• Are whatever resources we have distributed equitably?
• Are we continuously searching to expand our range of human and
material resources?

The sorts of question that might be asked in the second area (pedagogy)
could include:

• Are we keeping up-to-date with the material of our subject(s)?

• Do we regularly talk over our approaches to teaching with our
colleagues?
• Do we regularly visit each others’ classrooms to observe and act as
critical friends?
30 The dimensions of leadership

• Do we monitor what sorts of questions we ask?

• Do we regularly challenge and encourage all our students?
• Do we work in teams whenever possible?
• Do we search for and then adopt good practice?
• Do we regularly examine the rationale behind what we do to ensure
that we are being honest in our teaching?
• Do we regularly share our widening knowledge about how people
learn?
• Do we search out the quieter students and ensure their understanding
and participation?
• Do we listen to our students and take seriously what they say?
• Do we listen to the parents and take seriously what they say?
• Do we engage all the intelligences that our students possess?
• Do we reward the outworkings of those intelligences?
• Do we enjoy what we are doing? If not, how are we going to help each
other to revitalise our work here?
• What have I learned today?

The sorts of question that might be asked in relation to the third area of
inquiry (school–community links) could include:

• Do we encourage the parents to be participants in the children’s

learning? In what ways?
• Do we regularly discuss with the parents why we do things the way
we do?
• Are we committed to going into the community to explain ourselves?
• Do we try to involve the community in validating our students’ work?
• Do we actively try to help the community?
• Do we respond fully and in a friendly manner to parents’ questions and
queries?
• Do we bring in other agencies to help before a problem grows too large?
• Do we act as a focal point for the community?
• Do we use a wide range of approaches to communicate with the
community?

The final area (whether the community is being true to its values) might be
looked at through these questions:

• Do we care for each other?

• Do we express our affection for each other?
• Before making a decision, do we carefully examine its ethical basis?
• Do we look for opportunities to celebrate and enjoy the work of others?
• Do we regularly revisit our assumptions to ensure they are still valid?
• How do we check that prejudices are not clouding our vision?
 The ethical dimension 31

• How do we support each other in times of difficulty?

• How do we recharge our batteries?

Of course, the answers to the first three groups of questions will go some
way to filling out the whole-school picture.
What I am suggesting here is that the ethical school is a highly self-
conscious one, and a verbal one; by that I mean that it is continually
examining what it is doing and why, and articulating its questions and
answers.
Finally, I know that I am asking a very great deal, and I know that
institutions following the suggestions in this chapter will be demonstrating
courage. I am very conscious that I am living in an educational world that
is obsessed with targets, numbers, checklists, demands, false accountability,
tests and control – above all control. The needs of the whole child; the hopes
that we, as a society, have to look forward to the next generation being better
able to cope with the complexities of the twenty-first century than we were
with those of the twentieth; the necessity to have rounded people whose
intellectual and artistic capabilities have been challenged and expanded –
these hopes are simply not being met in this education system. Creativity,
both of adults and of children, has been buried under layers of tests and
prescribed syllabuses, and without creativity we are the victims of whatever
trite and superficial nostrum the government fastens on next. For a school
to stand out against this tide of imposed mediocrity is extremely difficult,
but I believe that there is no other choice. Hayes (1984) quoted Koestler,
and this quotation sums up our feelings with accuracy:

What we need is an active fraternity of pessimists. They will not

aim at immediate radical solutions, because they know this cannot be
achieved in the hollow of the historical wave; they will not brandish
the surgeon’s knife at the social body, because they know their own
instruments are polluted. They will watch with open eyes and without
sectarian blinkers for the first sign of the new horizontal movement;
when it comes they will assist at its birth, but if it does not come in
their lifetime, they will not despair. And meantime their chief aim will
be to create oases in the interregnum desert. (24)

There are schools which are breaking out from the rigidities of the past
few years. There are schools which are looking to an ethically driven
education, an education which focuses on the whole child and not just on
those outcomes which can be measured. They might, in some quarters,
be termed ‘rogue schools’. What needs to occur now is for these rogue
schools to band together, in the first instance to support and encourage each
other, but in the future to be examples not just of good practice, but of the
only practice that is acceptable.
The dimensions of leadership
4 The competent leader
Linda Ellison

INTRODUCTION
This book has proposed that leaders need to be both strategic and ethical
so that leadership is both forward looking and honest. However, there is a
whole range of activities in which a leader has to be competent. Using the
perspectives from the competence and competency movement, I will now
explore what they bring to considerations of effective leadership. Being
effective requires leaders throughout organisations who are aware of their
own knowledge and personal qualities (sometimes referred to as skills,
attributes and attitudes) and who are able to carry out their current lead-
ership roles successfully through demonstrating appropriate actions. They
must also be able to continue to be effective in a changing world and to help
other people to develop, for example, pupils, colleagues, parents and
governors. Handy (1996: 5) writes of these responsibilities emphasising that
‘the task of the leader is to make sure that individuals and groups are
competent to exercise the responsibility that is given to them’ but he goes
on to point out the need for leaders to look to their own development, saying
that ‘in the new organisations, titles and roles carry little weight until the
leaders prove their competence. All authority has to be earned before it
can be exercised.’
In response to the drive for effective and efficient organisations, the
concepts of competence and competency have been used extensively in
the last twenty years to refer to the skills and characteristics which enable
people to carry out successfully the tasks required of a role, yet there is
still confusion about the terms. This confusion is complicated by the fact
that, in several countries, ‘standards’ have been developed for various
leadership, management and teaching roles in schools. Within this
standards-based system, the terms competence and competency are not
always used, yet one or other of these concepts underpins many of the
expectations.
 The competent leader 33

EXPLORING THE TERMS COMPETENCE,

COMPETENCY AND STANDARDS
While definitions and examples of these concepts are provided here, the
reader needs to remember that the terms are often used interchangeably
by some writers and in some contexts, so it is probably more important to
consider what is actually being discussed, rather than forming a view based
merely on which term is being used. With that caveat out of the way, I will
provide below the most common explanations of the terms, pointing out,
where possible, any alternative usage which might be of significance.
A useful way of distinguishing is to think of competences as describing
the ability to carry out a particular task to an identified minimum standard.
In other words, they relate to outputs. Competencies, on the other hand,
relate to inputs, the things that a person brings to the job or activity in
order to be successful, i.e. a set of underlying characteristics which can be
drawn on in a range of situations in order to achieve superior performance.
However, we may also refer to a person who has ‘what is required for the
job’ as being competent in an overall sense so that those who wish to create
benchmarks for success in a job would often write these as standards which
are a combination of competence and competency, i.e. those things which
the person brings to the job and those outputs which they demonstrate as
they carry out the job. Some sets of standards are threshold, i.e. indicate a
minimum acceptable level, whereas other sets may be designed to describe
excellence in the role. In addition, we talk about organisations as having
core competences, i.e. core capability or expertise in a particular aspect
of work which can be applied and developed in a variety of ways. The way
in which these four terms might be seen to combine in an organisation is
shown in Figure 4.1.
This section is structured in order to explain individual competence,
individual competency, standards and organisational core competence.

Competence
The term competence has been used in Britain for many years and recog-
nises a person’s demonstrated ability, in terms of skills and knowledge,
to meet the minimum standards to fulfil a role in a particular occupation.
It therefore relates to the achievement of ‘outputs’, i.e. a person’s ability to
produce satisfactory ‘results’ through carrying out the role.
In the UK, the term competence is particularly familiar through its use
in the National Vocational Qualification (NVQ) and Scottish National
Vocational Qualification (SNVQ) frameworks, work-related qualifications
which are based on National Occupational Standards, i.e. statements
of performance standards describing what effective people do as they carry
out particular occupations from hairdressing to accounting. The standards
34 The dimensions of leadership

Standards for an Standards for an

individual’s overall individual’s overall

competences competences

competencies competencies

competence in a job competence in a job

ORGANISATIONAL
CORE
COMPETENCE
Standards for an Standards for an
individual’s overall individual’s overall

competences competences

competencies competencies

competence in a job competence in a job

Figure 4.1 Competence, competency, standards and core competence in combination

relate to practice, rather than theory; they cover all the main parts of the
job including best practice, knowledge and understanding, and the ability
to adapt in a future context. They are broken down into elements and, in
terms of level, they go from routine and predictable activities (‘Foundation’
– at Level 1) to complex, unpredictable activities with high levels of
responsibility and autonomy (‘Chartered, professional and senior manage-
ment roles’ – at Level 5). The acquisition of NVQs is intended to ensure
that employees have the skills and knowledge to meet the organisation’s
needs.
The standards of the Management Standards Centre (MSC) provide a
similar, standards-based approach for the various levels of management.
MSC standards are at Levels 3, 4 and 5 (where Level 5 is equivalent to
a degree in management). The MSC concept of competence relates to the
ability to carry out specific job requirements to a particular standard but
also considers the issue of transferability of the skills and knowledge to a
new situation.
In a similar way, a competence approach is used in order to specify the
standards which should be achieved by beginning teachers, i.e. those whose
initial training is complete (whether in a higher education institution
or through a school-based scheme). The standards were devised by the
Teacher Training Agency (TTA) in the 1990s to provide a common frame-
 The competent leader 35

work of expectations with the most recent version being ‘Qualifying to

Teach’ (TTA 2003b). This document states that the standards are ‘outcome
statements that set out what a trainee teacher must know, understand
and be able to do to be awarded QTS’ (TTA 2003a: 3). For the later career
stages in England, in 1997 and 1998 the TTA developed frameworks which
are more of a hybrid and which are discussed in the section on standards
below.
Competence frameworks such as NVQ and MSC are created by a specific
procedure so that once the performance criteria and situations have been
specified for a role, workers can be trained and assessed against them. The
whole process is a logical, systematic approach providing a comprehensive
guide for assessment and development. It involves the following stages:

• identify the key purpose of a job, of key roles within it and of key units
within each role;
• specify the performance criteria which are appropriate and the
situations in which these must be demonstrated;
• train staff, usually on the job;
• assess to see if the competence standard has been met.

In order to gain accreditation through NVQ or MSC, the person develops

a portfolio (or equivalent) which demonstrates the successful achievement
of the standards for a particular level.
The concept of competence in relation to school leadership and manage-
ment has not been widely adopted although there were, in the early 1990s,
several projects which built on the work of the School Management Task
Force (DES 1990). The most notable of these projects, as clearly described
by Esp (1993), would be those of Peter Earley for School Management
South and Tony Beck and Geoff Bowles for Manchester Polytechnic. Their
work provided a valuable stimulus to discussion about the skills, know-
ledge and understanding needed for effective leadership and management
but it was often felt that something was missing from the model in that it
disaggregated what seemed to many to be an holistic process.
The competence approach has been widely criticised because it sets out
minimum standards which give the expectations of a threshold level of
performance and are therefore not necessarily going to guide the develop-
ment of excellent performance. The approach also seems to suggest that
jobs are static by focusing on the characteristics of a job rather than on the
characteristics of people who can be successful in the job, both now and as
it changes in the dynamic context. Another criticism of the competence
approach is that the same job can be very different in different circum-
stances, e.g. small school or large school, successful school or one which is
struggling.
The standards are felt by many to be too detailed and fragmentary with
roles being over-analysed into many small parts with no discrimination
36 The dimensions of leadership

between the routine and the significant. Such an inflexible and prescriptive
approach may not be appropriate for complex roles such as the various
leadership positions in education where successful people need to be able
to combine knowledge and skills with an understanding of their own and
others’ behaviours and attitudes in a wide range of emerging circumstances.
Although requirements have changed, the time-consuming collection of
evidence for accreditation has been found by some in education to be a
‘paper exercise in proof’ rather than being developmental.
Although many organisations use the actual MSC models of managerial
competences, others feel them to be too inflexible for the higher levels of
management and leadership work and have adapted them to fit their needs
or just used the lower level standards such as those for team leading. The
emphasis in educational leadership on flexibility and on people skills has
led to the rejection by many of the competence approach and the seeking
of solutions via the competency model.

Competency
This term originated in the US, particularly through the work of the
psychologist David McClelland and the McBer organisation (later Hay
McBer and now the HayGroup) who carried out the first study of com-
petencies in 1973 and on whose work much of the current NCSL thinking
in school leadership is based. In a similar way, many large companies have
employed psychologists to develop competency models to meet their
needs.
In this approach, ‘a competency is a measurable characteristic of a person
that is related to effective performance in a specific job, organisation or
culture.’ (HayGroup 2001: 1) The term thus refers to the underlying charac-
teristics (i.e., the inputs) that an individual brings to the job and which
result in successful or superior performance. A competency is not, there-
fore, a task, but a characteristic that enables a person to carry out the tasks
of the job. This is a valuable approach because contexts change and it
would seem that those who have the right characteristics for the role would
be best able to adapt to new situations. It needs to be reiterated, how-
ever, that competencies can be developed as opposed to being fixed from
birth.
Competencies are determined by observing and interviewing those
who have been acknowledged by peers and experts to be outstanding per-
formers in their jobs. (It may be difficult to obtain consensus on this in
schools!) The process has been carried out for hundreds of different jobs,
such as nurses, sales personnel, headteachers, company directors, and it
allows for the identification of the characteristics which distinguish those
outstanding people from the rest. Each competency is expressed in terms
of behaviours, ‘those thoughts and actions of outstanding performers’
 The competent leader 37

(HayGroup 2001: 1). The competencies for a particular role can be identified
by the following process:

1 clarify the major requirements and performance criteria for a particular

job
2 identify successful job performers i.e. the best 10 per cent
3 observe them in the role and identify key characteristics, areas of
concern and actions
4 compare their characteristics and behaviour with that of other job
holders
5 formulate the key competencies
6 cluster the competencies into groups for ease of reference.

An example of a competency which was developed through this process,

originally for the Leadership Programme for Serving Headteachers (LPSH)
programme, is shown in Table 4.1 (HayGroup 2000). Although this relates
to headship, a similar process would be used in relation to other school
leadership roles and could result in some similar behaviours, although the
scale of influence may be different.
As suggested in Table 4.1, the competency approach can appear to
produce a list of characteristics which are found in excellent performers
and this can seem daunting to those who have not been recognised at such
a level of excellence or those who aspire to these positions. It is important,
therefore, to use the approach sensitively when developing leaders and
potential leaders. As the example shows, it is necessary to understand why
a competency is significant, rather than just to copy the behaviours so that
a leader is then able to use discretion in the working context, rather than
imitate the competency mechanistically. This understanding of the pur-
poses and principles can help to overcome the criticism of the competency
approach that simply replicating the characteristics of these excellent
performers will produce clone-like behaviour with standardised and
insincere responses in other individuals in particular situations.
It is most important that any study of the competencies needed for
a particular role has been carried out well, since otherwise the appointment
and development processes in the organisation will not produce effec-
tiveness in the role. For example, can a study of ‘leaders’ be useful across
different organisations or does it need to be context-specific? Are the
characteristics of effective ward or regimental leadership different from
subject or whole-school leadership, in terms of the generic characteristics
of leadership? One research project compared the leadership required of
effective headteachers with that of senior executives in private enterprise
and found that the two working environments are coming closer together
but that there are lessons to be learned on both sides. For example,
38 The dimensions of leadership

While business leaders are more adept at strategy and vision,

headteachers’ strengths lie in raising capability. Technology can render
a strategy irrelevant in a matter of months – capable, motivated
employees will never go out of fashion.
(Forde, Hobby and Lees, 2000: 4)

Table 4.1 The expression of a competency (based on HayGroup 2000)

Cluster Creating the vision

Title of competency Initiative
Definition The drive to act now to anticipate and pre-empt events
Core question Does the individual have a bias for action and does he or
she think ahead to anticipate and act on future needs and
opportunities?
Why it matters Heads need to be able to take decisive and immediate
action when there are difficulties, or to prevent a situation
escalating. Prompt action enhances the credibility of the
headteacher. Headteachers also need to be proactive in
the medium and long term so that opportunities are not
lost and problems not left to drift. Critically, they need to
be proactive in shaping and reshaping provision to take
account of fast-moving societal changes and educational
initiatives.
Levels of action (these 1 Acts decisively
are sometimes known Is decisive in a crisis situation. Defuses potential problems
as Behavioural Statements) before they escalate. Questions to probe significant detail.
2 Thinks and acts ahead
Thinks and acts ahead of time, to seize an opportunity or
to sort out a problem.
3 Prepares for future opportunities
Anticipates and prepares for possible problems or
opportunities that are not obvious to others. Takes action
to create an opportunity or to avoid a future problem.
4 Acts now to achieve long-term payoffs
Anticipates situations a long way off and acts to create
opportunities or avoid problems that are not obvious to
others.

Some critics feel that leadership and management takes place in such a
dynamic context involving varied and changing relationships that it is
impossible to suggest ‘ideal’ characteristics. It is likely that certain
competencies will be particularly significant for effective leadership in the
future but, as the approach is based on observing effective performers of
today, it cannot be used accurately to predict the competencies of the future.
Researchers, therefore, can only speculate but it is a flexible approach so
 The competent leader 39

models can be updated by further research. We already know that modern

workplaces require more collaboration, autonomy and creativity than
control and conformity and that there are, increasingly, variations in the
background and previous experience of the workforce so that different
combinations of competencies may be significant according to the situation.
We can also look at those competencies (shown in Table 4.2) which seem
to be linked with success in times of rapid change and in an increasingly
competitive global context, so that leadership development work can
provide opportunities to develop these.

Table 4.2 Competencies for the future

Self-confidence Information seeking

Achievement orientation Collaborativeness
Conceptual ability Impact and influence
Initiative Strategic orientation

There are similarities between the competency approach and emotional

intelligences. Goleman’s research (1998) found that emotional intelligence
was twice as important as a discriminator of success in leadership than
technical skills and general intelligence and he is now working closely with
those in the competency arena such as Richard Boyatzis and the HayGroup.

Standards for an individual’s overall competence for the job

In general conversation, we often refer to a person as being competent or
incompetent in a particular role. In relation to leadership, this implies that
a leader needs to have ‘what it takes’ to carry out the whole job. Standards
are often, therefore, developed for a particular role in order to determine
whether an individual has the overall capability to fulfil the role (i.e., ‘is
competent’) and to guide professional development. While some sets of
standards are a series of output statements (i.e., competences), others are
expressed as a mixture of competences and competencies and comprise the
knowledge (sometimes with ‘understanding’ listed separately), skills and
attitudes that are required to carry out a particular role.
Following the development of the standards for Qualified Teacher Status
in the late 1990s, the Teacher Training Agency (TTA) in England consulted
widely and developed sets of standards for various roles in the teaching
profession, for example National Standards for Subject Leaders (TTA
1998a), for Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators (TTA 1998b) and for
headteachers (TTA 1997). They recognised that success in each of these roles
involved more than just a tick list of actions and that there was a need to
set out the professional knowledge, understanding, skills and attributes
necessary to carry out effectively the key tasks of that role. Other than the
40 The dimensions of leadership

compulsory ones (for QTS), the sets of standards have been used with
varying degrees of acceptance or enthusiasm. The headteacher standards
were not used very much at first, except in the National Professional
Qualification for Headship (NPQH) programme. Work by NCSL has
reshaped the standards for headteachers in England so that they are
expressed as the required knowledge, professional qualities and actions
(see page 50), placing greater emphasis than before on competencies. The
standards for subject leaders have had a mixed response, especially when
applied to subject leadership in primary schools, where the expected
requirements were not felt to be feasible. More recently, the various stan-
dards have been used to inform performance management discussions and
as part of professional development programmes.
Some standards are written to reflect threshold or entry level performance
in the role while others are designed to reflect excellent performance. In
this way, for example, success in the NPQH suggests that a person is ready
to begin headship, although it does not guarantee later success. However,
the revised standards for headteachers (DfES 2004) have been designed to
indicate what is expected of an effective headteacher, not one who is
entering at threshold level nor one who is excellent. They differ from the
previous ones in that they reflect an increased focus on professional quali-
ties which are framed as competencies, while still including knowledge and
actions which are framed as outcome measures or competences.
Examples drawn from various standards for overall competence are
given in Table 4.3.

Organisational core competence

The core competences of an organisation represent an intermediate level

of capability between the capabilities of the individuals within the organ-
isation (discussed above) and the overarching metacompetence, such as
‘education’ or ‘public relations’. Thus, a core competence could be defined
as ‘the bundle of skills and technologies’ (Hamel and Prahalad 1994: 199)
or capabilities that allows an organisation to be a leader in the provision of
a particular range of products or services that are of benefit to its customers
such as the core competence of Canon in optics, Honda in engines and Sony
in miniaturisation.
Hamel and Prahalad (1994) maintain that there are likely to be between
five and fifteen core competences in an organisation and that, in order to
be considered ‘core’, the competences must have:

• customer value, i.e. people will choose the organisation over others,
even if it is sometimes difficult to explain why – the concept of a ‘happy
school’ comes to mind here;
 The competent leader 41

Table 4.3 Examples from standards for overall competence (extracts only)

Standard Aspect Description

Revised National Standards Developing self and Knows about strategies to

for Headteachers working with others promote individual and
in England (DfES 2004) team development.
Is able to develop, empower
and sustain individuals and
teams.
Acknowledges the
responsibilities and
celebrates the
achievements of individuals
and teams.

The Standard for Headship Interpersonal abilities Demonstrates confidence

in Scotland (Scottish and courage.
Executive 2003) Creates and maintains a
positive atmosphere.
Inspires and motivates
others.
Communicates effectively.
Empathises with others.
Values and works through
teams.

Original version of National Decision-making skills Able to:

Standards for Subject Judge when to make
Leaders in England decisions, when to consult
(TTA 1998b) with others and when to
defer to the headteacher or
senior managers
Analyse, understand and
interpret relevant
information and data
Think creatively and
imaginatively to anticipate
and solve problems and
identify opportunities

• competitor differentiation, i.e. competences not held by all in the

sector such as capability in global partnerships, vocational provision,
university partnerships for students and so on;
• extendability, i.e. the ability to be applied to new products or services,
for example, current capability in differentiated approaches to learning
and in community and family links could lead to a future application
through provision for learners of all ages ‘from cradle to grave’ and
through leadership of multi-agency provision of services.
42 The dimensions of leadership

The core competences are not always very obvious. They are below the
surface, rather like the roots of a tree or the submerged part of an iceberg,
and they are unlikely to be exclusive to a particular person or small team.
The way in which the capabilities of the individuals are integrated to form
a core competence is seen as the ‘distinguishing hallmark’ (Hamel and
Heene 1994: 11) of an organisation. For these reasons, effective leaders need
to understand how the various stakeholders such as students, staff,
governors and parents make their contributions to overall success.

The next section of this chapter examines some of the different systems
which are available to identify and develop individuals with particular
capabilities and which may be of relevance in education.

COMPETENCE AND COMPETENCY SYSTEMS OF

RELEVANCE TO SCHOOLS
The section which follows examines the features of some of the many
specific systems which are available in the UK and internationally for
the development of competent professionals in schools. In addition, some
systems are included which relate to other roles because the leadership
dimension in schools extends beyond the teaching profession. The first two
examples relate to systems which are largely based on competence while
the remainder are closer to competency in their philosophy.

The Management Standards Centre

The Management Standards Centre (MSC) is an independent unit of the
Chartered Management Institute and, since 2001, has been responsible
for revising and implementing competence standards in leadership and
management which can be used across all organisations in England. The
Centre has taken over the standards that were put in place by its pre-
decessor, the Management Charter Initiative (MCI) which was established
in 1988 following reports (Constable and McCormick 1987; Handy 1987)
highlighting the need for a higher level management development in the
UK.
In early 2004, the MSC was in the final stages of consultation about
revised ‘new world-class occupational standards for management and
leadership’ to improve capability in the UK, stating that

The new standards will identify what individuals with management

and leadership responsibilities are expected to know and understand
and be able to do in relation to management and leadership functions/
activities.
(MSC 2004: 1)
 The competent leader 43

In the proposed new system, ‘Version 2’ of the consultation process puts

forward six functional groupings:

• managing self and personal skills

• providing direction
• facilitating change
• working with people
• using resources
• achieving results.

Each grouping contains a cluster of units, forming 51 units in all. Table 4.4
shows the nine units for one grouping (‘Providing direction’) and the
headings which are used to define each of the units. Further details can be
obtained from www.managers.org.uk.

Table 4.4 Draft units for an MSC function

Functional grouping: Providing direction

Made up of nine units Each unit is expressed as

Map the environment Title

Develop vision and strategy Overview
Develop plans for your area of Outcomes of effective performance
responsibility Behaviours which underpin effective
Guide the implementation of strategy performance
Lead people Knowledge and understanding
Ensure compliance with legal, regulatory, Skills
ethical and social requirements
Develop organisational culture
Manage risk
Promote diversity

Source: MSC 2004

The model provides very detailed specifications of what a manager

should be able to do and should know. It is interesting to note the inclusion
of ‘behaviours’ in the new standards and also that some of the skills are
more related to what people bring to the job than previously, thus reflecting
a move towards the competency approach.
The standards provide a framework of benchmarks for development and
recognise existing achievements in experienced staff. They are assessed by
a file or portfolio but now more innovative approaches to assessment are
available such as video, audio, or ‘walk and talk assessment’, as long as
the evidence can be noted by the assessor. Those who demonstrate that they
have achieved particular levels in the standards can become eligible for
Associate or Membership of the Institute of Management Development.
44 The dimensions of leadership

Although the standards are generic across types and sizes of organ-
isations, as explained earlier in this chapter, they are little used in schools.
They could, however, form the basis of discussion and could be used
for those in a variety of school support positions whose leadership and
management roles are not covered by the TTA or NCSL standards
and could facilitate the ability of such staff to take their qualifications into
other employment sectors.

TTA standards
A number of standards have been introduced from the early 1990s onwards
in order to provide benchmarks so that all concerned are clear about what
is required of teachers at particular career stages or in particular roles.
The standards for beginning teachers with Qualified Teacher Status (QTS)
are output statements or competences, originally developed in the early
1990s, which have been regularly refined and are used to judge whether a
trainee can be designated as a newly qualified teacher (NQT). The most
recent standards are published as ‘Qualifying to Teach’ (TTA 2003a) which
states that:

The Standards for the award of Qualified Teacher Status are outcome
statements that set out what a trained teacher must know, understand
and be able to do to be awarded QTS.
(TTA 2003a: 3)

They comprise three interrelated sections: professional values and practice;

knowledge and understanding; teaching. As well as forming a baseline for
entry to the profession and guiding those involved in initial teacher training,
the standards can also prove useful in other circumstances, particularly to
act as guidance for those who are struggling to be effective for whatever
reason. (For a full copy of the standards, see www.tta.gov.uk.)
In addition, the TTA has developed a set of induction standards (TTA
2003b) which were published for use from September 2003. These set
out the standards (classified under the same three sections as for QTS) which
relate to working with students, colleagues and parents. These must
be met by the end of the Induction period and, in addition, the NQT
must continue to meet the standards for QTS as above. Most teachers in
England will, at a later career stage, wish to be assessed for additional salary
increments through the threshold system. As this system is still under
development, with ‘Upper Pay Spine 3’ on the horizon at the time of writing,
it is likely that national standards will be developed here as well.
As discussed in the earlier section on standards, the TTA standards for
Subject Leaders were disseminated in 1998 and have not had a very high
profile. They relate to:
 The competent leader 45

• core purpose of the subject leader

• key outcomes of subject leadership
• professional knowledge and understanding
• skills and attributes
• key areas of subject leadership.
(TTA 1998b)

It is to be hoped that, in the near future, these standards will be reviewed

in the same way as those for heads so that they are seen as more relevant
by the profession.
Although many teachers wish to move to team and whole-school
leadership roles, there are other ways in which leadership can be displayed,
including through the role as an Advanced Skills Teacher (AST) or master
teacher. The DfES has listed six broad sets of criteria, known as national
standards of excellence, for eligibility as an AST. They relate to outcomes,
knowledge, planning, teaching, evaluating and, crucially, supporting other
teachers. Assessment involves observation, interviews with pupils, parents
and staff and the production of a portfolio of evidence.
It is therefore important that those in leadership roles in schools, whether
at senior or middle levels, are aware of these sets of standards and the guid-
ance which is provided for leaders about their implementation, especially
in relation to motivation, monitoring progress and informing professional
development.

The HayGroup

The HayGroup, formerly known as Hay McBer and the McBer organisation,
has been researching characteristics or competencies across a wide range of
jobs since it was formed as a consultancy company by David McClelland.
The concepts are based on McClelland’s (1988) view that three tendencies
or motivations (for achievement, affiliation and power) are the main
determinants of the way in which a person demonstrates and uses his or
her skills and knowledge. The characteristics of these three motivations
are set out in Table 4.5 on p. 46.
This work resulted in the identification by McBer of a number of behavi-
our indicators which were clustered under headings as follows:

ACHIEVEMENT AND ACTION HELPING AND HUMAN SERVICE

Achievement orientation Interpersonal understanding
Concern for order Customer service orientation
Information seeking
Initiative
46 The dimensions of leadership

MANAGERIAL COGNITIVE
Developing others Analytical thinking
Directiveness Conceptual thinking
Teamwork and co-operation Technical/professional expertise
Team leadership

IMPACT AND INFLUENCE PERSONAL EFFECTIVENESS

Influence Self-control
Organisational awareness Self-confidence
Relationship building Flexibility
Organisational commitment

Many of the indicators and clusters have been found to be fairly common
across various occupations but there are some job-specific ones such as
low fear of rejection in salespeople or a sense of humour in nurses. The
HayGroup is constantly examining the characteristics demonstrated by
effective managers and leaders (at various levels in the organisation) and
refining the model for a changing world. For outstanding mid- and first-
level managers working laterally and upwards in the organisation as well
as downwards, the current model clusters the competencies as shown in
Table 4.6. This approach is relevant across many organisations, rather than
being context specific and could be applied at middle leadership level for
teachers as well as for leaders of support staff as an alternative to the MSC
approach.

Table 4.5 McClelland’s (1988) motivations

Motivation Characteristics

Achievement • sets challenging targets

• finds ways of improving things
• values personal responsibility
• seeks objective feedback in order to improve
• prefers working with experts to friends

Affiliation • likes to spend time with friends

• keeps in contact with people
• puts people before tasks and friends before experts
• would rather work in a group than alone
• likes co-operating

Power • looks for chances to lead

• influences others to obtain leader roles
• willing to help others towards own or their goals
• gets involved in organisational politics
• seeks and uses information to influence events
 The competent leader 47

Table 4.6 The manager model for first- and second-level managers

Cluster Competency
Managing yourself Empathy
Self control
Self confidence

Managing your team Developing others

Holding people accountable
Team leadership

Managing the work Results orientation

Initiative
Problem solving

Managing collaboratively Influencing others

Fostering teamwork
Source: HayGroup (2001)

Recent work by the HayGroup has focused on four competencies which

they believe are essential to effective leadership and seven which are
essential to effective management. This is an interesting development
in that it appears to recognise that, except in very large organisations,
leaders also need to be managers to some degree. The list of leadership
competencies focuses very much on the strategic, placing many of the
competencies which we might consider to be ‘leadership’ in schools into
the ‘management’ category. What is important is that these competencies
are developed in a school, even if there is dispute among authors about
terminology.

Table 4.7 Leadership and management competencies

Leadership Management

Information seeking Achievement orientation

Conceptual thinking Developing others
Strategic orientation Directiveness
Customer service orientation Impact and influence
Interpersonal understanding
Organizational awareness
Team leadership

Source: HayGroup (2003a, 2003b)

Instruments are available to assess an individual’s performance in

relation to these competencies, the Leadership Competency Instrument and
the Management Competency Questionnaire respectively (HayGroup
2003a, 2003b).
48 The dimensions of leadership

National College for School Leadership Models of Excellence

These models were originally developed by Hay McBer in 1998 when the
company worked in partnership with the TTA to develop the Leadership
Programme for Serving Headteachers (LPSH). The programme sub-
sequently passed to the DfES and then to the NCSL where responsibility
for delivery currently lies and under whose auspices further revisions
have been carried out. The Models of Excellence were developed as a result
of research into effective headteachers, using the standard Hay McBer
procedure of observing the work of effective people in the role. Models
for deputy headteachers were added later. The Models comprise fifteen
characteristics presented under five headings known as clusters and are
linked to the National Standards for Headteachers, although the latter do
not relate to excellent performance.
In addition, the HayGroup did further work on effective heads and
identified their leadership styles. This work has been criticised as not
necessarily being transferable across the range of heads although the writers
do acknowledge that it was based mainly on the work of five ‘maverick’
heads who are very experienced and well known in England. Contingency
theory (Fiedler 1967) reminds us to take account of the situation, the task,
the leader and the followers so, although the report gives food for thought,
it would be wrong to assume that these characteristics are going to be
applicable in all situations.

Table 4.8 The models of excellence

Cluster Characteristics

Personal values and passionate conviction Respect for others

Challenge and support
Personal conviction
Creating the vision Strategic thinking
Drive for improvement
Initiative
Planning for delivery: monitoring, Analytical thinking
evaluation and improving performance Initiative
Transformational leadership
Teamworking
Understanding others
Developing potential
Getting people on board Impact and influence
Being and holding people accountable
Gathering information and gaining Understanding the environment
understanding Information seeking

Source: HayGroup (2000)

 The competent leader 49

Emotional intelligence
Goleman’s (2000) studies in the workplace reflect the competencies
approach, seeing emotional intelligence as ‘the ability to manage ourselves
and our relationships effectively’ (Goleman 2000: 80), an essential aspect
of effective leadership. Indeed, he is now working with Boyatzis and the
HayGroup on new ways of linking aspects of their work. Goleman sets
out four fundamental capabilities and then lists the specific sets of com-
petencies which make up each as shown in Table 4.9. It is clear that these
competencies can be applicable in a range of contexts, both within and
beyond education.

Table 4.9 Capabilities and competencies

Fundamental capabilities Sets of competencies

Self-awareness Emotional self-awareness

Accurate self-assessment
Self-confidence

Self-management Self-control
Trustworthiness
Conscientiousness
Adaptability
Achievement orientation
Initiative

Social awareness Empathy

Organizational awareness
Service orientation

Social skill Visionary leadership

Influence
Developing others
Communication
Change catalyst
Conflict management
Building bonds
Teamwork and collaboration

Source: Goleman 2000

The Gallup Organisation

Gallup has developed a process which examines outstanding individuals
in a particular job in order to identify ‘talents’ and ‘strengths’ which are
then used to produce a template that can be applied to selection or devel-
opment. This approach has some similarities to the competency approach
but Gallup believes that everyone’s habits and behaviours are different and
50 The dimensions of leadership

that natural talents should be built upon, i.e. areas of talent are developed
into strengths, rather than trying to remedy ‘weaknesses’. The work is more
commonly used in the US and can be seen in the book, Now Discover Your
Strengths (Buckingham and Clifton 2001).

Standards for headteachers

In England, a set of standards was originally developed by the Teacher
Training Agency and introduced in 1997. The standards were revised in
2004 (DfES 2004) because it was perceived that the role of heads had
changed significantly. The revised standards relate to the following areas
of the head’s role:

• shaping the future

• leading learning and teaching
• developing self and working with others
• managing the organisation
• securing accountability
• strengthening community

Each is subdivided into:

• importance to headship (the significance and distinctiveness of each

area)
• knowledge (what the person knows and understands)
• professional qualities (skills, dispositions and personal capabilities
brough to the role)
• actions (what the person does to achieve the core purpose).

Although the lists appear to be separate, it is the NCSL’s view that there
are connections and interdependencies across the six areas. As explained
in the first part of this chapter, there is now a greater focus on the com-
petencies required for success, rather than on an output or competence
model.
The standards are intended to ‘capture the challenge of headship’ (NCSL
2003: 3), ‘articulating the role of effective headship in the 21st century’
(NCSL 2003: 6). They provide a framework for the development of aspir-
ing heads (for self-development and for NPQH) as well as for heads in
post and can aid the performance management process. They are stated to
apply to effective headship and do not, therefore, discriminate between
threshold or entry levels and excellence, nor is there currently any attempt
to differentiate between the headship of different types of schools.
 The competent leader 51

CONCLUSION
This chapter has outlined some of the different approaches which are avail-
able to provide a framework for the development of effective leadership
in schools. Senior staff and governors need to take a view as to which are
the most appropriate frameworks for the school, bearing in mind context,
transferability, legislation and economics. Leadership development should
be considered as a journey and not an event. The purpose of this chapter
has been to provide a map of that journey. We wish our readers well as they
undertake their own personal journeys.
Part II

Leading strategic change

5 Leading the strategically focused school
6 Leading and managing change
7 Leading and managing staff in high performance schools
Leading strategic change
5 Leading the strategically
focused school
Brent Davies

WHAT IS STRATEGY?
Strategy as a concept can be, and often is, misunderstood in the way it is
commonly used. Strategy is seen as a ‘good’ concept, being so often
erroneously attached to many leadership and management activities. For
example, in searching the Office for Standards in Education (OfSTED)
database of 100 reports on primary schools for mentions of strategy and
planning, this statement was found in an OfSTED report of a school:

From this informed base, good strategic planning is undertaken.

The school improvement plan is comprehensive and has a clear focus
on raising standards for Years 1 and 2 and sustaining standards for Year
6. Currently, the plan does not run for more than a year.
(OfSTED 2002: 12)

The problem with the OfSTED quotation is that it is about the short-term
agenda of target-setting and the statement ‘Currently, the plan does not run
for more than a year’ betrays the lack of understanding of the longer-term
direction-setting nature of strategy.
How does this idea check against concepts of strategy? Traditionally,
strategy has always been associated with the idea of direction setting for
the organisation. It is necessary to understand the history of the organisa-
tion and its current situation to be able to attempt to set the direction of the
organisation. This is articulated by Mintzberg (2003) in defining strategic
thinking as ‘seeing ahead’, ‘seeing behind’, ‘seeing above’, ‘seeing below’,
‘seeing beside’, ‘seeing beyond’, and significantly ‘seeing it through’.
Another concept is that strategy is about the broad major dimensions of
the organisation and another would be that it deals with the medium to
longer term. It is possible to consider that strategic activity deals with broad
aggregated data, and operational activity with the disaggregated detail
of the shorter term. Davies and Ellison (2003) use 1–2 years for the shorter-
term action planning, 3–5 years for the strategic medium-term and 5–10
56 Leading strategic change

years for the futures-thinking longer term. Clearly, the interpretation used
in the above OfSTED report is at variance with these concepts as it focuses
on shorter-term standards-raising agendas. What else apart from scope, in
terms of broad aggregated data and time scale, are the concepts we associate
with strategy? Instead of being associated with a linear plan, strategy might
usefully be thought of as a perspective, as a way of looking at things. Such
a view would bring together the idea of broader direction setting over the
medium term to create a strategic orientation. In other words, strategy
provides the template against which to set shorter-term planning and
activities. Having established some of the elements in a conceptualisation
of strategy, the chapter will now establish a three-part model for developing
a strategically focused school.

A MODEL FOR CREATING A STRATEGICALLY

FOCUSED SCHOOL
One of the challenges facing schools in the UK and other countries is that
they are confronted by a central government agenda that focuses on short-
term targets and achievements. While in themselves these shorter-term
improvement agendas may be beneficial, they may totally dominate
a school’s activities. The danger is that schools will orient their teaching
and organisational processes to achieve these targets but will neglect the
activities and processes they need to build sustainability; to make them
successful in the longer term.
As a result of researching schools that are strategically oriented and
sustainable in the longer term, three dimensions have become apparent.
First, there are strategic processes evident within the school; second, these
processes work through strategic approaches; third, these processes and
approaches help to establish characteristics of a strategically focused school.
This chapter will examine these three dimensions in detail but a brief
description will initially be given.
Initially, the strategic processes evident in strategically focused schools
manifest themselves in four domains: conceptualisation processes; people
and development processes; implementation processes; strategic articula-
tion processes. These four factors work together and while they will be
described separately, they should be considered as part of an integrated
process.
Next, these strategic processes work through different strategic approaches
to build a strategically focused school. The four strategic approaches that
will be discussed are: the rational or traditional approach of strategic plan-
ning; the flexible and reflective approach of emergent strategy; the devolved
or decentralised approach of strategic intrapreneurship; and the building
of strategic intent. Finally, there is the establishment of a strategic focus
for the school and this, in part, involves the development of the strategic
 The strategically focused school 57

architecture of the school, which enables the school to focus on the longer-
term key elements of the school’s development. This is one of the
characteristics of a strategically focused school that will be discussed later
in this chapter.
The model in this chapter focuses on the importance not only of creating
strategy but also of addressing the two crucial factors that, if neglected,
can lead to the failure of strategy. These factors are the ability to translate
strategy into action and second to align the organisation and the individuals
within it to achieving that strategy. While the chapter argues that stra-
tegic processes work through different strategic approaches to build a
strategically focused school, it would be simplistic to think of this as
a straightforward linear process. Rather, it is an iterative process with a
feed-back loop operating continuously. Strategic leadership is at the centre
of this activity in developing the successful school in the long term, as can
be seen in Figure 5.1.

Strategic
Processes

Work
Through

Strategic
A
Leadership
Strategically Strategic
Focused Approaches
School

To Build

Figure 5.1 A model for developing a strategically focused school

Source: Davies 2004: 13

STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP
In Figure 5.1, strategic leadership is the central activity that facilitates and
drives the strategic cycle. The nature of strategic leadership will be briefly
considered, but the reader should refer back to Chapter 2 for an in-depth
review of the nature and dimensions of strategic leadership, before the
chapter moves on to discuss strategic processes and approaches. In any
consideration of strategic leadership, it is important to consider whether
we are talking about an individual strategic leader or a wider group of
58 Leading strategic change

people who contribute strategic leadership insights and perceptions to

organisational decision-making. This chapter considers strategic leadership
to involve a number of individuals, throughout the school, who have
strategic leadership abilities and who contribute to the process.
Strategic leaders have a coherent and perceptive map of the existing state
or position of the organisation and are able to envisage how that map needs
to change and develop into the future. They use this knowledge to build a
vision of where the organisation needs to be. However, to turn that vision
into reality, they need to be able to communicate the map and vision to
others so as to engage them in the process of shaping the future direction
of the organisation. They achieve this collaboration by working to build
engagement, capability and alignment. Engagement is about the process
of motivating all staff in the school to believe in the purpose and need for
change and development so that it is meaningful to them. Capability is
about building the skills and understanding to both comprehend the neces-
sary developments and have the ability to put new approaches and systems
into practice. Alignment is the difficult challenge of bringing together both
individuals and organisational perspectives to work in a focused directional
way to achieve agreed objectives.
An interesting consideration is whether the ability to utilise strategic
leadership capabilities in an organisation is dependent on the stage of
leadership development in the individual or on the stage of the life cycle
of the organisation. Do leaders develop administrative and managerial
skills first and when they are comfortable with their skill level take on the
challenge of deploying more direction-changing strategic skills? Similarly,
do leaders have to ensure that the organisation is working effectively
and maximising its outputs in the current paradigm before they can think
of operating in a different way? Such a mode of operating might be thought
of as sequential strategic development. Does strategic activity only follow
operational activity or, as Davies, B. (2003) suggests, can it be part of a
‘twin-track’ parallel approach that uses the double s-curve as a means of
concurrently managing the known and developing the new? This double
s-curve is illustrated in Figure 5.2.
Figure 5.2 suggests that strategic leaders operate a twin-track approach.
Concurrently they attempt to extend the effectiveness of the current way of
working by extending the existing s-curve through improvements in practice
while at the same time building the capability and capacity to move to a
significantly new way of working by making a strategic leap. These two
activities combine the management task of ‘doing things better’ and the
leadership task of ‘doing things differently’. (See Barker, 2003; Davies, B.
2003; Davies and Davies 2003; Wise 2003). A consideration of when to
start ‘doing things differently’ leads to the critical factor of strategic timing.
The research would suggest that outstanding strategic leaders operate a
concurrent approach.
 The strategically focused school 59

Elongation:
Improving what
we already do
Improvement

Strategic leap
to a new type of
operation

Time

Figure 5.2 Sequential and parallel development approaches

Source: Davies, B. 2003: 306

Another characteristic of strategic leaders is that they are strategically

opportunistic. It is important to distinguish between opportunistic leaders
who may or may not take the opportunities that arise, such as bidding
for a particular government initiative, and those who are strategically
opportunistic. Being strategically opportunistic involves developing the
major directional thrusts for the school and configuring them to be in a
position to take on specific opportunities that fit that configuration as they
arise. It also involves the concept of abandonment, giving up some activities
to accommodate the new ones. A key characteristic of strategic leaders could
be the intuition and judgement which enable them to choose the optimum
time to make changes. Such ability is what can be described as strategic
timing. A final characteristic may well be that leaders are optimists as well
as opportunists in that they are positive about the future.

STRATEGIC PROCESSES
Strategic processes can be defined in four categories, each of which is
examined in more detail below:

• conceptualisation processes;
• people interaction and development processes;
• articulation processes;
• implementation processes.
60 Leading strategic change

Conceptualisation processes

In researching the development of strategy in schools, a key factor that has

emerged is that individuals within the school have to engage in a funda-
mental rethinking of the way the school operates and the way it needs
to operate in the future. The next significant step is deciding how to move
from the present state to the desired future state. The research suggests
that the leaders in strategically focused schools engage in a three-staged
personal and organisation conceptualisation. This process starts with
reflection, and being reflective enables the leader(s) to analyse the situation
and develop strategic thinking within themselves and the school, and
in doing so, to build new mental models of how to operate. The reflection
processes are built on the leader’s ability to make sense of the internal and
external environment. Headteachers in the research made the point of
making time to ‘see’ in these different ways in order to understand what
to do. This process obviously creates the ability to think differently and
strategically as Garratt (2003: 2–3) describes:

‘Strategic thinking’ is the process by which an organization’s direction-

givers can rise above the daily managerial processes and crises to
gain different perspectives of the internal and external dynamics
causing change in their environment and thereby give more effective
direction to their organization. Such perspectives should be both future-
oriented and historically understood.

The advantage of creating a new mental model is that mental models make
sense of complex reality and provide a framework to explain key concepts
to others in the organisation. An example of this conceptualisation process
would be building a new understanding within the whole community of
what learning is and how to develop optimal approaches and conditions
that will maximise children’s learning.

People interaction and development processes

In building strategic capability, the most significant resource, that of human

capital, is of fundamental importance (Gratton 2000; Grundy 1998). The
research interviewees articulated a process that was based on strategic
conversations which built participation and motivation within their school
to improve strategic capability.
These four stages of development can be conveniently displayed
sequentially in Figure 5.3 but it is more probable that they work in an
iterative way.
 The strategically focused school 61

Strategic
Participation Motivation Capability
Conversation

Figure 5.3 People interaction and development processes

Source: Davies 2004: 16

These four stages can be more fully described as:

(a) Strategic conversation. As described by Hirschhorn, (1997), van der
Heijden (1996) and Davies (2002), developing strategic conversations and
dialogue involves discussions about holistic whole-school issues and the
trends that face the school over the next few years as well as the shorter-
term operational issues. These strategic conversations enable people to
develop a strategic perspective of what the school might become. Without
such conversations, however tentative they might at first be, the future
will, literally, not be articulated. Such conversations are difficult because
short-term accountability demands mean that there is a danger that meet-
ings and discussions focus just on immediate issues. Leaders have to
split business and future developments into separate meetings and ensure
that attention is focused on the larger and longer-term agendas as well as
the immediate ones. Also, the importance of the day-to-day interactions
cannot be neglected as they can contribute to stimulating discussions and
ideas. It is this process that develops scenarios and strategic thinking to lead
the school forward.
(b) Strategic participation. By definition, the conversations lead to greater
knowledge and participation in discussions. It can be a difficult and slow
process from the previous state of being concerned only with the short term
to the new state of being involved in the broader and longer-term strategic
issues. It can be a process of reculturing (Fullan 1993; Hargreaves 1994;
Stoll, Fink and Earl 2002) the organisation. The process of greater awareness
and participation in discussion is a key means of developing the ability of
the organisation to build leadership in depth. The key ability here is to
build involvement in the longer-term development of the school. Strategic
organisations use the abilities and talents of wider staff groupings to involve
all in building and committing to the strategic direction of the school. One
of the research schools uses staff groups that cut across roles in the school
(teachers, learning support staff, administrative and premises staff) to
take on a major future-oriented change issue. The aim is to build capacity
and participation in reaching strategies and solutions for the school’s
development.
(c) Strategic motivation. Developing a strategic cause in which individuals
are motivated to contribute leads to an improved commitment and
effort. Gratton (2000: 19–20) advocates developing ‘emotional capabilities’,
‘trust-building capabilities’ and capabilities to build a ‘psychological
62 Leading strategic change

contract’ as means of engaging and motivating staff. Building a commit-

ment to values and long-term ambitions provides individuals with a vision
and sense of direction that allows them to put short-term problems and
challenges into context. This can be the key to seeing long-term activities
sustained. Covey’s (1989) ‘keeping the end in mind’ is as important in the
long term as it is in the short term because it is a vital strategic activity
in driving through the immediate situation in order to achieve long-term
goals.
(d) Building capability. The strategic conversation and enhanced participa-
tion build greater personal and organisational capability and capacity.
Given that the major resource of any organisation is the quality of its human
capital, then enhancing that quality is a major organisational focus. It
is useful to differentiate between capability and capacity. Capacity can be
considered the resource level that is available at any given moment to
achieve an objective. Capability is that mix of skills and competencies
possessed by the people in the organisation which is needed to achieve the
task. The right number of people may not, at a particular juncture, have
the right skills. However, when they do, then it can be said that both
capacity and capability are present. Boisot (1998: 5) states that ‘we shall
use the term capability to depict a strategic skill in the application and
integration of competencies’. A useful discussion of capability is provided
by Stalk, Evans and Schulman (1992). These definitions come out of the
business literature, while much of the educational literature uses the word
‘capacity’ as an overall term to mean capability and capacity (see Harris
2002; Stoll and Myers 1998). The challenge for strategic organisations is
not merely getting more people but getting the right people or developing
the existing staff to develop new skills and competencies. Establishing in
a greater number of staff the broader skills set necessary to build sustain-
ability and renewal and not just the ability to cope with current operational
needs is a major task of strategically successful schools.

Articulation processes
Articulation of strategy can take place in three main ways:
(a) Oral. How do those in leadership positions articulate the key messages
to staff about values, vision and the direction of the school? One of our
case study heads reported, ‘Once a half-term I do a brief focused presen-
tation to all staff (teaching and support) about the direction and challenges
facing the school to build a strategic view and language to extend their
operational knowledge.’ He went on to say, ‘this provides the cornerstone
for all the informal strategic conversations to take place between colleagues
and myself and between colleagues themselves’. The way that meetings of
staff are conducted is significant in building a strategic perspective. Do they
start with a celebration of learning or a discussion of future policy or are
 The strategically focused school 63

those items tacked on to the end of the administrative items? ‘Walking the
talk’ is vitally important with strategy if the culture is to change.
(b) Written. The written documentation needs to be of two types. First,
there needs to be a separate dimension or section to the planning docu-
mentation in the school that addresses not only the school improvement/
school development issues but the broader strategic development issues
and challenges over the medium to long term. Davies and Ellison (2003)
specify that there should be a strategic intent statement as well as a strategic
plan in a section of the overall school plan which is separate from the
operational or action-planning element. Second, individuals in the school
should be conversant with the strategic as well as the operational plan
and it should not just be a document on the shelf in the headteacher’s office.
If an external visitor talks to a member of staff about how his or her work
is guided by the plan, and there is not a coherent answer, then the plan
may be useful as an external audit document but not as a piece of writing
that affects practice in the school. Written documentation should be a guide
for action, not just a formal record, if it is to affect the strategic direction of
the school.
(c) Structural. How do the organisational structures in the school reflect
its strategic objectives as well as current managerial needs? Wise (2003)
reports:

The separation of the ‘Operational Management Team’ from the

‘Strategic Policy Team’ has proved to be a great success. Too often Senior
Management Teams become bogged down in operational matters with
little or no time to discuss important strategic issues. The separation
of strategic and operational functions has resulted in a separation
of the urgent from the important. No longer does the urgent drive
out the important; both are now catered for. In addition, the various
groups provide a unique ‘time horizon’ management structure with:
i) Operational Management Team, focusing on the next 0–12 months,
ii) School Development Plan Team, focusing on the next 6–24 months
and iii) Research and Development Team, focusing on the next 2–5
years.
(Wise 2003: 117)

Similar structural arrangements that articulate the strategic focus of the

school are reported by headteachers in our research project:

we have six cross-school change teams. They consist of teaching and

non-teaching staff and there are about 20 members in each team. They
are each tasked with one significant area of strategic development
each year. It is part of the organisational structure and aims to get all
64 Leading strategic change

staff to be involved in creative thinking directed at the medium-term

future of the school.

Another headteacher reported, ‘We have restructured the governing

body committee framework to have a strategic committee looking at where
KS1 and 2 should be in five years’ time.’ These examples of strategic struc-
tures highlight the significant factor that articulation must be an integrated
approach. The documentation must not be seen in isolation from how
leaders talk and discuss strategic issues or from the organisational struc-
tures they set up to facilitate the development of a strategically focused
school.

Implementation processes
The challenge of implementing strategy involves four key tasks: translating
strategy into action; aligning the individual and the organisation to the new
strategy; deciding between sequential and parallel implementation
approaches; finally the issue of strategic timing.
(a) Translating strategy into action. Although this sounds an obvious
activity, it is sometimes one of the most difficult to do. Whereas discussing
and writing plans cause some organisational tensions, the implementation
can produce significant tensions and resistance to change. The deploy-
ment of the conceptual processes on p. 60 above may assist the process.
However, successful strategic organisations pay similar amounts of atten-
tion to how strategies are to be implemented as well as to what those
strategies are. Three key points (adapted from Gratton 2000) are critical
here:

• keep the process simple;

• measure success through the richness of the strategic conversations;
• focus on the few themes that will make a real difference.

(b) Alignment. One of the key challenges in this implementation process

is aligning both individual and organisational values, culture and ways
of working to the new strategy. This alignment requires both initial and
ongoing attention from the strategic leaders in the organisation to ‘cement’
the new way of working into the organisational practice and culture.
Pietersen (2002: 54) forcefully argues:

You’ll need the ability to align every element of your entire organization
– measurement and reward systems, organizational structures and
processes, your corporate culture, and the skills and motivation of your
people – behind your strategic focus. This is a monumental leadership
challenge; without success here, no strategy can succeed.
 The strategically focused school 65

Thus realigning both the corporate and individual ‘mind set’ to the new
direction of the organisation and being committed to it needs extensive staff
development and training.
(c) Sequential and parallel implementation approaches. One way of con-
sidering organisational development is that schools, for example, move
from one phase of their development to another in a sequential way.
A common argument (Marsh 2000) is that once the improvements in the
current operation have been achieved, the leadership in the school has both
the courage and the experience to take more fundamental strategic moves.
Another and alternative perspective is to consider a twin-track approach
which was illustrated earlier in Figure 5.2.
(d) Strategic timing. The leadership challenge of when to make a significant
strategic change is as critical to success as choosing the right strategic change
to make. The issue of timing can rest on leadership intuition as much as
on rational analysis. When individuals in the organisation are ready for
change, when the organisation needs the change and when the external
constraints and conditions force the change all have to be balanced one
against the other. As Figure 5.2 shows, the leader’s skill, his or her critical
strategic judgement, lies in knowing when to make the leap to a new way
of operating. Such judgement is manifested in not only knowing what and
knowing how but also knowing when (Boal and Hooijberg 2001) and,
equally importantly, knowing what not to do (Kaplan and Norton 2001).

STRATEGIC APPROACHES
There are numerous categorisations of strategy (see Volberda and Elfring
2001). The one that has been used in this research project is a conceptual
framework by Boisot (2003) who identifies four types of strategic approach.
These are:
Strategic planning. The traditional ‘planning school’ approach (see
Mintzberg, Ahlstrand and Lampel 1998) assumes that the future can be
predicted and that linear, rational, pro-active plans can be drawn up. This
is a situation in which although there is significant change, it is not
overwhelming and there is a clear understanding of what to do. In a
school setting, it assumes you know where you want to go, how to manage
the journey and what the desired outcomes are. This certainty would apply
to part of a typical school’s activities. For example, at any given time, one
can know student numbers, and plot the students as they grow older and
move through the school; or one can estimate teachers’ salary costs as they
move up the incremental scale. While strategy is, in the terms of this chapter,
associated with the medium term (3–5 years), the basic principles of
strategic planning have been used for shorter-term school development
planning (SDP) or school improvement planning (SIP). However, while
SDP and SIP use the predictable nature of targets and managing the journey
66 Leading strategic change

to achieve them, they deal with detail and not the broad aggregated data
of a true strategic approach and they also operate in a much shorter time-
frame.
Emergent strategy. As the name suggests, this strategic approach is one
that emerges through practice. Organisations faced with significant but
not overwhelming change and with little initial understanding of how to
react, work through a policy of trial and error. As successes become
apparent they are replicated, whereas failures are not. Over a period of time
a portfolio of successful approaches is built up that becomes a coherent
pattern for future behaviour and hence a strategic approach emerges. In a
school setting, this strategy resonates with many initiatives that are forced
on schools by central government. With little time fully to implement the
changes, many schools work through an emergent strategy of learning by
doing. Whittington (2001: 4) summarises this as ‘seeing strategy best as an
emergent process of learning and adaptation’.
Decentralised or distributed strategy. This is what Boisot (2003) calls
intrapreneurship, a situation where the central leadership and management
of an organisation set down a very limited number of planning frameworks
and leave the detailed planning to the sub-units within the organisation.
Typically such planning would occur in an environment of rapid or turbu-
lent change. In this environment, the central leadership of the organisation
cannot understand in detail the rapidly changing context in which it
operates. To lead and manage in such a framework requires the ability
to lay down the key values and operating targets and then decentralise
the organisation and implementation to the sub-units. In schools, this
delegation would represent a situation in which school leaders leave a great
deal of the planning to the curricular or Key Stage sub-groups.
Strategic intent. This form of strategy is very useful in a period of con-
siderable change or turbulence. The planning framework is one in which,
although the senior leadership is able to articulate what major strategic
shifts or changes it wishes to make, it is unsure of how to operationalise
these ideas. In brief it knows where it wants to go but not how to get
there. Determining the intent may be dependent on leadership intuition
(Klein 2003; Parikh 1994) as well as leadership analysis. The key to
deploying this form of strategic approach is to set targets in the form
of strategic intents that stretch the organisation to perform at significantly
different or increased levels. It then engages in a series of capability- and
capacity-building measures to ‘leverage up’ the organisation to produce
at the higher level. The intent is the glue that binds the organisation together
as it focuses on how to achieve this new strategic outcome. Work by Hamel
and Prahalad (1994) and Davies, B. (2003) illustrates the significance of this
approach.
The mistake from reviewing these four types of strategic approach is to
think that schools use one strategic approach to the exclusion of all others.
 The strategically focused school 67

In practice a school may use a portfolio of strategic approaches in differing

circumstances. Strategic planning may be the preferred approach when
there is full knowledge and a time frame that facilitates it. However, given
a need to implement a significant change at short notice with little prior
knowledge of the area, then the strategic approach needs to be built up
drawing on the experience of implementing the change; thus an emergent
strategy would be evident. When the school is attempting to build a
major cultural and organisational change by developing the capacity to
achieve a significant shift in performance it would build a series of strategic
intents. All these approaches could be used concurrently in response to
the challenges and possibilities which face schools, so deploying a portfolio
of strategic approaches would be the appropriate response.

CHARACTERISTICS OF A STRATEGICALLY FOCUSED

SCHOOL
The initial research discussions and findings from the case study schools
have started to isolate features that strategically focused schools display.
These are considered below.

They build in sustainability

The first and most important characteristic of a strategically focused school
is that it builds sustainability into its processes. While many schools have
effective school development or improvement plans, these are by their
very nature short-term. While they may contribute to short-term effective-
ness, they do not necessarily ensure the longer-term success or viability
of the school. Similarly, having longer-term plans would be pointless if
the immediate viability of the school was threatened. What is needed is a
balance which is represented in Figure 5.4.
In Figure 5.4 the desirable position is in the upper right-hand quartile
where both short-term target setting and operational plans are com-
plemented by the medium- to longer-term strategic plans. While many
initiatives from government such as literacy and numeracy strategies have
short-term targets, there is concern as to whether these are sustainable by
simply working harder to achieve increased results in one-dimensional
tests. What is needed is a focus on deeper educational learning and
organisational capabilities that are sustainable over the longer term, often
described as strategic capabilities (Stalk, Evans and Schulman1992) or core
competencies (Hamel and Prahalad 1994). There needs to be a set of strategic
sustainable objectives in the planning process.
68 Leading strategic change

Effective
Functionally successful Successful and sustainable
in the short term but not in both the short term
sustainable long term and long term
(SDP and Target Setting)
Operational Processes
and Planning

Ineffective

Failure inevitable both Short-term crises will

in the short term and prevent longer-term
long term sustainability

Ineffective Effective

Strategic Processes and Planning

Figure 5.4 Short-term viability and long-term sustainability

Source: Davies, B.J. 2003

They develop set strategic measures to assess their success

For an individual on a diet the maxim may be ‘you are what you eat’. The
organisational equivalent of this may be ‘you are what you measure’. While
all schools have ways of measuring whether short-term goals such as Key
Stage and examination targets are realised, how many have strategic
medium-term goals and the measurement techniques to judge whether they
are reached? Initial research evidence suggests that strategically focused
schools have medium-term broader education measures of success, as well
as short-term goals that are measured by the raw numbers demanded by
many agencies.
 The strategically focused school 69

They are restless, not complacent

There is a strong correlation between individual characteristics of the leader

and the collective nature of the school team. While not dismissing current
approaches and strengths, strategically focused schools are constantly
looking for the next development idea or phase and they realise that what
is good enough for now will not remain so. They are forward looking and
futures oriented. They see the future as affording better opportunities;
they see change as desirable, not undesirable; they see challenges rather
than problems. In brief, they are improvers, not maintainers. They see a
constant need to keep up to date and draw in ideas on how they may
challenge current patterns and do things differently in the future.

They are networked: locally, regionally, nationally and

internationally

Our research shows that strategically focused schools invest considerable

time and energy in building and sustaining networks. These are not
confined just to benchmarking current practice but are forums for ideas
where visioning and future-oriented dialogues are facilitated. They are
constantly seeking new ways of thinking and working and they seek to
build their own solutions from a wide range of sources. In summary, they
are outward looking and believe that, however good they are, they can
never be good enough and need to make strategic alliances and networks
with other people and organisations to develop broad sets of ideas and
knowledge capital.

They use sophisticated multi-approach planning processes

The planning approaches in this chapter have been analysed and a perspec-
tive established that schools do not use one approach or another but use a
portfolio that combines some or all four main approaches so that depend-
ing on circumstance and context the school will utilise a sophisticated
multi-planning approach. This is a key attribute as planning should serve
the organisation and not the reverse. It also allows the school to cope with
complexity and rapid change.

They build the strategic architecture of the school

The need for ‘strategic architecture’ requires a school to identify the main
pillars of its existence and build a strategic map of the current situation
and how those key pillars will develop into the future. Davies, B. (2003)
outlines the strategic architecture of the school shown in Figure 5.5.
70 Leading strategic change

Culture

Relationships Strategy Learning

Resources

Figure 5.5 The strategic architecture of the school

Source: Davies, B. 2003: 308

The significance of the strategic architecture is that it outlines the main

features of the school and focuses attention on them and projects them five
years into the future. The challenge then is to adopt strategic approaches
that will assist the school to move from the current to the future strategic
position. For a more detailed analysis of the architecture of the school,
Davies, B. (2003) provides an analysis of the strategic activities and pro-
cesses, using a balanced scorecard approach (Kaplan and Norton, 1996,
2001; Niven 2002) that is necessary to turn strategy into action.

They are strategically opportunistic

Strategically focused schools position themselves to be able to build the
right capability to take advantage of future opportunities. It is possible to
consider positioning as a key to enabling the school to be strategically
opportunistic. There is a significant difference between schools which
simply respond to happenstance (i.e. they bid for initiatives as they come
along) and being strategically opportunistic. Strategically opportunistic
schools position themselves to make a choice between alternative oppor-
tunities and choose the one(s) that fits their strategic direction and
development framework.

They deploy strategic timing and abandonment

When to make a strategic shift and what to give up are difficult and chal-
lenging decisions. Strategically focused organisations give equal attention
to ‘when to change’ as to ‘what to change’. This dual focus is linked to the
double s-curve (see Figure 5.2) and when to make the strategic leap to a
new way of operating. The danger of taking on too many new initiatives
is that the organisation loses focus and overburdens the leadership capacity
of the school. Key to maintaining focus and operating within capacity is the
concept of abandonment. The schools make clear decisions to undertake
 The strategically focused school 71

the difficult challenge of abandoning some areas of development and

activity to create organisational capacity to undertake the new challenge,
which involves a constant process of focusing on priorities and making
strategic choices.

They develop and sustain strategic leadership

The linking theme in this chapter is that of strategic leadership. Initially it
flagged the idea that we need to focus not just on the leader but also on
leadership in the school. Strategically focused schools develop leadership
in depth which is sometimes called ‘distributed leadership’. A focus on how
this type of leadership is maintained and enhanced is a feature of
strategically focused schools. This concept was articulated more fully in
Chapter 2.

CONCLUSION
This chapter has addressed the key concern of how leaders are able to
sustain and develop schools through the deployment of effective planning
strategies. The central need in the education service is to recognise that
many of the gains in student achievement as measured in test scores may
not be sustainable if we continue to be fixated on short-term outcomes and
plans. There is a need to switch the focus on to two critical areas. First,
in order to achieve sustainable development it is necessary to have more
effective strategic medium-term planning. Second, if school development
and improvement are to be sustainable, it is vital to focus equal attention
on the planning processes through concepts such as strategic conversations,
participation and motivation as well as to the formal documentation of
planning. Leadership that is strategically focused is a key facilitator of this
process.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks are expressed to Carfax Publishing for giving permission for using
‘Developing the Strategically Focused School’ published in School Leadership
and Management: 2004, 24 (1) as the basis for this chapter.

RESEARCH SPONSOR
The concepts in this chapter were developed as part of the National College
for School Leadership (England) funded research project on develop-
ing strategy and strategic leadership in schools. This project aims at
exploring in primary (elementary) and secondary (high) schools and special
schools the strategic sustainability and leadership aspects of educational
organisations.
Leading strategic change
6 Leading and managing change
Viv Garrett

INTRODUCTION
The leadership and management of change is fraught with tensions:
tensions between desired change and imposed, often unwanted, change;
between planned and unplanned change; between systematic planning
and evolutionary change. And change can usually be guaranteed to cause
a great deal of disturbance in a school system. Now this is not always a
bad thing if it is well led and managed. But what is the best way to lead
and manage change? Is there in fact one best way, or should it depend on
our circumstances? Where do we start? One way may be to understand as
much as possible about the process of change in order to have a fair chance
of leading and managing it effectively.
The purpose of this chapter is to help give you that fair chance. First I
will discuss two key aspects of understanding change, then examine the
dilemma of planning for change in a dynamic environment, and finally
explore some important considerations for leading and managing success-
ful change. In order to do this, I will draw on my own experience and on
interviews and discussions I have had with a range of headteachers and
teachers. All agree that change is normal, is persistent, and is becoming ever
more complex. When one considers the number of changes affecting schools
over the past twenty years or so, one can see that change is now so frequent
as to be almost continuous. In addition, it is multi-dimensional in that it has
an effect on several, if not all, parts of the school system. If one adds to that
the normal unplanned disruptions to school life, such as the turnover of
staff, illness, disagreements and the like, it becomes impossible to predict
accurately the complexities of any particular change. That is not, however,
an excuse for a laissez-faire attitude; it is a reason for managing the change
instead of merely allowing it to happen. Fullan (1993: viii) acknowledges
that those people with ‘a knowledge of how to view, cope with and initiate
change’ will manage it better than others. He argues that change mirrors
life in that one can never be perfectly happy or in harmony. He further (2003:
24) warns us to ‘give up the idea that the pace of change will slow down’
 Leading and managing change 73

and to ‘develop a more relaxed attitude toward uncertainty’. The ability to

lead and manage change, therefore, is an essential skill for all those in
schools, whether they are working at classroom level, middle leadership
or senior leadership. This chapter, then, is for anyone involved in the
leadership and management of change. I acknowledge that not all those
charged with managing change will be change leaders, although most
change leaders will also be involved with its management. For the purposes
of this chapter, I will address all concerned as change managers.

KEY ASPECTS OF UNDERSTANDING CHANGE

Understanding the individual

One of the first considerations is to understand how change can affect the
individual. Let us look first at the tensions between planned and unplanned
change, and whether changes are wanted or unwanted. All changes involve
some form of transition from an old state to a new (Adams, Hayes and
Hopson 1976). These transitional events may be both desired and expected:
examples of this could be starting at university, getting married, having
children, or starting a new job. They may be desired yet unexpected like
winning the lottery, or meeting up with old friends. These two kinds of
change are generally pleasing to the individual. On the other hand are
changes which are not desired, yet are expected. Examples of these are the
death of parents, saying goodbye to close friends, or the end of a project.
The most stressful of all are those changes which are neither expected nor
desired, like a sudden crisis such as unexpected illness or redundancy.
All of these changes will cause a certain amount of stress to the individual
but it will not necessarily always be negative stress. As change managers
we need to be aware of these dimensions of desirability and predictability
in individual responses and approaches to the change process.
Change events happen to individuals whether they like it or not; whether
they learn and grow from the experience is up to them. What does change
mean to the individual? How does it make them feel? In order to answer
these questions, it may be worthwhile reflecting on your own experience.
What sort of feelings did you experience during a period of change? Did
those feelings alter during the process? Change can mean stepping out of
a position where you feel confident, where you know the rules and the
script, and where you are able to function comfortably, into an altogether
more uncomfortable position where there is uncertainty about role,
relationships and responsibilities, and where you have less confidence in
having the skills and knowledge necessary to function effectively. Plant
(1987) refers to these positions as firm ground and swampy ground. It is the
area of swampy ground that offers the greatest opportunities and chal-
lenges; later on, individuals will note that the greater choice is offered here
74 Leading strategic change

too, although that might not be apparent at first. It is a big step for people
to move into the unknown and can be likened to visiting a new part of the
world. Will I like it? How will I cope? It is risky – and exciting. Different
responses are normal and to be expected. They can range from the ‘I’ll try
anything for a bit of excitement’, through the more normal initial reticence
until persuaded, to the ‘I’m not going anywhere, and you’re not making
me’. These attitudes may well be affected by what else is going on in a
person’s life. Everyone has a need for a certain amount of stability – whether
it is personal or professional. The stress factors of moving house, getting
married (or divorced), or starting a new job are well documented. How
reasonable is it to expect a teacher who is experiencing a combination of
these stresses to view yet more change with enthusiasm? By recognising
that need for some stability, change managers can show understanding and
provide support.
Support can also be provided by taking note of individuals’ responses
to the transition into a changed state. It has long been accepted that a
person’s self-esteem can be affected by change, particularly undesirable
change (Adams, Hayes and Hopson 1976; Hopson, Scally and Stafford
1992) and seven stages of changes have been identified (see Figure 6.1).
Internalisation of the change is the aim, when ‘people’s hearts and minds
need to change, and not just their preferences or routine behaviours’
(Heifetz and Linsky 2002: 60).

7 Internalisation

2 Minimisation
+

3 Depression 6 Search for

meaning
Self-
esteem
1 Immobilisation
5 Testing out

–
4 Acceptance/
letting go

TIME
(usually longer than is thought)

Figure 6.1 Self-esteem changes during transition

Source: Adams et al. 1976
 Leading and managing change 75

These stages can be explored in the following way:

Immobilisation. As individuals start to piece together the information they
have been given along with the rumours they are collecting, they begin to
form a picture of what the change might be. First reactions are ones of shock
and may well include disbelief and the feeling that things could not possibly
be that bad, so they do nothing.
Minimisation. As the picture is confirmed, and people try to fit it within
their own frames of reference, they may well attempt to minimise the effect
it will have on them as individuals or as a group. They may even deny to
themselves that change will take place.
Depression. As reality sinks in, the individual may feel particularly
unhappy, confused and unappreciated. They may be trying very hard to
make sense of the change, trying to reconcile it with their own values and
beliefs, and trying to find where they actually fit into the new reality. They
may feel powerless and not in control.
Acceptance/letting go. This happens at the lowest point when individuals
do at last accept reality. While they do not know what the future holds, they
accept that there will be a future and that they cannot go back.
Testing out. Individuals start to examine ways in which they can work
with the change. This may involve discussions with peers or with senior
managers, or trying out new materials or techniques. ‘Where do I stand
now?’ is the prime question.
Search for meaning. This is the stage when self-esteem starts to rise again
as individuals begin to understand the new ways and to see how they can
use them and adapt them. They may continue to test out ways of working
until they feel comfortable and ready to move to the next stage.
Internalisation. The change has now been understood and adopted.
Individuals have the confidence to further adapt and develop what is now
an accepted way of working. They can now start to build on their newly
developed strengths.
The crucial thing for the change manager to understand is that everyone
will go through this process at their own pace, and that they should be
allowed time for this process. Change managers have to allow others to
make sense of the change in exactly the same way as they had to; it could
take others longer if they are at different starting points. People come from
different backgrounds with different experiences and this needs to be
acknowledged. Change managers cannot force people to act and think
differently but they can show understanding and support at the key points
in transition. Fullan (1993) quotes Marris (1975: 166) to demonstrate this:

When those who have the power to manipulate changes act as if they
have only to explain, and when their explanations are not at once
accepted, shrug off opposition as ignorance or prejudice, they express
a profound contempt for the meaning of lives other than their own.
76 Leading strategic change

For the reformers have already assimilated these changes to their

purposes, and worked out a reformulation which makes sense to them,
perhaps through months or years of analysis and debate. If they deny
others the chance to do the same, they treat them as puppets dangling
by the threads of their own conceptions.

In providing support it should be noted that the stage from depression to

acceptance is an important one and needs to be monitored. Patient
reassurance and help should be given so that individuals do not feel they
are suffering alone. While some will come through this stage relatively
unscathed, others will undoubtedly suffer. This is the stage of change when
some professional development is usual; however, this can cause even more
anxiety in cases where the individual feels they cannot cope. Once the
individual indicates that they will let go of the past, then further
professional development will be beneficial and will hasten the last stages.
This understanding of individuals’ response to change is crucial and
needs to be considered along with the second key aspect of leading and
managing change: that of understanding the organisation.

Understanding the organisation

An understanding of the organisation in which the change manager works
is essential to the successful leadership and management of change. That
is, not only the pattern of formal meetings and lines of reporting and
accountability, but also the more informal ways of getting things done.
Schools may all have a similar purpose in that they provide an education
for the students in their care, but the ways they go about this are very
different. It may help to refer to the iceberg diagram adapted from Plant
(1987) and shown in Figure 6. 2.
The visible part of the iceberg indicates the formal organisation of the
school: the ways in which the school is structured, its pattern of lessons and
meetings, the explicit parts of its philosophy and purpose, i.e. what is
immediately apparent. The underwater portion depicts the informal or hidden
organisation: the ethos or culture, the ways things really happen, i.e. what
becomes apparent after a period in the school.
The formal organisation is the normal vehicle for the working of the school.
Schools have always been complex organisations, and become more so
as they become more outward-looking and work with a wide range of
stakeholders. A deceptively simple way of describing a typical school is to
think of it as made up of a number of transparent layers. The first layer
is the physical environment: the buildings and grounds. The second is
the organisation of the students and the teaching: the students are divided
into classes, the curriculum is divided into subjects, the timetable is
divided into lessons, and the teachers are divided into subject or year
 Leading and managing change 77

Procedures
Technology
Job descriptions
THE FORMAL Organisation structure
ORGANISATION Products and services
Reporting relationships
Policies and objectives
Formal roles and job titles
Formal communication structures

Norms Beliefs and values Attitudes

Personal aspirations and goals Loyalties

Management style and values

THE HIDDEN Power networks Informal relations

UNCONSCIOUS
ORGANISATION Motivations and commitments

Perceived rewards Hopes and fears

Moral stances Rumours Moods

Ethos The silent majority

Weather Cycles Seasons

Figure 6.2 Organisation iceberg

Source: Adapted from Plant 1987

groups. They are surrounded by a framework of supporting personnel,

including administrative and clerical/technical staff, welfare and classroom
support staff and volunteer helpers, and those taking care of the physical
fabric and environment of the school. On top of this is a layer of
responsibilities and reporting structures; a further layer of strategies
contains communication procedures and meetings, and this is then covered
by a blanket of stated policies and procedures on the running of the school.
This multi-layered kaleidoscope is then managed by the governors,
headteacher and team, and influenced by parents, community, education
officials and government, as well as staff and students.
The informal organisation is the cultural dimension of the school. This
hidden part of the organisation includes the way individuals and groups
relate to each other in an informal sense, and establish power groups which
are apart from the formal structure of curricular areas and working parties.
78 Leading strategic change

The most powerful staff members may not hold formal positions of
responsibility in the school, but nevertheless teachers look to them for lead-
ership in times of decision-making. They may be particularly charismatic
individuals, they may be acknowledged experts who attract a certain level
of respect, or they may hold influential positions outside the formal school
structure. Examples of these might be a teacher union representative, a
teacher with several years of experience who does not hold a post of respon-
sibility, or a teacher well-known for expertise in areas outside the school.
Interest groups may have developed within the staffroom: the staff foot-
ball team, a group with similar values or political beliefs; and outside the
staffroom: those who prefer to take their breaks elsewhere in bases around
the school, and the outcast smokers. Each of these groups will have its own
unstated, yet understood, code of practice which may well include how
its members react to new initiatives. While change managers may be using
the formal structure and procedures of their schools to introduce and
implement a change, they need to be very aware of the informal rules and
relationships current in the school and take account of this dimension both
in their planning and in their day-to-day management. Hargreaves and
Fullan (1998: 27) have an insight on this:

Your own organisation has its own special combination of personalities

and prehistories. There is no one answer to the question of how one
brings about change in specific situations. You can get ideas, directions,
insights, and lines of thought, but you can never know exactly how to
proceed. You have to beat the path by walking it.

Walking that path and the place of planning is something to be addressed

in the next section.

PLANNING FOR CHANGE

The process of the planning of change should always be the topic of discus-
sion and debate. Should the implementation of changes be incremental and
controlled? Or should changes be allowed to evolve in an unplanned way?
Where is the powerbase for change? Wilson (1992: 12) explores these issues
in his discussion of approaches to organisational change, and comments
that planned change relies upon a model of organisation in which there
is uncritical acceptance of the managerial role, which has been particularly
true of North America and the UK. He compares this situation with other
countries and cites Sweden and Japan where ideas can emanate from all
parts of the organisation and planned change requires careful consultation
with the workforce. This is an interesting issue with regard to education in
the UK. There is no doubt that government policies favour the acceptance
of the hierarchical model of management with planned incremental change.
 Leading and managing change 79

However, the majority of school leaders would not accept that the onus of
change lies solely with senior school teams; I know of several schools which
have systems in place to actively encourage staff involvement in the
initiation and implementation of change. I would argue that effective
implementation of change relies on the active involvement of staff at each
stage of the process; otherwise the change will never become fully opera-
tional and incorporated into everyday practice. Morgan (1993) addresses
the empowerment of staff in his innovative book Imaginization:

We are leaving the age of organised organisations and moving into an

era where the ability to understand, facilitate, and encourage processes
of self-organisation will become a key competence.
(Morgan 1993: frontispiece)

Of course, school staff are not the only people to be involved in the change
process. There may well be other individuals and groups outside the
organisation who have an interest or stake in the changing situation. Fullan
stresses the need to take into account all participant and stakeholder views
as the change progresses. He warns us of the dangers of planning down
to the last detail and reminds us that ‘change is a journey not a blue-
print’(1993: 24): one can never accurately predict what is going to happen.
The active involvement of key stakeholders in the change process is crucial
for effective implementation. The more say individuals have had at each
stage of the process, the more likely they are to support developments.
It is worthwhile referring to Berman’s (1980) work at this point and noting
his concept of adaptive implementation which is reliant on stakeholder
input and participation. By allowing participants to adapt, form and reform
their approaches to initiatives, internalisation of the change is more likely.
This loosely coupled attitude is in contrast to his alternative concept of
programmed implementation which has, as its core, tightly controlled incre-
mental steps towards agreed goals. These are but two ends of a continuum;
actual practice takes place at various stages in between and has to be
dependent on the nature of the change, the internal situation and the external
environment.
Fullan takes these perspectives into account and suggests that we do not
spend too much time on strategic planning at the outset of complex change
processes. He supports Louis and Miles’ (1990) evolutionary perspective:

The evolutionary perspective rests on the assumption that the environ-

ment both inside and outside organisations is often chaotic. No specific
plan can last for very long, because it will either become outmoded due
to changing external pressures, or because disagreement over priorities
arises within the organisation.
(Louis and Miles 1990: 193)
80 Leading strategic change

As a result of the turbulent environment in which we now find ourselves,

Fullan has proposed a particular order of events in preparing for educa-
tional change: Ready! Fire! Aim! (Fullan 1993: 31). He argues that the
Ready! state encompasses the idea of preparedness and direction, Fire! is
the stage of enquiry and action where knowledge is formed, and Aim!
is the stage when vision, mission and strategic planning are addressed. This
is a direct challenge to the systematic approaches to change which first
encourage us to shape the vision, then define the mission, then formulate
the strategic plan, and only then follow it by action, i.e. Ready, Aim, Fire.
Fullan maintains that the Ready! state encompasses a notion of direction
but that one should not become bogged down by vision, mission and
strategic planning before learning about the dynamic reality (Fullan 1993:
31). An example which immediately comes to mind as an illustration of
these three stages is the OfSTED inspection. Any school which has not
been inspected for a while is in a state of readiness; the staff have an idea
of the direction in which they should be going. Once the school has been
informed of a date for inspection, the lead time enables the staff to complete
informal audits of their information systems and their teaching and learning
processes in preparation for the formal procedure. Fire! is the process of the
inspection itself where all concerned share in a great deal of learning; and
Aim! is the agenda discussed and formulated as a result.
I will use this framework of Ready! Fire! and Aim! to examine how these
states can be translated into concepts and strategies for the school
workplace. I will then explore some key considerations for the successful
management of change.

A state of readiness
We have seen above that Fullan (1993) believes that vision-driven change
is an old paradigm, that vision should emerge from, rather than precede,
action. He stresses the importance of the shared vision, and believes that
the process of merging the personal and the shared visions takes time, and
can be achieved only after much discussion and interaction. In my experi-
ence, schools are addressing this state of readiness and vision creation
in different ways. All have become very conscious of the power of the
marketplace and this becomes one of the key drivers of the ready state.
What does a state of readiness actually mean for schools? I give three
examples below of schools in various stages of creating readiness for
change. The first school has raised awareness by initially focusing on
classroom practice; the second by voluntary involvement of staff in regular
think-tanks; the third by a new headteacher appointed to turn a school
around.
The first headteacher stresses that the intellectual stimulation of change
is quite critical for the success of a school, but emphasises that the need for
 Leading and managing change 81

change has to be based on a knowledge of what is happening – that change

evolves from a felt need. But where does this knowledge come from? He
acknowledges that anticipation about particular situations comes from two
sources in the school: from middle and senior leadership and from the
classroom. He has a very strong philosophy that the key function of a school
is what happens in the classroom, and that the quality of interaction
between the teacher and the pupil is one of his most important respon-
sibilities. In order to learn about this, he and his assistant heads target
faculties in the school, observe lessons and hold discussions with staff.
In checking out the different subject areas, they ask questions and pose
challenges and make this part of accepted practice. In this way they have
become sensitive to the need for change. As teaching has improved and
examination pass rates have increased, the staff in turn have learnt about
their situations and have become far more sensitive and welcoming to the
idea of change. The concept of professional development plays an important
part in the life of this school.
Another headteacher stresses the importance of continuous thinking
about the future and harnessing the best ideas from any member of the
school, students included. She holds regular think-tank meetings with
open agendas at which anyone can present a paper and share their ideas.
The only proviso is that each area of the school must be represented at
the meetings. These ideas are then discussed at various levels within the
school. During this process, the ideas are shaped and reshaped before being
given to a small working group to investigate. This headteacher feels it
extremely important to indulge in the process of innovative lateral thinking:
to focus on what is best for students and not to get demoralised by working
to others’ agendas all the time. An emphasis on the development of indi-
viduals through the performance management process and training
programmes, together with a climate of support, ensures that there is a buzz
of involvement and achievement in the school.
Both of the headteachers cited above are very experienced and run very
successful schools. But what of a headteacher taking over a school cate-
gorised by OfSTED as having serious weaknesses? This third school is at
a very different stage of development. The new head has a different starting
point in attempting to achieve a ready state in her school. She not only has
to bring in new ideas to make a difference to the school in a short length of
time but she also has to work on the culture of the school and improve
staff morale. She concedes that she has had to adopt a fairly autocratic
style in order to introduce the necessary challenges for thinking about the
future. The question of leadership style is an interesting issue in this context:
this head differs very much from the first two examples of heads in
established schools. In preparing this school for a state of readiness, this
head has had to take into account various situational factors: those of
relationships within the school (trust, respect and support for her and for
82 Leading strategic change

one another), of the nature of the tasks to be undertaken, and of the maturity
of the staff in terms of ability, experience and motivation. It is largely the
factors of relationships and levels of maturity which may differ in the three
schools described. Long-established theories from researchers such as
Fiedler (1967) and Hersey and Blanchard (1982) bear out these influences
on leadership style. As this school is working through its agenda and
individuals are developing in maturity, so the head is able to soft-pedal on
the telling dimension and encourage a more participative climate. In
practice, the perceived and real culture change, as a result of the appoint-
ment of a new headteacher, often results in a turnover of staff which
can contribute to the development of maturity in the organisation. In this
school, over 60 per cent of the staff now have less than five years’ experience;
although they may be lacking in maturity in terms of experience, change
is normal to them. Professional development plays a significant role in this
school with the benefits of increased staff confidence in the development
and implementation of new ideas.
Each of these schools is working towards a culture of readiness for change
in which individuals feel they have responsibility for their part in the overall
agenda for school improvement.
Let us now consider the next part of the framework.

Prepared to fire! Investigating wicked problems

This is the stage of enquiry and learning; the action preceding the stage
of strategic planning. Before making detailed plans for the future, we must
ensure we learn as much as possible about our particular problems. The
term ‘wicked problems’ was coined by Rittel and Webber (1973) and could
have been devised especially for the problem situations faced in schools.
A wicked problem is one that does not have an easy solution; in fact it is
probably not solvable. There is no right answer to the problem, and any
possible action will be dependent on the nature of the problem, the situa-
tion and the individuals involved. The danger is that we get so close to
our problem that we lose sight of the whole picture and make assumptions
as to its real nature. When a problem occurs, we automatically search
our frames of reference and slot in our previously tried solutions – we
use our programmed knowledge. This ready application of programmed
knowledge is not always appropriate in complex situations and denies
learning taking place until after a solution has been tried out, sometimes
unsuccessfully. Fullan (1993: 26) has a comment to make on this:

we cannot develop effective responses to complex situations unless we

actively seek and confront the real problems which are in fact difficult
to solve. Problems are our friends because it is only through immersing
ourselves in problems that we can come up with creative solutions.
 Leading and managing change 83

We need to focus actively on the problem itself and try and build up the
richest possible picture of the situation rather than begin by focusing on the
possible solutions. In order to do this, we need to learn to ask questions of
ourselves and others and explore the situation afresh. As Pascale (1990:
14) states ‘Inquiry is the engine of vitality and self-renewal’.
This questioning is an integral part of Action Learning, an approach to
management education identified by Revans (1983) and further developed
by Pedler (1996). Questioning and careful reflection should precede the use
of programmed knowledge; learning is achieved when both are added
together. This technique is used in Action Learning groups which bring
together small groups of committed people on a voluntary basis in order
to help and support one another through the wicked problems of the work-
place. By the use of careful questioning, an individual is helped to explore
the fullest possible picture of a problem, then to focus in on possible ways
forward. Strict rules regarding technique and confidentiality apply. A
commitment to action completes the first stage of the process with follow-
up meetings to check progress and provide continuing support. Action
Learning groups are used in and across a wide range of organisations and
are particularly valuable in providing support to individual leaders who
would otherwise feel very isolated in their organisations.
Action Learning can be used in schools in a number of ways. A group
of classroom teachers or members of a department can explore ways to
improve teaching using their real experiences of problem situations; a group
of heads of department can explore the problems besetting the introduction
of new assessment methods; young teachers can develop their confidence
in dealing with difficult situations; a senior management team can actively
support one another in their responsibilities. In addition to extending their
knowledge about the particular situations being addressed, individuals
will learn more about themselves and their styles of leading and managing,
and experience the challenges of commitment and accountability to the
group.
Other groups and working parties can be set up in schools in order to
investigate problem areas more deeply, to consider proposals and sugges-
tions, to consult, and to conduct feasibility studies. All these functions
are examples of further enquiry and learning and fulfil the necessary
components of the Fire! stage.

Aim! Now can we plan?

The investigative processes outlined above begin the process of shaping
and reshaping ideas to form a vision of the future. By further developing
the circles of involvement and participation, knowledge and understand-
ing is increased, not only about the vision but also about the changes that
may be necessary. Each stakeholder has had the opportunity to provide
84 Leading strategic change

some input into the shared vision of the future. The personal vision
presented to the school think-tank, described earlier, has now been inves-
tigated, and has been shaped and reshaped as it has been discussed formally
and informally in various corners and at various levels in the organisation.
Although this process can be lengthy and difficult as individuals form
and reform their positions, implementation now has more chance of success
because of the early involvement of those affected. The planning in turn
can be less affected by the negative actions of individuals who feel their
opinions have been ignored, or, worse, were never sought. There is also
more chance of the implementation involving more creative changes and
challenges to the normal accepted pattern of the school. These more far-
reaching changes have been described as revolutionary transformation
(Wilson 1992) or second-order changes (Cuban 1988).
Wilson (1992: 20) has identified four levels of organisational change:

Level 1 Status quo staying the same (or even

running to stand still?)
Level 2 Expanded reproduction doing more of the same
Level 3 Evolutionary transition making changes within the
existing structures
Level 4 Revolutionary transformation making fundamental
changes to the structures of
the organisation

Each level of achievement may be the result of a conscious decision. It may

be that a school decides, after much consultation and reflection, to maintain
the status quo in a particular area for the time being (Level 1). Discussions
of a successful pilot scheme may well result in replicating it elsewhere in
the organisation: doing more of the same (Level 2). Similarly, fine tuning
of extensive developments may be necessary, i.e. making changes within
the existing structures (Level 3). However, it is the level of making
fundamental changes to the structures of an organisation which is the most
difficult to achieve (Level 4). Cuban (1988) has a simpler model of first-order
changes similar to Wilson’s Levels 2 and 3, and second-order, similar to Level
4. He comments on the difficulties of second-order changes in relation to
his analysis of school reform in North America:

Most reforms foundered on the rocks of flawed implementation.

Many were diverted by the quiet but persistent resistance of teachers
and administrators who, unconvinced by the unvarnished cheer of
reformers, saw minimal gain and much loss in embracing second-order
changes boosted by those who were unfamiliar with the classroom as
 Leading and managing change 85

a workplace. Thus first-order changes succeeded while second-order

changes were either adapted to fit what existed or sloughed off,
allowing the system to remain essentially untouched. The ingredients
change, the Chinese saying goes, but the soup remains the same.
(Cuban 1988: 341)

We can learn from his experience and should never lose sight of the fact
that educational change involves people. Systems seldom fight back, but
human beings can and will! Heifetz and Linsky (2002: 30) have a comment
on this:

Adaptive change stimulates resistance because it challenges people’s

habits, beliefs and values. It asks them to take a loss, experience un-
certainty, and even express disloyalty to people and cultures. Because
adaptive change forces people to question and perhaps redefine aspects
of their identity, it also challenges their sense of competence. Loss,
disloyalty, and feeling incompetent: That’s a lot to ask. No wonder
people resist.

MANAGING SUCCESSFUL CHANGE

It is tempting to say that once the three stages of Ready!, Fire!, Aim! have
been addressed, there is every chance that the change will be successful.
However, as Heifetz and Linsky point out above, we need to recognise
that resistance to change can be normal and natural. It is important for
the change manager to be sensitive to this and to be aware of the barriers
which can exist (Dalin 1978; Pugh 1993; Aspinwall 1998). There may be
personal barriers built up as a defence where an individual feels that their
values and beliefs are being threatened or undermined or psychological
barriers in response to an inherent unwillingness to change. There may
also be organisational barriers where the structure of the organisation is
not flexible enough to permit particular changes, or power barriers where
individuals or interest groups are unhappy about possible redistribution
of power.
There are two diagnostic tools which may be of use in raising the
awareness of the change manager and others to the barriers which exist in
a particular situation. These are: force field analysis, and micro-political
mapping (see Aspinwall et al. 1992). Force field analysis (see Figure 6.3)
is commonly used to identify whether there is a critical mass of support
for a proposed change, and to analyse the reasons for any blockages later
on. An open discussion of the driving forces and hindering forces of a
change can be of considerable advantage and can aid identification of ways
forward. By ensuring overt analysis, change managers open up the problem
to encourage participation and ownership of possible solutions.
86 Leading strategic change

Driving forces Hindering forces

Efficient use of resources

Some staff feel threatened by idea

Opportunities for professional ‘Aren’t they good enough?’
development

Heads know and trust one another Some staff don’t want to share their ideas

Good for children to mix with those Some parents don’t want their children
from another school mixing with another school

Can offer a wider range of activities Travel to the other school could be
a problem for staff and children

Enthusiastic teacher leading this Both schools could be competing for the
same children (adjoining catchment areas)

Present situation Desired situation

Figure 6.3 Force field analysis: two schools wishing to combine resources in the form of
some teacher expertise and accommodation

The second tool, micro-political mapping (see Figure 6.4) focuses more
on people and their behaviour. This exercise aids the identification of
individuals in terms of their power or influence, and their concern or sup-
port for the change in question. This mapping of the distribution of power
and the identification of winners and losers is a useful exercise to undertake
as an individual change manager, or as a small group managing a change.
However, it should be noted that the analysis can be quite subjective, and
any results should be sensitively handled.
Both of these exercises can help to identify areas, and agents, of resistance.
The next stage for the change manager is to try to understand the reasons
for resistance and to introduce strategies to remedy the situation. One
particularly common reason is the perceived lack of communication. ‘No-
body’s told me what’s happening’ is commonly heard and is a good excuse
for non-involvement. Ensuring that all have the necessary knowledge
and understanding of the proposed changes is the first step. Yet com-
munication does not finish there. There are further questions which are
often overlooked. What are the procedures for communicating progress
and achievements to others? Are there mechanisms for feedback? A busy
change manager can become so caught up in the intricacies of imple-
 Leading and managing change 87

High
• Alan
• Bernadette

Powerful Powerful
but and
Unsupportive Enthusiastic

• Colin
Power/
influence

• Diana

Uninfluential Uninfluential
and and
Unsupportive Enthusiastic

• Eric • Greg
• Frances
• Hanif

Low Concern/support High

Figure 6.4 Micro-political mapping

mentation that the business of reporting and receiving feedback can seem
relatively unimportant. Yet it is the sharing of the successes and difficulties
that ensures the continued involvement of people. ‘Communicate like never
before’ (Plant 1987) and ‘Communicate like crazy’ (Clarke 1994) are the
constant cries of advice. This applies not only to the supply of information
down through, and across, the organisation, but also to allowing information,
comment and feedback upwards. Only then can all feel properly informed.
There is always the danger of not providing enough information: in those
cases, the resultant vacuum provides opportunities for rumour and assump-
tions. Then additional work is required of the change manager to discover
the truths and deal with the false situations which have arisen.
Even if communication is satisfactory, there will still be some individuals
or groups who can be identified as resistors. This is when the change
manager needs to consider specific strategies to overcome the negative
attitudes displayed. A short-term strategy of immediately counteracting
any negativity can prove its worth and nullify mischief making, but requires
considerable vigilance by the change manager and can absorb much time
and energy. An understanding of ‘what makes people tick’ can help to
identify additional strategies for providing support where needed, helping
88 Leading strategic change

to build confidence, working together and sharing hopes and concerns:

remedies for the difficulties of the transition curve described earlier in this
chapter.
Although the above may be effective strategies for managing resistance
to change, they do not address the cultural issues of helping a school to
achieve Fullan’s (1993) Ready! state. It is in the quality of people and their
interactions that ultimate success lies. We have agreed that change depends
on people, on their feeling confident enough to take on change: confident
both in the role they are playing and in their relationships with other people.
We have discovered that we need to be sensitive to the need for support,
particularly when individuals are anxious or afraid. We have established
that we need to nurture the skills of individuals and help them to develop
to achieve their potential both as individuals and as members of the larger
organisation. We need to empower them to do this.
Professional development plays an important part in any organisation,
and leaders have to try to achieve a balance between the needs of the
individual and the needs of the organisation. In a period of scarce resources,
it has become increasingly the case that the needs of the organisation come
first; although any wise leader will take account of the individual’s interests
and needs in developing their role in the organisation. The performance
management or appraisal system should provide a vehicle for the effective
integration of personal and organisational needs. The resultant consoli-
dation of personal and school development plans provides the basis for a
programme of professional development. A key group of staff who are
benefiting from targeted professional development are the middle leaders
(e.g. the ‘Leading from the Middle’ programme from the National College
for School Leadership). It is acknowledged that these leaders can be a
significant influence in schools: both on classroom practice and on whole-
school leadership and management. Professional development can play
a large part not only in providing them with appropriate teaching and
leadership skills, but also in helping them with the wider issues of devel-
oping confidence, clarifying their role, and being prepared to take on their
responsibilities. As one head said to me, ‘You can never have enough help
for all the changes a school needs to take on board.’ A leadership develop-
ment programme for middle leaders run by a university with local schools
provides an example of learning that can be achieved by the sharing of
experiences across and within schools. As well as gaining a qualification,
the middle leaders are providing a support group for each other in which
they can safely work through their ideas and frustrations, as well as con-
tributing to the development of a critical mass driving and supporting the
improvement agenda in their schools.
It is now generally acknowledged that the quality of ideas and creative
thinking is greater in a collaborative situation where individuals can bring
and share their specific knowledge and expertise. ‘People need one another
 Leading and managing change 89

to learn and to accomplish things’ (Fullan 1993: 17), which is demonstrated

by the forming of relationships, teams, partnerships and alliances. But these
are not static: relationships by their very nature will change and develop.
Collaboration is a dynamic process requiring awareness of the potential of
forming and reforming relationships all the time. Collaboration means
accepting that everyone’s contribution will be encouraged and valued. It
does not, and should not, mean that everyone will always agree, because
the quality of interaction will depend on the contributions of the individual.
These in turn depend on the individual’s experience, their values and
beliefs, their intuition, their capacity for independent thinking and their
confidence in themselves and in the collaborative situation. Sometimes the
contribution may be an initiating one; at other times, it may move matters
on by involving others inside and outside the group. It may also be a
dissenting one, advising caution or proposing a different mode of action.
This position of dissension is not a comfortable one, but the resulting conflict
is essential for healthy group working and learning. ‘You can’t have organ-
izational learning without individual learning, and you can’t have learning
in groups without processing conflict’ (Fullan 1993: 36). Tuckman’s (1965)
writings show agreement with the importance of conflict and he argues that
the process of storming is an essential one for effective group performance.
It is only after a group of people have been through the uncomfortable
experiences of initiating and responding to personal challenge that they can
call themselves a team.
Belbin (1981, 1993) is one writer who, over the years, has taken this idea
of teams further. His research is based on the belief that individuals fulfil
a team role as well as a function within the organisation. He identifies nine
such team roles: Plant; Resource-investigator; Co-ordinator; Shaper;
Monitor–evaluator; Teamworker; Implementer; Completer–finisher, and
Specialist. Some of these roles are inward-looking towards the maintenance
and development of the team; others look outwards towards the organ-
isation and the wider environment. It is not expected that any one person
would be able to fulfil all of these roles; the team role will depend on the
pattern of behaviour in the team situation. This behaviour pattern is estab-
lished by a combination of the factors of personality, mental abilities, values
and motivations, field constraints, experience and role learning (Belbin
1993). There is an art to building a team and, for a team to be effective,
each of these team roles should be covered. That is not to say that each team
should have a membership of nine people, but that each role should be
represented within the membership. For example, one team member may
fulfil a dual role of monitor-evaluator and completer-finisher, another of
resource-investigator and plant, and another may fulfil the specialist role
alone.
It is recognised that one cannot always set up teams from scratch, and
that it is often politically desirable to include certain members in a team,
90 Leading strategic change

but it is worthwhile using Belbin’s framework to analyse problems of non-

performance and then taking remedial action. One headteacher who uses
short-term working parties to initiate and implement change selects a small
nucleus of workers: ‘doers’, ‘facilitators’ and ‘thinkers’. The working party
is then opened up for free membership to enable everyone to have the
opportunity of serving. The importance of a clear brief is established with
agreed dates for reporting back. In this respect, the role of the completer-
finisher is important; different skills and roles are useful at different stages
of a change process.
Provided that teamwork is not forced upon people, or worse, that people
pay lip service to teamwork by merely appearing at meetings, there are
very real benefits. Most individuals have an affiliation need – they like to
feel part of something. Success or adversity can help the bonding of indi-
viduals into a team; OfSTED inspections can play their part in this. Several
schools organise informal social activities to encourage bonding and the
breaking down of barriers. They can aid the development of an understand-
ing that everyone in the organisation is a human being with different needs
and different vulnerabilities even though they may hold different positions
of responsibility. Improving relationships within the staff group as a whole
can facilitate team working throughout the school. In turn, as individuals
begin to realise both their and others’ potential in small working groups,
so a better level of understanding and appreciation of others’ strengths
can influence relationships within the larger organisation.
But what happens when a short-term working group disbands? The
members have succeeded in working well together to achieve their targets
and have begun to realise their potential. They do not want to break up as
a group; they are back on Plant’s (1987) firm ground. However, there is a
good opportunity here to use the expertise developed. Individuals can be
encouraged to use their teamwork skills to develop other working groups.
And the group as a whole can be used, in one headteacher’s words, as a
‘building block’ for the future, for example a successful group working with
other groups on relevant change issues.
However, it is not only inside the organisation that collaboration takes
place. Working with the wider environment can provide new perspectives
and the stimulus necessary to view the future creatively. Although this
means moving into Plant’s (1987) swampy ground, this can be particularly
beneficial for the smaller school where the staff may feel under more
pressure to be creative and might welcome an influx of new ideas. Fullan
(1993: 87) is continually advising teachers to ‘connect with the wider
environment’:

There is a ceiling effect to conceptualising inspiring visions, to

investigating and solving problems, to achieving greater and greater
competencies, and to engaging in productive relationships, if one does
 Leading and managing change 91

not connect to varied and large networks of others involved in similar

and different pursuits.

Schools cannot develop in isolation from their environments. The best

schools will always take account of the local and wider context in recog-
nising opportunities for development, but without losing sight of their
fundamental beliefs and values. This may range from school staff being
active members of local community groups, through joint management of
a sports centre, to the setting up of a Community School. The development
of an interactive relationship with external bodies can be very challenging
as well as potentially extremely rewarding. It is essential to respect each
other’s cultures and ways of working; it is by recognising and incorporating
the strengths of those cultures that learning and development occurs. But
ease of working together does not happen overnight. It can take some time,
and much hard work, to build up, particularly if the cultures are very
different. However, once a working relationship is established, the results
are worthwhile and can provide the impetus for further developments and
future alliances. It is by learning to work with others that we start to learn
more about ourselves. As schools work with new partners both inside and
outside the education system, they can also begin to discover how others
perceive them. Some perceptions and assumptions may be wrong and can
then be challenged and corrected; others may well be uncomfortable but
correct. Some schools have joined together for mutual support in all sorts
of areas, for example, a more efficient means of offering training courses,
or a sharing of specialist facilities.
A paradox here is the idea of collaborative working, and the establish-
ment of alliances and networks, set against the reality of competition in
the marketplace. This is another interesting tension leading to the careful
choice of partners. But it is worthwhile seeking out more challenging
partners and establishing an atmosphere of trust: the ultimate sharing
may be beneficial to all. Some schools are taking advantage of the wider
national and international context to further enhance their development
opportunities.
This widening of individuals’ experience is borne out by Fullan (2003:
27) who writes of the ‘big picture dot-connection’ . . . to integrate ‘new
horizons and moral purpose’:

The goal is to create new policies, strategies and mechanisms that enable
people to enlarge their own worlds in order to provide greater ideas
and place the meaning of their work in a much larger perspective. When
people do this they have a chance of changing the very context that
historically constrains them.
92 Leading strategic change

CONCLUSION
All of the above strategies refer to empowerment of individuals: ensuring
they have involvement in the processes of change, ensuring they are able
to work together in collaboration with others, and ensuring they have the
necessary skills to implement any change. This form of power-sharing is
crucial to successful implementation and eventual internalisation of the
change, but it does require a school leader who is secure enough to continue
to see the whole picture and to live with the feeling of possible loss of
control. Headteachers can empower others by giving individuals the oppor-
tunity to share the power and control of a change. Individuals can empower
themselves by learning about the change process and taking responsibility
for their part in it. This acceptance of the potential of individuals is summed
up in DePree’s (1990: 142) description of elegance:

Most of the time, when we consider ourselves and others, we are

looking at only parts of people. The measure of individuals – and so
of corporations – is the extent to which we struggle to complete
ourselves, the energy we devote to living up to our potential. An elegant
company frees its members to be their best. Elegant leaders free the
people they lead to do the same.
Leading strategic change
7 Leading and managing staff
in high performance schools
Max Sawatzki

THE NEED FOR BOTH LEADERSHIP AND

MANAGEMENT
It needs to be acknowledged from the outset that, in this era which is high
on both complexity and rate of change, there is a need for high levels of
both leadership and management in striving to develop and maintain
world-class organisations. Hence, there is little point in debating the virtue
of one versus the other, or even bothering to dwell greatly on defining the
difference between them, even though Kotter (1990) does this very neatly
through the analysis illustrated in Table 7.1.
Suffice it to say that in this high performance era it is pointless talking
about managing staff, without at the same time talking of leading staff.

EMERGING TRENDS IN LEADERSHIP

While it is not possible to examine fully here the nature of effective leader-
ship, it is worth reflecting briefly on the changes to the concept of leadership
that have occurred over a number of years. The American Telephone and
Telegraph definition, for example, as presented by Moses (1990) has changed
significantly in this time, as illustrated below:
1956 A man can lead a group to accomplish a task without arousing
hostility.
1970–80 An individual can lead a group to accomplish a task.
1990– An individual elicits high performance outcomes from others.
Apart from the significance of the changed wording to include female
leaders, which in itself is a major leap forward, the trend in this develop-
ment is clearly towards the leader as facilitator of team performance, rather
than as knight on white charger, or director and supervisor; and towards
a situation wherein leadership is about the creation and maintenance of a
climate and conditions for the achievement of goals and the attainment of
high performance – a situation in which leadership involves working with
and through others.
94 Leading strategic change

Table 7.1 Distinguishing leadership and management

Management Leadership

Creating an agenda Planning and budgeting – Establishing direction –

establishing detailed steps and developing a vision of the future,
timetables for achieving needed often the distant future, and
results, and then allocating the strategies for producing the
resources necessary to make changes needed to achieve that
that happen vision
Developing a Organising and staffing – Aligning people – communicating
human network establishing some structure the direction by words and deeds
for achieving the for accomplishing plan to all those whose co-operation
agenda requirements, staffing that may be needed so as to influence
structure with individuals, the creation of teams and
delegating responsibility and coalitions that understand the
authority for carrying out the vision and strategies, and accept
plan, providing policies and their validity
procedures to help guide
people, and creating methods
or systems to monitor
implementation
Execution Controlling and problem Motivating and inspiring –
solving – monitoring results energising people to overcome
vs. plan in some detail, major political, bureaucratic, and
identifying deviations, and then resource barriers to change by
planning and organising to satisfying very basic, but often
solve these problems unfulfilled, human needs
Outcomes Produces a degree of Produces change, often to a
predictability and order, and dramatic degree, and has the
has the potential of consistently potential of producing extremely
producing key results expected useful change (e.g., new products
by various stakeholders (e.g. that customers want, new
for customers, always being on approaches to labour relations
time; for stockholders, being that help make a firm more
on budget) competitive)
Source: Kotter 1990

This does not suggest for a minute that the leader is simply a co-ordinator,
for this is certainly not the case. Leadership is a far more active and delib-
erate process than this. Indeed, leadership will always be about helping the
group move forward by utilising the efforts of individuals who complement
and enhance each other’s skills, ‘linking the group to the strengthening unit
of a common purpose . . . making the parts whole’ (Adair 1986: 116).
Looking at these changes in another way, it is worthwhile reflecting,
as Sharpe (1995: 17) does, that ‘education for the 21st Century is coinciding
with a renewed interest in the concept of leadership’. Tracing the emergence
of the concept through two-dimensional leadership (1960s), situational
 Leading and managing staff 95

leadership (1970s) and transformational leadership (late 1970s), Sharpe

concludes that in the late 1990s leadership regained its rightful place in the
scheme of things, having been relegated to second place by the ‘more
mundane and at times sterile diet of management efficiency’ in the 1980s.
This analysis supports a currently dominant view of the need for what
DePree (1990: 1) describes as Strategic Leadership. In his terms, ‘the first
requirement of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say “Thank you”.
In between the leader must become a servant and a debtor.’ Within
the schooling context, Caldwell and Spinks (1992: 92) define strategic
leadership as:

• keeping abreast of trends and issues, threats and opportunities in the

school environment and in society at large, nationally and internation-
ally; discerning the ‘megatrends’ and anticipating their impact on
education generally and on the school in particular;
• sharing their knowledge with others in the school’s community and
encouraging other school leaders to do the same in their areas of
interest;
• establishing structures and processes which enable the school to set
priorities and formulate strategies which take account of likely and/or
preferred futures; being a key source of expertise as these occur;
• ensuring that the attention of the school community is focused on
matters of strategic importance;
• monitoring the implementation of strategies as well as emerging
strategic issues in the wider environment; facilitating an ongoing process
of review.

Consistent with, but somewhat an extension of these views, is the concep-

tion of leadership provided by Manz and Sims (1994). In their publication,
Superleadership they conclude that the leadership which is required today
is best described as ‘leading others to lead themselves’ through, among
other things, modelling effective leadership behaviours, and through
establishing self-leadership systems – culture, socio-technical designs, and
teams. In their terms, ‘superleaders have super followers’, a view which is
endorsed by Chaleff (1995: 46) who argues that ‘We need a dynamic model
of followership that balances and supports dynamic leadership . . . a pro-
active view of the follower’s role, which brings it into parity with the
(formal) leader’s role.’ In essence, we are therefore drawn to a model which
suggests that leadership lies in all of us, and the high performing organ-
isation will be one in which each member of the team is a self-led, growing
and dynamic individual, prepared to contribute to the greater good of the
team and the organisation.
But what of the formal or designated leader’s position within this scheme
of things? The final piece in the mosaic is provided by Wilson et al. (1994)
96 Leading strategic change

who show visually the changes that have occurred over the years, arriving
at the highly empowering leader who acts as mentor to a number of self-
managing work teams. This formulation is shown in Figure 7.1

Autocratic Leadership
Level 1
Autocratic

Participative Leadership
Level 2 Level 3
Central Transitional

L L

High Involvement Leadership

Level 4 Level 5
Partnering Highly Empowering

Figure 7.1 Five levels of leadership

Source: Wilson et al. 1994
 Leading and managing staff 97

As portrayed in Figure 7.1, the transition in conceptions of leadership

commenced with earlier bureaucratic and often autocratic forms; moved
through more participative leadership forms in which the designated leader
allowed others to exercise a leadership responsibility; through to more
recent high involvement models under which the leader is either a partner
in leadership or in its most highly developed form, a mentor to the self-led
team.
Again, I emphasise that under these arrangements the role of the formal
leader is no less important. Indeed, the opposite is true, as he or she must
carry out his or her role by establishing and communicating the vision, by
modelling, and by mentoring and coaching. This approach is consistent
with Bennis and Nanus’ (1985: 46) view that ‘Leaders acquire and wear their
visions like clothes. Accordingly, they seem to enrol themselves (and then
others) in the belief of their ideals as attainable, and their behaviour exemplifies
the ideals in action’ (italics added).
Such views of leadership also rely heavily on the concept of empowerment
whereby the designated leader ‘empowers others to translate intention into
reality and sustain it’ (Bennis and Nanus 1985: 80). Such empowerment,
urge Bennis and Nanus, involves four major elements:

• significance – a feeling of those involved that they are doing something

important and significant – ‘of being at the active centre of the social
order’ (ibid.: 82);
• competence – development and learning on the job;
• a sense of community – a sense of ‘family’, of being ‘joined in some
common purpose’ (ibid.: 83);
• fun and enjoyment – derived from the work and interactions with
others involved in it.

In summary therefore, rethinking leadership in high performing schools

of the future involves developing a form of leadership which is highly
involving and highly empowering, which relies on leading others to lead
themselves, and which consequently has significant implications for the
second major part of our picture, namely Management.

EMERGING TRENDS IN THE MANAGEMENT

OF STAFF
Of the many issues that could be addressed under this heading, I propose
to concentrate here on three: creating and developing high performance
teams; utilising on-the-job development systems including mentoring and
coaching; and developing performance feedback mechanisms.
98 Leading strategic change

Creating and developing high performance teams

As we saw earlier, new conceptions of leadership involve the formal leader
acting as a mentor to largely self-led, self-managed work teams. The
outstanding emphasis being placed on these increasingly popular organ-
isational forms mirrors Moses’ (1990) view that in the high performance era
the team, and not the individual, becomes the major unit of analysis.
It should come as little surprise that such an arrangement is currently
enjoying increasingly high levels of support from organisations of all kinds.
This is because it is a manifestation of the belief that in high performing,
responsive, customer-focused organisations striving for success in this era,
power, information and resources need to be allocated as close as possible
to the point of delivery of services; and the team represents a strong
organisational form which can provide the basis for such an arrangement.
The emerging model suggests that for high performance teamwork to
occur, this alignment of power, information, resources and indeed rewards
with the team structure is a fundamental prerequisite. This is in contrast
with earlier approaches in which teams were sometimes used to deal with
specific issues and/or solve particular problems, without, necessarily,
having large amounts of power and resources at their disposal. Under the
new scenario, effective teamwork becomes far more than a nicety aimed at
improving working conditions of staff, or even achieving improved out-
comes, and moves to the central position of major driver in pursuit of high
performance.
Putting it another way, we can talk all we like about teams and team-
work (when we may well often mean groups and group work), but unless
we are prepared to put our money where our mouth is, we are not likely
to achieve high performance teamwork, i.e. teamwork that produces, in
the main, consistently high levels of performance, or higher levels of
performance than would normally be expected given all the circumstances.
If this is true of organisations generally, it is even more pertinent for
schools and school systems within which the dominant paradigm is rapidly
becoming one in which the school itself is the major self-managing team.
Under this arrangement it is important that the paradigm shift that has
seen the transformation of large, bureaucratic education systems to new
arrangements involving a strategic core steering a system of self-managing
schools, is in fact institutionalised at the school level, so that the school itself
consists of a strategic core steering a system of self-managing teams.
Carmichael (1993) portrays the change at institutional level as shown
in Figure 7.2. Under the arrangement outlined, the hitherto bureaucratic
scientific management model applying world-wide in years gone by, is
rapidly being replaced by a new arrangement featuring a very lean strategic
core ‘steering’ a system of self-managing work units, with responsibilities
as shown.
 Leading and managing staff 99

• Negotiating strategic directions

STRATEGIC CORE • Allocating resources
• Monitoring performance

SELF-MANAGING • Increased interpersonal skills

WORK UNITS • Participative decision-making
BUREAUCRACY • Outcomes by working smarter
• Shared responsibility for
outcomes

Figure 7.2 The paradigm shift

Source: Carmichael 1993

Hence this is where the real challenge lies for schools; because while many
school heads or principals endorse the move from the centralised organ-
isational arrangements which were typical at the system level in a previous
era, many have, as yet, to come to terms with the new paradigm as it applies
at the school level.
What to do?
In implementing this central idea there are four key steps which need to
be taken:

• reorganising the school

• forming the teams
• building high performance teamwork
• aligning rewards and incentives with team performance.

Reorganising the school

The first of these steps, as suggested above, is to organise the school so
that teams become an integral part of it. In other words, the school, as a self-
managing work unit, needs to comprise a strategic core, steering a system
of smaller self-managing work units or teams. Visually, the overall changes
may be portrayed as in Figure 7.3. Depending on the nature of the school,
the arrangements will vary.

(a) (b)
Figure 7.3 Restructuring (a) the system and (b) the school
100 Leading strategic change

(a)

4
Functional
3 teaching
and
2 learning
teams
1

Cross functional
teams
(b)

Figure 7.4 School reorganisation: (a) the previous arrangement and (b) the new
arrangements at Huntingdale Primary School, Western Australia

One example of such an approach is that of Huntingdale Primary

School, Western Australia, where principal Murray Randall organised
the school into functional and cross functional teams responsible for the
teaching and non-teaching aspects of school life respectively. Visually,
the organisation changed from a set of more or less free-standing individual
units as shown in Figure 7.4 (a), to one based on horizontal and vertical
teams shown in Figure 7.4(b). Under this new arrangement, there are four
teaching and learning teams of six to eight people, and cross functional
teams to cover areas such as school management, curriculum and so on.
In explaining the very thorough culture building process the school went
through, principal Murray Randall said they began by talking and moving
towards a shared understanding and a common language. They then
held a strategic planning workshop for the three members of the School
Administration (Senior Management) Team, including sorting out their
roles. Next they raised the level of debate through presentations at staff
meetings, through holding targeted workshops, and providing release
time, for staff to plan and think. They gradually moved to implementation
of Total Quality Management principles, and made a number of important
modifications to teaching and learning.
 Leading and managing staff 101

Peer coaching is a significant feature of the new arrangements, and new

leaders have emerged very clearly. What began as a good idea has become
a vibrant new organisational structure which has overcome initial barriers,
and as Murray tells it, the ‘fierce individualism’ that existed previously.
The next move is to provide each team with its own budget which will
operate within the framework of the overall school budget. This will
provide the cement that binds the mosaic together.

Forming the teams

The second step that needs to be taken is to form the teams that will provide
the basis for the organisation. Like the definition of team and leader, there
are many theories on forming teams based on complementary roles, behav-
iour styles, personality styles and the like. Analytical instruments and
psychometric tests range in sophistication and technicality from the more
extreme such as the Myers–Briggs Type Indicator and the Margerison–
McCann Team Index, to far simpler versions such as the Briggs–Stratton
behaviour styles inventory, the Belbin self-perception inventory, and the
Gregorc style delineator. Each of these latter three has a different role to
play in helping with teamwork. The first deals with dominant behavioural
styles, the second preferred team roles, and the third dominant thinking
styles.
Of course care needs to be exercised in the use of such instruments
as they are merely indicators of dominant styles at a particular point in
time. These can change over time, and any one individual can display the
characteristics of more than one style at any particular point in time. Hence
caution must be exercised in granting to the instruments a level of accuracy
and immutability that cannot be justified. Similarly, in arranging the mix
of styles it is important to recognise the limitations of the instruments and
our own ability to combine complementary styles in order to make the
‘perfect’ team. In short, this is not an exact science, and it should not be
treated like one.
Having said all this, the fact is that instruments such as those mentioned
above can play an important role in team building, and whether we use
the simple versions or the complex ones, whether we read widely and
deeply to increase our own knowledge and understanding, or indeed use
other methods, the major messages remain the same, namely that in
building effective teams, we need to:

• be aware of our own dominant behaviour styles, thinking styles, and

preferred team roles;
• be aware of the range of styles and roles that exist in others;
• appreciate and respect other styles and roles as valid, indeed important
to the success of the team;
102 Leading strategic change

• compose teams using complementary behaviour styles, thinking styles,

and preferred team roles;
• assign individuals to appropriate roles, based on their individual styles,
characteristics, and preferences;
• vary team composition according to the nature of the task;
• share functional team leadership according to the nature of the task.

And if high performance teams need very good leadership, leaders of

high performing schools need to be thoroughly sensitised to this issue
of diversity and complementarity, in order to ensure that the teams which
are formed, the people who are recruited, and the systems which are
developed, take account of these significant issues. This may require some
form of technical analysis from the many that are available, but the least it
will require will be conscious observation of the behaviour of team members
or potential team members, and heightened sensitivity to their particular
styles, characteristics, and individual needs.

Building high performance teamwork

Having formed the teams, the third step is to create the conditions for the
achievement of high performance. What are some of the issues that need
to be considered here?
First, one major discriminating characteristic of teams that ultimately
reach high levels of performance is their preoccupation with outcomes,
as well as their focus on measurements of performance. In essence, for such
teams feedback is the fuel that powers performance and they are very active
in gathering and analysing data in order to take their performance to even
higher levels. Hence whether it is data relating to the extent of achievement
of goals, whether it is data relating to the performance of individuals within
the team, or whether it is data relating to performance of the team as per-
ceived by the individuals within it, one critical element of high performance
is that of data gathering, analysis and feedback.
A second major element relates to the unification of the team around a
common cause or, more often, a difficult or highly challenging task. Those
of us who have experienced teamwork in a personally challenging out-
door or wilderness environment appreciate fully the team cohesiveness
and synergy that results from an extremely difficult and/or dangerous
situation, whether it be in white water or on a sheer rockface. There are
few other experiences which reduce individuals to a sense of common cause
and genuine feeling and concern for other members of the team than this
one. And of course there are many parallels in organisational life, with
particularly challenging missions and their associated levels of risk having
similar effects upon team members.
 Leading and managing staff 103

The point is, however, that without this single unifying challenge or
threat teams can rarely rise to levels which might genuinely be called ‘high
performance’. Hence, it is in my view unrealistic to expect all teams within
an organisation to be high performing. And yet, if there are insufficient such
teams, the overall organisation is likely to lack the get-up-and-go to reach
the very high standards necessary for the high performance era.
Critical questions that must be addressed, therefore, are what are the
real challenges in this organisation? What are the issues which desperately
need to be addressed? Who are the best people to address them? And how
should we configure them as a team in order to achieve the outcomes
required in as effective and efficient a manner as possible? Having said this,
there is no good reason why all teams should not aspire to the features of
high performing teams and it is therefore important to emphasise that while
not all will be high performing, there is no reason why they cannot still be
highly effective ‘real teams’.
Thus, in building high performance, as well as forming teams effectively,
it is also critical to do the following:

• identify clearly the specific challenge that needs to be addressed;

• develop a clear focus on outcomes and performance;
• collect and use high quality data to underpin judgement and action;
• foster a culture of continuous improvement;
• create a climate of development and learning on the job;
• adopt common and agreed processes of decision-making, problem-
solving, and innovative thinking;
• develop a sense of caring for the team and individuals within it, that
transcends personal success or well being;
• create a working climate which offers fun and enjoyment;
• celebrate success.

Aligning rewards and incentives with team performance

The fourth and final step relates to alignment – alignment of resources to
programme outcomes and alignment of incentives and/or rewards to team
outcomes. This is indeed a real challenge, indeed one which is occupy-
ing a lot of thought in organisations that have, since time immemorial,
remunerated individual performance. Even now, with an increasingly high
degree of emphasis on teamwork and team performance, the dominant
reward paradigm continues to be based on the individual.
So how might it be done differently? In short, only with difficulty unless
the school has the power to allocate a certain amount of its salary and/or
other budget to a reward pool that may then be applied on the basis of
performance. Like most things, the best approach would be one based on
common sense – one that has as its basis individual salaries and perhaps
104 Leading strategic change

even an element of individual performance reward, while at the same time

building in a capacity for incentives and/or rewards for teams, not neces-
sarily in cold hard cash, but in whatever form is negotiated between the
team and the principal or his/her strategic core team. This could include,
for example, professional development opportunities, fact-finding or
benchmarking investigations, special technology for use by the team,
or even celebratory events to mark the accomplishment of noteworthy high
levels of performance.

From manager to mentor; from commander to coach

Under the arrangements outlined above, it becomes clear that approaches
to leadership and management will be quite different, with a major
emphasis being placed on mentoring and coaching both of teams and of
individuals within teams. Consistent with Figure 7.1 earlier, it seems reason-
able that the principal and his/her strategic team might be responsible for
mentoring and coaching one or more teams within the school and might,
in addition, be responsible for setting up a school-wide mentoring and
coaching system which involves everyone in the school.
Within the overall context of performance development, the concept of
mentoring and coaching has always offered great promise for supporting
individual growth and development but in the high performance era, the
concept which might hitherto have been seen as an organisational frill,
becomes integral to performance. Little wonder that in The Return of the
Mentor, Caldwell and Carter (1993) note that mentoring as an issue has
recently taken on far greater prominence as workplaces seek to respond to
the needs of the emerging era, and the demands for service-driven, highly
efficient organisations. They also note that this prominence spans a wide
range of both private and public sector organisations, including many in
Health and Education that seek to create what Senge (1990) refers to as the
learning organisation.
Some commentators are inclined to use the terms ‘Mentor and ‘Coach’
interchangeably, but I prefer to differentiate between the two. In a sense,
mentoring is a more inclusive, more embracing term which often includes
the activity of coaching, but can be much more than that. Hence for me
a Mentor is a trusted experienced professional, who is willing to assist a
less experienced person by listening, sharing experiences, advising,
guiding, and coaching; a coach is more of a trusted colleague who is willing
to assist by observing performance, gathering and analysing data, and
providing meaningful positive feedback. As suggested above, coaching
may be thought of as a subset of mentoring, and while a mentor may well
coach from time to time, he or she will do far more than this. Other activities
may include helping the person to identify and refine developmental needs,
assisting with the creation of a personalised individual development plan,
 Leading and managing staff 105

reflecting with the person on his/her handling of specific activities or

initiatives which the mentor may not have seen personally, but which can
provide the opportunity for what Hersey (1990) calls reflective review and
coaching.
Whatever the tasks agreed upon, it is critical that the protégé takes
responsibility for managing an individual developmental plan, while the
mentor acts as supporter, helper and encourager. Consequently the role
involves far more listening than it does talking, and is much more subtle
than giving lots of good advice and suggestions based on experience.
Indeed, the skilled mentor is able to assist the individual to draw his/her
own conclusions about performance by having him/her articulate the
issues, incidents, solutions and so on, and by working in a way that allows
distillation of appropriate action plans.
It is important to note here that this concept of ‘mentor’ is a far cry from
the earlier colloquial versions of the term which implied opening doors
for fortunate individuals or giving them a leg up the organisational ladder,
often at the expense of others who were not lucky enough to have key
decision-makers as their ‘mentors’. On the contrary, the model envisaged
here is a very professional one, aimed totally at assisting the individual to
grow and develop.

Developing performance feedback mechanisms

As has already been established, the quest for high performance needs to
be built upon a platform of goals, outcomes, and feedback about perfor-
mance, both at the organisational level and at the level of individuals within
the organisation. Since this chapter deals predominantly with leading and
managing staff, it is to this latter point that we now turn.
It has long been recognised that feedback about performance is essential
to organisational improvement, and organisations all over the world are
increasingly seeking such feedback from their clients/customers and from
other key stakeholders. This is in fact one major characteristic that distin-
guishes high performance organisations and/or teams from others – the
extent to which they gather effective data, feed it back, and use it to drive
the organisation to increasingly higher levels of performance.
Such approaches involve collection of performance data about a whole
range of variables in the course of normal operations. Most also involve
gathering customer response data through survey questionnaires and,
increasingly, through face-to-face focus group meetings. Many organisations
have found this approach to be highly effective, not the least of which are
Qantas, Australia’s largest airline, and BA. Both represent excellent examples
of organisations that use feedback to drive their performance.
It is not just external customers that can provide this crucial feedback.
Many high-powered organisations are seeking feedback from employees,
106 Leading strategic change

sometimes using very informal and/or unstructured approaches while

others are using more structured approaches based around specially devel-
oped questionnaires such as the Service Organisation Profile (Georgiades
1990). The basis of such feedback models is the belief that employee
satisfaction provides the basis for customer satisfaction. Hence when an
organisation obtains a clear view of its performance in terms of key variables
such as Leadership, Service Mission, Management Practices, Group
Climate, Job Satisfaction, Role Overload, Career Development and the like,
and when this is shown relative to a world-wide database, the feedback can
be extremely powerful in stimulating change and, ultimately, heightened
performance.
Within education, increasing emphasis is being placed on annual survey
data, with many school systems and individual schools gathering important
data which they can use to improve their performance. As in other organ-
isations, the trend is towards gathering these data from a wide range of
stakeholders about a broad set of variables relating to school performance.

Feedback – an essential ingredient for the people

of the organisation
If feedback is essential for driving organisational performance, it is just
as critical for the individuals within the organisation. Outside education,
increasing importance is being placed upon what is now being termed ‘360
degree feedback’. Under this approach, each individual systematically
gathers data about his or her performance from a range of people, either
once or twice a year, using specially prepared and agreed instruments.
The range of people from whom comments are sought typically includes
the person’s manager, his/her ‘peers’, and his/her ‘subordinates’, whom
we now prefer to refer to as ‘team members’, a term better suited to the
flatter, team-based structures of today. By gathering data from these various
sectors, the individual gets a multifaceted, rounded, or ‘360 degree’ view
of performance, as seen from a range of perspectives.
Surprisingly, analysis of a range of models and instruments reveals that
many omit reference to the client or customer served by the individual,
either internal to the organisation, or external. No doubt this is somewhat
related to the difficulty of gathering meaningful data from the client sector,
but for organisations that champion service excellence this appears to be a
serious omission, and one which schools can hardly afford.
Hence within schools it is suggested that data should be sought from
the person’s manager, and an appropriate sample of peers, team members,
parents and, where appropriate, students. The person also needs to analyse
his/her own performance in order to compare perceptions with the
feedback received from others. Thus the 360 degree feedback model might
be pictured as in Figure 7.5, with the individual at the centre of the process,
 Leading and managing staff 107

Parents Managers
and
students
I

Team Peers
members

Figure 7.5 The 360 degree feedback model

and the person’s mentor on the side, with the task of helping the person
make sense of the feedback and determine appropriate growth plans.
It is important that the process be kept simple, through the use of an
instrument which asks simple questions, and which is easy to complete and
return. It is also important that respondents be free to rate the person in
accordance with their true opinion in answer to the questions asked, by
providing the feedback anonymously.
Thoughtful construction of the data gathering instrument and accom-
panying analytical approaches can result in the individual receiving
very specific feedback which can be presented in a simple and easily under-
stood graphical format. One example of such an approach was provided
by the Principal Development Inventory (PDI), developed by Performance
Development International with input and assistance from a large number
of experienced principals (PDI 1995). The PDI was created especially for
members of the principal class, i.e. principals and deputy/assistant prin-
cipals. It focused on a range of critical variables identified by practitioners
as essential to successful functioning as a school leader, thereby providing
the basis for high performance feedback and individual development
planning.
In addition to inviting the individual to complete his/her own assessment
using the forty-item questionnaire, the PDI was used to gather 360 degree
feedback from a full spectrum of stakeholders. Following analysis by
Performance Development International, the individual was provided
with feedback in graphical format, with results shown against those of
an international database including principals and assistant principals
from a number of countries. The forty items clustered around key vari-
ables including Leadership, Management, Teamwork, Communication/
Interpersonal Skills, Personal Attributes, and Overall Job Competence.
Performance on each variable as perceived by each of the respondent
108 Leading strategic change

groupings (parents, teachers, manager and so on), was shown, relative to

the perception of the individual, thereby providing a solid basis for analysis
and for development planning.
Of course, the place to start with all this is with the designated formal
leader and his or her leadership team. Apart from the fact that the
performance of school leaders is such an important variable in school perfor-
mance, there is another major reason for doing so. In Australia we call it
leadership by example. As noted earlier, others such as Manz and Sims (1994)
call it Superleadership, or leading others to lead themselves, by modelling effective
leadership behaviours while Bennis and Nanus (1985) simply call it exemplifying
ideals through behaviour.
Whatever we call it, it means being prepared to put ourselves on the
line by demonstrating our own personal commitment to high performance
and growth – and, having done this, by then holding the quite reasonable
expectation that all other staff will follow the lead. The overall outcome of
this will hopefully be a learning, growing, dynamic, high performing school
of the twenty-first century – a school which is nourished by feedback, the
fuel that powers performance.

DRAWING THE THREADS TOGETHER

This chapter has presented a range of issues relating to leading and man-
aging staff in high performing schools. It began by emphasising the
importance of both leadership and management, and the leadership theme
has permeated the whole chapter. It has also acknowledged that the changes
required are more than fiddling at the edges or simply tweaking the sys-
tems. For many schools the changes envisaged represent a bold, adventurous
step, and one that can only be met by comprehensive overhaul.
Hence, major emphasis has been placed on creating and building high
performance teams, on aligning rewards and incentives with team perfor-
mance and on adopting approaches to leadership and management which
place responsibility for performance with the team and the individual;
which encourage performance feedback and developmental planning; and
which begin with the leadership team leading by example in search of a
new, great tomorrow in the truly high performing school of the twenty-first
century.

NOTE
Minor alterations have been made to this chapter written by the late Max Sawatzki
in the mid-1990s.
Part III

Leading learning
8 Leading learning
9 Information for student learning – assessment for learning: the profile
10 Information for organisational learning – establishing a coherent,
rigorous and workable system of self-evaluation
11 Resourcing learning
Leading learning
8 Leading learning
Christopher Bowring-Carr

The central message that runs throughout this book is that the core activity
of a school is learning. Of course, it is not just the students who learn; to
suggest that is to imply that learning is imposed on one group by another,
and that the other group has completed all the learning that it needs. In
a world changing as fast as this, such a suggestion is profoundly silly.
Everyone in a school is a learner. The objective that every school should
strive for is to become a learning community, and the word ‘community’
is chosen deliberately rather than ‘organisation’.

Since community means different things in different disciplines, I

proposed that for schools we define the term as follows: Communities
are collections of individuals who are bonded together by natural
will and who are together bound to a set of shared ideas and ideals.
This bonding and binding is tight enough to transform them from
a collection of ‘I’s’ into a collective ‘we’. As a ‘we’, members are part
of a tightly knit web of meaningful relationships. This ‘we’ usually
shares a common place and over time comes to share common
sentiments and traditions that are sustaining.
(Sergiovanni, 1996: 48)

Not merely does this community have individual learning at its heart, but
it embraces the idea that learning is a social activity, and, as the learner
grows in experience, becomes an interdependent activity. The community
and the individual learn with and from each other. Therefore, one of the
themes running through such a community is that it is helping to produce
learners who are autonomous, learners who can and want to learn, and
know how to do so.
Before looking at the implications of the notion of an autonomous learner,
we need to try to explain our belief as to what learning is, and what it is
for. Taking in information, remembering more and more facts are only
distantly related to real learning. Real learning, or deep learning, alters the
way in which we see the world, alters us as people. When we look back at
112 Leading learning

the mass of material that we processed while at school and university, what
percentage can we honestly say fundamentally, or even slightly changed
us? How much of it was anodyne? How much of it, in retrospect, was plain
wrong? That great Irish essayist, Butler (1990: 125) described learning
vividly:

Real learning is dynamic, dangerous, exhilarating. It is built on curiosity

not knowledge.

One of the important activities for any leader is constantly to be inviting

discussions about what learning is and how it can be demonstrated. It must
be remembered in the learning community that although learning occurs
almost all the time, it is channelled and limited by the culture and the
mythology of the community. Also, it is distorted by the micro-political
interests of the individual. And finally, it is frequently prevented by the
personal defence mechanisms that we all erect to protect us from the dis-
comfort of the new, and from the fear of failure. What is needed, therefore,
is for the leader to encourage in the community an attitude of self-awareness
and openness, an acceptance of the unpredictability of learning, of self-
consciousness about how we learn, and how we do not, what fosters and
what blocks learning – in other words, the topic of learning needs to be the
centre of staff meetings on a regular basis, not relegated to the occasional
in-service development day.
Clearly, the ultimate purpose of learning is going to dictate the type
of learning that will be fostered, and the type of leadership that will be
required. Are our schools maintained in order to transmit society’s values
to the next generation? Are they in place in order to produce willing workers
and consumers to maintain our economy? If they are, then schools are there
merely to transmit information, not to enable the next generation to grow
into being reflective, questioning people. I believe that schools exist in order
to help children become better at thinking, imagining, understanding,
questioning, challenging the status quo, and adapting to change. I believe
that what we need is for the community to be able to interrogate that mass
of information which is now available – it needs the right questions,
so that it can turn information into knowledge, and then knowledge into
wisdom. There are a great many people in the world who want to ensnare
citizens with their particular brand of information – ensnare them
politically, commercially or emotionally. The learning community needs to
be able to question these people rigorously and persistently. For the stu-
dents to be able to make the most of their lives, they need to be able to
probe, both for work and for pleasure, that mass of information that is so
easily available, and to shape it, order it, and make good sense of it. And
for schools to be able to do those things, everyone in them must be eager
to question and think, reflect, care and imagine. After all, as Kohn (1999:
 Leading learning 113

121) puts it, not many parents, if asked what they want for their children
to gain from school, say

‘What’s most important to me is that my kid will be able to convert a

fraction into a decimal’ or ‘will know the difference between a simile
and a metaphor’.

The problem is that the dominant language of those who control our schools
focuses on tests, test scores, league tables, standards (not clearly defined)
– the paraphernalia of measurement. Moreover, the problem has an impact
out of all proportion to its intellectual worth because that official language
is unavoidable. Or at least at first sight it is unavoidable. However, there
are a number of schools which, while successfully fulfilling the demands
of the testing regime, are putting (have put) in place organisations which
enable deep learning to occur.
Let me make clear what is needed for deep learning to occur, and then
look at the implications for leadership. First, a list of nine aspirations, some
of which are realistically achievable in the short term, while others might
take a little longer.

1 Schools are physical and virtual learning resources at the heart of their
communities. The days when the school was defined, limited, by
the fence around its grounds, and when the community sent its child-
ren there to be taught and disciplined, should be ended. Schools are
expensive resources open at the moment for about 16 per cent of the
year. They need to be the monasteries of the twenty-first century
– centres of learning, of caring, of sustenance.
2 Access to the building blocks of learning is now available 24 hours a
day, 365 days a year. Schools need to adjust to this fact.
3 Learning programmes need to be individual. We all learn differently,
at different speeds, in different rhythms and for different reasons. The
idea that thirty students can be mandated to learn a sequence of facts
at the same time, grouped together for no good reason other than their
date of birth, is outdated.
4 Learners should be able, from time to time, to choose areas which they
want to investigate for their own purposes.
5 Teachers are coaches, mentors, guides and resources who co-ordinate
the work of learners and those who support them. The teacher should
be seen more as a team leader, the team being a group of people with
many different strengths and specialisms enabling students to learn.
Teachers are no longer the main transmitters of information.
6 Learning is a community-wide responsibility.
7 Modes of assessment are negotiated.
8 Funding is public, private and individual.
9 Accountability is based in local democracy.
114 Leading learning

There are certain basic requirements without which we cannot begin to

have deep learning, but instead would be forced to continue with the regime
of short-term, superficial memorisation which is so rewarded and exhorted
at present. These requirements are:

• No hierarchies – when there are hierarchies there is a focus on position

and the status quo, both inimical to learning. Instead, there will be
informality – all the people in the learning organisation are relaxed
in each others’ company, open to new ideas, supportive of each other
and accepting of an equality of regard. There has to be accountability,
of course, and legally there has to be one person who bears that respon-
sibility. However, being accountable and instituting a hierarchy do
not need to go together.
• No fear – in an institution in which there is fear, the individuals in it
will minimise taking risks and doing something new; learning implies
taking risks and moving into unknown ground.
• Emphasis will be primarily on the process, rather than on the end result.
In other words, grades, marks, the results of tests will take on decreas-
ing importance. As Bruner wrote (in Kohn 1999: 191) students should
‘experience success and failure not as reward and punishment, but as
information’.
• The learning community knows that intelligence is not individual
but social, and that learning is not best achieved through solitude but
through social interaction. The implication is that the organisation
of the daily routines emphasises and encourages people to meet, to
work in small or large groups, and for varying times.
• The learning community also knows that intelligence depends on the
richness of the resources available. The library, the software, the net-
works – the antennae of learning will be given the highest priority.
• The learning community knows that learning comes from asking
questions, not having the ‘right’ answers. The best questions will be
those that no-one has an answer to right away, and in any one day the
students will be asking far more questions than the teachers. Also,
learning comes from self – from questioning one’s mistakes, learning
from them, and taking the pains to work through that difficult self-
discipline.
• The learning community knows that learning cannot be hemmed in
by artificial subject barriers. Although for the sake of the imposed tests,
some attention will be paid to the old-fashioned subject labels, the
deepest learning will come from students working together across a
number of disciplines.
• The learning community knows that people see the world through
different lenses, and they use different intellectual, physical and
emotional strengths to make sense of the world and build their reality.
Learners will have each strength fostered and rewarded.
 Leading learning 115

• The learning community, most importantly and urgently, needs to

return to a living language about education. In its discussions about
learning and pedagogy, it has to ditch the dead language of the
government and look afresh at what it – this living community – wants
to describe and analyse. It will have to subvert the unthinking
acceptance of the sterile metaphors such as ‘targets’, ‘Key Stages’,
‘levels’, ‘standards’. The language in the public arena used to describe
and proscribe education is the language of managerialism; it is a
language bereft of passion, power and precision. In the extract that
follows, Martin and D’Agostino (2003: 5) look at the language of the
National Curriculum’s prescription for the teaching of reading.

In reading, pupils should be taught strategies to help them read with

understanding, to locate and use information, to follow a process
or argument and summarise, and to synthesise and adapt what they
learn from their reading. . . . ‘To synthesise and adapt’ – not ‘to
question and provide alternatives’. ‘To follow a process or argument
and summarise’, not ‘to initiate, create and pursue intriguing lines
of enquiry’. ‘To locate and use information’, not ‘to question the
sources and the hidden agendas of the messages we receive’.

They go on to quote from Steiner, who sums up this corrosive language

perfectly:

In certain civilisations there come epochs in which syntax stiffens,

in which the available resources of live perception and restatement
wither. Words seem to go dead under the weight of sanctified usage;
the frequency and sclerotic force of clichés, of unexamined similes,
of worn tropes increases. Instead of acting as a living membrane,
grammar and vocabulary become a barrier to new feeling.

It is perhaps the paramount duty of the leader in the learning community

to start that probing and questioning of the official language, to examine
the dead metaphors and restricted view of what education can be about,
so that the community can create a meta-language, and through that
language, their own language, talk about the education of their students
with freshness, openness, excitement. The community needs a language
for life, not for an acquiescent acceptance of managerialism.
• Finally, the end point of the endeavours of such a community will be
the autonomous learner – the learner who knows how to learn and
wants to do so.

There are many implications arising from such a commitment to enabling

learners to be both autonomous and part of a learning community, and
the leader’s role is crucial. However, as we discuss elsewhere in this book,
116 Leading learning

there is always the need to hold firmly on to the two concepts of a leader
and dispersed leadership. The former is necessary for two distinct reasons.
The first is that in a complex society such as ours, there has to be a person
who ultimately is accountable for the school. An important, but simple,
legal necessity. The second is that a community needs a leader to articulate
its vision and goals, to be the embodiment of all that is best in the
community and of what it is striving for. The community needs a leader to
be continuously keeping in touch with what it is doing and how its
emotional health is faring, and to look to the next steps and longer-term
projects. It needs a leader to enthuse and help when accidents and disasters
strike, and to celebrate the triumphs and successes. Finally, the community
needs the leader who demonstrates in every fibre the meaning of the idea
of life-long learning; the leader is the principal learner.
Leadership, on the other hand, is something that everyone in the com-
munity demonstrates on a continuous basis. Let me put that another way
– if there are not possibilities for a person to demonstrate leadership,
then there is no learning community, because to lead is to learn. One of the
functions of the leader is to sweep away the barriers, the clutter that
might hinder someone taking on a leadership role. That means first that the
leader genuinely does not want to keep the levers of power in the principal’s
office. The comparison that Bell (1998) makes is an apt one. The leader
of a learning community is playing in a jazz band, and not conducting
an orchestra. Second, and it follows from this analogy, the leader has to
know the strengths and development points of the community so that
possibilities, opportunities to take the lead are always being opened up for
each member.
On a day-to-day basis, what are the implications of this placing of
learning at the core of the community? What is meant by ‘the autonomous
learner’ that the learning community is trying to foster? And, in attempting
to answer those two questions, can we at the same time tease out what the
members of the community must be doing? First, we need to define
the term ‘autonomous learners’ more exactly.
Autonomous learners know how to learn and have an eagerness to do
so. Both knowing how to and wanting to are jointly essential; one without
the other leads either to a mechanical response to what is offered, or to
fuzzy, rushed and superficial thinking. So, from entry to school, students
are encouraged and helped to acquire the questioning techniques needed
to stand outside their learning and analyse it. They also need the tenacity
to question and probe their own successes and mistakes. Teachers encour-
age students’ growing self-confidence and develop in them an enquiring
attitude towards their learning. Students are frequently asked: ‘Do you
think that is the best way of doing x? Have you thought of y? Have
you asked your friend if she can help? Did you use those books in the
library? Is there someone in your home community who might help?’
 Leading learning 117

They are regularly asked to estimate how well they are learning. They
are encouraged, by adults and peers, always to move on from the ‘comfort
zone’ of what they know, to the next step. The adults are enthused about
and committed to their own learning, and discuss with enthusiasm their
own learning among themselves and with the students. After all, if students
never see or hear that the teachers actually enjoy learning, and feel charged
by it, why should they believe that ‘learning is a good thing’. The classrooms
are lively, with the display concentrating on provoking questions and
observations. Excitement and enjoyment, as well as the need to take infinite
pains, and being able to cope with frustration, are shown to be ingredients
essential to learning.
The leaders throughout the school frequently meet to discuss learning,
and, most importantly, to look for any impediments to learning. They will
be looking for ways to improve the learning, to widen the range of learning
styles and be continuously monitoring what is going on to make sure that
good practice is spread as widely as possible. One important aspect is to
ensure that students can recognise and pose problems. Official documents
often suggest that students need to be problem solvers. However, the
suggestion implicit in such a statement is that it is for others to pose
the problems, which is a hierarchical way of looking at learning. The learner
that I want to encourage looks for problems and can articulate their com-
ponents, can identify the difficulties inherent in them, and then can initially
sketch a possible solution. Also, we need to have a community which knows
how to support people when they find that a problem has no solution;
emotional intelligence manifests itself at such times.
So, autonomous learners can identify, on their own and/or with others,
a problem, analyse its components and then gather the resources, human
and non-human, to solve it. The students are often asked: ‘What do you
think the problem is? What materials do you need to solve it? Who could
help you solve it?’ Sometimes the group is asked: ‘What problem(s) about
being 15 years old do you want to study?’ The problems need to be real
to the students, and their brainstorming of what they want to investigate
is a powerful starter to learning. The emphasis is on the process, and on
the depth of that process rather than on ‘covering’ a range of material.
Again, the leadership in the classroom steps back; the focus must be on the
students’ needs as they work on a problem or a project, decide whether
to work on their own, or in pairs or in larger groups, and the decisions will
be made according to the stage of the learning, their particular ways of
learning, and the nature of the task.
They will be encouraged to cope with increasingly complex problems
which demand for their solution an increasingly wide range of resources
(books, ICT, peers, teacher, other adults and so on) which are not necessarily
in the classroom or in the school. Indeed, for the students (from an early
age) projects and extended pieces of work might well demand out-of-school
118 Leading learning

research and activity. The solution is important, but getting to the solution
is far more important. This emphasis on the process means that it is for the
leaders to ensure that there are minimal barriers to accessing the necessary
resources.
Autonomous learners are encouraged to take time to reflect on what they
have learnt. Following students through a school day all too frequently
points to what a harried and over-packed life they lead. Increasingly we
know that there is an over-riding need to think about what is being and
what has been learnt; time is needed for the new material to settle in, for
connections to be made with ideas and knowledge that are already in the
student’s mind, and, vitally, for the student to be able to reconcile new ideas
which appear to, and often actually do, conflict with previous knowledge.
The average school day, divided into 40- or 60-minute segments, simply
does not allow for such reflection. The further division into ten or even
twelve different subject labels makes learning even more difficult.
Leaders in a number of schools have come up with a variety of solutions
to the problem of timing: blocking the timetable into half days (and prior
to that shift, building the capacity of the staff to make maximum use of the
longer lessons); having one day a week ‘off’ timetable so that projects can
be undertaken; having one week every two months ‘off’ timetable. There
is no one solution, of course; each community needs to find its own solution.
But the imperative is there: if we as a community know that 40- or 60-minute
sessions are anathema to deep learning, then a solution has to be found. Not
to find one would be professionally unacceptable, and unethical.
As a minimum, there needs to be built into the lesson and/or into the
school day time to be reflective about what has been learnt. Once the habit
of stopping and thinking and talking about what have been the high
points of the day has become established, then it will be easier to move,
not only into that discursive mode in which everyone in the room is jointly
discussing learning, but also into the acceptance that depth of learning is
infinitely more important than the amount that has been ‘covered’.
One of the attributes of autonomous learners is that they can explain the
processes of their learning and its outcomes with their peers and others.
A learner needs to be able to be self-conscious, in the best possible way, of
what is going on while involved in learning, but also s/he needs a meta-
language with which to discuss, with adults and peers, that process.
Students who can articulate the processes of their learning learn more
easily, and more deeply. Such articulation goes to the heart of what assess-
ment in the learning community should look like. At present, most
assessment creates and prolongs the dependency of the learner on the
teacher and the system. This is not the place to go into detail as to what an
assessment system for the autonomous learner should be. Those readers
who want to explore this area should go to the chapter by Black and Wiliam
in Davies and West-Burnham (2003) titled ‘The development of formative
 Leading learning 119

assessment’. Also, in Chapter 9 in this book, I deal with assessment at

some length. I want to put forward some headline ideas which underpin
assessment for learning rather than assessment of learning. The main points
are:

• as the student grows in confidence, s/he takes on self-assessment as a

part of learning;
• as the individual student and the group grow in ease with and trust in
each other, peer assessment will be an essential part of learning;
• assessment tasks need not be solo performances;
• one of the ways in which students demonstrate their learning will be
to draw up the questions at the end of a unit of work;
• assessment tasks should, whenever possible, give students the
opportunity to show their sensitivity to the whole and not merely to
discrete elements;
• assessment tasks should be related to what the students will meet
in the world outside, and should not be limited only to the official
curriculum;
• the student(s) and the teacher(s) will agree on the mode in which the
learning will be expressed – the narrow method of the written essay
handicaps too many;
• performance assessment, that is students actually doing something
(prescribing and pricing a diet for a sick elderly person; writing a play;
teaching a less expert person a difficult computer skill) will be the norm;
• students will build up a portfolio of their work, and will, on ‘parents’
evening’ take the parents and the teacher through the portfolio
explaining why the entries were chosen, what they say about his/her
learning, what has been difficult, and what easy, and what the next
steps are to be.

In short, the student, with the teacher and sometimes peers, needs to be
able to decide on how, and when, to demonstrate what has been learnt.
The student, with the teacher and sometimes peers, will decide on the
criteria by which the success of the learning will be judged, and the student
will become increasingly at ease with those criteria being challenged so as
to take him/her out of the comfort zone. The leader’s task is to create the
atmosphere, and build the capacity among staff and parents, in which it is
accepted that when the learner and learning are put at the heart of the
community, then there are certain logical outcomes, and this approach to
assessment is one of them. The leader will also have to reassure both
students and the larger community that this approach will both enable deep
learning to occur and will ensure improving results in the public testing
system.
The staff in the learning community need to ensure that students are
given the time and the encouragement increasingly to take a synoptic view
120 Leading learning

of what they are learning. We all learn better when we can see the whole
picture, when we can, to use Forster’s words, ‘only connect’. If a student
can make a connection between one aspect of what s/he is learning and
another, then learning becomes easier and deeper. However, in the standard
school day, there is no time to make those connections, and there is little
help given to make them. Three extracts from research carried out in
Northern Ireland by the NFER (Harland et al. 2000) into the Key Stage 3
cohort underline this lack of linkage:

Pupils were generally not aware of any planned coherence in the

courses offered by schools.
(Ibid., p. 4)

Teachers reported that they let cross-curricular links occur through

serendipity rather than deliberately build them in.
(Ibid., p. 4)

The evidence suggested that numerous valuable learning opportunities

for exploring links across the curriculum were lost to both pupils and
teachers. Additionally, in the absence of any significant guidance to the
contrary, the concept maps indicated that some pupils internalise
images of the whole curriculum that may have deleterious effects on
their learning and motivation.
(Ibid., p. 5)

‘Why am I learning this, at this time, and how does it fit in with all the
other things I am learning?’ is a legitimate question and one that requires
an answer. ‘Why am I teaching this, at this time, and how does it fit in with
everything else that the other teachers are doing?’ is a question that the
reflective teacher will need to answer.
The leader of the community needs to look at the degree of coherence in
the school day, and at the need for more ‘custom-made’ timetables for
individuals. ICT has been shown to be of help in this area.
The autonomous learner knows when it is best to work alone, and when
in a team. As I have said above, intelligence does not reside solely in the
individual, and deep learning is promoted when work is carried out by a
group. The implication is that inter- and intrapersonal intelligences need
to be fostered, because such intelligences are vital to team or group work.
Further, because in the adult world team work is increasingly the norm, in
schools there is the need to encourage and enable students to decide what
parts of coping with a topic are best fostered by solitary learning, and what
parts by working in a team. Students need to be shown how to work in a
team, how to gain from such work, and how to contribute to such work.
As Perkins (1995: 323) puts it when discussing distributed intelligence:
 Leading learning 121

Then there is such a thing as knowing your way around working with
others – how to argue fruitfully, to build on others’ ideas, to provoke,
to listen, to encourage.

Teachers also need to work in teams, thus not only demonstrating good
practice but also enabling a wider pool of expertise to be available. Teachers
need to have the opportunity to set up topics which demand teamwork
and which, through being cross-curricular, demonstrate connectivity. One
of the features of team work is, of course, the reduction of competition,
and competition is rarely a feature of real learning. Once we get into
the realm of competition, we get into the world of marks and grades, and
then the focus is on the marks and not on the learning. As Kohn (1999: 21)
puts it:

This focus on results turns out to be remarkably simplistic, particularly

when one considers the psychological issues involved. A preoccupation
with achievement is not only different from, but often detrimental to, a
focus on learning.
(emphasis in the original)

Later, he goes on to say:

The goal of some students is to acquire new skills, to find out about
the world, to understand what they are doing. When they pick up a
book, they’re thinking about what they’re reading, not about how well
they are reading it. Paradoxically, these students who have put success
out of their minds are likely to be successful. They process information
more deeply, review things they didn’t understand the first time, make
connections between what they’re doing now and what they learned
earlier, and use more strategies to make sense of the ideas they’re
encountering. All of this has been demonstrated empirically.
(Ibid., p. 31)

Undoubtedly, in creating a school which downplays the importance of

marks, and stresses commenting on process instead, and which eliminates
competition as an (spurious) encouragement of learning, the leader,
depending on the traditions of the community, may have a deal of persuad-
ing to do. However, there is a wealth of material now available all of which
points to the correctness of Kohn’s position.
One of the main features of a learning community is the spirit of enquiry,
or curiosity, which is palpable in the conversations between and among
students and teachers, in the displays on the walls, and in the open, chal-
lenging discussions about learning that occur frequently. Perhaps the one
over-riding aim of a learning community is to promote, sustain and satisfy
122 Leading learning

the innate curiosity which is an integral part of being a human. Curiosity

is the major driving-force to learning. Teachers need to know what makes
each individual curious, and use that curiosity as the starting point for
learning. But that curiosity may flag when the going gets difficult, so the
teacher’s role, and that of the students’ peers, is to learn the basic need to
stick at it. An eagerness to learn implies, inter alia, taking pains; the student
needs to be encouraged to improve, and to be dissatisfied until the best is
achieved, and then to move on to even better. The student and the teacher
need to accept the untidiness and non-linearity of learning, and not be
frustrated by its difficulties. The student needs to be given ample time for
such painstaking work.
As I have said in Chapter 3, a learning community has to be an ethical
community. Students need to grow up in a school in which the ethi-
cal imperatives are clear and in which the adults share a clear set of
ethics which informs their every action. These ethics are the benchmark
against which all decisions are judged. Students are helped to develop a
moral sense, and they need frequently to have opportunities to judge and
review their actions against a growing, increasingly sophisticated code. The
leader in the community is the presence which reifies this moral code.
The leader of the community, working with the home and with the
surrounding community, needs to put at the heart of all that the school does
the fostering of self-esteem, for all adults and students. Without that, there
can be no true learning. There needs to be a sensitive awareness of the
emotional well-being of all members of the community, and opportunities
for emotions to be discussed. The acceptance of difference, indeed the
welcoming of diversity, needs to be central to the ethos of the community.
Emotional intelligence, working within the self and with and through
others, needs to be reflected on and nurtured as the essential prerequisite
to anything else that happens in a school. The community needs to be
outward looking; changes in the world are so rapid and all-pervasive that
there cannot be any inward turning. In brief, the leader’s task, working with
the rest of the community, is to make the school a place to which people
want to come, a community in which enjoyment, openness and caring are
highly in evidence.
In conclusion, the leader of a school or college needs certain character-
istics which have little in common with the charismatic, ‘here’s the flag,
follow me’ traits displayed by the hero of the action movie. The trouble
is that as soon as the word ‘leader’ is used, there is a stereotype that is
immediately assumed by most listeners. The term used by Bowring-Carr
and West-Burnham (1997), which they in turn took from Senge (1990) was
‘steward’, and that word has the considerable advantage of not having the
baggage associated with the word ‘leader’. A steward has the over-riding
aim of wanting to hand over the institution to the successor in the best
possible shape. There is little of the possessive in the make-up of a steward.
 Leading learning 123

There is much more a set of abilities which, in combination, enable and

enthuse people to give of their best.
First, the steward is a facilitator, the person who, seeing a complex
problem, gathers together a group of people, poses the problem and then
helps the conversation to unfold and explore the complexities, and finally
enables the group to articulate a conclusion. The steward does not solve the
problem and then impose the solution; s/he is not in the game of demon-
strating personal infallibility. Second, and as part of the first requirement,
the steward understands the system and the people in it. Rather in the way
that I suggested that students need to be able to identify a problem, and
then bring the resources to bear in order to work towards a solution, so the
steward knows the system thoroughly, which means knowing the people
who work in it, and being so attuned and attentive to its workings that s/he
will notice the slightest creak or missed beat, and have the emotional
intelligence to know if intervention is necessary or whether the problem is
self-curing.
Third, the steward needs to be continuously aware of what other people
and other schools and colleges are doing and thinking. The steward is a
supreme networker, someone who keeps in touch with as wide a group of
fellow professionals as possible, actively seeking out new contacts, using
every means of communication. From this network, the steward is open to
and perceptive about new ideas, and has the ability to explain them to the
community in such terms that they will see the relevance to their own
system. Fourth, the steward must be continuously looking ahead five years
or so to make sure that the community is not caught flat-footed by the rapid
approach of a potential opportunity or disaster. The steward is the radar-
scanner of the community, and as in air-traffic controlling, the radar scan
cannot safely be switched off. As we explain in Chapter 5, there is an
overriding necessity for the community to build capacity to meet strategic
intentions, and the intentions will arise in large measure from the steward’s
meticulous scanning of the horizon.
Fifth, the steward has to be the guardian of the community against
the arbitrary, frequently contradictory, short-term managerialism of gov-
ernment agencies. It is the steward who has to keep up the professional
morale of the community, so that what the community knows to be the right
ways to enable deep learning to occur are not stunted by, for example,
an assessment system that rewards memorisation. The steward filters the
deluge of official print, learning the art of constructive forgetfulness and
compassionate blindness. No steward can, of course, insulate the com-
munity from all government orders, but the necessity is to ensure that the
community’s core message is never forgotten – that the wider and deeper
the experienced curriculum, the better the students will do in any test,
however silly, that is imposed on them. They will cope with such tests and
do well in them, but they will also do well in other, far more meaningful
124 Leading learning

demonstrations of their learning, and they will not have their experience
at school curtailed by ‘teaching-to-the-test’. To deny students the right to
a rich, deep and inclusive range of experiences is to act unethically. One of
the over-riding aims is to make sure that the deeply saddening
conversations recorded by Reay and Wiliam (2001) in a primary school
(class 6S) are not repeated in another community:

Lewis: I wish we did technology.

Jackie: Yeah, that would be good.
Tunde: We should do more dance. We should have dance in the SATs.
Terry: And they never teach you anything about cavemen either.
Ayse: And we don’t do history any more.
Terry: All I know is because I read about it on my own.
Ayse: And we don’t do geography. Only science, language and maths.
Just over and over again.
Diane (R): So is the curriculum very different this term to what it was last
term?
Terry: Yeah.
Jackie: Last year we done music and dance, interesting things.
Terry: The best thing we did was PE. And last week was the best
session we’ve had in ages ‘cause it was something different. And
I hate football and it was football but it was the best session we
done in ages.

Reay and Wiliam go on to say:

But it was the emphasis on more individualised, competitive ways of

working which were increasingly displacing the mutually supportive,
collaborative group work to which the children were accustomed . . .
that caused the most disquiet.
(Ibid., p. 157)

The learning community must resist those outcomes at all costs.

Finally, and underpinning all that has been written above, the steward
is the lead learner, showing a passionate involvement in his/her own learn-
ing, showing enjoyment in that learning, but also enthusing, encouraging
everyone in the community to continue to be learners. Our students need
to see how we find learning difficult, frustrating, humbling, necessitating
going off at tangents, but ultimately enormously rewarding and indeed
frequently fun. Our students need to hear us talking about our learning,
what is proving fascinating, what insights we have gained, where such-
and-such an enquiry may lead us. They need to see that learning, deep
and profound learning, cannot be mandated. We need to show that we
cannot teach anyone anything of any real importance but only through the
 Leading learning 125

quality of our relations with our students and adults can we motivate,
guide, encourage, prod, advise, demonstrate, help our students to learn
for themselves. When we have solid evidence that our learning community
is learning for its own sake, and that that learning is deep, and that it
involves all aspects of our humanity, then we can turn to the steward and
say: ‘Thank you for your stewardship, but really we have done it ourselves.’
The steward will then know a feeling of real success.
Leading learning
9 Information for student
learning – assessment for
learning: the profile
Christopher Bowring-Carr

In this chapter, I am going to take the vexed question of assessment and

expand its usual field of reference so that I will discuss not only assessment
for learning, but also describe its use as an instrument which provides
information that enables the leadership teams in a school to monitor whether
all students are encountering, regularly, that range of situations which
enables deep learning. I believe that learning is social, that learning to
learn is at the heart of education, and that currently, assessment focuses
on too narrow a range of memorised outcomes and simplistic information
sources.
Ramsden, quoted by Willis (1993: 205), states that ‘Evidence now exists
to show students’ interests, attitudes to studying, and approaches to
academic tasks are strongly related to their experiences of teaching and
assessment.’
The major problem with the assessment that Ramsden refers to is that
too often it manifests itself in a number – 7 out of 10 – or a letter – B+. Such
numbering or lettering is of no value, but the system of marking in this way
is so ingrained in our schools that despite a very wide range of researchers
on both sides of the Atlantic showing its malign effects, it still thrives. In
brief, researchers have found that traditional grades are likely to lead to
three separate results: ‘less impressive learning, less interest in learning,
and less desire to do challenging learning’ (Kohn, 1999). Reay and Wiliam
(2001: 150) also make the very important point that assessment can fre-
quently seem to leave the individual child out of consideration, writing that
‘children are subsumed as a means to an end within a process which is
primarily an exercise in evaluating schools and their teachers’.
Current systems of assessment, put in place as a result of the National
Curriculum, narrow the focus to those aspects of learning which are
susceptible to simple, simplistic, numbering. Reay and Wiliam again:

there is no doubt that such activities (teaching to the test) rob National
Curriculum assessments of the power to say anything useful about
what the students have learnt. The more specific the government is
 Assessment for learning 127

about what it is that schools have to achieve, the more likely it is to get
it, but the less likely it is to mean anything.
(Ibid., 160)

Darling-Hammond (1997: 240) says:

The standards-and-sanctions approach to school reform suffers from

similar shortcomings (long-term failure due to goal displacement,
reduced cooperation, and inadequate attention to collective learning
and problem solving). More than a decade’s worth of evidence shows
that simply setting test score goals and attaching sanctions to them does
not result in greater learning – and sometimes produces destructive
side effects (Darling-Hammond 1991; Madaus, 1991; Shepard, 1991).

Black and Wiliam (2003: 411) comment:

The main starting point for our work on this aspect (marking and
comments) was the result of research experiments that established that,
while students’ learning can be advanced by feedback through com-
ments, the giving of marks does not usually help and, moreover, has
a negative effect in that students ignore comments when marks are also
given (see, for example, Butler 1990).

Another drawback to this emphasis on narrow numbers is that the leader-

ship of the school will have its scope for intervention narrowed. The
information that can be obtained from these numbers is information only
on outcomes. The information can give no hint as to the underlying pro-
cesses and how they can be improved. It is by scrutinising the processes
that school improvement can occur; looking at the outcomes is, by contrast,
at best a means of identifying the symptoms, but it is not a way of knowing
what caused those symptoms.
In this chapter, therefore, I am going to attempt two things. The first is
to give an outline of what might be put in place of marks and grades, and
the second, a result of the first, is to show how the information gathered
through this alternative will provide rich information to be used to go to
the roots of learning and thereby improve it. I am going to attempt to move
from ‘assessment of’, which is the adding to a completed piece of work some
mark or letter grade (what might be termed the post-mortem approach to
assessment), past ‘assessment to’, which uses both a mark or grade and a
suggestion as to what the next piece of work should attempt, to ‘assessment
for’. This last type of assessment is for learning, indeed is an integral part
of learning. I will be stressing that assessment is not a bolt-on, something
separate from the act of learning, but must be at the heart of learning. Also,
I shall be stressing that assessment needs to be in large part a commentary
128 Leading learning

on the situations in which the learning did or did not take place. In order
to underline that I am not discussing an improved system of marking, or
a means of establishing a ‘marking policy’, I have sub-titled this chapter
‘The profile’.
I am suggesting that when we start to analyse what we want from an
effective profile system, I am, in fact, going to state what I believe effective
learning and teaching are. So, let me make certain assumptions clear before
I start; in no particular order of importance:

• I am putting the process of learning as opposed to outcomes at the

centre of profiling, as indeed we should all put learning at the centre
of all deliberations about what goes on in the school.
• Research shows that grades and marks are disincentives. Hence
profiles.
• We need to recognise and exploit all intelligences.
• Any profiling system has to encompass our knowledge of the processes
of what is happening when we say that this person is, or is not, learning.
• The profile reflects the belief that ‘the curriculum’ is the totality of what
the student experiences while at school, filtered through what s/he
brings to school from home and community.
• The senior leadership team will be able, having read a selection of
student profiles, to obtain a very clear picture of the strengths and
weaknesses of what is going on in the area of learning and teaching,
and will thus have the necessary, detailed information to use in their
school’s improvement.

Let me try to expand on these starting points.

The first – putting learning at the centre – means that the focus of the
profile is on the processes of the learning, with achievement comments
coming as a consequence of them. I am suggesting that at the heart of the
profile is a diagnosis of the strengths and weaknesses of the individual
student’s learning. Let me try to start building an entry to the profile. An
opening comment might be:
John is relying on his memory too much. This tendency leads him to rush to a
response without thinking through if it is reliable. However, when he does slow
down, and is encouraged to burrow into the text, his emotional maturity enables
him to understand the characters’ motivation.
That is just a start but it does suggest what will be aimed at. How can that
starting point be built on? Our knowledge of what constitutes effective
learning is growing by the day. We know of a number of attributes and
assumptions that are connected with deep learning. One set of assumptions
is that intelligence is not fixed, is not singular and is not located solely in
the individual’s being. Intelligence can be increased, can grow, if the social
and physical circumstances are right. We do not have a single intelligence,
 Assessment for learning 129

but, as Gardner (1983, 1999) has shown, we have multiple intelligences.

We are enabled to be more intelligent if we are in a social setting which
encourages, fosters and celebrates our collective intelligences. Perkins (1995:
322) states that intelligence is distributed in three ways:

Physical. We rely on physical artefacts as simple as note pads and as

complex as computer-aided design systems and beyond to do various
kinds of remembering and computing for us.
Social. We do not typically think solo but in teams in which different
people bring different abilities to the mix, and patterns of collaboration
move the general enterprise along.
Symbolic. We do not think in bare thoughts but thoughts clothed in
symbol systems, including natural languages with their rich vocabulary
of thinking-oriented terms and a variety of notational and graphic
symbol systems.

He goes on to ask us to try to imagine the totally solo thinker. No pencil or

calculator, no friend or partner, no linguistic or other symbolic resources,
no terms and concepts like option or reason. How impaired such a person
would be.
Putnam and Borko (2000) in their work quoted in the OU course E843
state that ‘First – cognition is situated.’ This means that the physical and
social contexts in which an activity takes place are integral to the learning
process. Our learning is not an individual event, but arises from the inter-
action with other people, materials and representational systems. ‘Second,
cognition is social’, so that what we take as knowledge and how we
think and express ideas are the results of interactions among people over
time. Third, we should now give importance to the idea that ‘cognition is
distributed’. Knowledge and learning are often and effectively created by
groups with the individuals in them bringing different skills and expertise
to bear on common tasks. The profile, therefore, has to reflect both the
individual’s progress in learning, and also that individual’s part in the
group’s learning – the part s/he plays in the learning of the group, and the
learning s/he takes from the group.
The aim of this chapter, as I said above, is to show that a profile is not
an inert bolt-on merely recording what is happening. It is, in fact, a vital
part of the learning and teaching process. It both reflects that process, and,
more importantly, it is a continual reminder of good practice, a stimulant
to look for a multitude of ways to enable learning to take place. It is a
leadership tool of the greatest importance as profiling goes to the heart of
what a school is about – enabling deep learning to take place.
If the school staff considers, in the traditional way, what intelligence is,
there is a tendency to look inwards, to the individual and to ways of
training/developing individual minds of various kinds in various ways.
130 Leading learning

As a result, and this is an important point when considering profiles, undue

attention is paid to the individual and what strengths and weaknesses
he/she displays, with the suggestion (sometimes much more than a sugges-
tion) that if learning has not taken place or cannot be displayed, then it
is the individual’s fault. If, however, ‘distributed intelligence’ and ‘social
learning’ are taken into account, then the school has to pay heed to the
physical, social and symbolic settings. Such a change of view is vital to
the success of a school. The implication is that there is a contract between
the student and the school. It is not the old contract: ‘You behave yourself
and work hard, and we will teach you and help you pass the examinations.’
The contract now is rather: ‘We will try our hardest to put in place all the
circumstances which we know will enable you to learn at a deep level,
and you will take advantage of all these settings and resources, and from
this combination you will be able to expand your intelligences and learn
profoundly and meaningfully.’ That contract means that the school’s part
in providing the range of settings to increase the individual’s intelligence
needs to be monitored continuously, and only from a careful reading of
many profiles can such monitoring be possible.
Perkins (1995: 323) writes:

To put this in terms of realm theory; there is such a thing as knowing

your way around the use of various physical support systems for
thinking from pencil and paper to spreadsheets to word processors
to decision-analysis systems. . . . Then there is knowing your way
around working with others – how to argue fruitfully, to build on
others’ contribution, to provoke, to listen, to stimulate. Finally, there
is knowing your way around symbolic resources, such as the language
of thinking with its reservoirs of terms like decision, option, reason,
evidence, consequence.

He goes on to suggest that if we want to enable our students to extend

their distributed intelligence, then the place in which they study needs to
be as conducive to supporting intelligent behaviour as a good kitchen is
conducive to good, healthy cooking. Such a place would have the computer-
driven means of enabling real-time video contacts and asynchronous
communication; programs which build concept maps and contrast lists,
many spaces to write on, and ‘easy connectivity with those who might
work with you, through electronic mail but also real-time video communi-
cation’. The human side of the equation is equally important. We have
all sat through committee meetings which achieved little because people
do not know or use the language needed – meanings and decisions blur.
Students (and some adults) need to learn the language of intelligent and
purposeful discourse, and of collaborative thinking and communicating.
(Ibid., pp. 323–4, adapted.)
 Assessment for learning 131

There are other factors that impinge on the student’s ability to learn. Diet
plays a vital part, as do sleep, physical exercise and emotional security. There
is little we can do to influence the average student’s dietary or sedentary
habits – but we can point out the consequences, and do so with some vigour.
We can also start to inform the parents, from entry year onwards, about
the close connection between physical well-being and mental health and
agility. We can, as far as possible, ensure that the physical and emotional
areas which the student inhabits are as fear-free as possible; no threats, no
implied dire consequences as to what will happen if something is done, or
is not done.
Let us return to the start of a profile and see, at this stage, what needs to
be added.
John is relying on his memory too much. This tendency leads him to rush to a
response without thinking through if it is reliable. However, when he does slow
down, and is encouraged to burrow into the text, his emotional maturity enables
him to understand the characters’ motivation. Although there is a wealth of
computer software to help sift through the many approaches to the complex
interaction between characters and environments, John does not take advantage of
them and is therefore coming to less tenable and less well constructed theories
than his colleagues. He is good in discussions and helps promote and steer focused
arguments. He needs to take better care of his physical needs; too often he is losing
concentration and appears tired early in the day.
Briefly, it is important to stress that learning is made easier and deeper
not only through an individualistic approach but by working collectively.
Although the profile will focus on the individual, it must not constrain us
into thinking that effective learning is individual; it is very frequently
collective, occurring through the interplay of discussion, argument and
group exploration. Ways need to be found of incorporating the collective
experience into the individual’s profile.
There is still another area to look at. A reminder of Gardner’s (1999)
multiple intelligences (MI) is necessary, namely: linguistic, musical, spatial,
logical-mathematical, bodily kinaesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal,
naturalist. I am assuming that there is a general acceptance of the existence
of MI. If this assumption is correct, then the implications of such accept-
ance are very clear. To ignore MI is to say that all students are more or
less the same and can be taught in the same way, will learn in the same
way, and can be assessed in the same way. That is not a stance that is
acceptable.
Therefore, teachers have to know their students’ main intelligence(s), and
play to that/those strength(s). In exactly the same way as teachers need to
provide the human and physical surroundings for distributed intelligence
to thrive, so there is a need to provide opportunities for the student who
is, for example, spatially very sharp, to use, inter alia, mind-maps and
spider-grams to help him/her learn, but also use them to display the results
132 Leading learning

of learning. It appears to be fairly well established by educational research

that the student who is enabled to develop the main intelligences gains in
self-esteem and develops other intelligences also.
The profile might be developing along these lines:
John is relying on his memory too much. This tendency leads him to rush to a
response without thinking through if it is reliable. However, when he does slow
down, and is encouraged to burrow into the text, his emotional maturity enables
him to understand the characters’ motivation. Although there is a wealth of
computer software to help sift through the many approaches to the complex
interaction between characters and environments, John does not take advantage of
them and is therefore coming to less tenable and well constructed theories than his
colleagues. However, he is good in discussions and helps promote and steer focused
arguments. He needs to take better care of his physical needs; too often he is losing
concentration and appears tired early in the day.
He worked with two other students on providing a musical background to a scene
in the play that his group is studying. It was outstanding. The texture of sounds
added to the understanding by all in the group of the tensions in the scene. They
were very warmly congratulated on this work; their stature in the group has been
immeasurably heightened.
There are some further matters to be considered. The first is the area of
ethics. I deal with this topic in detail in Chapter 3, but it is necessary to
summarise some of the main points. It is a truism to say that a school has
to be an ethical place; indeed there are few decisions made in a school which
are not rooted in a strong and clearly stated set of ethics. However, it is not
as clear that we sufficiently and overtly help students to develop their own
reflected-upon and argued-through set of values and from those values be
encouraged to establish an ethical code. Perhaps it is assumed that if the
community’s ways of dealing with each other on a day-to-day basis are
informed and guided by an ethical stance, then it will in some way rub off
on the students. This is not a convincing argument. Ethics is not something
that can be caught by propinquity. The question of how best students can
not only learn about ethics but learn to live by an overt ethical code is closely
bound up with the concept of ‘student voice’.
In very brief terms, the idea of ‘student voice’ relates to the degree to
which students take a responsibility for, and a sharing in the governance of
the school. This is not the time to discuss in any detail the ideas behind
‘the learning community’ – this is a topic dealt with in Chapter 8 – but one
of the features of a learning community is that it is (in the proper sense of
the word) self-conscious and is explicit about the values, the ethics, which
drive and guide it. Stemming from that idea, one can say that it is only
through taking an active and reflective part in the community’s governance
that students can build an ethical frame, test it, refine it, and see its
pertinence to their day-to-day life.
Another visit to the profile:
 Assessment for learning 133

John is relying on his memory too much. This tendency leads him to rush to a
response without thinking through if it is reliable. However, when he does slow
down, and is encouraged to burrow into the text, his emotional maturity enables
him to understand the character’s motivation. Although there is a wealth of
computer software to help sift through the many approaches to the complex
interaction between characters and environments, John does not take advantage of
them and is therefore coming to less tenable and well constructed theories than his
colleagues. He is good in discussions and helps promote and steer focused
arguments. He needs to take better care of his physical needs; too often he is losing
concentration and appears tired early in the day.
He worked with two other students on providing a musical background to a scene
in the play that his group is studying. It was outstanding. The texture of sounds
added to the understanding by all in the group of the tensions in the scene. They
were very warmly congratulated on this work; their stature in the group has been
immeasurably heightened.
His membership of the Community Council has become increasingly important
to him. He is discussing with me (as tutor) and with his group more and more
how to make decisions which on the surface are fairly straightforward, but are
actually complex, fit in with the community’s ethical stance. He is realising the
complexity of being part of our community’s way of running things.
The next two elements are closely linked – connectivity and application.
It is accepted that once learners can see the connections between aspects
of what is being learnt, then learning becomes easier and more profound.
Also, when knowledge learnt in one situation can be applied in a situation
different from that in which it was learnt, then the knowledge is internalised
and becomes more readily accessible. Too often in schools, particularly in
the first few years of secondary school, there is little that connects one
subject to another, and rarely is there any chance of applying new know-
ledge to help embed it. For the sixth-form student, the subject of the profile
that is growing in this chapter, there is a need for his teachers and his
tutor to ensure that he is making connections across the normal subject
boundaries, and how, perhaps in school, perhaps in work outside school,
he is applying that knowledge. If he is not doing either, or if he is making
the connections only in one situation, then ways of enabling those processes
to take place both in and out of the classroom must be found.
Two final points need to be made on the topic of the adults’ input to the
profile. (Of course, a number of ‘adults’, and not all of them necessarily
teachers, will contribute to the profile, though the tutor/learning manager
will be responsible for writing up the profile.) The first has been alluded
to above. The profile needs to include comment on any work being done
out of school. It might be no more than a bald statement that the student
works in Tesco all weekend, and such work is not helping his school work
at all. It might be that the work is connected with what is being studied,
and then the applicability can be underlined.
134 Leading learning

The profile might also carry some indication of what home life is like,
with the permission of the student, and within the constraints of data
protection legislation. The point to be made is that as the human and
physical helps to learning need to be recorded and their influences noted,
so those events which hinder learning need to be known about by the staff
involved. It is the question of how and if those events are recorded that
needs to be addressed by each school.
There is one further point to be made. Much of work outside schools is
organised around teams. Too little work inside schools, except on the sports
field, is so organised. There is a need to encourage and enable teamwork
by both teachers and students. There is also a need to enable work to be
carried out which crosses the traditional subject boundaries; I referred to
connectivity above. I suggest that part of the curriculum should involve a
group of students carrying out a project which involves sustained work
over time, using a range of different disciplines. This concept comes from
the Coalition of Essential Schools in the United States. One of the impera-
tives that a school signs up to if it wants to join the Coalition is the idea
that a ‘demonstration’ or ‘exhibition’ of a cross-disciplinary project carried
out by a team of students is a requirement for graduation. As increasingly
employers in all walks of life are asking that employees work in teams,
there is a need to build such work into the curriculum, and, of course, such
work must be reported in the profile. Apart from anything else, such a
project can lead to connectivity, applicability and a growth in inter-personal
intelligence.
Two further points need to be made, one a major and the other a minor.
As I have said, there is an overwhelming amount of research which shows
beyond any doubt that giving marks out of ten, or allocating letter grades,
are disincentives to learning. It is a commentary on the process of the work
that is necessary; how the work could be improved, what the next piece
of work should be about, whether the resources (human and/or material)
used were the right ones, or if there were untapped but available resources,
and so on. As students are enabled to acquire and use a metalanguage to
become self-conscious and articulate about the process of their learning,
so teachers’ written and spoken comments will be focused on the process,
and will point to the Zone of Proximal Development rather than be irrelevant
asides on past work.
Finally, I suggest that there needs to be a parallel profile, this one written
by the student. The student would write a journal that was a distillation of
the comments and discussions that s/he has regularly with the teachers
and tutor. It would highlight what had been easy, what difficult, what had
excited or bored – in short it would be a written form of the metalanguage
used in the day-to-day conversations about learning that all students
carry on. Over time, patterns emerge, which help both student and tutor
steer the learning opportunities. In an MEd course that I am tutoring, some
 Assessment for learning 135

of the students have been writing papers on how they used pupil-generated
journals to help their pupils analyse their strengths and weaknesses in
mathematics, and also to comment on the teaching styles which were being
used. Unanimously, the MEd students showed in their assignments that
such journals were very useful in helping their students to learn, and also
helped the teachers adapt their teaching styles to meet the needs of the
pupils.
So, it is suggested that the profiles that will be kept for students need to
run in parallel to the ones that they, the students, are keeping. It is, of course,
a skill that does not develop unaided. The idea of the journal needs to be
introduced quite early – precisely when is up to each individual school.
Perhaps for the two years leading up to GCSE students could, in some
subjects if not all, start the process of learning how to write journals. Staff,
too, will have to accept the possibility that not all students like all the
teaching strategies employed, but such acceptance is a necessary part of
their being a member of a learning community. Journals add powerfully
to that absolute bedrock of a learning community – the establishment of a
metalanguage with which all can talk professionally about the core activity.
So, what might the profile look like when those latter points have been
added in?
John is relying on his memory too much. This tendency leads him to rush to a
response without thinking through if it is reliable. However, when he does slow
down, and is encouraged to burrow into the text, his emotional maturity enables
him to understand the character’s motivation. Although there is a wealth of
computer software to help sift through the many approaches to the complex
interaction between characters and environments, John does not take advantage of
them and is therefore coming to less tenable and well constructed theories than his
colleagues. He is good in discussions and helps promote and steer focused
arguments. He needs to take better care of his physical needs; too often he is losing
concentration and appears tired early in the day.
He worked with two other students on providing a musical background to a scene
in the play that his group is studying. It was outstanding. The texture of sounds
added to the understanding by all in the group of the tensions in the scene. They
were so warmly congratulated on this work; their stature in the group has been
immeasurably heightened.
His membership of the Community Council has become increasingly important
to him. He is discussing with me (as tutor) and with his group more and more
how to make decisions which on the surface are fairly straightforward, but are
actually complex, fit in with the community’s ethical stance. He is realising the
complexity of being part of our community’s way of running things.
Through discussions that I helped establish with his class, John is beginning to
understand the theme that any technological advance has its benefits and drawbacks.
He is using his A-level history of Europe in the nineteenth century, and his
A-level Economics to explore the topic, and bring to it some illuminations from
136 Leading learning

each discipline. His essays have improved as a result. However, he has not taken
the opportunities offered through studying his part-time work placement to see how
that business puts some of the economic theories he is learning into practice.
He is beginning to come out of the shock and depression that he felt when his
father left home. His first term in the sixth-form was badly affected by this loss.
The counselling that we recommended has appeared to help.
He has joined a group of eight other students to carry out a long-term
project on the amenities and community services needed in the housing estate
being planned on the south-east of town. They have lined up a really impres-
sive list of sub-topics and people to interview, and background research to be
done. The knowledge that there is a six-month time limit has sharpened their
approach.
At the beginning of the chapter, I said that an assessment system that
focused on the processes would also give rich information to the leader-
ship team to analyse in order to see the extent to which the school is
providing the resources, human and material, the settings and the ethos
which together make for real learning. If we look at the profile above, in its
completed form, we can begin to see what an extensive fund of information
is here. In very brief form:

• Memory is seen not to be all-important.

• Quick responses are not rewarded.
• Emotional intelligence is fostered and monitored.
• Computer resources are available.
• Discussion is valuable and encouraged. The individual is not learning
on his/her own.
• The link between physical well-being and learning is established.
• All the intelligences are encouraged and celebrated.
• Self-esteem is fostered.
• There is a Community Council – learning about democracy and its
ethical underpinnings can occur only in a school in which there is
democracy.
• Ethics are at the heart of the process.
• Connectivity is understood as vital to learning.
• Application of knowledge is seen to be important.
• Emotional security is recognised as important.
• Team learning is essential.

Were the leadership team to read, regularly, twenty or thirty such profiles,
it would be very easy to see where the learning processes were being well
cared for, and where neglected. Remediation, which focuses on processes
and not outcomes, stands a far greater chance of success.
Let me end the chapter with some caveats and questions.
 Assessment for learning 137

The first is that a very fine line has to be steered between, on the one hand
knowing enough to help the students learn, collectively and individually,
and on the other, becoming obsessive collectors of minutiae. The profile
needs to be an aid, not an intrusion.
The second is that such profile writing takes time, but if a school is serious
about enabling autonomous learning, and puts in place the ICT needed to
extend learning, then there will not be as much up-front teaching as there
is now. It is to be hoped that the profile, and the student’s parallel journal,
will become an essential part of the learning process. It will be a dialogic
commentary for learning.
Third, the desire to present a profile that is coherent may lead to thinking
that learning is linear and neat. It is not. The art will be in writing coherently
about a process that is frequently incoherent.
Fourth, there is the question as to whether the profile should be written
in the third person, as in this chapter, or whether it should be in the second
person, so that in time a dialogue builds between student and tutor, with
the student’s journal being one side of the ‘conversation’, and the tutor’s
profile the other.
Fifth, if learning is frequently collective, as we are sure it is, how can the
profile reflect and comment on the collective? The journal could have such
statements as: ‘I joined with Sean and Ilsa in . . . and we managed. . . . There
were times when Sean’s comments really helped me to understand . . .’. In
the examples of the profile above, there is a hint as to how the tutor might
reflect such work.
Sixth, can a space always be found to record that Eureka moment, that
moment when a real breakthrough has been achieved, when learning has
resulted in a real change in the student’s perception of the world and her/
his place in it? And of course, that moment may have nothing to do with
the official curriculum.
Seventh, and vitally important, the community as a whole has to have
come to a collective and agreed understanding as to the meaning of ‘worth-
while learning’, of what the processes of such learning are, and what
constitutes an expression of that learning.
There is one last query. Can we use the technology that is available
to enable teachers to include video clips of the students going about
their work – showing the art work they have done, showing a discussion,
the Community Council at work, the music they have composed, and so
on and on? If only paper profiles are used, then much of the richness of
a student’s life in school will be lost, and because unrecorded, undervalued.
There have been two parallel aims in this chapter. The first is to suggest
ways in which the leadership of a school or college can acquire information
needed to ensure that the school is continuously aware of how it is foster-
ing learning and improving the range of ways in which people learn. The
second is to suggest a tool which goes to the heart of improving the process
138 Leading learning

of learning, turning away from the mere accretion of superficial, and

ultimately meaningless, marks. For the individual student and for the
teachers the second aim is probably the more important. For the school as
a whole, the profile is the more important as it gives, possibly for the first
time, a detailed way of maintaining a steady look at the core activity.
Leading learning
10 Information for organisational
learning – establishing a coherent,
rigorous and workable system of
self-evaluation
Peter Smith

INTRODUCTION
Whole school self-evaluation was not the first thing on everyone’s mind
when we started the development of a workable system a few years ago.
Today it has become something which is central to the leadership and
management of school improvement. It is an increasingly important
element of OfSTED Inspections and of local Advisory and Inspection ‘health
checks’.
I believe that this is a good thing. It returns a degree of control to us as
professional educators, something which only a few years ago seemed to
be lost for ever. It provides the opportunity to prove our expertise and
our worth. Ultimately, it could enable schools to set their own agenda for
improvement, an agenda that dismisses schools as a standardised factory
for information cramming but moves them towards being centres of learning
and a reflection of the finest achievements of human endeavour.
In this chapter, I propose a system of collating information for school self-
evaluation which the reader can adapt. The essence of this chapter is
probably best summed up by considering the following questions posed
by OfSTED:

How does your school rate against the following statements?

1. Standards in our school are higher than average and higher than our
previous best and better than in most other schools serving similar pupils.
2. Progress of most pupils is better than expected from their previous results
or their attainment on entry to the school.
3. The school knows whether any groups of pupils have results which are
lower than those of the rest, for reasons other than prior attainment, and
is targeting and monitoring these groups.
4. The school knows which subjects and teaching groups, relatively, reflect
the highest and lowest standards and which elements within subjects are
the strongest and weakest.
140 Leading learning

The school that knows and understands itself is well on the way to
solving any problems it has. The school that is ignorant of its weak-
nesses, or will not, or cannot, face up to them is not well-managed.
(Office for Standards in Education 2000)

In order to simplify matters I have not entered into all the steps taken over
more than ten years. This chapter has not been written in the form of a
logically unfolding master plan which you can copy. Indeed our actual
plans often changed to accommodate some new piece of legislation or a
new national initiative. Instead it explains ideas and gives sources of infor-
mation. It also presents some formats for information gathering and
analysis which you might adapt to your own situation. None of this would
be of any use if the information gleaned was not used to improve the
education we were giving to our children. Discovering and instigating such
improvements should naturally follow on as the end product of self-
evaluation. The methods of doing this would form a whole new chapter
and, therefore, only have implicit references in this text. There has also been
a degree of poetic licence in an attempt to make the whole readable and
understandable but I do not believe that this has compromised the integrity
of our work.

FIRST STEPS

The mother of invention

Reading through notes and school documentation in preparation for this
chapter, I was reminded of how relentless the pace of change has been in
our schools since the education acts of the 1980s. Those who were teaching
in the 1990s will remember the almost weekly (daily?) deluge of instructions
from on high, consultations with too short a time scale and the seemingly
constant carping by sections of the press and many other people who should
have known better. The introduction of the National Curriculum was a
mammoth task in itself, while the prospect of the end of key stage tests
and the unknown quantity of a tough inspection regime made many people
question why they had chosen to teach in the first place.
Heads who had been appointed well before any of the above started,
suddenly found themselves, as it were, having to play a new game.
Unfortunately, in this game, the rules seemed to change constantly while
the pitch was re-marked in a different pattern almost every day. The
scoreboard showed we were losing, even when we thought we were at least
drawing, while the referee was definitely biased. At least that is the way
it felt to me. Despite all of this, I knew my school was performing well. Local
inspectors had said so and had even written it, parents had confirmed it
and all my experience said we were achieving a great deal with relatively
 Self-evaluation 141

poor resources. I believed our development planning addressed all the

issues and was built on the expertise and judgment of a first-rate set of
professionals. But I soon discovered that we were moving into a new era
when our experience and knowledge would not be enough.
It was at about this juncture that I was asked one of the most significant
questions of my career. A visiting LEA inspector, unofficially wearing his
OfSTED hat, asked me who was the best teacher on my staff. I answered
using my personal knowledge and experience going back over nearly
30 years in primary education. His reply, ‘but how do you know?’ actually
left me lost for words. I knew because I knew because I knew. I couldn’t
back up my thoughts with any performance indicators or comparative data.
I had nothing in writing, no empirical measures, just personal experience
and a degree of self-belief. Now I was a lamb going to ritual slaughter by
a dangerous beast unless I could find protection. Necessity is, they say, the
mother of invention. It was, therefore, this rather defensive posture that led
me towards systems of self-evaluation.

Making a start
But where to start? To many people the words ‘self-evaluation’ immediately
conjure up visions of the statistical analysis of SATs and other tests, of
classroom observation and feedback and possibly long essays justifying the
school’s performance. It did not take long for us to realise that:

• we had been self-evaluating all along but in a much less formal and
rigorous way than would be required;
• self-evaluation is actually a proactive tool which can lead to greater
competency and even win us back some of the right to professional
judgement that we perceive has been taken away by the recent reforms;
• factors influencing raising standards of achievement were more than
just teaching and learning in the classroom.

The implication of this last point was that some official documents at this
time were wrong. We believed that while teaching and learning were the
core purpose of the school, excellence could not be achieved by concen-
trating solely on classroom practice. Any self-evaluation system would
need to examine the whole organisation and management of the school;
its systems, its ethos and its vision. Take, for example, relationships and
leadership. If the school has a climate of trust, a ‘no blame’ culture attached
to innovation and change, a mutual respect of individual strengths and
capabilities, how much easier it is to introduce new ideas for teaching or
classroom monitoring. If school leadership provides opportunities for
individuals to take charge, and therefore responsibility, or if it can success-
fully ensure that the vision for the school is shared and owned by all staff,
142 Leading learning

how much easier to adopt or adapt all the changes being introduced. Get
such matters as these right and a virtuous circle of improvement is created
with obvious implications for pupil achievement.
Looking back, the systems we created or borrowed then were very
good for the time but probably would not stand up today. They did,
however, do the job we wanted at the time. The school was inspected and
the result justified our efforts as we were judged to be a very good school
with four areas of curriculum excellence. Overall the teaching was judged
very good with no unsatisfactory lessons. Data analysis/ evaluation was
said to be a strength. Relationships and pupil behaviour were graded very
good and exemplary. Such a report in the climate of the time could be a
cause for complacency. However, no sooner had we read the report than
members of staff were asking how we might become an ‘excellent’ school
with no weaknesses. In our opinion, the answer lay in taking self-evaluation
to new heights and introducing systems that were so efficient that any
weakness could be identified and acted upon. Quite a challenge, but one
to which we were keen to respond.
What actually happened over the next seven years was a process
of evolution which resulted from a growing awareness of possibilities, a
widening of personal knowledge and expertise, and a reaction to new
demands made by initiatives such as the numeracy and literacy strategies.
Despite the last phrase, it also gave us a greater feeling of being in charge
of our own destiny and not constantly feeling overwhelmed by events.

Cracking the code

At about this time OfSTED had circulated a pamphlet to schools entitled

School Evaluation Matters (Office for Standards in Education 1998). Perhaps
one of the best documents ever produced for schools, this not only gave a
breakdown of a system which would evaluate school performance, but
related it to the inspection framework. The publication is no longer available
but some of what follows is an interpretation of the text and a summary of
sections that we adopted. The core of our efforts at this stage was a School
Improvement File (SIF). This was not intended to be a replacement or
substitute for the School Development Plan (SDP) which remained central
to whole school strategies for improvement/management. Indeed the
making of this file of information formed part of a priority in the SDP
pertaining to school improvement. The purpose of this new file was to
provide a central theme, shape and order in our efforts towards school
improvement by:

1. holding some original documents which monitor, evaluate and draw

conclusions about school improvement;
 Self-evaluation 143

2. cross-referencing supportive evidence in other documents, policies and

practice in order to provide a coherent picture about all that was taking
place and would take place in the school;
3. provide a resource to inform SDP priorities or short-term fixes.

OUR FIRST SYSTEM

The basics of our first system: the collection and analysis

of data
Seven methods of collecting and analysing data were listed in School
Evaluation Matters. Most were already in use and nearly all could be under-
taken by staff in the normal time available for curriculum development
or administrative work. All could be undertaken as part of some other
project, thereby maximising the use of time and easing workload. All would
provide important information which could be co-ordinated and acted
upon. Table 10.1 tabulates the information about the seven methods as
shown in the introduction to our SIF. Note that some of the nomenclature
is now outdated but has been left for the purpose of this illustration.

The basics of our first system: methodology

School Evaluation Matters (OfSTED 1998) stressed the importance of
establishing a climate of understanding the methodology of self evaluation
so that it would become embedded in the school culture. This involves
the activities of monitoring, analysing, evaluating, planning and acting as
discussed below.

1. Monitor performance at all levels in the school.

This is attained by effective school monitoring/evaluation policies and
good inter-staff relations. It can be applied across the school as shown
in the Monitoring and Evaluation Matrix (Table 10.3).
2. Analyse where the standards are high enough throughout the school
and compare with data for similar schools.
An example is shown in Section 4 of our SIF on page 155. In addition
to an individual school’s PANDA, there will be local data such as a local
tracking project and LEA analysis.
3. Evaluate the quality of teaching and learning and other aspects of the
school’s provision against national criteria, to diagnose strengths and
weaknesses.
Published criteria, benchmarks or performance indicators from national
and local sources can be used e.g. OfSTED Inspection Framework. Such
144 Leading learning

Table 10.1 Methods of collecting and analysing data

Method Activity Comment

Checklist The staff carry out an audit Often used prior to embarking
approach against a long list of questions on a new initiative, e.g., audits
generated by the school or by for Literacy and Numeracy
the LEA Strategies, National Grid for
Learning
Ballot approach Staff identify the wide range of Used in staff meetings when
and SWOT influences on their work or planning the approach to a
analysis proposed initiative. They consider problem or topic. Led by
more productive approaches, subject co-ordinators or senior
systematic analysis of strengths, staff. Good for clearing the air
owning up to weaknesses, and dispelling irrational fears (if
identifying opportunities and handled properly)
assessing threats/problems.
Curriculum-led An approach where one or two Originally used by us in the
approach areas of the curriculum are early Management Plans as a
reviewed each year, usually on a systematic way of completing
rotational basis. Weakness – that curriculum review and
curriculum review is normally improvement but then largely
undertaken in the context of the swept aside by a myriad
coverage and design of the Government initiatives. We had
curriculum rather than its not adhered to a strict order
effectiveness in developing but had frequently adapted to
knowledge, understanding and school needs.
skills, with a focus on raising
standards.
Appraisal approach Strategies for the appraisal of We strongly believe that the
teachers and headteachers essence of a high-quality
concentrates the focus of evaluation of teaching and
evaluation closer to our core learning is a system of trust and
purpose: teaching and learning. mutual respect between
professionals who can
communicate hard lessons and
recognise success in all its
guises. The present
performance management
system, if underpinned by the
above, can form an effective
method of developing individual
competencies within the
context of the whole school.
Client-centred Involves the school in surveying Will inevitably throw up
approach the views and attitudes to the something you did not know
school of parents, pupils and and give the opportunity to
other interested parties. improve or put things right.
Essential to remain objective in
the face of seemingly groundless
criticism.
 Self-evaluation 145

Table 10.1 continued

Method Activity Comment

The quality mark Used by us and other schools School Evaluation Matters says,
approach seeking external recognition of ‘Effective self-evaluation does
their success, e.g., School not rely solely on such
Curriculum Awards, Charter endorsements, none of which
Mark, Investors in People. focuses explicitly on teaching
and learning and raising
educational standards.’ This is
true but such endorsements
can highlight particular
successes which support
teaching and learning e.g.
Investors in People shows a
strength in staff development
which in turn influences
personal performance. Such
areas must contribute to the
raising of standards.
Self-evaluation Self-evaluation as distinct from The basis of what we were
(i.e., of pupil review must be able to: trying to achieve, the data from
performance data • take an objective look at which we collated our SIF and
and classroom pupils’ achievements; which would enable us to reach
monitoring) • pinpoint areas of our goal of whole school
underachievement; excellence.
• account for results by
identifying strengths and
weaknesses and the quality
of effectiveness of any part of
the school’s work, particularly
teaching and learning;
• provide information for the
school improvement plan
which will in future be a
vehicle for raising standards
and improving quality.

sources as the national standards for entry to the teaching profession,

the Hay McBer work on excellence in teaching and in leadership,
Investors in People indicators etc have all become available, and
provide a rich source for constructing evaluation formats.
4. Plan what needs to be done to overcome weaknesses and set clear
objectives and targets for improvement.
This is usually accomplished through development plans and target-
setting (official and unofficial). Plans are useless unless they are put
into action so this needs the wholehearted commitment of all, owner-
ship throughout and a shared vision.
146 Leading learning

5. Act on the findings of monitoring, evaluation and diagnosis to promote

more effective teaching and learning through support and training.
There needs to be a recognition that the twin constraints of time and
money inevitably impinge on all we do. Our experience showed that
prioritising and delegation were the keys to action whilst, once again,
commitment, ownership and vision were also essential.

In summary, therefore, any system which is devised must:

• have the support of staff;

• use monitoring of results to focus evaluation on raising standards;
• evaluate the quality of teaching and learning against criteria using a
range of evidence;
• involve all staff, particularly those having curricular responsibilities
and ensure that teachers have the opportunity, not only for self-
evaluation, but for seeing the work of others;
• provide performance feedback and an agenda for improvement;
• ensure that evaluation leads to action, support and development.

Our first system: collating the data

Having established a climate for school improvement through self-
evaluation, we were making a good start. All data concerned with self-
evaluation and analysis were now collated in the School Improvement
File (see Tables 10.2 and 10.3). Where there was cause for concern and a
need for action, plans were made and became part of the School
Development Plan (later called the School Improvement Plan) or, if it was
something which could be dealt with quickly, a note was made and action
taken.
Table 10.2 shows an overview of the SIF structure and content; some
of the questions posed will be very familiar! The structure is entirely based
on School Evaluation Matters. Pages 148 to 157 (Table 10.3) then provide
an explanation of the various sections which make up the system’s struc-
ture, with illustrations of data collection methods.

Table 10.2 The contents of the School Improvement File

Introduction What is school evaluation ?

Section 1: Action Planning, review and outcomes following OfSTED

1a Whole school issues from recent OfSTED report
1b Co-ordinator’s analysis of progress made in each individual subject
1c Implementation of the Post-OfSTED Action Plan
 Self-evaluation 147

Table 10.2 continued

Section 2: External Perspective and Review

2a PANDA/Autumn Package: Analysis of PANDA

2b School Improvement Report (SIR)

Section 3: Internal Data and Review

What are our strengths and weaknesses? Where shall we start?

3a (i) How can we evaluate teaching?
3a (ii) How can we evaluate other areas which may impact on standards?
3b Fulfilling the aims of the school
3c Development Plan priorities and targets
3d Monitoring by HT and co-ordinators, record and outcomes (where
appropriate)
3e Self-review summary using the OfSTED Framework for Inspection

Section 4: Statistical Evidence of Progress and Improvement

How good is our school?

4a How good is our school?
4b Are standards improving?
4c (i) SATs for last 4 years
‘Are standards as high as they should be?’
‘Do pupils make the expected progress or better?’
‘Are results better in some subjects than others?’
4c (ii) Internally administered tests to present cohorts
‘Are standards as high as they should be?’
‘Do pupils make the expected progress or better?’
‘Are results better in some subjects than others?’
4d Progress and gender: ‘Are some groups doing better than others?’
4e Analysis of tracking project long-term data
4f Special Needs
4g ‘How can we monitor other types of achievement?’

Section 5: Target Setting/Our Capacity for Improvement

Annual Target Setting Process

What must we do to improve? Have we got what it takes?

148 Leading learning

Table 10.3 The School Improvement File

Section 1:
Action Planning, review and outcomes following OfSTED

1a Whole school issues from recent OfSTED report.

Completed by HT in consultation with staff.

What to do
• Take each section of your last OfSTED report which relate to whole school
issues.
• Use highlighter pens to draw attention to strengths (green) and weaknesses
(red).
• Reference these S1, S2, etc for strengths/good practice and W1, W2, etc for
weaknesses/concerns
• Enter these on a chart, stating present position and explaining plans for
development/improvement.
• Complete summative statement and future action sections as appropriate.

Why you should do it

• Provides a framework to review a particular aspect of the school
• Provides an on-going assessment of progress and a base for further improvement
• Useful as a basis for Form S4 or similar, School Improvement Plan/Strategic
Planning, dialogue with link inspectors , updates to Governors’ Committees
• If done honestly, provides OfSTED Inspectors with an in-depth assessment of
school progress.
• Shows that you know what’s going on!

When you should do it

• As often as you like, but certainly before an OfSTED Inspection.
• Bear in mind that changes in staff, imposed initiatives and circumstances beyond
your control, may radically alter particular levels of efficiency in the school.

1b Co-ordinator’s analysis of progress made in each individual

subject
The same format as above but concentrating on individual subjects. Usually conducted
by co-ordinators.

1c Implementation of the Post-OfSTED Action Plan

Completed by HT following consultation with staff and drawing from Development Plan,
reports to governors etc.
 Self-evaluation 149

What to do
A record of the progress of your Post-OfSTED Action Plan.
Include the original plan with any updates.
Include all written reports by you to the Governors

Why you should do it

A convenience to you, Governors and Inspectors.
Brings together all aspects of the work undertaken to implement the plan and thereby
provide a coherent record of progress so far.
Feeds reports to Governors and Link Inspectors etc.
A confirmation that you are dealing with points raised by a rigorous evaluation from
outside the school.

When you should do it

On-going from one OfSTED inspection to the next, provides a summary at the end
of each year.

Example
School’s Response to OfSTED report
Implementation of the Post Inspection Plan
(Insert the time report completed in relation to the Inspection)

Key Issue 1:
Actual wording of the Key Issue.

Overview
Your commentary on the relevance of the issue and its place in the development of
the school

What we have done Impact of action Evidence

A succinct list of actions The impact of each action Clear reference to
on the school and its place documentation, statistical
in raising standards evidence which proves
actions and improvements.

Summary judgement:
Your assessment of the work so far and its overall impact

continued
150 Leading learning

Section 2:
External Perspective and Review

2a PANDA/Autumn Package: Analysis of PANDA

What to do
Analyse and pick out key issues from PANDA/Autumn Package
Place in file for ease of access when completing reports, action plans etc. May be
cross-referenced to other sections if necessary

Why you should do it

Condenses complex messages from an enormous amount of data

When you should do it

This section to be changed each year following publication of PANDA. Earlier reports
filed and available.

2b School Improvement Report (SIR)

This may be a termly LEA Inspector’s Report (or local equivalent).

An annotated copy of any external written report would be placed in the file and may be
used as evidence in earlier sections or as a springboard for further action.

Section 3:
Internal Data and Review

What are our strengths and weaknesses ? Where shall we start?

3a (i) How can we evaluate teaching?

Pointers to effective evaluation of teaching.

What to do
This section is intended as a summary of the school’s philosophy and policies for
evaluating teaching. It should make reference to any publications that the school has
found useful and also refer to school policies on classroom monitoring and appraisal.
It may form the introduction to a school policy. Its content should be known and
agreed by all staff.
 Self-evaluation 151

Why you should do it

Explains school procedures/ethos on evaluation of teaching and supports and makes
public a uniform approach.

When you should do it

Now. Review as necessary.

3a (ii) How can we evaluate other areas which may impact on standards?

Taken from OfSTED School Evaluation Matters and showing how the school has inaugurated
systems which enable the evaluation of other areas (e.g. non-teaching) which impact on
standards.

What to do
• Take each statement from School Evaluation Matters (see A to D below) and
consider how the school addresses the matter.
• Make responses by cross-referencing to supportive remarks in the last OfSTED,
SIR, school documents, governors’/parental comments, etc. If the response is
negative cross reference to SIP/SDP or suitable initiative.

Why you should do it

• Provides a thorough assessment of the area for development or foundation for
future success
• Gives a strong indication of the school’s ethos and its success in achieving its stated
Aims

When you should do it

• As required. Update to take account of changes, particularly if initial negative
response requires action.

Example for 3a (ii)

(School’s response shown in boxes on first two of A only)

A. Evaluation of the curriculum and assessment is concerned with how the school
plans for, provides and assesses the full range of learning experiences in order to promote
higher standards. You should evaluate how far the curriculum:

is balanced and broadly based;

See: OfSTED 33, Aims of the school, planning documentation

continued
152 Leading learning

promotes pupils’ intellectual, physical and personal development and prepares pupils for the next
stage of education, training or employment;

See: Aims of the school, OfSTED 2, Reports to Governors and parents

meets statutory requirements to teach the subjects of the national curriculum, religious education
and sex education, where these apply;

etc.

provides equality of access and opportunity for pupils to learn;

meets the curriculum requirements for all pupils with special educational needs;
is planned effectively, provides continuity and progression of learning;
is enriched by curriculum provision, including sport.

B. Pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. These aspects also
reflect the ethos of the school. They should be judged by the extent to which the school:
provides its pupils with knowledge and insight into values and beliefs and enables them to reflect
on their experiences in a way which develops their spiritual awareness and self knowledge;
teaches the principles which distinguish right from wrong;
encourages pupils to relate positively to others, take responsibility, participate fully in the community,
and develop an understanding of citizenship;
teaches pupils to appreciate their own cultural traditions and diversity and richness of cultures.

C. Support, guidance and pupils’ welfare. These areas should be evaluated in terms
of the extent to which the school:
provides effective support and advice for its pupils, informed by monitoring of their academic
progress, personal development, behaviour and attendance;
has effective measures to promote discipline and good behaviour; and illuminate oppressive
behaviour, including all forms of harassment and bullying;
has effective child protection measures;
is successful in promoting the health, safety and general well-being of its pupils.

D. Partnership with parents and community. Evaluation should consider the extent
to which:
links with parents (home/school contracts), contribute to pupils’ learning including information to
parents and reporting on pupils’ progress.
 Self-evaluation 153

3b Fulfilling the aims of the school

An analysis of the aims and how we try to achieve them. Also cross-referenced with OfSTED
and other external documents as supporting evidence. It is particularly important that
supporting evidence is accurate and up to date in this section, referring as it does to a
fundamental of the school.

What to do
• State the aims of the school and comment on how these have been/are/will be
achieved.
• Cross reference to OfSTED Reports, LEA inspector reports, school
documentation, visiting governors’ reports, events etc.

Why you should do it

• Provides a good indication to you and others of how successful the school is in
terms of achieving its aims.
• Shows how successful you are in producing a shared vision with which all can
identify.

When you should do it?

• At least every year.

3c Development Plan priorities and targets

3d Monitoring by HT and co-ordinators, record and outcomes (where

appropriate)

3e Self-review summary using the OfSTED Framework for Inspection

Each of the above, 3c, 3d and 3e to be completed with specific reference to your school.

Section 4:
Statistical Evidence of Progress and Improvement

Background information on Section 4

The availability of performance data in a range of formats has improved beyond all measure
since we devised this section. Originally we had to invent our methods of presenting data
in an understandable and accurate form using Microsoft Excel. This task has now largely

continued
154 Leading learning

been completed for us through the county tracking project and the annual PANDA. The
introduction of benchmark groups, value added and a points system were all to come.
However, the rationale behind what we did and why we did it remains largely intact. Extracts
from the SIF are given below. Today it may only be necessary to take data from sources
available rather than starting from scratch.
The use of testing and analysis of data was already well established by the mid-1990s
and, indeed, was described as a strength of the school. By using our test results databases
built up over a number of years, it was even then, possible to track progress, target individual
needs and adopt suitable corrective strategies in teaching. Since then, however, several
important developments enabled us to improve our systems even further.

What we have done

Sources now provide us with comparative data which enables us to:

• compare our performance with national results and national data groups (PANDA);
• compare our performance with all local schools and local benchmark groups (using
LEA data and tracking projects);
• compare the performance of cohorts against national standardised results in English,
Maths and general potential (NFER);
• compare the performance of individual children in SATs with their performance in
standardised national tests by NFER in English and Maths;
• use subject performance indicators to examine a child’s long-term performance as against
that ‘on the day’.

Each layer of the above gives a truer reflection of performance finishing, as it does, with
the potential of performance of the individual child. When we devised this system, great
emphasis was being placed on the aggregated performance of schools. We felt that such
information did not truly reflect performance; indeed it could obscure excellent teaching
and individual success. By using the data provided by the tracking project, we have been
able to examine the potential and progress of individual pupils and relate this to targets
and performance at national and local level.
Additionally, we have been able to take into account very real differences in our intake,
differences which could totally mask any trends and true levels of achievement. By
aggregating this data we have also been able to monitor trends, revise teaching strategies
and check our own ‘gut’ feelings as to how well we are doing as educators. We believe
that this aspect of school self-assessment has given us a much more accurate picture, relating
as it does to the individual.
The content of Section 4 is set out opposite.
 Self-evaluation 155

Section 4:
Statistical Evidence of Progress and Improvement

4a How good is our school?

We felt that success measured as an end of Key Stage percentage against a national
curriculum level was an extremely misleading measure of school and pupil achievement.
We therefore developed an average level measure which reflected the achievement of all
children. A similar system based on points is now to be found in PANDA reports. Both
systems give credit to schools which manage, for example, to achieve a high proportion
of level 5 at KS2. Furthermore such a system does not ignore the achievement of children
who strive to attain levels below 4.

4b Are standards improving?

Statistical records by individual subject or all core subjects which show yearly results of
the SATs average (points scores). Best shown as a histogram. A commentary is essential.

4c (i) SATs for the last x (decide) years answering the following questions:

‘Are standards as high as they should be?’

School results compared with local and national results and targets in English, Maths and
Science. Comparison with benchmark group and full national results.
‘Do pupils make the expected progress or better?’

A look at end of Key Stage results compared with school-based assessments/tests.

LEAs will probably conduct a tracking project such as that based on NFER maths 7–11,
Progress in English (PiE) and Non Verbal Reasoning Quotient. Standardised test results give
a good indication of progress and ability over time which can then be combined with SATs
to answer the above question.

‘Are results better in some subjects than others?’

Comparison of average or points scores in core subject SATs over the chosen time scale.
Similar figures available from PANDA. Analysis of data used in curriculum development and
adjustments to teaching strategies.

4c (ii) Internally administered tests to present cohorts

Present cohorts’ progress in English, Reading and Maths using Neale Analysis of Reading
and NFER PiE and Maths 7–11. Comment and analysis of yearly results answering the same
three questions as in 4c (i) above.

‘Are standards as high as they should be?’

‘Do pupils make the expected progress or better?’

‘Are results better in some subjects than others?’

continued
156 Leading learning

4d Progress and gender

‘Are some groups doing better than others?’

Comparison of average or points scores of boys and girls in all core subjects using tracking
project and PANDA data. County Tracking Project also gives evidence of social class and
achievement.

4e Analysis of tracking project long-term data

Some current references but rest held over in Data File.

4f Special Needs.

Additional answer to the question,

‘Are some groups doing better than others?’

How the children on the Special Needs Register are achieving success which represents
individual challenge and school-based targets.

4g ‘How can we monitor other types of achievement’?

This question may be answered by using the system described in 1a and 1b. As much
inevitably depends on subjective judgements, the observations of those outside the day-
to-day life of the school are probably of most use. These include Governors, Inspectors,
parents and a range of visitors.
In relation to this wider analysis, School Evaluation Matters says:

‘You may consider pupils’ attitudes, behaviour and personal development in terms of the
extent to which pupils:

• show interest in their work, sustain concentration, develop their capacity for personal
study;
• behave well in and around the school, are courteous and trustworthy and show respect
for property;
• form constructive relationships with each other, teachers and other adults;
• work collaboratively when required;
• show respect for people’s backgrounds, feelings, values and beliefs;
• show initiative and are willing to take responsibility;
• attend well and come to school and lessons on time’.
 Self-evaluation 157

Section 5:
Target Setting/Our Capacity for Improvement

Annual Target Setting Process.

Cross-refers to a separate file on this.

These final questions from School Evaluation Matters are ones which are best answered
by schools on an individual basis.

‘What must we do to improve.’

‘Have we got what it takes?’

EARLY VISITORS
Once we had started work to build our self-evaluation system, over the
following two years we applied the method described above to fine tune,
improve or reconstruct perceived weaknesses. Not such an arduous task
as one might think. For example, Section One completed by subject co-
ordinators not only enabled them to monitor their subject, but provided the
basis for reports to Governors or dialogues with the LEA inspectorate.
At the same time as we were developing and using our system, we were
having to adapt our methods to cope with a new OfSTED framework, new
national strategies, changes to the National Curriculum and a host of other
initiatives and requirements. Within two years of starting we were entering
another chapter in the whirlwind of change we had come to expect.
We commenced work towards the Investor in People award, in itself an
excellent means of self-evaluating the development and management of a
school’s most expensive and important resource, its staff. Two of us were
about to embark on the OfSTED School Self-evaluation course, a useful tool
in our continuing work with classroom monitoring. We had discovered
the useful publication The Numbers Game1 which confirmed much of our
approach to the analysis of test results.
It was about this time that we also discovered the Scottish schools’ system
of self-evaluation, based on the European Foundation for Quality
Management Framework (EQFM).2 Here was a ready-made system that
used an established framework, gave performance indicators and also
provided a comprehensive list of actions and relevant documentation
needed for analysis. It also covered the entire spectrum of school organ-
isation and management in a rigorous but user-friendly way. It was already
becoming obvious that self-evaluation would play an increasing role
in future OfSTED inspection and so it was decided to trial some of the
indicators in parallel with, or instead of, the formats we had devised.
Table 10.4 Our first system: overview: monitoring and evaluation matrix

This matrix provides an overview and guide to our systems of monitoring and evaluation which contribute data to our School Improvement File and thereby
inform whole school improvement. Each school will have a different text in columns A–F which reflect local arrangements

Focus/evaluation A Criteria for B Sources of C Method of D Roles/ E Frequency of F Summative

questions judgement evidence available information/evidence responsibilities occurrence and evaluation: format
collection timeline and destination of
outcome

1 School aims See report in SIF. 1 Feedback from 1 Written report. See Management 1 Termly. Aspects of aims
Do aims reflect visiting governors. 2 Survey of Responsibilities list. 2 Alternate years. figure in HT report
true picture of the 2 Parental survey. statistical analysis. Developed by all 3 On-going. to governors.
school ethos? 3 Teacher 3 Discussion, staff and members 4 Yearly or more See also SIF.
Do all members of observations. informal/formal. of school frequently if
the school 4 Quality of work 4 Levelling and community. requested.
community identify and evident other work
with them? school ethos. examination.

2 Pupil 1 Improvements 1 Reading tests. 1 Individual children See Management 1 Entry, then yearly. Data available to
achievement set against 2 NFER tests. read to Responsibilities list. 2 Yearly, spring staff in class lists.
national figures 3 SATs tests. Headteacher. Data co-ordinated term. Data converted to
and chronological 4 Previous reports. 2 Conducted as per by Headteacher / 3 Yearly, summer charts etc. for
age. 5 Pupil records. test rules. Deputy Headteacher. term (end KS2). summative records,
2 Figures analysed 6 Subject 3 Conducted as Subject 4 Others, yearly by report to
by LEA and school assessments. national rules. co-ordinators arrangement. governors, etc.
in Tracking 4 Compiled by class lead specific 4 and 5 Ongoing. Scores available to
Project report teacher, copy sent discussions. 6 See whole school parents.
and SIF. to new class. Class teachers 2, 3, plan.
3 National 5 Compiled by 4, 5
comparisons by class teacher.
PANDA etc. 6 Agreed by all staff.
3 Budget Mostly outcomes School – mainframe See Financial See Management Monthly printout to All reports printed
set against projected printouts. Procedures file. Res. list. Finance Committee. and distributed as
expenditure. Departments – Office computer Secretary obtains Bi- or tri-termly detailed left.
Final outcome set mainframe printouts. system linked to LEA. report. meeting. LEA figures
against budget plan. Headteacher reports Report to monthly published annually
Efficiency of to Finance governors’ meeting.
resource provision/ Committee.
payment etc. Chair of Finance
Committee reports
to governors.
Gov. Annual Report
to Parents.

4 Teaching Based on OfSTED Classroom 1 and 2 See 1 Co-ordinator with On-going but see 1 Co-ordinators,
criteria, policy 1 Visit by subject Classroom reference to monitoring policy summary in SIF
contains breakdown. co-ordinators. monitoring policy. Development Plan for details. file.
2 Visits by 3 Inspector agrees agreed focus Usual limit 1 session 2 Headteacher, as
Headteacher. sessions with 2 HT / DHT Curric. per half-term. above.
3 Visits by local Headteacher. overview + Exceptions NQT, 3 Feedback to staff,
inspectors. mediation if weaknesses usually verbal.
necessary 4 Report to
3 As above but not governors,
limited to single number, type,
subject. main outcomes
+ NQT mentor. only.
(LEA-trained)

continued
Table 10.4 continued

Focus/evaluation A Criteria for B Sources of C Method of D Roles/ E Frequency of F Summative

questions judgement evidence available information/evidence responsibilities occurrence and evaluation: format
collection timeline and destination of
outcome

5 Pupil support NVRQ scores 1 Yearly progress Data, see SIF file, SEN Co-ordinator, Ongoing assessment, 1 Data available as in
against NFER tests as in 2 Pupil Data file. feedback from staff usually half-termly, 2, Pupil
Maths/PiE scores. Achievement. Support record in and assistants, IEPs. Achievement.
Targets set 2 Year 6 SATs SEN file, see also 2 leading to Other tests as in 2, 2 SATs/SEN policy
individually in IEP. outcomes against left. development of Pupil achievement. report to
Policy aim to help all SEN Policy. Other pupil records. ‘next step’ strategy. governors’ and
children achieve 3 Parent/teacher HT analysis and parents’ annual
Level 3 or above. interview. publication of report.
outcome data. 3 Individual pupils:
annual/special
reports.

6 Staff Completion of Staff Development – Recording course See Staff On-going recording Termly report to
development courses. Appendix to details with explicit Development Policy. of needs/course governors and
Relevance to SDP Development Plan intro to DHT co-ordinates. attendance. section in annual
of feedback. Development Plan HT overall within Yearly summary in report.
One-to-one and and school aims. school Dev Plan. Development Plan. Record kept of
group discussions. Use of IiP criteria Annual. HT/teacher courses attended and
Raising of pupil as performance dialogue. outcomes in
achievements/ staff indicators. Development Plan.
expertise and See also teacher
confidence. appraisals.

7 Communication 1 Do parents have Questionnaires to Periodic All staff to be As necessary, main Information gathered
a coherent view parents/staff/ questionnaires with involved. questionnaire at to be used to inform
of their place in governors etc. opportunities for least every year. next development
their child’s follow up and plan or change
education? feedback to present one.
respondents.
 2 Do all members Other written Compile responses HT has important Information requiring
of the school responses e.g. to discover patterns role in establishing immediate action
community parents’ letters, or widely held beliefs a ‘no blame’ culture should be dealt with,
clearly understand report comments. which can then be which will support and seen to be
systems of used to make development. dealt with, as soon as
organisation and Informal verbal changes where possible.
management? feedback from the necessary.
3 Is there a clearly school community.
stated philosophy Governors can play
of education and Feedback and an important role in
vision which all discussions at ensuring open and
staff support and Governors’ meeting. constructive debate.
own?
4 Are there LEA inspectors.
explicit systems
for the above?

8 Efficiency 1 Do a range of 1 Feedback from 1 Part of See Management 1 Alternate years, Written reports to
procedures exist parental survey/ Development Plan. Responsibilities List. see Development governors on
for all OfSTED. 2 Publication and Ultimately Plan. procedural changes.
contingencies? 2 Informal/formal availability of Headteacher. 2 Annual internal Relevant documents
2 Are procedures staff discussions. documents organisation circulated to
revised and 3 School paramount. review. governing body
renewed as documentation 3 Review of committees as part
necessary? and procedures. documentation, of consultation
3 Are documents usually every 2 progress.
circulated to years.
correct audience
and then available
for later
examination?

9 Curriculum For curriculum, monitoring and evaluation system – see classroom monitoring reports in SIF
162 Leading learning

This work had barely begun when we received notification of an OfSTED

inspection to take place three years and three months after our first.
Although we had not completed all the targets in the School Improvement
Plan (formerly School Development Plan) relating to self-evaluation, we
had reached a fairly advanced stage. Tasks such as updating Form S4
were completed in record time, largely because we had the majority of
information to hand, information that was based on the solid analysis
of data.
Our inspection was one of the first ‘short’ inspections awarded to schools
that had had a good first round inspection. The final report stated that the
school had made ‘excellent improvement’ since the last inspection, 66 per
cent of teaching was judged to be very good or excellent, all four areas of
leadership and management were graded excellent, relationships were said
to be a strength of the school whilst the system of self-evaluation was
described as rigorous. Later we were named as an ‘outstanding school’ by
HMCIS and awarded Beacon status by the DfES. Two of our Beacon areas
were self-evaluation and the use of data.

WHERE NEXT?
The non-existence of a post-OfSTED action plan or key points for improve-
ment was a liberating professional experience. For the first time in perhaps
ten years, I felt that my professional integrity was unchallenged and that
I was actually being trusted to run the school without outside interference.
I also felt that it was necessary to continue the development of our self-
evaluation systems, not only to maintain and perhaps even improve our
performance still further, but also to justify the faith that had been put
in us.
Following the inspection and the award of Beacon status, I explored the
Scottish system and its EFQM framework to a greater depth. I had also
acquired a Lloyds TSB CD-rom entitled Quality in Education which sup-
ported the process of self-assessment against the EFQM Excellence Model.
The CD contained quality tools, best practice resources and school/LEA
generated exemplars to support improvement activities.
We had already started to use parts of the Excellence Model in our normal
on-going evaluations and it now seemed a good idea to examine the
possibilities more widely. Business Link Nottinghamshire was providing
EFQM Assessor Training Courses and following discussions with their
representative, we assembled several local heads, deputies and other school
leaders into an initial group of self-evaluation enthusiasts. About a dozen
schools were represented and, following the successful completion of the
course, the group continued meeting on a regular basis as a quality network.
We were able to run these meetings as a Beacon activity with the attendant
advantages of financial support. Business Link Nottinghamshire also
 Self-evaluation 163

provided us with the services of one of their business advisers and Wyn
Williams, an acknowledged expert on EFQM and an excellent facilitator for
our deliberations.
Additionally, we made contact with André Haynes, the person
responsible for the development of the Lloyds TSB CD-rom. Consequently,
we were kept informed of further changes resulting from the continuous
review of the Excellence Model which was making it of even more use to
schools. Latest versions provide a section on change management, the
evaluation of inclusion/diversity and a school-based case study which can
be used for training purposes. An electronic filing cabinet provides a flexible
system of accessing and cross-referencing school documentation. A second
group of local headteachers has committed to undertake training with this
updated resource and will also take part in a follow-up quality circle.
Did all of this mean that we had wasted our time developing our own
system? The answer is ‘no’ on two main counts. First, at the time, there
was no published system that completely fitted our needs. Second, the
framework we had developed was based on sound principles which
taught us valuable lessons. These lessons could and would be applied no
matter which underlying system we used. The five main sections of our
SIF could still form a core of questions that would always need to be
answered.
Later I invested some time investigating a range of other benchmark
or performance indicator systems. These enabled a pick and mix or best fit
method of assessing almost any area of school life. As well as the systems
above, I examined the West Sussex Model of Self-review, The Charter Mark
criteria, Investors in People, the Hay McBer Models of Excellence and,
of course, the OfSTED Framework for Inspection. A matrix showing their
application over a range of areas of school management/organisation was
drawn up using general headings such as community, governors, assess-
ment. While it is not suggested that all of these be applied in school at
once, they do provide a ready-made series of formats for use by the
person(s) charged with conducting self-evaluation in any area of school life.
For example, they have particular uses in assisting with performance
management or reports to governors. School data or personal self-review
information may be compared with indicators that give strong evidence
of success or otherwise.

CONCLUSION
And finally
. . . a return to School Evaluation Matters. How do you evaluate your
evaluation method? Whatever system you devise or use, whether it’s a
mix and match or ‘off-the-peg’, the following qualities should be present.
If they are, congratulations, you’ve made a start.
164 Leading learning

To monitor and analyse standards you need to:

• collect all available reliable data on attainment and progress with any
other aspects of pupil development which the school values;
• analyse these achievements regularly and systematically, looking for:
trends; relative levels of attainment between subjects, groups and
individuals; highlights; areas of concerns;
• compare data about your school with those of similar schools and with
local and national averages;
• devise and adopt indicators for other important aspects such as
behaviour and pupils’ attitudes to school and seek parents’ and pupils’
views on the school’s strengths and weaknesses.

NOTES
A list of useful resources appears at the end of the book (pages 215–16).
1 Using Assessment Data in Primary Schools, Hedger & Jesson, Shropshire
County Council
2 Some readers will also know EFQM by the name of the ‘Excellence model’
referred to in a NAHT Primary Leadership Paper or through the first Lloyds
TSB CD-Rom Quality in Education.
Leading learning
11 Resourcing learning
Mick Brookes

INTRODUCTION
In the beginning was the word, and the word was with the Local Education
Authority (LEA) officers and those in their favour were blessed. Nowadays,
there are many in leadership roles in schools who do not remember the
times before delegated budgets, when headteachers were freer to be
headteachers, but funds to support the learning process were allocated
on an apparently irrational basis. In contrast, today, the leadership and
management of the school budget is a major role for senior staff and impacts
on the roles of all in the school. Leaders need to be able to make significant
decisions which determine the effectiveness of the school in meeting its
aims. This requires strategic and ethical leadership and it links to the other
chapters of this book.
In this main part of the chapter, I will consider two aspects. The first part
will look at the funding of schools and the second at some aspects of good
practice in the leadership and management of those funds. Those who
are unfamiliar with developments in school finance which have led to
the current responsibilities may wish to turn to the Appendix to this chapter
which charts the journey from the 1980s to the election of the Labour
Government in 1997.

THE FUNDING OF SCHOOLS

In order to understand and to challenge the levels of funding to schools and
the mechanisms which are employed, leaders need to look more widely
and to be aware of the policy context in which the schools operate.
The current Government was elected on the promise of ‘education,
education, education’, suggesting that spending on this vital area of the
social fabric would improve. It was hoped that such a focus would end the
huge inequalities in the funding of education across the country and the
subsequent inequalities of class sizes and facilities which appeared to
depend on a postcode lottery. It was also hoped that any new system would
provide greater transparency as there remained a lack of clarity about where
166 Leading learning

the money was going. In some cases there was considerable leakage between
the funding allocated to education and the final amount ending up in
schools, leading to perennial rows between central government and the
LEAs about where the money had gone. The LEAs blamed the Government
and the Government blamed the LEAs. The schools lost.
This debate sharpened the political situation. An obvious answer to
the funding debate was to distribute money directly to schools on a formula
basis. This was greeted with a chorus of disapproval from the Local
Government Association who saw that losing control over education fund-
ing (the largest ‘purse’ in the local treasury) would strip them of a power.
The compromise that followed, and still exists, resulted in some funding
being allocated directly to schools (the Standards Grant) and some being
allocated to schools via the LEA (the Standards Fund). In addition there
grew numerous separate funding streams that could be bid into. Alongside
this were strict guidelines on the distribution of the general funding to
schools so that LEAs were increasingly being cut back to a smaller and
smaller share of the budget. We now have discrete budgets for LEA and
school funding.
However, there was still some room for ‘sleight of hand’ under these
rules. In one LEA where schools’ funding was particularly dire, it was
apparent that money had been diverted from the education budget and into
the social services budget. When challenged, a local Councillor responded,
‘Don’t think you’re getting your hands on the money we use to run our
women’s refuge!’ This remark brings into sharp focus the problem
for schools and the competing demands at national and local level for a
limited pot of gold. Demand for high cost services (education, health, social
services, crime prevention) will always outstrip supply. High taxation is
one of the hurdles on which ‘socialist’ governments will fall. It is arguable
that low taxation and worsening public services present a hurdle to trip
up a ‘conservative’ administration. This funding pipeline is illustrated in
Figure 11.1.
The determination to ensure that funding should go directly to schools
persuaded the DfES to design a new formula for funding schools. This
formula intends that the funding allocated to schools should be ‘passported’
by the LEA directly to schools. Fairly stringent checks are made to ensure
that LEAs pass on the designated funding to schools (the Individual Schools
Budget, ISB) and the Secretary of State has powers to ensure that this is the
case. He/she may direct an LEA to spend allocated funding on schools.
Some local authorities spend more on education than the government
allocates. This situation will usually lead to higher local taxation . . . and
so the national funding dilemma (higher spending = higher taxation) is
replicated at a local level.
The new formula was devised by the DfES and implemented in April
2003.
 Resourcing learning 167

The funding stream

Funding allocated by central government – bid for by the Secretary of

State for Education against other government departments (e.g. Health,
Defence etc.)

The education budget

Funding for schools and Funding for external

LEAs education agencies (DfES,
Education Formula Spending OfSTED, QCA etc)
Share (EFSS)

LEA LEA Individual Schools Budgets

Funding retained (ISB)
(LEA FSS) funding

This simplified diagram illustrates just how little funding gets into
schools (52%) after everyone has taken a slice.
Even the identified school funding can be raided by LEAs to be
delegated back again for example:
• to match fund Standards Fund allocations, which are then
re-allocated to schools;
• to provide for high cost/low incidence pupils with special needs;
• to run the Schools’ Forum.

Figure 11.1 The funding stream

The new formula was intended to distribute funding to schools so that

the postcode lottery of a child’s entitlement to equality of education was
fair, wherever the child lived. To illustrate how this has worked, it is easier
to confine the situation to the funding of schools in England. Scotland,
Wales and Northern Ireland all have significantly different funding
systems.
168 Leading learning

Inequalities of funding were twofold:

• differences of funding between geographical areas;

• differences of funding between phases of education (Key Stages).

The new system of funding has largely failed to address these fundamental
differences in funding. There are still huge differences. For instance, at the
time of writing, a primary pupil living in Leicestershire receives on average
£360 per annum less than a primary pupil in Leicester City. Year 6 pupils
(primary) are still funded at about 66 per cent of the average Year 7
(secondary) pupil. This can mean that a Y6 pupil is funded at £2,083 per
year in July and at £3,075 six weeks later in September of the same year.
How can this possibly have happened when the new formula was
supposed to be based on a notion of fair funding so that, no matter where
you live, the base unit of funding should be the same? In order to explore
this we need to take a detailed look at how the new formula operates. The
formula comprises four components:

• basic entitlement
• additional educational needs (AEN)
• area cost adjustment (ACA)
• sparsity (primary only).

The basic entitlement certainly conforms to the requirements of the fair

funding lobby. Wherever you are in England (2003), all Early Years pupils
under 5 have the same entitlement, £2,549; all primary pupils have £2,006;
and all secondary pupils have £2,659.
These figures illustrate that while the intention to fund fairly across
England is a clear part of the formula, the opportunity to address the historic
inequality of funding across Key Stages has been missed. Add to this the
class size requirement in Key Stage 1 schools (no more than thirty in a class)
and it becomes obvious that the notional funding for primary education
is drawn out of Key Stage 2 and into Key Stage 1 to enable schools to adhere
to the Government’s class size promise. Key Stage 2 in the shire counties
has thus become the Cinderella of the funding regime.
However, while it looks as though the geographical issue has been
resolved, the formula confounds this belief through the application of the
additional educational needs (AEN) factor.
The additional educational needs factor is computed by the following
components:

• income support (working families’ tax credit);

• English as an additional language (primary);
• ethnicity (secondary);
 Resourcing learning 169

• High Cost Pupils, calculated by income support plus low birth weight
(research shows that babies with a low birth weight do significantly
less well at school and are more prone to ill-health).

This AEN factor adds a huge top-up to the basic entitlement (for instance
Leicestershire pupils receive on average, £14 per pupil while their near
neighbours in Leicester City receive on average £447 per pupil). The distor-
tion of pupils’ entitlement caused by this factor must be questioned.
Few would argue that additional resources are required in the toughest
socio-economic areas, but a difference of £433 seems to be overdoing it,
particularly when there are pockets of extreme deprivation in the shire
counties, and considering also all the problems of rural deprivation.
The area cost adjustment has a less profound effect, and used to favour
the Greater London area, but is now more widespread. The ‘Earnings
Survey’ is used to calculate this and gives a geographic index for all LEAs.
There are 51 LEAs out of 148 that receive no area cost adjustment.
The net effect of any formula change is that there will be winners and
losers, and there have been winners and losers across the country. Therefore
a transition was put in over two years so that LEAs moving to higher budget
shares would receive two tranches of additional funding, while LEAs that
were moving downwards lost funding over two years. Even so, in 2003
the introduction of this formula produced a funding and political disaster
that threatened to destabilise the Government’s main policy – ‘education,
education, education’. The problems encountered by schools in 2003 were
complex and compound, and are summarised as follows:

1 Although the LEAs that were losing funds had an historically larger
slice of national funds, schools had quite properly spent up to the limits
set. The effect of greater funding can be most keenly felt in advan-
tageous levels of staffing, better classroom resources and better support
for a wider curriculum. It is always difficult to adjust down, whatever
one’s income. This is as true in schools as it is in the domestic situation.
This led to an outcry from the ‘South’ that the ‘North’ had grabbed their
money. This is only partly true; the winners and losers were scattered
across the country. However the reduction in the amount of the Area
Cost Adjustment (largely a Home Counties benefit) did have an effect.

2 At the same time as changing the formula, huge increases hit schools
in the form of:
• increases in the employers’ rate of ‘on-costs’ (National Insurance and
teachers’ pensions);
• increases caused by the compression of the teachers’ pay scale;
• insufficient funding of the performance pay scheme;
170 Leading learning

• a continuous stream of government initiatives that are either

unfunded or partially funded. (e.g. inclusion of pupils with moderate
or severe learning difficulties into the mainstream setting, and
workload reduction).

This severely damaged schools’ budgets and caused widespread job losses,
prevented in some areas only by the use of contingency reserves. While, for
the first time, spending in England’s schools was in mid-table relative to
our European neighbours (OECD 2003), cost pressures in schools had risen
by more than the extra funding put in. This amounts to an embarrassment
as the tenets of creating a new funding system were to:

• create greater clarity about funding streams;

• even up the disparities in funding between geographical areas;
• create budget stability over three years.

Only the first of these was successful.

There are still wide disparities in levels of funding. Some disparity is
unavoidable. It does cost more to support the disadvantaged in our schools.
The question is – how much more? It appears that the ‘basic entitlement’
aspect of the funding formula is at too low a value, while the AEN factor
has too high a weighting. The solution is obvious – freeze the additional factors
and put increase into the basic entitlement. However, the political expedient
for a Labour government is to pour money into areas of deprivation – so
no change is expected!
In summary, the net negative effect on schools was that they were hit by
all of the cost pressures above, in addition to the school-based factor of
falling rolls across the primary sector. This left some schools in dire financial
straits, and destabilised budgets.
However, before we put all the lights out, there is no doubt that greater
funding over the past few years has led to real benefits in schools:

• more employed staff;

• unprecedented levels of ICT equipment and software;
• gradually improving buildings and facilities;
• standards of literacy in the primary sector that are the envy of the world
(Ogle et al. 2003) and some good rankings in the PISA study (OECD
2002) as discussed in Chapter 12.

It is now time to turn the focus to the management of funding in schools

and the leadership opportunities in the deployment of school-based
budgets.
 Resourcing learning 171

LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT OF FUNDING

IN SCHOOLS
It would be a mistake to think that dealing with the financial resource
is simply a management function. The entrepreneurial ability of school
leaders has been remarkable over the past decade. The new Workload and
Standards initiative from the DfES has already produced innovative solu-
tions to the challenge of providing a reduction in workload and the
introduction of quality reflective time for teachers across the country. This
is discussed further later in this chapter. However, effective leadership can
only happen within a context of sound management.
A useful differentiation between leadership and management can be
demonstrated in the analogy of planning a journey. Leadership requires
the vision of destination. Effective management will provide the resources
to realise the vision. The vision without the management will result in a
mere dream, while management without vision will stultify and stagnate.
In a churchyard in West Sussex, England, there is a useful summary of this
condition.

A task without a vision is drudgery

Vision without a task is a mere dream
A vision and a task are the hope of the world.
Anon.

So, the task is to set an effective context within the school. Badly managed,
this can result in an over-bureaucratic monolith that stultifies growth and
the creative use of resources. In diagrammatic form the continuum of
management would appear as follows:

Tight systems Loose systems

• Over bureaucratic • Thin policy direction

• Excessive control • Insufficient control
• Insufficient flexibility • Dangerous flexibility
• Constant meetings and • Lack of structured
checks meetings and checks
• Blocking the flow of • Free flow of funding
funding without agreed limits

A generality would be to claim that the larger the school organisation, the
tighter the bureaucratic structure and control; the smaller the organisation,
the lighter that structure needs to be. Larger organisations also have a
greater capacity to delegate control functions. The danger of systems that
are too loose is the possibility of the accusation of financial impropriety.
(Sadly this is the subject of too many disciplinary actions involving budget
managers.)
172 Leading learning

Adopting a robust system of financial control is not difficult. OfSTED,

the Audit Commission, LEAs and private organisations all have guidelines
and advice to assist. Schools must consider the following if they are to
operate within a sensible construct of financial probity and control and
to satisfy the demands of OfSTED and the LEA finance department.
Schools should

• plan the future;

• access external funding;
• set balanced budgets;
• operate effective and efficient systems;
• benchmark spending against other schools;
• operate within a ‘best value’ policy;
• provide ‘value for money’;
• have well-thought-out financial planning cycles;
• be clear about roles, responsibilities and accountabilities.

Aspects of thinking and planning strategically have already been covered

in earlier chapters. I will focus here on developing the ideas in the last four
points above.

‘Best value’ policy

The word ‘policy’ is misleading here. The word conjures up the vision of
a dusty tome hidden on a shelf. A true best value policy should permeate
the operation of the school management systems in an active and con-
tinuous state. Best value requires that the school will constantly compare
its spending decisions with other schools, consult with appropriate
personnel, challenge orthodoxies and compete with similar schools in terms
of effective management.
A good working policy will guide the provision of goods and services to
a school. It is wrong to think that best value is another term for ‘cheapest’.
In life, as well as in school, the cheapest option does not necessarily represent
the best value. Conversely the most expensive option will not necessarily
provide the best quality.
One illustration of the most difficult area of achieving best value is
in the provision of computer hardware to schools. There are numerous
disaster stories up and down the country of schools that have gone for a
cheap option, only to find that machines do not have the capacity to perform
properly and therefore require replacement or costly upgrades. This
situation has not been helped by some LEAs providing heavy-handed
coercion to the purchase of ‘recommended’ systems that are very expensive,
and it has also suffered from a lack of guidance from Becta, the national
committee responsible for the oversight of ICT provision. (Until recently
 Resourcing learning 173

Becta did not have an efficient system of checking with schools whether
ICT products worked well.)
Likewise the selection of plumbers, electricians, gasfitters and boiler
maintenance personnel is fraught with the probability of shoddy service
or exorbitant costs. All this takes time to administer, and can be time taken
away from the ‘teacher’ part of headteacher. This is particularly true in small
primary schools. Sadly some LEA provision of domestic services (which
would be an asset to schools) is still riddled with shoddy workmanship and
work done at times not convenient to the effective operation of schools.
Most heads will have stories of work neglected over the summer closure,
only to be started in September when the pupils return.
The services of known and trusted local firms can greatly reduce costs,
expenditure and precious time. Even so, occasional challenges as to the
competitiveness of your trusted friend should be made. The use of local
providers also raises the necessity to be scrupulous in the declaration of
interest, and avoidance of falling into legal difficulties of taxation. In short,
everything is required to be ‘above board’.
‘Best value’ represents the culture in which modern schools exist – the
checks and balances applied to external providers are also applied to
schools themselves. OfSTED must report on whether schools provide value
for money. The next section will examine what this means.

‘Value for money’

Currently OfSTED ‘measures’ schools according to a set of criteria that seek
to give a definition of value for money. Inspectors will look at the school’s
effectiveness (standards, leadership/management, etc.), contextual factors
(the school and its pupils in the local environment), and unit costs. This will
give a definition of ‘Value for money’ which is best illustrated by two
extremes in Figure 11.2. School A has high standards, unfavourable
contextual factors and low unit costs. Such a school would be judged to give
excellent value for money. School B might have poor effectiveness (low
standards, weak leadership/management), favourable contextual factors
and high unit costs. Such a school would be considered to give poor value
for money.
This is really quite a crude measure for several reasons.
Effectiveness as measured by league table status will depend on the context
of the school. It is a truism that children from privileged backgrounds
outperform children from deprived backgrounds.
For contextual factors, OfSTED has chosen to use the narrow measure of
free school meals (income support). This is only one element of the school’s
contextual factors and may give a very misleading view. An unemployed
barrister will probably have children better equipped to do well at school
than an unemployed manual worker. This does not condemn the deprived,
174 Leading learning

Effectiveness Excellent A B Poor

Contextual factors Favourable B A Poor

Unit costs High B A Low

resulting in a judgement of

Value for money Excellent A B Poor

Figure 11.2 OfSTED judgement on value for money for schools A and B

but merely represents common sense. Other factors, such as the percentage
of higher education qualifications in the community or the occupation of
parents, could be more significant contextual factors, but are largely ignored.
Unit costs will favour large schools in the worst funded areas with the
worst funded Key Stage. (A two-form entry junior (Key Stage 2) school in
a shire county is likely to have very low unit costs.) On the other hand, a
small (50 place) primary school may have very high unit costs and thus be
at a disadvantage.
However, whatever the fairness of the system, it is up to the school
leadership team to ensure that funding is properly expended and that the
school does not (for instance) have large unexplained balances. (A sur-
prising number of governors think that having £110,000 in reserves shows
good financial management.)
OfSTED will also examine whether clear financial management supports
educational priorities. This requires that the School Improvement Plan be
properly costed. There should be a clear audit trail that links the provision
for expenditure on a specific priority to the impact that the expenditure
has on the effectiveness of the school. However, it would be easy to get
into a ‘measuring the marigolds’ frame of mind here. Sometimes it is not
easy to measure impact, particularly when (for instance) applied to profes-
sional development. Funding aimed at a ‘tips for teachers’ course may have
an immediate, but limited, impact whereas funding for a school leadership
course may have a less measurable impact, but the behavioural change may
be far more significant.
One aspect more closely investigated by OfSTED is whether specific
grants have been used for specific purposes. The provision of ‘hypothe-
cated’ funding may be seen as a good way of ensuring that schools use
funding for specific purposes, but it does rather militate against the ideal
 Resourcing learning 175

of delegated budgets whereby schools operate within their local context

and know what best suits their needs. For instance, a school in good struc-
tural repair may not need to use its Capital Funding grant for that purpose,
but, because the use of that funding is strictly limited to the fabric
(renovation, repair or new build) of the building, it is a contravention of
the rules to use it for any other purpose. While there was a need to ensure
that the fabric of our schools was improved, the maintenance of tight control
means that schools will either waste precious resources on structural
expenditure that is not entirely necessary or risk losing the funding. It
is also absurd that capital funding can be used to install new windows,
but cannot (for instance) be used to paint (and therefore maintain) existing
windows. There are numerous other examples of such bureaucratic short-
sightedness.
A valuable aspect of OfSTED scrutiny is financial benchmarking (as
shown in Table 11.1) which compares the use of resources, in this case in
two-form entry junior schools. This information is useful in that it provides
a direct comparison between similar ‘types’ of school.

Table 11.1 Financial benchmarking

Category School P Average Highest Lowest

Employees 86.03% 81.97% 86.03% 74.50%

Premises 3.54% 6.00% 7.96% 3.54%
Supplies 7.88% 7.54% 11.18% 4.23%

The importance of this information is not that it varies from school to

school, but that the differences can be explained. Comparatively, therefore,
it looks as though School P’s expenditure on staffing is excessively high.
The reality is that this school decided to directly employ its grounds and
premises staff. This factor explains the above average expenditure on direct
employee costs, and shows why that the premises costs are the lowest. The
other schools have their ‘bought’ premises services shown in this category.
However, the school’s expenditure on supplies looks about average.
OfSTED will visit only once every few years, and as long as the school’s
own systems of information gathering and review are firmly in place, it has
nothing to fear from external scrutiny. Nevertheless, external inspection is
an important part of the guarantee that public money is being properly
managed.

The financial planning cycle

There is a cyclical nature to the planning of school expenditure that is an
essential tool for ensuring that the impact of falling or rising revenue is
176 Leading learning

properly predicted. A calendar of events may look as below. For this

example, a financial year cycle has been used, but one of the anomalies of
the administration of finance in school is that we deal with two or possibly
three years – financial, academic and calendar. It is important to time
meetings to take place a few days after the end of the financial ‘quarter’
as the full month’s quota of payments will not be known until then. This
keeps the ‘pending’ column manageable.

April – new budgets begin. Consultations with Finance Committee and

consent to present the budget to the full governing body (mandatory
regulation) need to be given. April may seem a little late to external
eyes, but as many schools may have received budget allocations only
shortly before this date it represents a reasonable timescale.

July – review with the Finance Committee the performance of the

budget against the first quarter of the budget set for the beginning of
the year. An expectation of 25 per cent expenditure may be misleading
for two reasons. First, incremental rises in teacher’s pay do not impact
until September, so the profile will probably be lower than 24 per cent.
Second, expenditure on school resources (books, pencils, equipment
etc.) is normally made at the beginning of the year and so the profile
may look much higher than 25 per cent. This period of time is suffi-
cient to be certain that no major mistakes have been made in the
budget setting exercise. This is also the time for finalising the School
Improvement Plan (SIP) for September of the new academic year. The
current budget will have to support 7/12 of the envisaged expenditure,
i.e. September to March.

October – half way through the school year. If things are going badly
off track, schools will know by now! The SIP should have been agreed
by the full governing body, or at least presented to the appropriate
curriculum committee. This is not too early to begin planning for the
following financial year. The school’s main internal factor, the numbers
of pupils on roll, will be known. The pupil driven factor will amount
to approximately 80 per cent of the school’s total budget. What is less
clear for many schools at this stage is the number of new pupils to be
enrolled the following September. This will have a significant effect
on the school’s future funding, and so can make the budget prediction
exercise a far more risky business.

January – predicting out-turn values for the current year’s budget

should be possible at this stage. Higher than expected income, or
unexpected expenditure, should be known by now. Early warning of
budget difficulties makes it possible for the school to operate without
 Resourcing learning 177

using crisis management. If job losses look likely, this is not too early
to warn staff about the possibility of redundancies. The period between
the finance meeting in January and the budget agreement meeting in
April is a busy one. New shapes and dimensions and initiatives will
need to be ‘felt out’ without absolute certainty about the capacity to
fund.

Roles and responsibilities

The Senior Leadership Team (a committee of one in very small schools!)
should consider consultation with Governors, school staff, pupils, parents
and the LEA as key stakeholders.

Governors
They must approve the budget and should be kept regularly informed about
budget progress and planning. The Finance Committee will require a
greater level of detail than the governing body as a whole, who should
just receive agreed ‘headlines’. It is not an efficient use of time to debate
budget detail in two committees. If the governing body is delegating power,
it must trust the sub-committee. The governing body is a curious beast: it
can either be a source of support and guidance for the beleaguered head,
or it can be a millstone that interferes with the day-to-day management of
the school. These dimensions are illustrated below.

Commitment

High maintenance The ideal governor –

governor, will do has the best interests of
things but only if there the school at heart and
is personal is available
aggrandisement

Self-interest Altruism
May be seen only Good governor, but
fleetingly when there large social conscience
is some personal means that s/he is not
agenda to be achieved available enough

Absence

Figure 11.3 Dimensions of governance

School staff
All the members of staff (not just teachers) have a real vested interest in
the effective management of the budget. Their jobs depend on it. Therefore
178 Leading learning

they should be kept regularly informed. The whole staff should have the
opportunity to contribute to the SIP. It is good practice and good leadership
and management development to delegate funding to post-holders. Some
budget information (e.g. salary details) is confidential and should not be
open to general view.

Pupils
All pupils can be involved but the extent varies according to age. Many
schools give School Councils a delegated sum to use to fund their own
initiatives.

Parents and carers

Parents and carers have a right to see the summary school expenditure
(provided in the Annual Governors’ Report), and may be kept informed
about budget progress either as representatives on the governing body or
as part of the PTA. The group may want to contribute to the school budget
share.

The LEA
The LEA has a statutory duty to ensure that school budgets are properly
maintained and will require to be regularly informed. This duty still
gives LEAs some considerable power which is exercised to the benefit or
detriment of schools, according to the prevailing LEA culture. The imple-
mentation of ‘Consistent financial reporting’ means that LEAs are required
to receive and report budget income and expenditure in a particular format
that enables comparisons to be made from school to school and from LEA
to LEA.
The wider the involvement and consultation on the budget has been,
the more likely it is that the whole school community will take ownership
of responsibility. However, strong ethical leadership needs to be demon-
strated if funding is not to be pulled into projects that do not contribute to
the school’s agreed vision and its strategic focus.
In addition to roles and responsibilities of individual stakeholders, there
are levels of working to be considered. To be effective and efficient, finance
in school should be dealt with on three levels:

1 Administration – dealing with the day-to-day maintenance of ordering,

paying invoices, completing staffing returns and obtaining budget
summary information. All schools should have the capacity to operate
at this level without the direct involvement of the headteacher or senior
staff.
 Resourcing learning 179

2 Management – checking that budgets are running on track, getting

quotations for works costing more than £1,000, preparing information
for the Finance Committee, managing virements within permitted
parameters. If schools have a competent person to operate at this level,
it frees up the headteacher to be headteacher! However there should be
regular (monthly) collaboration at this level between the senior
leadership team and the budget manager/bursar. Those who lead very
small schools will find that it is at this level that frustrations are felt as
all roles fall on the headteacher.
3 Leadership and strategic development – this is the realm that requires
vision, a strategic focus for the school and entrepreneurial skill. If s/he
is not officially part of the Senior Leadership Team, the budget manager
should be included in these discussions, not least so that vision can be
grounded in reality.

CONCLUSION: STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP AND

MANAGEMENT OF THE BUDGETARY PROCESS
The degree to which there is scope to operate visionary leadership is
governed to some extent by the capacity of the budget. Tight budgets, and
little room for change within the school, mean that there is little scope to
manoeuvre once the essentials (staffing, utilities, books and paper, etc.)
have been paid for. But even with tight budgets it is possible to free up
funding that can make a difference in the classroom. For instance, when
teaching staff leave, decisions can be made about replacement by a newly
qualified teacher (NQT), or even the employment of teaching assistants
(TAs). The difference in cost between an NQT and a member of staff on
the top of the scale can be as much as £15,000. While some of that funding
will be needed to support the teacher, funds can also be used to provide
additional high cost equipment, schemes of work, or to fund field trips.
Care must be taken, however, not to commit the additional funding to items
(such as staffing) that do not take into account the rising cost of employing
an NQT on an incremental basis each year.
A true test of leadership and creative management is already challenging
schools across the country. The workload and raising standards initiative
is challenging school management and fundamental tenets of the profession
in the role of the TA. There is clear division between those willing to
expand the role of the TA to the borders (and beyond?) of the kingdom of
the teacher, and those who adamantly oppose this concept. Visionary
leadership can be exciting, but it can also be risky. Partnership between key
players in the school can ensure that vision is properly planned and
channelled into new reality.
We live in interesting times. They have been interesting for the past decade.
We are getting closer to a funding system that is fit for the twenty-first
180 Leading learning

century; the clarity of the formula is there, but it needs to be fine-tuned. But,
however good the formula, if it does not have the quantum of cash to drive
it, it will lead to failure. A change in central government priorities, an
expensive war, a costly disaster or a change of government may all affect
the way in which schools are funded.
The school of the future may be a lonely place. If external support is cut
away to allow greater funding to be aimed at the classroom, we must ask
ourselves, ‘who cares for the carers?’. There can be no replacement for the
excellent teacher who motivates, and builds hopes and dreams in his/her
children. The principal use of funding of schools is very simple. It was, is
and always will be to enable that person to be the gateway to new futures
for our children.

APPENDIX

School finance in England: a recent history

Before the Education Reform Act (1988) the funding of schools from the
school’s point of view was a very simple matter. All they received was a
virtual pittance in order to buy the basic tools of the classroom: books,
pencils, paper and wax crayons. This did not amount to much – the equiva-
lent, according to a pressure group in Lincolnshire, the FEN (For Education
Now) Group of a Mars Bar a day. The LEA, rather than the schools,
controlled staffing, building maintenance, minor works and so on. There
was no clarity about where the funding had gone, what method had been
used to distribute that funding or what accountability there was for that
distribution. This is, of course, the prevailing situation in many countries.
However, it did mean that headteachers were freer to be headteachers,
and that clerical support was exactly that. No need then for bursars and
office managers. But the random distribution of the allocation of resources
was all too evident in the first round of budget distribution to schools on
a formula basis.
Local Management of Schools (LMS), introduced by the Education
Reform Act (DES 1988), has dramatically taken power away from the Area
Office of the LEA (many are now closed). At its extreme, grant-maintained
schools removed themselves completely from the local structure, and were
autonomous within a framework of control directed by the Department
for Education and Science.
This is an important historical turning point, and began a furious struggle
for survival by the local council against a strong move towards central-
isation promoted by the Conservative Government of the time. This power
struggle still exists today, between the current Labour Government and the
champions of local democracy led by the Local Government Association
(LGA). This group has political power because it represents many of the
 Resourcing learning 181

local party members (in all political parties) who are relied upon to rally
the troops at election time.
The introduction of school based finance in the 1990s caused, respectively,
widespread uproar or glee among the favoured or the neglected of the
previous baronial rule. The neglected found that budgets allocated by
formula for the first time, aimed at distributing funding on a more equable
basis, meant that they received funding that was above their current
allocation of staffing and resources. On the other hand, those who had been
in favour in the previous regime were outraged that their generous alloca-
tion of funding and resources was not matched by their formula funding
allocation. Opprobrium followed. Transitional arrangements were put in
that enabled those losing funding to manage staff reductions, while those
moving to a higher base had to wait three years to receive the full benefit
of the new funding regime. Interesting times . . . but things were to get
much worse!
The delegation of funding to schools and the vast new powers extended
to Governing Bodies meant that accountability was firmly placed within
the school, and allowed the government of the early 1990s to make swinge-
ing cuts in the education budget. Because the effect of these cuts was not
felt so much at the LEA, the outcry came from 24,000 individual schools
without a collective voice. The effect of these cuts became a national scandal.
Funding of education in England was one of the worst in any developed
country (OECD 1994) and class sizes were beginning to look as though
schools had returned to Victorian times. Indeed, ‘victorian’ politicians
of the time thought that this was ‘a jolly good thing’. They reasoned that a
good teacher ‘could teach 40 children in a bus shelter’. Some of us were
beginning to think that we might have to, as the fabric of school build-
ings had deteriorated to the extent that they were uninhabitable in wet
weather! Such was the furore over the plight of schools that a report
commissioned by the National Association of Headteachers, and conducted
by Nottingham University ‘The Class Size Report’ (Day et al. 1996), severely
embarrassed the Secretary of State who, supported by the Chief Inspector
of Schools, issued a statement claiming that ‘class size did not matter, it
was the quality of teaching that counted’. This was greeted with such
incredulity by the general public, not least by the ‘elite’ who were paying
to send their children to private schools to benefit from small class sizes,
that the subsequent election defeat was not much of a surprise, so far had
the government moved away from the reality of the state school classroom.
Things improved very little under the early years of the new Government
(1997), despite the promise of ‘education, education, education’. Most of
the previous Government’s systems were retained but with the abolition
of grant-maintained status. As reported earlier in this chapter, we are now
beginning to see a focus on funding and several changes to the system,
largely as a result of an outcry from schools which attracted media attention.
182 Leading learning

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
My grateful thanks to Peter Downes (ex Headteacher of Hinchingbrooke
School and one of the fathers of school-based funding), and George Phipson.
Their commitment to school funding has been instrumental in leading the
agenda for change. Thanks also to the NAHT ‘think tank’ on funding that
has contributed to the funding debate.
Part IV

Leading transformation
12 The transformation of schools in the twenty-first century
Leading transformation
12 The transformation of schools
in the twenty-first century
Brian J. Caldwell

INTRODUCTION
My approach to this exploration of transformation is to adopt an inter-
national perspective. A study of education in other countries is important
for several reasons. First, to the extent that systems of education have
common aspirations, strategies that have led to success in other places may
be adopted or adapted in the local setting, and strategies that have proved
unsuccessful elsewhere may be set aside in the search for solutions. Second,
problems that appear intractable in the local setting may be the subject of
fresh enquiry leading to possible resolution when approaches in other
countries are critically examined. Third, knowledge of approaches in
other places may suggest possibilities for critical scrutiny in the search for
alternatives. Fourth, local policy and practice can be affirmed with know-
ledge that others have adopted similar approaches and have achieved
success. In each instance it is acknowledged that a country should not adopt
an approach from another setting in the absence of evidence that it suits the
local scene. The insights in this chapter thus draw from my knowledge of
what is occurring in many countries. I hope that the outcome will add value
to each of us as we seek to lead the transformation of schools in the twenty-
first century.

THE CASE FOR TRANSFORMATION

It is necessary at the outset to establish the case for transformation. After
all, some may argue that there has been enough transformation and that
too many changes are being foisted or foreshadowed. Surely this is a time
for consolidation. Not so!
There are four reasons why further transformation in desirable as well
as inevitable. First, the performance of significant numbers of students
falls short of expectations. Second, every scenario suggests that further
change is inevitable if the institution of ‘school’ is to survive in the years
ahead. Third, the technologies of learning are changing in irresistible and
186 Leading transformation

irreversible ways. Fourth, each of the first three calls for new associations
between schools and other human services in the public and private sectors
– the school as a stand-alone institution cannot and should not survive.
In relation to performance, we can look at the UK where the achievements
of the schools are a cause for celebration, according to some media reports.
The students are among the very best in the world judging by the perfor-
mance of 15-year-olds in tests of their capacity to apply knowledge and
skills in reading, mathematics and scientific literacy to real life problems.
A total of 265,000 students from 32 countries participated in the landmark
Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) conducted by the
OECD (OECD 2002). The UK ranked seventh behind Finland, Canada,
New Zealand, Australia, Ireland and South Korea in reading; eighth
behind Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Finland, Australia, Canada and
Switzerland in mathematics; and fourth behind South Korea, Japan and
Finland in science. However, a more sombre mood takes hold when deeper
analysis reveals that the disparities among different groups of students
are wider in the UK, along with Australia and New Zealand, than in 29
of the 32 countries. No government will rest on these achievements or be
satisfied with these disparities. The case for transformation can stand on
this fact alone.
There is evidence that these and other disparities are becoming greater.
Is such a trend sustainable? Not so, according to some scenarios, as illus-
trated in two of the three outlined below. Each scenario is written as if in
the future, describing an outcome in 2010 if certain events come to pass. It
must be stressed that these are not the only scenarios, but they are examples
of credible constructions that commence with current circumstances.

Scenario 1: public schools are safety net schools

It is 2010. The disparities among schools in terms of outcomes and resources
that were evident in 2002 have widened, especially but not exclusively at
the secondary level. About 60 per cent of secondary students attend private
schools, reflecting a steady increase over recent years. Parents became
increasingly dissatisfied with education offered by schools owned by public
authorities. They left the system, prepared to invest ever-larger proportions
of personal resources to assure their children success in a knowledge
society, with access to the individual care and attention and the increasingly
rich range of technologies necessary to achieve these ends. Most public
schools are now simply safety net schools.

Scenario 2: the decline of schools

It is 2010. Schools are rapidly disappearing. A range of educational, tech-
nological and social developments overtook the institution that dominated
 The transformation of schools 187

the twentieth century. Schools became increasingly dangerous places to

be, a perception fuelled by media accounts of frequent violence and the
prevalence of drugs. Combined with advances in information and com-
munications technology, home schooling gathered momentum in the early
years of the century. Support for secondary schools, in particular, fell
dramatically when traditional approaches to curriculum, teaching, learning
and organisation proved impervious to change. Innovative learning centres
steadily replaced them, with many operated in public–private partnerships
as government, parents and the wider community lost patience with the
existing system.

Scenario 3: the transformation of schools

It is 2010. The disparities among schools in terms of outcomes and resources
that were evident in 2002 have narrowed. There is agreement on expecta-
tions for schools and the values that should underpin the endeavour.
Governments concentrate their efforts on creating a climate in which the
whole community provides resources to support schools, with a demand-
ing regime of accountability in the use of a steadily increasing pool of
public funds. There is a range of innovative approaches in community-
based learning centres and in the use of information and communications
technology. There is still a place called school, but that place has been
transformed after a decade of creative leadership.
Scenarios along these lines are not the daydreams of an idle academic.
A conference on ‘Schooling for tomorrow’ in Rotterdam in November
2000 led to the presentation in April 2001 to OECD Ministers of Education
of a set of six scenarios (OECD 2001). Two were described as ‘status quo’
(‘bureaucratic school systems continue’, ‘teacher exodus – meltdown’); two
were described as ‘re-schooling’ (‘schools as core social centres’, ‘schools
as focused learning organisations’); and two were described as ‘de-
schooling’ (‘learning networks and the network society’, ‘extending the
market model’). That the OECD is prepared to contemplate such a range
of scenarios is evidence that education, especially public education, has
reached a watershed, and that transformation is inevitable if expectations
are to be realised. The blueprint for leadership presented here is designed
to bring about Scenario 3 (‘the transformation of schools’). It is offered as
the starting point for ‘a decade of creative leadership’.
The third reason why transformation is irresistible and irreversible is
derived from change in pedagogy, energised in part by advances in infor-
mation and communications technology (ICT). Expressed simply, people
can now learn anywhere and anytime. Learners have been empowered as
never before. Schools must accommodate these developments as surely
as they accommodated the advent of the printing press. More broadly,
however, our knowledge about what works and why in approaches to
188 Leading transformation

learning and teaching is better than it has ever been. Accommodation along
these lines is part of Scenario 3 (‘the transformation of schools’).
The fourth reason is connected to the other three and, indeed, underpins
them if expectations for schools are to be realised. Schools will not survive
as free-standing isolated institutions unless there is change of another kind.
The call for ‘joined-up solutions to joined-up problems’ applies more to
schools than to most other organisations if the disparities in student
achievement are to be addressed. The concept of full-service schools
where a range of public and private sector services is located at or near the
school is one manifestation of what is required. The concept of a ‘whole-
of-government’ approach to dealing with particular services is another
manifestation. Michael Barber’s role in the UK as Chief Advisor to the Prime
Minister on Delivery is concerned with the links between services such as
education health, law enforcement and transformation. To achieve these
links, at national or local levels, calls for a dramatic change in culture – a
transformation.

THE BLUEPRINT
The blueprint which I propose comprises one vision, three tracks, six values,
four dimensions, five domains and one integrating theme, as shown in
Table 12.1. The vision refers to the desired outcome of the global trans-
formation that is under way and the emerging consensus on expectations
for schools. The tracks refer to the broad directions of change in schools
and school systems. The values are those that underpin a sense of the public
good in education. The dimensions refer to major classifications of
approaches to leadership that should be evident in practice. The domains
refer to areas in which leaders should concentrate their efforts. The
integrating theme is the capacity that must be developed to ensure success
in transformation.

Table 12.1 One vision: the blueprint

Component Description

Vision 1 Emerging global consensus on expectations for schools

Tracks 3 Broad directions for change in schools and school systems
Values 6 Defining the public good in education
Dimensions 4 Major classifications of approaches to the practice of leadership
Domains 5 Areas in which leaders should concentrate their efforts
Integrating theme 1 Capacity that must be developed to ensure success in
transformation
 The transformation of schools 189

I have refined and presented the blueprint over time in Australia,

England, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Taiwan and Thailand, in each instance
drawing on developments in the different national settings. Responses in
these seven countries suggest it is relatively robust.

One vision
Agreement is emerging on expectations for schools, if documents from key
international institutions, such as UNESCO and OECD, and the espoused
policies of governments, are taken as a guide (Barber 1999; Chapman 1997;
Chapman and Aspin 1997; Delors 1996). This agreement amounts to a global
consensus on expectations for schools and it may be summarised in these
words:

All students in every setting should be literate and numerate and

should acquire a capacity for life-long learning, leading to success and
satisfaction as good citizens and productive workers in a knowledge
society.

It is important to stress that this is an emerging consensus. Different

countries, schools systems and schools will, of course, have their own
special expectations.
Embracing this vision forms part of what Fullan (2001) calls ‘moral
purpose’ in leadership. If we cannot embrace the vision of ‘all students in
every setting’ we do not need transformation, and Britain can rest on its
laurels in PISA.

Three tracks
A blueprint for successful leadership at all levels calls for a vision of
education along the lines suggested above. It also calls for recognition that
movement in this direction is occurring at different rates in different settings
but in the same broad directions. There seem to be three such directions or
tracks for change in education (Caldwell and Spinks 1998):

Track 1 Building systems of self-managing schools

Track 2 Unrelenting focus on learning outcomes
Track 3 Creating schools for the knowledge society

In Track 1, the building of systems of self-managing schools, more authority

and responsibility are being decentralised to the local level within a frame-
work of centrally determined goals, priorities, frameworks, standards
and accountabilities. Track 2 is an unrelenting focus on learning outcomes
for students where there is unprecedented concern for the monitoring of
190 Leading transformation

student achievement, with international benchmarking now gathering

momentum (as illustrated in PISA). In Track 3, the creation of schools for
the knowledge society, ICT is a powerful force for change. A defining
characteristic of the knowledge society is that the largest group in the work-
force comprises knowledge workers, being those who solve problems,
manage information, or create new knowledge, products and services.
In relation to self-managing schools (Track 1), it seems that Victoria in
Australia continues to set the pace, with 94 per cent of the state’s recurrent
budget for schools decentralised to the local level, an even higher level
than the 90 per cent under New Labour in England. There are, however,
some important aspects of the concept of self-management that need to
be affirmed at this time. I refer here to the concept as Jim Spinks and I
employed it in three books over ten years (Caldwell and Spinks 1988, 1992
and 1998).

A self-managing school is a school in a system of education to which

there has been decentralised a significant amount of authority and
responsibility to make decisions related to the allocation of resources
within a centrally-determined framework of goals, policies, stand-
ards, and accountabilities. Resources are defined broadly to include
knowledge, technology, power, material, people, time, assessment,
information and finance.
(Caldwell and Spinks 1998: 4–5)

We stressed that ‘a self-managing school is not an autonomous school

nor is it a self-governing school, for each of these kinds of schools involve
a degree of independence that is not provided in a centrally determined
framework’ (Caldwell and Spinks 1998: 5).
Evidence that a balance of centralisation and decentralisation is required
comes from recent analysis of student achievement in 39 countries. The
Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) was the largest
international comparative study of student achievement ever under-
taken. As part of the project, information was gathered on a range of factors,
including student and family characteristics, resources and teacher charac-
teristics, and institutional settings. Analysis of the performance of more
than 260,000 students from 39 countries was undertaken at Kiel University
in Germany and reported by Woessmann (2001). Among the policy settings
that are favourable to student performance are the following:

• central examinations;
• centralised control mechanisms in curricular and budgetary affairs;
• school autonomy in process and personnel decisions;
• an intermediate level of administration performing administrative tasks
and providing educational funding;
 The transformation of schools 191

• individual teachers having both incentives and powers to select

appropriate teaching methods;
• scrutiny of students’ educational performance; and
• encouragement of parents to take an interest in teaching matters.

It is important to note that ‘centralised control mechanisms in curricular

and budgetary affairs’ refers to centrally determined frameworks, not to
the manner of implementation at the school level. In the case of budgets,
this refers to the existence of a funding mechanism that specifies how funds
shall be allocated to schools, but schools then determine how these funds
are deployed at the local level.
The connection between self-management and improved student
learning is becoming clear, with research at the University of Melbourne
by Wee (1999) mapping the links. Indeed, there is now a relatively robust
‘theory of learning’ in self-managing schools (Caldwell 2000; Caldwell and
Spinks 1998). Interest in self-management is now extending to developing
countries, with a UNESCO forum in February 2001 sharing international
experience of success with strategies that link self-management, enhanced
professional development for teachers, community support for schools, and
making learning for students more active and enjoyable.
Themes from Tracks 2 and 3 are followed up in the discussion of the other
components of the blueprint below.

Six values

Strategies for leadership should be shaped by a set of values, and six values
in public education are proposed in the blueprint, as follows:

• choice
• equity
• access
• efficiency
• economic growth
• harmony.

It is suggested that these should provide the basis for a test of ‘the public
good’ for leadership at all levels in a system of schools.

• Choice reflects the right of parents and students to choose a school that
meets their needs and aspirations.
• Equity provides assurance that those students with similar needs and
aspirations will be treated in the same manner in the course of their
education.
192 Leading transformation

• Access ensures that all students will have an education that matches
their needs and aspirations.
• Efficiency optimises outcomes, given the resources available.
• Economic growth generates resources that are adequate to the task.
• Harmony ensures commitment among all stakeholders in efforts to
realise high expectations for schools.

The first five are drawn from a classification proposed by Swanson and
King (1997). Three are based on the classic trio of liberty (choice), equality
(equity) and fraternity (access). Efficiency and economic growth are
important if these three values are to be realised in practice. Educators are
now coming to terms with the need for economic growth to fund the rapidly
escalating costs of schooling, given the high expectations as far as outcomes
are concerned.

Four dimensions
Four major dimensions are included in the blueprint for leadership for
sustainable improvement. These dimensions are: strategic, educational,
responsive and cultural (Caldwell and Spinks 1992).

Strategic leadership
School leadership is strategic when it involves:

• Keeping abreast of trends and issues, threats and opportunities in the

educational environment and in society at large, nationally and inter-
nationally; discerning the ‘megatrends’ and anticipating their impact
on education generally and on the school in particular;
• Sharing such knowledge with others in the school community and
encouraging other leaders within the organisation to do the same in
their areas of responsibility;
• Establishing structures and processes which enable the school to set
priorities and formulate strategies which take account of likely and/or
preferred futures, and being a key source of expertise as these occur;
• Ensuring that the attention of the school community is focused on
matters of strategic importance;
• Monitoring the implementation of strategies as well as emerging
strategic issues in the wider environment, and facilitating an ongoing
process of review.

A capacity for strategic leadership has special priority at this time. Higher
expectations for schools present challenges that have no counterpart in the
history of education if they are to be brought to realisation. It requires every
 The transformation of schools 193

leader at every level to do the things listed above. It is no longer sufficient

for a single minister, or head, or president of a professional association, to
be out in front saying these things. It is a ‘whole-of-government’ or ‘whole-
of-enterprise’ approach, with every minister, every school leader and all
officials in professional associations having a capacity for strategic leader-
ship in the specific meaning of that term: seeing ‘the big picture’, discerning
the ‘megatrends’, understanding the implications, ensuring that others can
do the same, establishing structures and processes to bring the vision to
realisation, and monitoring the outcomes.

Educational leadership
Educational leadership refers to a capacity to nurture a learning community,
again defined broadly to include a country, state, school system, but espe-
cially a school. This is explained in more detail in one of the domains for
leadership (see page 200), but there is a ‘hard edge’ to the concept. A
‘learning community’ or a ‘learning organisation’ sounds a very comfort-
able place in which to work, but the stakes are high if the consensus on
expectations for schools is to be realised.
With the wide range of learning needs in schools, these and other
strategies to achieve targets call for teachers to have state-of-the-art know-
ledge about what works for each and every student. It calls for leaders
who themselves will have much of this knowledge, but will certainly be
able to manage learning and teaching so that knowledge is acquired and
successfully brought to bear. Once again, this extends to all levels, including
government, as well as applying to leaders in the local school setting.

Responsive leadership
There is an implication here that leaders will respond to the expectations
for schools and will be comfortable in collecting, analysing and acting
on data that let them know how well things are going (as outlined in
Chapter 10). Responsive leaders accept that there are many stakeholders
who have a ‘right to know’. As with the other three dimensions, this
acceptance extends to all levels of leadership.
The importance of this dimension is reflected in current interest in
‘evidence-based leadership’. It is good to see that people are now examining
ways in which school leaders can gather data as a basis for making good
judgements and good strategic leadership decisions.

Cultural leadership
Each of the above indicates that there will be dramatic change to ‘the way
we do things around here’, at the national, local and school levels. Successful
194 Leading transformation

leaders will have a capacity to change the culture. This is no easy task, given
that the scale of the change and the seriousness of the endeavour are still
not broadly understood, let alone accepted, in many settings.

Five domains
Five domains for action are proposed for those who seek to lead the
transformation of schools in the twenty-first century. These domains of
practice in the exercise of leadership are:

• school design
• boundary spanning
• curriculum
• pedagogy
• professionalism.

Some lie squarely in the field of education while others span the fields
of education, health, and a range of other institutions and agencies in
the public and private sectors across the community, reflecting the view
that we cannot close the gap between current achievement and higher
expectations unless we can, quite literally, ‘span the boundaries’.
The integrating concept here is change. Drucker (1999: 73) contends that
the only ones who will survive in a period when change is the norm will
be the change leaders, for ‘to be a successful change leader an enter-
prise has to have a policy of systematic innovation’ (Drucker 1999: 84). For
this reason, each domain for leadership is considered to be a field of
innovation.

School design
The first domain, school design, is a comprehensive one, for it integrates
all the work of a school in a comprehensive and coherent whole. Hill
and Crévola (1999) refer to a ‘whole school design’ and propose eight
elements:

• standards and targets;

• monitoring and assessment;
• classroom teaching programs;
• professional learning teams;
• school and class organisation;
• intervention and special assistance;
• home, school and community partnerships; with all
• underpinned and centred on beliefs and understandings.
(Hill and Crévola 1999: 123)
 The transformation of schools 195

A design for the third track for change introduced on page 189 (‘creating
schools for the knowledge society’) may be illustrated in a gestalt – a
perceived organised whole that is more than the sum of its parts – as in
Figure 12.1. The factors shown in the figure are explored below.

g2
Workplace g3
transformation School fabric and
g1 globalization
Connectedness in
curriculum
g7 g4
virtual schools Professionalism
g6 and great
Cyber-policy, access teaching
and equity g5
Teams and
pastoral care

Figure 12.1 A gestalt design for creating schools for the knowledge society
Source: Caldwell and Spinks 1998: 160

Dramatic change in approaches to learning and teaching is in store

as electronic networking allows ‘cutting across and so challenging the
very idea of subject boundaries’ and ‘changing the emphasis from
impersonal curriculum to excited live exploration’ (Papert 1993: 39). At
risk is the balkanised curriculum that has done much to alienate children
from schooling, especially following the transition from primary to
secondary (represented by g1 Connectedness in curriculum in Figure
12.1).
Schools as workplaces are transformed in every dimension, including
the scheduling of time for learning and approaches to human resource
management, rendering obsolete most approaches that derive from an
industrial age, including the concept of ‘industrial relations’ (g2 Workplace
transformation).
The fabric of schooling is similarly rendered obsolete by electronic
networking. Everything from building design to the size, shape, alignment,
and furnishing of space for the ‘knowledge worker’ in the school is
transformed. In one sense, of course, the school has no walls, for there are
global learning networks, and much of the learning that calls for the student
to be located at school occurs in many places, at home and, at the upper
years of secondary schooling and for lifelong learning, in the work place.
(g3 School fabric and globalization).
196 Leading transformation

A wide range of professionals and para-professionals support learning

in an educational parallel to the diversity of support that may be found in
modern health care. The role of teacher is elevated, for it demands wisdom,
judgement, and a facility to manage learning in modes more complex and
varied than ever. While the matter of intellectual capital must be resolved,
teachers are freed from the impossible task of designing from their own
resources learning experiences to challenge every student: the resources
of the world’s great teachers will be at hand (g4 Professionalism and
great teaching). (The Department for Education and Skills in the UK
has published on its website more than a thousand evaluated lesson plans
in most key learning areas (see http://www.teachernet.gov.uk and then
look for lesson plans).)
A capacity to work in teams is more evident in approaches to learning,
given the primacy of the work team in every formulation of the workplace
in the knowledge society. This, of course, will confound those who see
electronic networking in an outdated stereotype of the loner with the laptop.
The concept of ‘pastoral care’ of students is as important as ever for learning
in this mode, and in schools that quite literally have no boundaries (g5
Teams and pastoral care).
The formulation of ‘cyber-policy of the future’ (Spender 1995) is a priority.
The issues of access and equity will drive public debate until such time as
prices fall to make electronic networks as common as the telephone or radio,
and that may soon be a reality, given trends in networked computers
(g6 Cyber-policy, access and equity).
The concept of the virtual organisation or the learning network
organisation is a reality in the knowledge society. Schools take on many of
the characteristics of such organisations, given that learning occurs in so
many modes and from so many sources, all networked electronically (g7
Virtual schools).
The challenge for leaders is to work with others to create a design that
suits the setting. Is there a design for your school that can be described
and illustrated along the lines proposed by Hill and Crévola (1999) or
Caldwell and Spinks (1998)? What changes should be made on the basis of
what is learned here? What processes should be set in train to create a design
or change a design?

Boundary spanning
The second domain lies in organisational arrangements to design, deliver
or in other ways drive the effort. We have had a century or more of largely
successful effort in the public sector with responsibility in the hands of
discrete government departments, each reporting to a particular minister.
What happens at a government or public school is largely a matter for the
department and a responsible minister. Yet the problems to be addressed
 The transformation of schools 197

in closing the gap are complex and demanding of attention of those who
work in different departments, or elsewhere, outside government and in
the private sector.
While inter-department cooperation and freewheeling boundary
spanning have been evident, it is only in recent times that signs of a major
shift in culture that fosters even higher levels have been seen. That shift
has resulted from a backward-mapping approach, starting from a focus
on people and a problem, then selecting a strategy to address the problem,
then designing and delivering a constellation of services and resources,
without consideration of organisational boundaries except where the public
good test is not satisfied. This linear process is made more complex because
there is rarely a single problem to address and rarely a single solution.
Governments that have taken this approach now speak of ‘joined-up solu-
tions to joined-up problems’ and advocate breaking down organisational
boundaries. They use the metaphor of a silo to describe the isolation of
a government department. I should hasten to add that the same metaphor
has been adopted to describe different faculties in universities.
One attempt at boundary spanning appears to have met with limited
success. Despite several significant achievements, the Blair Government
will not continue with EAZs beyond the statutory lifetime of five years from
the date of their establishment. More than 2,000 schools have joined an
EAZ. Links have been made with more than 1,000 businesses. Additional
cash and in-kind support is likely to exceed £300 million over the course
of the project. However, the impact on learning outcomes has been mixed.
School standards Minister Stephen Timms reported that:

The most significant impact has been made in primary schools, where
achievement continues to rise faster than the national rate. The chal-
lenge for zones now is to bring about comparable improvements at
secondary level. Some zones are matching or outpacing the national
improvement rate, but considerable work remains to be done, particu-
larly at Key Stage 3 [age 14–16] where the rate of improvement is still
not matching the national figures.
(cited in Department for Education and Skills, 2001)

Does your school seek ‘joined-up solutions to joined-up problems’? Can

you map the relationships with organisations and agencies outside the
school, and outside education that reflect the importance of ‘boundary
spanning’? To what extent does the metaphor of ‘silo’ apply to your school?

Curriculum
The emerging global consensus on expectations for schools is commend-
able, but many would argue that the range of outcomes and their measures
198 Leading transformation

are much too narrow. The idea of ‘multiple intelligences’, based on Gardner’s
Frames of Mind (Gardner 1983), is a helpful starting point. He included logical
mathematical, linguistic, spatial, musical, bodily kinaesthetic, interpersonal,
existentialist, intrapersonal and naturalist.
Handy provides a more accessible classification, suggesting that three
intelligences – factual intelligence, analytical intelligence and numerate
intelligence – ‘will get you through most tests and entitle you to be called
clever’ (Handy 1997: 211). He suggests eight more: linguistic intelligence,
spatial intelligence, athletic intelligence, intuitive intelligence, emotional
intelligence, practical intelligence, interpersonal intelligence and musical
intelligence (Handy 1997: 212–13).
Leadbeater suggests that ‘the curriculum needs to encourage creativity,
problem solving, team building, as well as literacy and numeracy’
(Leadbeater 1999: vi) while Beck sets a similar curriculum in the context of
globalisation:

One of the main political responses to globalisation is . . . to build and

develop the education and knowledge society; to make training longer
rather than shorter; to loosen or do away with its link to a particular
job or occupation. This should not only be a matter of ‘flexibility’ or
‘lifelong learning’, but of such things as social competence, the ability
to work in a team, conflict resolution, understanding of other cultures,
integrated thinking and a capacity to handle the uncertainties and
paradoxes of the second modernity. Here and there, people are
beginning to realise that something like a transnationalism of university
education and curricula will be necessary.
(Beck 1999: 27)

To do all of this will require the abandonment of much of the existing

curriculum. Writing for the UK setting, Seltzer contends that ‘we can’t
just keep piling new expectations and structures on to old ones. Some-
thing has to give. We should aim to have reduced the national curriculum
by half by 2010 in order to make room for new approaches’ (Seltzer
1999: xxi).
It is clear that school leaders will be actively engaged in this domain
over the next decade.

Pedagogy
The revolution in ICT and the advent of exciting, pedagogically sound
approaches to inter-active multi-media learning mean that it is possible to
learn anytime, anywhere. A revolution is clearly under way. Kenichi Ohmae
has captured the new reality in The Invisible Continent (Ohmae 2000).
Compared with continents that have clearly defined boundaries, geography
 The transformation of schools 199

that is visible, governments that hold power, and societies that celebrate
unique cultures, the invisible continent has these characteristics.

1 It is ‘cyber-enabled’. The new continent ‘easily moves information

across all kinds of borders, both national and corporate’.
2 As ‘a continent without land, the new continent is easy to enter, but
only for those who are willing to give up their old ways of thinking’.
3 ‘No nation holds a monopoly on entrance to it. Any nation, any
company, any race, any ethnic group, or any individual may enter.’
4 The new continent draws on ‘highly individualistic values. Communities
and families, or old-style establishment connections, do not determine
worth in this world.’
(Ohmae 2000: 16–20)

Ohmae is in no doubt about the place of education. He states that ‘The

most fundamental lever for success in the new continent is education’ and
‘education is the first and foremost priority for any nation’. Preparing
youngsters to comprehend the invisible continent and compete in its
endeavours and explorations is the best investment that a government (or
parents, for that matter) can make. (Ohmae 2000: 227–9)
More fundamentally, and linked to the domain of innovation in
curriculum, is how learning occurs. The challenge is to provide balance.
To what extent does the following commentary on developments in the
United States apply to students in other countries?

They are extremely good at manipulating symbols and working

on computers, they are verbally fluent and extremely good at asking
questions, but they don’t really know anything in depth and they
haven’t really read anything. The high school curriculum is so chopped
up into tiny bits and pieces that the integrating power of a liberal
education is somewhat lost.
(Sheridan 1999: 274)

Henry Kissinger said that ‘the present generation has the power to tap into
astonishing amounts of knowledge on any subject but no ability to integrate
it into a knowledge of the past and no ability therefore to project it
meaningfully into the future’ (cited by Sheridan 1999: 274).
School leaders will be at the centre of many discussions and debates
on pedagogy in the decade ahead. The use of ICT is just one strand of
these deliberations. The wider issue will be to bring about a high degree
of alignment of curriculum, pedagogy and assessment. These three will
shape the more comprehensive school design, described and illustrated in
domain 1, on pages 194–6.
More generally, however, is the issue of knowledge about pedagogy, and
what works and why for different students in every setting. It is my view
200 Leading transformation

that this knowledge base is stronger than it has ever been, and the challenge
for leaders is to ensure that this knowledge is created, shared and managed
in the local setting. An illustration of the strength of that knowledge base
is in Carolyn Orange’s user-friendly summary of practices, programmes,
policies and philosophies associated with different innovations (Orange
2002).

Professionalism
The unrelenting focus on learning outcomes in the emerging consensus on
expectations for schools suggests ‘innovation in professionalism’, in that
teachers’ work will be research-based, outcomes-oriented, data-driven, and
team-focused, with lifelong professional learning the norm as it is for
medical specialists.
A wonderfully rich professionalism is evident in the ‘intelligent school’
proposed by MacGilchrist, Myers and Reed (1997). This is the organisational
counterpart of an individual with ‘multiple intelligences’. Professionals
in an ‘intelligent school’ will have contextual intelligence, strategic intelli-
gence, academic intelligence, reflective intelligence, pedagogical intelligence,
collegial intelligence, emotional intelligence, spiritual intelligence and ethical
intelligence.
Leaders will be actively engaged in the promotion of this kind of
professionalism in the decade ahead. There has been impressive achieve-
ment in recent times, as evidenced by the acquisition of knowledge and
skill in the areas of literacy and numeracy. The challenge is to ensure that
this applies for all teachers in every area of their professional work. A
starting point for appreciating the size of this domain is the taxonomy of
educational innovations prepared by Orange (2002).
There is also the challenge of how to attract and keep in the profession
the best of our young people and the wisest of our mature people. There
are implications for governments and the wider community as well as for
schools and, in universities, there is a need to re-design programmes in
teacher education.
The numbers of people seeking to enter the profession are increasing.
On the other hand, the numbers who leave are increasing. Internationally,
at least in most Western countries, there is a crisis in these matters, and
a failure to resolve it is one of the six OECD scenarios referred to earlier
(‘teacher exodus – meltdown’) (OECD 2001). In the United States, there is
evidence that the nature of teachers’ work is at the root of the problem.
The data show ‘that the amount of turnover accounted for by retirement is
relatively minor when compared to that associated with other factors, such
as teacher job dissatisfaction and teachers pursuing other jobs’ (Ingersoll
2001: 499).
 The transformation of schools 201

Integrating theme
You may already have detected the integrating theme in the blueprint.
Expressed simply, there is an unprecedented large body of knowledge
relevant to the work of leaders that has to be managed. Knowledge
management includes knowledge creation, dissemination and utilisation
for the purposes of improved learning and teaching and to guide decision-
making and priority setting in every domain of professional practice.
Knowledge management is not just a fad that will pass or a piece of jargon
to describe what has always been a requirement in the organisation.
According to Bukowitz and Williams (1999: 2), ‘knowledge management
is the process by which the organisation generates wealth from its
intellectual or knowledge-based assets’. In the case of school education,
‘knowledge management is the process by which a school achieves the
highest levels of student learning that are possible from its intellectual or
knowledge-based assets’. Successful knowledge management is consistent
with the image of ‘the intelligent school’ (MacGilchrist, Myers and Reed
1997) and the concept of ‘intellectual capital’ (Stewart 1997).
Knowledge management calls for a school to develop a deep capacity
among its entire staff to be at the forefront of knowledge and skill in learn-
ing and teaching and in the support of learning and teaching. This is more
than occasional in-service training or professional development. This is
a systematic, continuous and purposeful approach that starts with know-
ing what people know, don’t know and ought to know. It assumes an
innovative professionalism, as already described, and includes a range
of functions such as selection, placement, development, appraisal, reward,
succession planning, contracting of services and ensuring that every aspect
of the workplace is conducive to efficient, effective and satisfying work for
all concerned.
It is important to conceptualise the process of knowledge generation
and utilisation in knowledge management. Burgoyne (cited by Bahra, 2001,
pp. 155) offers the following:

Data are collected, stored and processed to create

↓
Information that is reflected on to produce
↓
Knowledge that is the basis for
↓
Action
↓
Reflection on which may lead to wisdom.

Leadership for the transformation of schools calls for the design of a system
of knowledge management. A starting point is to conduct an audit of
202 Leading transformation

existing capacity. Rajan (as cited by Bahra 2001: 110–14) has developed a
tool for self-assessment that can be used for this purpose.
Competitive intelligence, a capacity for school leaders to work in an
environment of competition and choice is necessary, with knowledge
management a key component of the role. The analysis of TIMSS data by
Woessmann (2001) reported above included ‘competition from private
educational institutions’ as a factor associated with high student achieve-
ment. A key issue is defined by the question: ‘Is competition helpful
or harmful in efforts to improve learning outcomes for students?’ Recent
studies in Britain suggest that there are benefits for students in communities
where there is competition among schools. A study of competition among
secondary schools in Britain in the late 1990s (Levac̆ić 2001) found that
schools perform better, as indicated by the proportion of students achiev-
ing high grades in the GCSE examinations, in communities where there
are a number of perceived competitors. It appears that this outcome is not
determined by unfair ‘rivalrous’ conduct but by the greater stimulus
to improve and maintain the school’s position and by the taking up of
opportunities for cooperation in matters that may improve outcomes for
students.
A number of writers (see review by Bahra 2001: 202–3) distinguish
between knowledge management and competitive intelligence, and advo-
cate that organisations need to combine the two in an ‘intelligence pyramid’.
Knowledge management (KM) forms the base, with three layers: data,
information and knowledge. In this view:

Knowledge management facilitates ‘the now’ – knowledge, information

and data collection and sharing. It emphasises the people, culture and
process.
(Bahra 2001: 203)

Competitive intelligence (CI) forms the apex, with two layers: intelligence
and actionable intelligence. In this view:

Competitive intelligence focuses on ‘the future’ – likelihood and

possibility, influencing future events and decisions. It emphasises
trends, patterns and what is currently unknown.
(adapted from Bahra 2001: 203)

The completed ‘intelligence pyramid’, as illustrated in Figure 12.2, that

combines knowledge management (KM) with competitive intelligence (CI),
should inform decisions and lead to action, in this instance, to guide the
transformation of the school in a competitive environment. The challenge
for leaders is to build the intelligence pyramid.
 The transformation of schools 203

Action

Decision

Actionable
intelligence
Competitive
Intelligence Intelligence (CI)

Knowledge

Information
Knowledge
Data Management (KM)

Figure 12.2 The Intelligence Pyramid

Source: Bahra 2001: 203

Levac̆ić ’s finding in relation to cooperation in a competitive environment

is interesting, suggesting that competition and cooperation are not mutually
exclusive. The creation of ‘knowledge networks’ (Networked Learning
Communities) around England by the National College for School
Leadership is consistent with this view. The challenge is to transform the
culture in education to enable such networks to be created and sustained.
Jackson (2002) draws attention to the currently weak culture compared with
that in medicine (moderate) and in the high technology industry (high).
If the integrating theme among the domains of leadership is innovation,
and if there is not to be an accretion of new tasks on old, it follows that
a capacity for systematic abandonment is as important as a capacity for
systematic innovation. Effective knowledge management should enable
the school to engage in systematic abandonment, something the culture has
not allowed to this point. The outcome has been a clearly over-worked
profession.
Drucker (1999) calls for ‘organised abandonment’ for products, services,
markets or processes:

• which were designed in the past and which were highly successful,
even to the present, but which would not be designed in the same way
if we were starting afresh today, knowing the terrain ahead;
• which are currently successful, and likely to remain so, but only up to,
say, five years – in other words, they have a limited ‘shelf life’; or
• which may continue to succeed, but which through budget commit-
ments, are inhibiting more promising approaches that will ensure
success well into the future.
204 Leading transformation

Virtually every domain of leadership calls for abandonment of one kind

or another, regardless of the scenario.
The five domains call for abandonment of a range of approaches.
Innovation in design will certainly require abandonment of standard class
sizes for all students at every level in facilities built like a collection of boxes,
lined end to end or stacked one upon the other. Innovation in boundary
spanning calls for abandonment of the silo metaphor and abandonment of
the view that problems occur in simple clusters and can be addressed by
networking of services in a single sector. Innovation in curriculum requires
abandonment of some learning areas that have been painstakingly
constructed over the past decade. Pedagogy is a domain fraught with
dilemmas, but ripe for abandonment of approaches that do not yield
outcomes consistent with expectations for world-class schools. Innovation
in professionalism challenges the modest levels of knowledge and skill that
sufficed in the past with a vision for values-centred, research-based,
outcomes-oriented, data-driven and team-focused approaches that matches
or exceeds that of the best of medical practice.

CONCLUSION
This completes the blueprint for successful leadership in an era of
globalisation of learning. The different components are brought together
in Table 12.2. It cannot, of course, tell us all about the requirements for
successful leadership, but a capacity to grasp the vision and work along the
tracks in each of the domains, exercising leadership in several dimensions,
underpinned by a commitment to a set of public values, will surely go a
long way to bringing the vision to realisation.
A recent study in England by Hay McBer (Forde, Hobby and Lees, 2000)
suggests that headteachers have a much wider range of skills than they
are often given credit for, and on some dimensions they outperform leaders
in business. The sample comprised 200 headteachers and 200 senior
managers and directors in multinational companies. In each instance, five
members of staff were asked to describe and rate leadership according to
a set of common criteria.

The results leave us in no doubt that headteachers have much to

offer their counterparts in business. While business leaders are more
adept at strategy and vision, headteachers’ strengths lie in raising
capability.
(Forde, Hobby and Lees 2000: 4)

There is now a growing literature on the transformation of schools and

perhaps the best in recent times is a book by Hedley Beare (2001). He is
one of Australia’s most experienced leaders in public education and a
 The transformation of schools 205

Table 12.2 Blueprint for leadership in the transformation of schools

Component Element

Vision 1 Global consensus on expectations for

schools.
Tracks for change 1 Building systems of self-managing schools
2 Unrelenting focus on learning outcomes
3 Creating schools for the knowledge society
Values defining the public good 1 Choice
2 Equity
3 Access
4 Efficiency
5 Economic growth
6 Harmony
Dimensions of leadership 1 Strategic
2 Educational
3 Responsive
4 Cultural
Domains of practice 1 School design
2 Boundary spanning
3 Curriculum
4 Pedagogy
5 Professionalism
Integrating theme 1 Knowledge management

distinguished scholar with an exceptional capacity to see the pathways from

past to present to future. He concludes an uplifting chapter about teachers
for the school of the future with these words:

This terrain is not for the immature, the shallow, the unworthy,
the unformed, or the uninformed, and society needs to be very careful
about what people it commissions for this task.
(Beare 2001: 185)
References and further reading

Adair, J. (1986) Effective Teambuilding, London: Pan.

Adair, J. (2002) Effective Strategic Leadership, London: Macmillan.
Adams, J., Hayes, J. and Hopson, B. (eds) (1976) Transition: Understanding and
Managing Personal Change, London: Martin Robertson.
Argyris, C. and Schön, D. (1978) Organisational Learning, Reading, MA: Addison-
Wesley.
Aspinwall, K. (1998) Leading the Learning School, London: Lemos and Crane.
Aspinwall, K., Simkins, T., Wilkinson, J. and McAuley, M. J. (1992) Managing
Evaluation in Education, London: Routledge.
Bahra, N. (2001) Competitive Knowledge Management, Basingstoke: Palgrave.
Barber, M. (1999) A World Class School System for the 21st Century: The Blair
Government’s Education Reform Strategy, No. 90 in a Seminar Series of the
Incorporated Association of Registered Teachers of Victoria (IARTV), December
(reprint of a paper presented at the Skol Tema Conference in Stockholm in
September 1999).
Barker, G. (2003) ‘Case study 1: Reengineering teaching and learning in the primary
school’ in Davies, B. and West-Burnham, J. (eds) Handbook of Educational
Leadership and Management, London: Pearson.
Barth, R. (1990) Improving Schools from Within, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Bartunek, J.M. and Necochea, R. (2000) ‘Old insights and new times: Kairos, Inca
cosmology and their contributions to contemporary management inquiry’,
Journal of Management Inquiry, 9(2): 103–13.
Bass, B. M. (1985) Leadership and Performance beyond Expectations, New York: Free
Press.
Beare, H. (2001) Creating the Future School, London: RoutledgeFalmer.
Beck, U. (1999) ‘Beyond the nation state’, New Statesman, 6 December, pp. 25–7.
Belbin, M. (1981) Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail, London: Heinemann.
Belbin, M. (1985) Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail, London: Heinemann.
Belbin, M. (1993) Team Roles at Work, Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.
Bell, L. (1998) ‘From symphony to jazz: the concept of strategy in education’, School
Leadership and Management, 18 (4) pp 449–460.
Bennett, D. (2000) The School of the Future, National College for School Leadership,
Leadership evidence base, NCSL: Nottingham.
Bennett, N., Wise, C., Woods, P. and Harvey, J. A. (2003) Distributed Leadership,
Nottingham: NCSL.
 References and further reading 207

Bennis, W. and Nanus, W. (1985) Leaders, New York: Harper and Row.
Berman, P. (1980) ‘Thinking about programmed and adaptive implementation:
Matching strategies to situations’, in Ingram, H. and Mann, D. (eds) Why Policies
Succeed or Fail, Beverley Hills, CA: Sage.
Black, J.A. and Boal, K.B. (1996) ‘Assessing the organizational capacity to change’,
in Heene, A. and Sanchez, R., eds. Competence-based Strategic Management,
Chichester: John Wiley.
Black, P. and Wiliam, D. (2003) ‘The development of formative assessment’, in
Davies, B. and West-Burnham, J. (eds) Handbook of Educational Leadership and
Management, London: Pearson.
Boal, K. B. and Bryson, J. M. (1988) ‘Charismatic leadership: A phenomenological
and structural approach’, in Hunt, J. G., Baliga, B. R., Dachler, H. P. and
Schriesheim, C. A. (eds) Emerging leadership vistas, New York: Lexington.
Boal, K. B. and Hooijberg R. (2001) ‘Strategic leadership research: Moving on’,
Leadership Quarterly, 11(4): 515–49.
Boisot, M. (1998) Knowledge Assets: Securing Competitive Advantage in the Information
Economy, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Boisot, M. (2003) ‘Preparing for turbulence’, in Garratt, B. (ed.) Developing Strategic
Thought, London: McGraw-Hill.
Bowring-Carr, C. and West-Burnham, J. (1997) Effective Learning in Schools, London:
FT Pitman Publishing.
Buckingham, M. and Clifton, D. O. (2001) Now, Discover Your Strengths, New York:
Free Press.
Bukowitz, W. R. and Williams, R. L. (1999) The Knowledge Management Fieldbook,
London: Financial Times Prentice Hall.
Buley, A. L. (1998) ‘A vision of learning’, in Kakabadse, A., Nortier, F. and
Abramovici, N-B. Success in Sight, London: International Thomson Business Press.
Burgleman, R.A. and Grove, A.S. (1996) ‘Strategic dissonance’, Californian
Management Review, 38(2): 8–28.
Bush, T. and Glover, D. (2003) School Leadership: Concepts and Evidence, Nottingham:
NCSL.
Butler, H. (1990) Grandmother and Wolfe Tone, Dublin: Lilliput Press.
Caldwell, B. J. (2000) ‘Local management and learning outcomes: Mapping the links
in three generations of international research’, in Coleman, M. and Anderson,
L. (eds) Managing Finance and Resources in Education, London: Paul Chapman
Publishing.
Caldwell, B.J. and Carter, E.M. (1993) The Return of the Mentor, London: Falmer.
Caldwell, B. J. and Spinks, J. M. (1988) The Self-managing School, London: Falmer
Press.
Caldwell, B. J. and Spinks, J. M. (1992) Leading the Self-managing School, London:
Falmer Press.
Caldwell, B. J. and Spinks, J. M. (1998) Beyond the Self-managing School, London:
Falmer Press.
Carmichael, L. (1993) ‘The management paradigm shift’, unpublished presentation
to the National Project on the Quality of Teaching and Learning, Adelaide.
Chaleff, I. (1995) ‘All hail the brave follower’, The QANTAS Club, November.
Chapman, J. (1997) ‘Leading the learning community’, Leading & Managing, 3(3):
151–70.
208 References and further reading

Chapman, J. and Aspin, D. (1997) The School, the Community and Lifelong Learning,
London: Cassell.
Cheng, Y. C. (2002) ‘Leadership and strategy’, in Bush, T. and Bell, L. (eds) The
Principles and Practice of Educational Management, London: PCP.
Clarke, L. (1994) The Essence of Change, Hemel Hempstead: Prentice-Hall International.
Cohen, W. M. and Levinthal, D. A. (1990) ‘Absorptive capacity: A new perspective
on learning and innovation’, Administrative Science Quarterly, 35: 128–52.
Collins, J. (2001) Good to Great, London: Random House.
Constable, J. and McCormick, R. (1987) The Making of British Managers, London:
NEDO.
Covey, S. (1989) The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, New York: Simon &
Schuster.
Craig, E. (ed.) The Concise Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2000), London: Routledge.
Cuban, L. (1988) ‘A fundamental puzzle of school reform’, Phi Delta Kappan, 70 (5):
341–4.
Dalin, P. (1978) Limits to Educational Change, London: Macmillan.
Darling-Hammond, L. (1991) ‘The implications of testing policy for educational
quality and equality’, Phi Delta Kappan, 73, 220–5.
Darling-Hammond, L. (1997) The Right to Learn, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Davies, B. (2002) ‘Rethinking schools and school leadership for the 21st century:
Changes and challenges’, International Journal of Educational Management, 16(4):
196–206.
Davies, B. (2003) ‘Rethinking strategy and strategic leadership in schools’, Education
Management & Administration, 31(3): 295–312.
Davies, B. (2004) ‘Developing the strategically focused school’, School Leadership and
Management, 24(1): 29–38.
Davies, B. and Davies, B. J. (2003) ‘Strategy and planning in schools’, in Davies B.
and West-Burnham, J. (eds), Handbook of Educational Leadership and Management,
London: Pearson.
Davies, B. and Ellison, L. (2003) The New Strategic Direction and Development of the
School, London: RoutledgeFalmer.
Davies, B. and West-Burnham, J. (2003) Handbook of Educational Leadership and
Management, London: Pearson.
Davies, B. J. (2003) Washingborough Foundation Primary School Planning for 2003/4,
Washingborough, Lincolnshire.
Day, C., Tolley, H., Hadfield, M., Parkin, E. and Watling, R. (1996) Class Size Research
and the Quality of Education: A Survey of the Literature Related to Class Size and the
Quality of Teaching and Learning, London: National Association of Headteachers.
Delors, J. (ed.) (1996) Learning: The Treasure Within, Paris: UNESCO.
Department for Education and Skills (2001) ‘Continued Support for Education
Action Zone Schools’, Report of School Standards Minister’s Address to seventh
EAZ Conference, 14 November.
DePree, M. (1990) Leadership is an Art, New York: Currency Doubleday.
DePree, M. (1993) Leadership Jazz, New York: Dell.
DES (1988) Education Reform Act, London: HMSO.
DES (1990) Developing School Management: The Way Forward (Report of the School
Management Task Force), London: HMSO.
DfES (2004) The National Standards for Headteachers, London: DfES.
 References and further reading 209

Drucker, P. F. (1999) Leadership Challenges for the 21st Century, Oxford: Butterworth
Heinemann.
Education Training and Inspectorate (2000) Report of a Survey of Provision for
Education for Mutual Understanding in Post-primary Schools, Bangor, Northern
Ireland: Department of Education.
Esp, D. (1993) Competences for School Managers, London: Kogan Page.
Fiedler, F. E. (1967) A Theory of Leadership Effectiveness, New York: McGraw Hill.
Flecknoe, M. (2001) ‘ICT doing different things, rather than doing them differently’,
Management in Education, 16 (1): 26–30.
Forde, R., Hobby, A. and Lees, A. (2000) The Lessons of Leadership, London: Hay
Management Consultants.
Forster, E. M. (1969) Howard’s End, London: Penguin.
Fullan, M. (1993) Change Forces: Probing the Depths of Educational Reform, London:
Falmer Press.
Fullan, M. (2001) Leading in a Culture of Change, San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
Fullan, M. (2003) Change Forces with a Vengeance, London and New York:
RoutledgeFalmer.
Gardner, H. (1983) Frames of Mind, London: Heinemann.
Gardner, H. (1985) The Mind’s New Science: A History of the Cognitive Revolution, New
York: Basic Books.
Gardner, H. (1999) Intelligence Reframed, New York: Basic Books.
Garratt, B. (2003) Developing Strategic Thought, London: McGraw-Hill.
Georgiades, N. (1990) The Service Organisation Profile, Chorleywood, Hertfordshire:
NGA Organisation Consultants.
Gioia, D. A. and Thomas, J. G .(1996) ‘Identity, image, and issue interpretation:
Sensemaking during strategic change in academia’, Administrative Science
Quarterly, 41: 370–403.
Goleman, D. (1998) ‘What makes a leader?’, Harvard Business Review, November–
December: 93–102.
Goleman, D. (2000) ‘Leadership that gets results’, Harvard Business Review,
March–April: 78–90.
Gratton, L. (2000) Living Strategy: Putting People at the Heart of Corporate Purpose,
London: Financial Times–Prentice Hall.
Grundy, T. (1998) Harnessing Strategic Behaviour, London: Financial Times–Pitman
Publishing.
Hambrick, D. C. (1989) ‘Guest editor’s introduction: Putting top managers back in
the strategy picture’, Strategic Management Journal, 10: 5–15.
Hamel, G. and Heene, A. (eds.) (1994) Competence Based Competition, New York: John
Wiley.
Hamel, G. and Prahalad, C. K. (1994) Competing for the Future, Boston, MA: Harvard
Business School Press.
Handy, C. (1987) The Making of Managers, London: British Institute of Management.
Handy, C. (1996) ‘The New Language of Organizing and its Implications for
Leaders’, in Hesselbein F., Goldsmith, M. and Beckhard, R. The Leader of the
Future, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Handy, C. (1997) The Hungry Spirit, London: Hutchinson.
Hargreaves, A. (1994) Changing Teaching, Changing Times: Teachers’ Work and Culture
in the Postmodern Age, New York: Teachers’ College Press.
210 References and further reading

Hargreaves, A. and Fullan, M. (1998) What’s Worth Fighting for out There? Guidelines
for Principals, Toronto: OISE.
Harland, J., Moor, H., Kinder, K. and Ashworth, M. (2000) Is the Curriculum Working?
The Key Stage 3 Phase of the Northern Ireland Curriculum (Summary), Slough:
National Foundation for Educational Research.
Harris, A. (2002) School Improvement: What’s in it for Schools?, London:
RoutledgeFalmer
Hayes, M. (1984) Lecture, ‘Why can’t they be more like us?’ Belfast: John Malone
Memorial Committee.
Hayes, M. (1990) Lecture, Conference on Education for Mutual Understanding,
Bangor: Department of Education, Northern Ireland.
HayGroup (2000) Raising Achievement in our Schools: Models of Excellence for
Headteachers in Different Settings. Boston, MA: Hay Resources Direct.
HayGroup (2001) The Manager Competency Model. Boston, MA: Hay Resources
Direct.
HayGroup (2003a) Leadership Competency Inventory http://www.hayresources
direct.haygroup.com/Competency/Assessments_Surveys/Leadership_Compe
tency_Inventory/Overview.asp accessed 10 Nov. 2003.
HayGroup (2003b) Managerial Competency Questionnaire http://www.hayresources
direct.haygroup.com/Competency/Assessments_Surveys/Managerial_Compe
tency_Questionnaire/Overview.asp accessed 10 Nov. 2003.
Heifetz, R. and Linsky, M. (2002) Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive through the
Dangers of Leading, Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
Hersey, P. (1990) Mentoring and Coaching: A Development Program for Educational
Leaders, Reston, VA: NASSP.
Hersey, P. and Blanchard, K. (1982) Management of Organizational Behaviour: Utilizing
Human Resources, fourth edition, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Hill, P. and Crévola, C. (1999) ‘The role of standards in educational reform for the
21st century’, in Marsh, D. (ed.) Preparing our Schools for the 21st Century, ASCD
Yearbook 1999, Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Hirschhorn, L. (1997) Re-working Authority: Leading and Authority in the Post-modern
Organisation, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Hitt, M. A., Keats, B. W. and DeMarie, S. M. (1998) ‘Navigating in the new
competitive landscape: Building strategic flexibility and competitive advantage
in the 21st century’, Academy of Management Executive, 12: 22–41.
Hopson, B., Scally, M. and Stafford, K. (1992) Transitions: The Challenge of Change,
London: Mercury Books.
Ingersoll, R. M. (2001) ‘Teacher turnover and teacher shortages: An organizational
analysis’, American Educational Research Journal, 38 (3): 499–534.
Jackson, D. (2002) ‘The creation of knowledge networks’, Paper presented at the
CERI/UNESCO/DfES/QCA/ESRC Forum on Knowledge Management and
Learning, 18–19 March, Oxford.
Jaeger, R.M. (1991) ‘Legislative perspectives on state-wide testing’, Phi Delta Kappan,
73: 239–42.
Javidon, M. (1991) ‘Leading a high-commitment, high-performance organisation’,
Long Range Planning, 24(2): 28–36.
Kakabadse, A., Nortier, F. and Abramovici, N-B. (1998) Success in Sight, London:
International Thomson Business Press.
 References and further reading 211

Kaplan, R. S. and Norton, D. P. (1996) The Balanced Scorecard, Boston, MA: HBS Press.
Kaplan, R. S. and Norton, D. P. (2001) The Strategy-focused Organization, Boston, MA:
Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation.
Klein, G. (2003) Intuition at Work, New York: Doubleday.
Kohn, A. (1999) The Schools our Children Deserve, New York: Houghton Mifflin.
Korac-Kakabadse, N. and Kakabadse, A. (1998) ‘Vision, visionary leadership
and the visioning process: An overview’, in Kakabadse, A., Nortier, F. and
Abramovici, N-B. Success in Sight, London: International Thomson Business
Press.
Kotter, J. P. (1990) A Force for Change: How Leadership Differs from Management, New
York: The Free Press.
Leadbeater, C. (1999) ‘It’s not the economy, stupid’, New Statesman, special
supplement on the theme Knowledge is Power! 27 September, pp. iv–vi.
Levac̆ ić, R. (2001) An Analysis of Competition and its Impact on Secondary School
Examination Performance in England, Occasional Paper No. 34, National Centre
for the Study of Privatisation in Education, Teachers College, Columbia
University, September.
Louis, K. and Miles, M. (1990) Improving the Urban High School: What Works and
Why, New York: Teachers College Press.
MacGilchrist, B., Myers, K. and Reed, J. (1997) The Intelligent School, London: Paul
Chapman.
Madaus, G.F. (1991) ‘The effects of important tests on students: Implications for a
national examination system’, Phi Delta Kappan, 73: 226–31.
Manz, C. & Sims, H. (1994) Superleadership, New York: Berkeley.
Marris, P. (1975) Loss and Change, New York: Anchor Press/Doubleday.
Marsh, D. (2000) ‘Educational leadership for the twenty-first century: Integrating
three essential perspectives’, in The Jossey-Bass Reader on Educational Leadership,
San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Martin and D’Agostino (2003) ‘Having a field day: managerialism, educational
discourse and the fifth province of Ireland’, paper presented at Conference:
Discourse Power Resistance, New Directions, New Moves, University of
Plymouth.
McClelland, D.C. (1988) Human Motivation, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Mintzberg, H. (2003) ‘Strategic thinking as seeing’, in Garratt, B. (ed.), Developing
Strategic Thought, London: McGraw-Hill.
Mintzberg, H., Ahlstrand, B. and Lampel, J. (1998) Strategy Safari: A Guided Tour
through The Wilds of Strategic Management, San Francisco, CA: Prentice Hall.
Morgan, G. (1993) Imaginization: The Art of Creative Management, London: Sage.
Moses, J. (1990) ‘High performance leadership’, unpublished paper presented to
the Twenty-first International Congress on the Use of the Assessment Centre
Method, Anaheim, California.
MSC (2004) Development of World Class National Occupation Standards for Management
and Leadership. www.managers.org.uk/msu2001/review.htm.
National College for School Leadership (2001) Report of the Think Tank to the
Governing Council, Nottingham: NCSL.
NCSL (2003) Consultation on the National Standards for Headteachers, Nottingham:
NCSL.
212 References and further reading

Niven, P. R. (2002) Balanced Scorecard Step-by-Step, New York: John Wiley.

OECD (1994) Education at a Glance: OECD Indicators, Paris: OECD.
OECD (2001) What Schools for the Future? Paris: OECD, Chapter 3 ‘Scenarios for the
Future of Schooling’.
OECD (2002) Knowledge and Skills for Life: First Results from PISA 2000, Executive
Summary, Paris: OECD (data underlying PISA available on www.pisa.oecd.org).
OECD (2003) Education at a Glance 2003, Paris: OECD.
Office for Standards in Education (1998) School Evaluation Matters, London OfSTED.
Office for Standards in Education (2000) Handbook for Inspection, London OfSTED.
OfSTED (2002) Inspection Report on Cheddington Combined School, Leighton Buzzard,
Hertfordshire.
Ogle, L. T., Sen, A., Pahlke, E., Jocelyn, L., Kastberg, D., Roey, S. and Williams, T.
(2003) International Comparisons in Fourth Grade Reading Literacy: Findings
from the Progress in International Reading Literacy (PIRLS) of 2001 on line from
National Center for Education Statistics nces.ed.gov/surveys/pirls.
Ohmae, K. (2000) The Invisible Continent: Four Strategic Imperatives of the New Economy,
London: Nicholas Brealey.
Orange, C. (2002) The Quick Reference Guide to Educational Innovations, Thousand
Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
Papert, S. (1993) The Children’s Machine: Rethinking School in the Age of the Computer,
New York: Basic Books.
Parikh, J. (1994) Intuition: The New Frontier of Management, Oxford: Blackwell.
Pascale, R. (1990) Managing on the Edge, London: Penguin.
Pedler, M. (1996) Action Learning for Managers, London: Lemos and Crane.
PDI (1995) The Principal Development Inventory. Fadden, Australian Capital Territory:
Sawatzki Consulting Group International.
Perkins, D. (1995) Outsmarting IQ – The Emerging Science of Learnable Intelligence,
New York: Free Press.
Pietersen, W. (2002) Reinventing Strategy: Using Strategic Learning to Create and Sustain
Breakthrough Performance, New York: John Wiley.
Plant, R. (1987) Managing Change and Making it Stick, London: Fontana.
Postman, N. (1996) The End of Education, New York: Vintage.
Prahalad, C.K. and Hamel, G. (1990) ‘The core competence of the corporation’,
Harvard Business Review, 68: 79–93.
Pugh, D. (1993) ‘Understanding and managing organisational change’, in Mabey,
C. and Mayon-White, B. (eds) Managing Change, second edition London: Paul
Chapman/Open University.
Putnam, R.T. and Borko, H. (2000) ‘What do new views of knowledge and thinking
have to say about research on teacher learning?’, Moon, B., Butcher, J. and Bird,
E. (eds) Leading Professional Development in Education, London: RoutledgeFalmer
with the Open University.
Reay, D. and Wiliam, D. (2001) ‘I’ll be a nothing’: Structure, agency and the
construction of identity through assessment’, in Collins, J. and Cook, D. (eds)
Understanding Learning, London: Paul Chapman Publishing with the Open
University.
Revans, R.W. (1983) ABC of Action Learning, Bromley, Kent: Chartwell-Bratt.
Rittel, H. and Webber, M. (1973) ‘Dilemmas in a general theory of planning’, Policy
Sciences, 4: 155–69.
 References and further reading 213

Sanders, T. I. (1998) Strategic Thinking and the New Science, New York: Free Press.
Schwenk, C. R. (1997) ‘The case for “weaker leadership”’, Business Strategy Review,
8(1): 4–9.
Scottish Executive (2003) Standards for Headship. www./scotland.gov.uk/library5/
education/shss.pdf
Seltzer, K. (1999) ‘A whole new way of learning’, New Statesman, special supplement
on the theme Knowledge is Power! 27 September, pp. xvii–xix.
Selznick, P. (1984) Leadership in Administration: A Sociological Interpretation, Berkeley:
University of California Press.
Senge, P.M. (1990) The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organisation,
New York: Doubleday.
Sergiovanni, T. (1992) Moral Leadership, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Sergiovanni, T. (1996) Leadership for the School House, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Sharpe, F.G. (1995) ‘Educational leadership for the twenty-first century’, The
Practising Administrator, 2.
Shepard, L.A. (1991) ‘Will national tests improve learning’, Phi Delta Kappan, 73:
232–8.
Sheridan, G. (1999) Asian Values, Western Dreams, St Leonards, Sussex: Allen &
Unwin.
Spender, D. (1995) Nattering on the Net: Women, Power and Cyberspace, North
Melbourne: Spinifex.
Stacey, R. D. (1992) Managing the Unknowable: Strategic Boundaries between Order
and Chaos in Organisations, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Stalk, G., Evans, P. and Schulman, L. (1992) ‘Competing on capabilities: the new
rules of corporate strategy’, Harvard Business Review, 70(2): 57–69.
Sternberg, R. J. (2002) ‘Wisdom, schooling and society’, keynote presentation to
the 2002 International Thinking Skills Conference, Harrogate, UK.
Stewart, T. A. (1997) Intellectual Capital: The New Wealth of Organisations, London:
Nicholas Brealey.
Stoll, L., Fink, D. and Earl, L. (2002) It’s about Learning (and it’s about Time), London:
RoutledgeFalmer.
Stoll, L. and Myers, K. (1998) No Quick Fixes: Perspectives on Schools in Difficulty,
London: RoutledgeFalmer.
Swanson, A. D. and King, R. A. (1997) School Finance: Its Economics and Politics,
second edition, New York: Longman.
Tichy, T. and Sharman, S. (1993) Control Your Destiny or Someone Else Will, New York:
Doubleday.
TTA (1997) National Standards for Headteachers. London: HMSO.
TTA (1998a) National Standards for Subject Leaders. London: HMSO.
TTA (1998b) National Standards for Special Needs Co-ordinators. London: HMSO.
TTA (2003a) Qualifying to teach. www.tta.gov.uk/qts standards/index.htm
TTA (2003b) Induction Standards for Newly Qualified Teachers, London: TTA.
Tuckman, B. (1965) ‘Developmental sequence in small groups’, Psychological Bulletin,
63: 384–399.
van der Heijden, K. (1996) Scenarios: The Art of Strategic Conversation, New York:
John Wiley.
Volberda, H. W. and Elfring, T. (2001) Rethinking Strategy, London: Sage.
Wee, J. (1999) ‘Improved student learning and leadership in self-managed schools’,
214 References and further reading

Unpublished thesis for the degree of Doctor of Education, University of

Melbourne.
Whitbourn S, et al. (2000) What is the LEA for? Emie, NfER.
Whittington R. (2001) What is Strategy – and Does it Matter? (second edition), London:
Thomson Learning.
Willis, D. (1993) ‘Learning and assessment: Exposing the inconsistencies of theory
and practice’, Oxford Review of Education, 19(3): 383–402.
Wilson, D. (1992) A Strategy of Change: Concepts and Controversies in the Management
of Change, London: Routledge.
Wilson, J. M., George, J., Wellins, R.S. and Byham, W.C. (1994) Leadership Trapeze:
Strategies for Leadership in Team-based Organizations, San Francisco, CA: Jossey-
Bass.
Wise, D. (2003) ‘Case study 2: Reengineering teaching and learning in the secondary
school’, in Davies B. and West-Burnham, J. (eds) Handbook of Educational
Leadership and Management. London: Pearson.
Woessmann, L. (2001) ‘School resources, educational institutions, and student
performance: The international evidence’, Kiel Institute of World Economics,
University of Kiel (available at http://www.uni-kiel.de/ifw/pub/kap/2000/
kap983.htm). Presented at the Annual Conference of the Royal Economic Society,
Durham, April 9–11 2001.

USEFUL RESOURCES
André Haynes
Strategic Change and Quality Human Resources Group
Lloyds TSB Bank plc
1st Floor
71 Lombard Street
London EC3P 3BS

Business Link
Your local Business Link may be contacted through their national website:
www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/home

Charter Mark
Full information on the award may be found at:
www.chartermark.gov.uk/

EFQM
General information on the wider application of the model:
www.efqm.org/

Investors in People Award

The award and its place in schools:
www.iipuk.co.uk/IIP/Internet/Investorsin People/Schools/default.htm
 References and further reading 215

Lloyds TSB Quality in Education Program

Information on the adaptation of EFQM for specific use in schools plus CD-Rom
‘Quality in Education’.

N.A.H.T.
School Self Evaluation – Primary Leadership Paper No. 1 (September 2000);
www.naht.org.uk

The Numbers Game: Using Assessment data in Primary Schools

Hedger & Jesson, Shropshire County Council

OfSTED
Inspecting Schools: Handbook for Inspecting Nursery and Primary Schools:
www.ofsted.gov.uk/

Scottish HMI. ‘How good is our school?’ is now available as a CD-Rom. This contains
a wide-ranging set of performance indicators for school self-evaluation. See:
www.hmie.gov.uk/documents/publication/cd/frames.htm

West Sussex. West Sussex have a comprehensive series of self evaluation materials
available.
Index

360 degrees 106–7 awakening 9

abandonment 59, 70, 71, 198, 203 BA 105

absorptive capacity 13 backward mapping 197
acceptance 75–6 Bahra, N. 201–3
achievement 45–6 balanced scorecard 9, 70
action learning 83 balkanised curriculum 195
Adair, J. 8, 94 Barber, M. 188–9
Adams, J. 73–4 Barker, G. 58
adaptability 49 barriers 85
adaptive capacity 13; change 85; Barth, R. 24
implementation 79 Bartunek, J. M. 12
Additional Educational Needs (AEN) basic entitlement 168
168–70 Bass, B. M. 11
administration 178 Beacon status 162
Advanced Skills Teacher (AST) 45 Beare, H. 8, 204–5
affiliation 45–6, 90 Beck, U. 198
Ahlstrand, B. 65 BECTA 172–3
Aim! 83–5 behavioural 101; change 174;
align 10, 57 indicators 45
aligning people 94 behaviours 36–7, 43, 95, 101–2
alignment 11, 19, 58, 64, 103 Belbin, R. M. 89–90, 101
Annual Governors’ Report 178 Bell, L. 116
application 133–4, 136 benchmarking 190; financial 175
architecture 10, 57, 69–70 Bennett, D. 14–15
Area Cost Adjustment (ACA) 168–9 Bennett, N. 7
Argyris, C. 13 Bennis, W. 97, 108
articulation processes 62–4 Berman, P. 79
Aspin, D. 189 best value 172–3
Aspinwall, K. 85 Black, P. 13, 118, 127
aspirations 113 Blair 197
assessment 118–19, 123, 126–38, 190, Blanchard, K. 82
194, 199; for learning 119, 126–38; of Boal, K. B. 9–14, 65
learning 119 Boisot, M. 8, 62, 65
attitudes 32, 36, 39, 87, 126 Borko, H. 129
attributes 32, 39 boundaries 27, 133–4, 195–6, 198
Audit Commission 172 boundary spanning 194, 196, 204–5
autocratic leadership 96 Bowring-Carr, C. 17–31, 111–38
autonomous learner 111, 115–18, 120 Boyatzis, R. 39, 49
 Index 217

Briggs–Stratton Behaviour Styles Cohen, W. M. 13

Inventory 101 collaboration 89, 179
Brookes, M. 165–82 collaborative working 91
Bruner 114 commitment 177
Bryson, J. M. 10 Committee, Finance 179
Buckingham, M. 50 community 18–21, 24–5, 27–8, 41, 50,
budget, 179, 191, 203; delegated 165; 95, 97, 111–13, 115–19, 122, 124, 128,
school 165 137, 178, 187, 192, 194, 199–200, 202;
Bukowitz, W. R. 201 Council 20, 136–7; learning 25,
Buley, A. L. 8 111–12, 114–16, 118, 121–2, 124–5,
bureaucratic school 22 132, 135, 193, 203; links 30
Burgleman, R. A. 11 competence 32–51, 79, 85, 97, 198;
Burgoyne, R. 201 approach 35; for the future 39;
Bush, T. 7 frameworks 35
Business Link 162, 214 competency 32–51, 62, 90
Butler, H. 112, 127 competent leader 32–51
competitive intelligence 202–3
Caldwell, B. J. 95, 104, 185–205 Completer Finisher 89–90
capability 33, 38, 40–1, 49, 58, 60–2, concept map 130
66–7, 70, 141, 204; building 62; conceptualisation processes 56, 60
strategic 12, 60, 67 conflict resolution 198
capacity 58, 61–2, 71, 123, 188, 198, connectivity 133–4, 136
201–2; absorptive 13; adaptive 13; Constable, J. 42
building 66 contextual factors 173–4
capital, intellectual 195, 201 continent, the new 199
Capital Funding Grant 175 contingency theory 48
Carmichael 98–9 co-ordinator 89
Carter 104 core capability 33
centralisation 190 core competencies 12, 33–4, 40, 67
Chaleff, I. 95 costs 175; unit 173–4
change 11, 22, 61, 63, 66–7, 69–70, covenant 19
72–94, 112, 141; adaptive 85; Covey, S. 62
barriers to 85; behavioural 174; first Craig, E. 17
order 84–5; individual 73; leaders creative tension 13; leadership 187
73, 194; managers 73–6, 78, 85–7; creativity 198
managing successful change 85–91; Crévola, C. 194, 196
organisational 76–8; planning for cross-disciplinary project 134
78–85; second order 84, 85; stages of Cuban, L. 84
74; strategic 65; understanding 73–8 cultural leadership 193–4
Chapman, J. 189 culture 8, 64, 70, 81–2, 85, 91, 95, 100,
characteristics 32, 35–8 103, 112, 141, 188, 194, 197–9, 203
Charter Mark 163, 214 curiosity 122
Chartered Management Institute 42 curriculum 128, 194; balkanised 195
Cheng, Y. C. 11 cycle, financial planning 175–7
choice 191–2, 202, 205
Clarke, L. 87 D’Agostino 115
class size 181, 204 Dalin, P. 85
Clifton, D. O. 50 Darling-Hammond, L. 127
coach 104, 113 Davies, B. 7–16, 55–71, 118
coaching 97, 101, 104–5 Davies, B. J. 7–16, 58
Coalition of Essential Schools 134 Day, C. et al. 181
code 19–22 decentralisation 190
cognition 129 decentralised strategy 66
218 Index

decline of schools 186 ethical 122; code 19–22, 132;

deep learning 111, 113–14, 119–20, community 27; dimension 17;
124–6, 128–9 intelligence 200; leader 17;
delegated budgets 165; funding 178 leadership 178; school 21, 23, 25, 31;
Delors, J. 189 stance 20; system 21
DeMarie, S. M. 13 ethically focused school 22, 24
Department for Education and Skills ethics 17–18, 21, 122, 132, 136
(DfES) 40–1, 45, 48, 50, 162, 166–7, ethos 21–2, 77, 122, 136, 141
171, 196–7 European Foundation for Quality
DePree, M. 10, 92, 95 Management (EFQM) 157–60
depression 75–6 evaluation, self- 139–64
DES 180 Evans, P. 62, 67
deschooling 187 evidence-based leadership 193
design (school) 194 evolutionary perspective 79
development: individual 105; plan 145;
planning 108, 114 fair funding 168
dimensions 188, 192–4, 205 feedback 106–8, 127, 146
direction, strategic 61 Fiedler, F. E. 48, 82
direction-setting 55 finance: school 165; school-based 181
dispersed leadership 18–19, 116 Finance Committee 176–7, 179
distributed: intelligence 120, 130; financial: benchmarking 175; planning
leadership 7, 71; strategy 66 cycle 175–7; reporting 178
domains 188, 194–200, 205 Fink, D. 61
double-loop learning 13 Fire! 82–3
double s-curve 12, 58 firm ground 73, 90
driving forces 85, 86 Flecknoe, M. 23
Drucker, P. F. 194, 203 flexibility 36
focus, strategic 7, 63, 178
Earl, L. 61 followers 9, 95
Earley 35 Force Field Analysis 85–6
EAZ (Education Action Zone) 197 Forde, R. 38, 204
Education Formula Spending Share formal 98; leaders 95, 97; organisation
(EFSS) 167 76–7; structure 78
Education Reform Act 180 formative assessment 118–19
Education and Training Inspectorate formula 167, 180; for funding schools
21 166
educational leadership 193, 205 Forster, E. M. 120
effective leadership 32, 35 frameworks, planning 66
effectiveness 173–4 full service schools 188
elegance 92 Fullan, M. 61, 72, 75, 78–80, 82, 88–91,
elegant leaders 92 189
Elfring, T. 65 funding 165–70, 180–1, 190; delegated
Ellison, L. 32–51, 55, 63 178; fair 168; formula 166;
emergent strategy 14, 56, 66–7 leadership and management of
emotional capabilities 61 171–9; mechanism 191; stream 167
emotional intelligence 39, 49, 117, futures: oriented 69; thinking 27, 56
122–3
empowering leader 96 Gallup 49
empowerment 97 Gardner, H. 15, 129, 131, 198
engagement 58 Garratt, B. 60
envisioning 9 Garrett, V. 72–92
equity 191–2, 195–6, 205 GCSE 135, 202
Esp, D. 35 Georgiades, N. 106
 Index 219

gestalt 195 individual development plan 105

Gioia, D. A. 10 individual learning 89
global learning networks 195 Individual School Budgets (ISB) 167
globalisation 198 induction standards 44
Glover, D. 7 informal: organisation 77; rules 78
Goleman, D. 39, 49 information for learning 126–64
governing body 176, 181 Ingersoll, R. M. 200
governors 157, 177 initiative 38, 49
Governors’ Annual Report 178 innovation 141, 200, 203
grades 126–8 inputs 33, 36, 84
grant-maintained: schools 180; status insight 12
181 Institute of Management Development
Gratton, L. 10, 60–1, 64 43
Gregorc 101 instructional leadership 15
Grove, A. S. 11 integrating theme 188
Grundy, T. 60 intellectual capital 195–6, 201
intelligence 14, 114, 120, 128–32, 134,
Hambrick, D. C. 13 136, 198, 200–3; competitive 202–3;
Hamel, G. 10, 12, 40, 42, 66–7 distributed 120, 130; emotional 39,
Handy, C. 32, 42, 198 49, 117, 122–3, 136, 198, 200;
Hargreaves, A. 61, 78 interpersonal 120, 131, 134, 198;
Harland, J. 26, 120 intrapersonal 120, 131, 198; multiple
Harris, A. 62 129, 131, 198; pyramid 202–3; social
Hay McBer 36, 45, 48, 145, 204; models 15
of excellence 163 intelligent school 200–1
Hayes, J. 73–4 intent, strategic 10, 14, 56, 63, 66–7
Hayes, M. 23–4, 31 interdependence 22
HayGroup 36–9, 45–9 internalisation 75
Haynes, A. 163, 214 interpersonal intelligence 120, 131, 134,
heads, maverick 48 198
Hedger 160 intervention points 11
Heene, A. 42 intrapersonal intelligence 120, 131,
Heifetz, R. 74, 85 198
Hersey, P. 82, 105 intrapreneurship 66
hidden unconscious organisation 77 intuition 12, 59, 65–6, 89
hierarchy 114 Investor in People 157, 163, 214
high involvement leadership 96 involvement 83, 87
high performance schools 93–108
Hill, P. 194, 196 Jackson, D. 203
hindering forces 85–6 Javidon, M. 8
Hirschhorn, L. 61 jazz band 116
Hitt, M. A. 13 Jesson, 164
Hobby, A. 38, 204 journal 134–5, 137
home schooling 187 judgement 59
Hooijberg, R. 9–14, 65
Hopson, B. 73–4 Kairos time 12
Kakabadse, A. 8, 9
iceberg 42, 76–7 Kaplan, R. S. 9, 65, 70
immobilisation 75 Keats, B. W. 13
implementation processes 56, 64–5; Key Stage 3 120, 168, 174, 197
adaptive 79; programmed 79; Kiel University 190
sequential and parallel 64–5 King, R. A. 192
Implementer 89 Kissinger 199
220 Index

Klein, G. 66 89; knowledge 203; lifelong 116,

knowledge 32, 34, 39–40, 83, 88, 129, 189, 195, 198, 200; networks, global
199, 201, 203–5; management 201–5; 195; organisation 104, 114, 193;
society 189, 190, 195–6, 198, 205; organisational 10, 89; outcomes 189,
workers 190, 195 200, 202, 205; profound 124;
Koestler 31 resourcing 165–82; social 129;
Kohn, A. 112, 114, 121, 126 theory of 191
Korac-Kakabadse, N. 8 Lees, A. 38, 204
Kotter, J. P. 93 lesson plans 196
letting go 75
Lampel, J. 65 Levac̆ić, R. 202–3
LEA 141, 157, 162, 166–7, 169, 172–3, Levels (1, 3, 4, 5) 34; (1, 2, 3, 4) 84; of
177–8, 180–1 leadership 96
Leadbeater, C. 198 Levinthal, D. A. 13
leader 95, 108, 115–17, 121; change 73, lifelong learning 116, 189, 195, 198, 200
194; competent 32–51; elegant 92; Linsky, M. 74, 85
empowering 96; ethical 17; as Lloyds TSB 162, 163, 215
facilitator of team performance 93; Local Government Association (LGA)
formal 95, 97; strategic 8, 59, 64 166, 180
leadership 93–108, 112, 116; autocratic Local Management of Schools (LMS)
96; by example 108; Competency 180
Instrument 47; creative 187; cultural long term 57, 62–3, 67; sustainability 68
193–4, 205; dispersed 18–19, 116; longer term 55–7, 61, 67, 116
distributed 7, 71; educational 193, loose systems 171
205; effective 32, 35; ethical 178; Louis, K. 79
evidence-based 193; (of) funding
171–9; high involvement 96; McBer 36, 45–6
instructional 15; intuition 65–6; McClelland, D. C. 36, 45–6
learning-centred 15; levels of 96; McCormick, R. 42
moral 15; participative 96; MacGilchrist, B. 200–1
propositions 1; responsive 193, 205; Madaus 127
situational 94–5; strategic 7, 8–16, management 93–5, 97, 104, 108; of the
57–9, 64, 71, 95, 205; strategies for budgetary process 179; of funding
191; styles 48, 81–3; successful 204; 171–9
superleadership 95, 108; Management Charter Initiative (MCI)
transformational 11, 15, 95; 42
two-dimensional 94; visionary 8, 11, Management Competency
49, 179 Questionnaire 47
Leadership Programme for Serving Management Standards Centre (MSC)
Headteachers (LPSH) 37, 48 34–6, 42–3, 46
leading and managing staff 93–108 manager 104; change 73–6, 78, 85–7;
‘Leading from the Middle’ 88 model 47
leading learning 111–25 managerialism 115, 123
leading transformation 185–205 managing staff 93–108
leap 12–13, 58–9, 65, 70 Manz, C. 95, 108
learner 111, 113, 115, 119; autonomous mapping, backward 197
111, 115–18, 120 Margerison and McCann Team Index
learning 82, 111–38, 141; assessment 101
for 126–38; centred leadership 15; marking 126–8; policy 128
community 25, 111–12, 114–16, 118, marks 127–8
121–2, 124–5, 132, 135, 193, 203; Marris, P. 75
deep 111, 113–14, 119–20, 124–6, Marsh, D. 65
128–9; double loop 13; individual Martin 115
 Index 221

maturity 82 networker 123

maverick heads 48 networks 91; global learning 195;
medium term 55, 63–5, 67–8, 71 quality 162
megatrends 192 Newly Qualified Teacher (NQT) 44,
memory 136 179
mental models 60 Niven, P. R. 70
mentor 97–8, 104–5, 107, 113 Northern Ireland 21, 26, 120
mentoring 97, 104 Norton, D. P. 9, 65, 70
metacompetence 40
metalanguage 115, 134–5 occupational standards 42
micropolitical mapping 85–7 OECD 170, 181, 186–7, 189, 200
Miles, M. 79 Office for Standards in Education
minimisation 75 55–6, 80–1, 90, 139–43, 157, 162–3,
Mintzberg, H. 55, 65 167, 172–5
Models of Excellence 48 Ogle, L. T. 170
Monitor Evaluator 89 Ohmae, K. 198–9
monitoring 94, 99, 130, 141, 143, 146, operational management: team 63;
164, 194 plan 63
moral: leadership 15; code 122; oral articulation 62
purpose 189 Orange, C. 200
Morgan, G. 79 organisation 104; formal 76–7; hidden
Moses, J. 93, 98 unconscious 77; informal 77;
motivating 94 learning 104, 114, 193; virtual 196
motivation 45–6, 61, 71, 77, 82, 120 organisational: barriers (to change) 85;
multiple intelligences 129, 198 change 76–8; core competence 33;
Myers, K. 200–1 learning 89
Myers–Briggs Type Indicator 101 outcome 40, 94, 99, 102–3, 108, 118–19,
126–8, 187, 192, 197, 204; learning
Nanus, W. 97, 108 189, 200, 202
National Association of Headteachers outputs 33, 39, 44, 50
(NAHT) 181, 215
National College for School Papert, S. 195
Leadership (NCSL) 1, 36, 40, 44, 48, parallel approach 58; development 59
50, 88, 203 Parikh, J. 66
National Curriculum 115, 126, 140, participation 61–2, 71, 83, 85
157 participative leadership 96
National Foundation for Educational Pascale, R. 83
Research (NFER) 26, 120 pedagogy 28–9, 115, 187, 194, 198–200,
National Occupational Standards 33 204–5
National Professional Qualification for Pedler, M. 83
Headship (NPQH) 40, 50 people and development processes 56,
National Standards for Headteachers 60–2
39, 41, 48, 50 performance: criteria 35, 37; data 105;
National Standards for Special Development International 107;
Educational Needs Co-ordinators excellent 35; feedback 105, 146;
39 indicators 141; management 88;
National Standards for Subject Leaders standards 33
39–41, 44 Perkins, D. 120, 129–30
National Vocational Qualification personal: barriers (to change) 85;
(NVQ) 33–5 qualities 32
Necochea, R. 12 perspective, evolutionary 79
networked 69; Learning Communities Pietersen, W. 10, 64
203 PISA (Program for International
222 Index

Student Assessment) 170, 186, reflective review 105

189–90 relationships 81, 90, 111
plan 146; individual development 105; re-schooling 187
lesson 196 Research and Development Team 63
planning 94, 143; (for) change 78–85; resistance 85, 88; to change 85–6
development 108; financial cycle resistors 87
175–7; frameworks 66; processes 69; Resource Investigator 89
strategic 56, 65, 67, 79, 80, 82, 100 resources 134, 136
Plant, R. 73, 76–7, 87, 89–90 resourcing learning 165–82
Postman, N. 25 responsive leadership 193
power 45–6, 87, 98; barriers (to change) restlessness 13, 69
85–6 Revans, R. W. 83
Prahalad, C. K. 10, 12, 40, 66–7 review, reflective 105
Principal Development Inventory Rittel, H. 82
(PDI) 107 Ruels 78
private schools 186
problem: solvers 117; solving 94, 103, safety net schools 186
127, 198; wicked 82 Sanders, T. I. 13
processes: articulation 62–4; SATS 124, 141
conceptualisation 56, 60; Sawatzki, M. 93–108
implementation 56; people and Scally, M. 74
development 56, 60–2; strategic scenarios 61, 185–8
articulation processes 56 Schön, D. 13
professional qualities 34, 40 school 21–5, 31, 130, 139–64; based
professionalism 194–6, 200–1, 205 finance 181; budget 165; Council 20,
profile 126–38 178; decline of 186; design 194;
programmed implementation 79 development plan 67, 142–3, 146,
psychological: barriers 85; contract 162; Development Plan Team 63;
61–2 development planning (SDP) 65;
PTA 178 finance 165; full service 188; high
public–private partnerships 187 performance 93–108; improvement
Pugh, D. 85 127; Improvement File (SIF) 142–57;
pupil shadowing 28 Improvement Plan 67, 146, 162, 174,
Putnam, R. T. 129 176, 178; Improvement Planning
(SIP) 65; intelligent 200;
Qantas 105 Management Task Force 35; private
Qualified Teacher Status (QTS) 35, 186; safety net 186; self-managing
39–40, 44 189–91, 205; virtual 195; world-class
Qualifying to Teach 44 204
qualities: personal 32; professional 34, schooling 187
40 Schools Forum 167
quality network 162 Schulman, L. 62, 67
Schwenk, C. R. 8
Rajan 202 Scottish Executive 41
Ramsden 126 Scottish National Vocational
readiness 80–2 Qualification 33
reading 115 self-esteem 74, 122, 132, 136
Ready! Fire! Aim! 80, 85 self-evaluation 139–64
rearchitecturing 9 self-management 191
Reay, D. 124, 126 self-managing schools 189–91, 205
reculturing 61 Seltzer, K. 198
Reed, J. 200–1 Selznick, P. 10
reflection 60 Senge, P. M. 13, 104, 122
 Index 223

Senior Leadership Team 128, 177 leaders 8–16, 57–9, 64, 71, 95, 205;
sequential development 59 leadership 7, 10, 15–16, 57–8, 71, 95,
Sergiovanni, T. 17, 111 192–3, 205; leadership of the
Service Organisation Profile 106 budgetary process 179; leap 12–13,
Shaper 89 58–9, 65, 70; maps 9, 69; measures
Sharman, S. 9 68; motivation 61; opportunism 14;
Sharpe, F. G. 94–5 orientation 8–9, 56; participation
Shepard, L. A. 127 61; perspective 7, 61; plan 63, 67,
Sheridan, G. 199 80; planning 56, 65, 67, 79–80, 82,
short term 55–6, 61–2, 67–8, 71, 87, 90, 100; policy team 63; processes
114, 123 56–7, 59–65; team 104; thinking
Shropshire County Council 164 48, 55, 60–1; timing 58, 64–5, 70;
Sims, H. 95, 108 view 62
situational leadership 94–5 strategically opportunistic 58–9, 70
skills 32, 34, 39, 58 strategically oriented 8, 56
Smith, P. 139–64 strategies 94–5, 192–3; for leadership
social intelligence 15 191
society, knowledge 189–90, 195–6, 198, strategy 9–11, 38, 55–71; decentralised
205 or distributed 66; emergent 14, 56,
spanning, boundary 196–7 66–7; into action 10, 57, 64, 70
sparcity 168 structural articulation 63
specialist 89 structure, formal 78
Spender, D. 196 superleadership 95, 108
Spinks, J. M. 95, 189–92, 195–6 sustainability 67–8
Stacey, R. D. 8, 10 swampy ground 73, 90
staff, leading and managing 93–108 Swanson, A. D. 192
Stafford, K. 74 systems: loose 171; management 172;
stages of change 74 tight 171
Stalk, G. 12, 62, 67
standards 32–4, 39–41, 43–4, 115, 127, talents 49
139, 146, 189–90, 194; Fund 166–7; teacher, trainee 35
Grant 166; for Headship in Scotland Teacher Training Agency (TTA) 34–5,
41; induction 44; national 39, 41, 44–5, 48, 50
occupational 42 Teaching Assistants (TAs) 179
Steiner 115 team 89, 94–109, 113, 120–1, 134, 194–6,
Sternberg, R. J. 14 204; building 198; learning 136;
steward 27–8, 122–5 Senior Leadership 177; worker 89
Stewart, T. A. 201 theme, integrating 201–5
Stoll, L. 61–2 think tank 81
storming 89 Third International Mathematical and
strategic: activity 62; approaches 56–7, Science Study (TIMSS) 190, 202
65–7, 70; architecture 9, 69–70; Thomas, J. G. 10
articulation processes 56; awareness threshold 33, 44; level of performance
10; capability 12, 60, 67; change 65; 35
choices 71; committee 64; Tichy, T. 9
conversation 9–10, 61–2, 64, 71; core tight systems 171
98–9; development 179; dimension timing 58, 64–5, 70
15; direction 9, 61, 63, 70, 99; Timms, Stephen 197
flexibility 13; focus 7, 63, 178; Total Quality Management 100
inflection points 11–12; intelligence tracks 188–91, 195, 204–5
200; intent 10, 14, 56, 63, 66–7; transformation 84; leading 185–205; of
intentions 123; intervention 11; schools 185–205
intrapreneurship 56; judgement 65; transformational leadership 11, 15, 95
224 Index

translating strategy into action 64 voice, student 132

trust 14, 19, 91, 141; building Volberda, H. W. 65
capabilities 61
trustworthiness 49 Webber, M. 82
TTA 34–5, 39, 41, 44–5, 48, 50 Wee, J. 191
Tuckman, B. 89 well-being 131, 136
twin-track parallel approach 58, 65 West Sussex Model of Self-review 163
two-dimensional leadership 94 West-Burnham, J. 27, 118, 122
Whittington, R. 13, 66
understanding 39, 58, 83, 100–1, 112 wicked problems 82
UNESCO 189, 191 Wiliam, D. 118, 124, 126–7
unit costs 173–4 Williams, R. L. 201
Upper Pay Spine 44 Williams, W. 163
Willis, D. 126
value: for money 173–5; best 172–3 Wilson, D. 78, 84
values 9, 11, 14, 17–19, 21–2, 30, 62, Wilson, J. M. 95–6
64, 66, 77, 83, 85, 89, 91, 132, 164, wisdom 14, 112, 196, 201
187–8, 191–2, 199, 204–5; shared Wise, C. 7
10 Wise, D. 58, 63
van der Heijden, K. 61 Woessmann, L. 190, 202
virements 179 Woods, P. 7
virtual: organisation 196; schools 195 worker, knowledge 190, 195
vision 8–11, 13, 22, 29, 38, 48, 58, 62, 80, world-class schools 204
84, 90, 94, 97, 116, 141, 178–9, 188–9, written articulation 63
204–5
visionary leadership 8, 11, 49, 179 Zone of Proximal Development 134