Heads need heart to succeed in Scottish schools

Published on Sunday 8 November 2009 21:12

GUESS whose is the first car in the morning in the school car park and the last to depart at night? Who eats their lunch on the run – if they eat at all? How many working professionals have a job description ranging from changing light bulbs through to preparing strategic plans?

How many people work with a range of children from neighbourhoods of grinding poverty and generous wealth? How many have to endure being verbally (and sometimes physically) abused by parents? But who else experiences the joy of watching children flourish and seeing staff growing in confidence and expertise?

Welcome to the world of the Scottish headteacher. A complex and demanding world which requires an extraordinary level of mental agility, interpersonal savvy and emotional resilience.

It is a job in which one is expected to be both "on top" and "on tap" at all times, only a mobile phone call away from the next demand, the next problem, the next unanticipated dilemma.

These were recurring themes in our study into the recruitment and retention of headteachers, commissioned by the Scottish Government.

Interviews with headteachers and teachers across the country told similar stories, of professional sacrifice yet personal gratification.

For many heads it was a studied choice to work in troubled areas. They wanted to make a difference – to the welfare of children growing up in fractured neighbourhoods and multiple disadvantage.

A head's description of putting on her make-up in the morning was portrayed as a symbolic act, echoed in the determination to "try to keep a professional face, not letting the mask slip". Many of the big leadership decisions have to be carried alone.

Professional inhibitions tend to deter heads from sharing frustrations or confiding in their staff. It is typically wives, husbands, partners and friends who bear the brunt of emotional release and, in the words of one headteacher, "letting off steam".

School leadership is distinctively different from leadership in the commercial world. Public service roles are rarely undertaken for financial gain. Most heads and teachers don't seek the limelight. What motivates them is a passion to serve and to improve the lives of children.

They work more unpaid hours than any other professional group and do so with commitment. There is, however, a fine line between provision of a service and exploitation. Particularly when resources are scarce and the political pressures on education are intense, requiring staff to do more with less, squeezing out ever more productivity.

While unremitting change is a constant, it is less the imperative of change that saps energy and enthusiasm than change driven by external sources, undermining latitude and discretion for heads to exercise the leadership talents for which they were recruited. Instead many find themselves in compliant managerial roles delivering agendas decided elsewhere but for which they are nevertheless held to account.

A head's description of "walking the tightrope of complex and multiple accountabilities" depicts a balancing act, on one side, trying to hold a precarious line with the local authority and Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education (HMIE), while on the other keeping a watchful eye on community, parents, teachers and pupils.

In these circumstances, there is a delicate balance to be struck between making demands on headteachers that challenge and stretch them, while not making the job so burdensome that sufficient numbers still retain their enthusiasm for the task. This is "intelligent" accountability.

A local authority manager, perhaps wisely preferring to remain anonymous, sympathised with heads summoned by a "three line whip" to attend authority briefing meetings, with directives in the form of one-way communication – decisions already taken.

Advice and support were, it was said, being slowly eroded in favour of mandated standards and "snoopervision". Improvement plans, standards and quality reports, once useful working documents, were now described as a form of ritual compliance.

"Generosity" is the distinguishing feature of intelligent local authorities. They believe in keeping the dialogue with schools alive. They regard headteachers as senior partners. They discriminate between the urgent and the important. They understand that trust takes time to grow and a moment to destroy. Generosity is the counterpoint to the gloomy picture of sleepless nights and impatient accountabilities.

Headteachers stayed with it because of their own generosity of spirit and the reciprocal goodwill from staff, from advisers and critical friends and, most rewarding of all from children eager to share their drawings, paintings, songs and stories. If only one could make time for them!

While the problems of headteacher recruitment and retention are not peculiar to Scotland, the solutions have to be. Scottish education already performs remarkably well. Succession planning and leadership development have been achieved without investing huge resources in a national leadership college.

Prospective heads now have two pathways available to them as options for satisfying the Standard for Headship, the Scottish Qualification for Headship and the Flexible Route to Headship. Few other systems in the world provide such options. The Chartered Teacher scheme for teacher leaders is also exemplary.

Equal imagination needs to be given to recruitment and retention. We have described school leadership as a high-wire act. It is a risky business requiring both a better safety net and more collegiate sharing of the high stakes attached to failure.

What keeps headteachers in their job, and equally what might influence teachers to leave their comfort zones and apply for senior leadership roles, will require a genuine partnership among professional associations, employers and government.

&#149 Prof John MacBeath and Prof Peter Gronn of Cambridge University were among the authors of The Recruitment and Retention of Headteachers in Scotland, published by the Scottish Government.