What I Learnt from being a CEO in Education
Without doubt, people make, break, or evolve the system. Whether this is internally or externally, there are pressures that come from meeting expectations but as a leader you have to be capable of self-authoring your own journey. The greatest challenges in this is not understanding yourself or the other person, or that they, without doubt, will have a different perspective to you. As you become more conscious of this it can be even more difficult. ‘How can this not be obvious that an angry parent, a child that is dysregulated, and a teacher who is trying to maintain their professional standards are driven to different outcomes by different values?’
This human element of education makes it a complex system and one that is incredibly hard to transform.
Figure 1. 22 Barriers to Successful Transformations (Garcia, Krippendorff & Ness, 2019)
This conflict has certainly been mirrored by the blockers identified in Figure 1 above (each blocker will be referenced with its numerical number below). Each position I walked into as a leader had a legacy culture (01) and it certainly didn’t align with my ambitious beliefs of what learners were capable of and how this could be realised. This certainly required culture change and this began at an individual level in each setting. The key to this has always been discovering the perspective each individual holds on the current state of the setting, what would they prioritise for change and what is their role in the future?
Since being exposed to incredible frameworks of values and ego maturity, the capacity to do this and assess if the individual's wishes have the capacity to be a part of the strategy have become far more nuanced. The same can be said about culture design and readiness when you truly understand the need for diverse value stages in your teams (02). Do not get me wrong, I made mistakes either in appointments, positions and systems throughout my journey, yet the number reduced significantly and with minimal consequence once I understood human development and my own lens and biases. This enabled far more vulnerability to challenge and criticism and often reframed conflict to become the type of tension that innovation emerges from repositioning roles transparently has been a key learning point.
Giving individuals voice (03) in the process has always been part of my approach, but the specificity of who and the tools we used to accelerate this ensured it wasn’t laboured. In each setting the pace of culture and system change (04) varied according to context, but involving individuals, particularly those with the strongest influences on the network was essential. This often meant increasing leadership (05) opportunities and these individuals thrived in different roles of responsibility and created their own teams to become far more accountable. This peer change allowed old practice to be let go of (06) as peer to peer groups were purposefully created into a matrix and then network structure.
As I continued my career, the systems of governance (07) we created accelerated this massively, with common language and systems becoming established and built around the principles of deliberately developmental organisations. Professionals treated as adults are like learners treated with respect, they thrive and challenge to promote a sense of agency, commitment and effort, building intrinsic motivation. This is partly why we are called The Glass House - ‘we design the house, you decorate the rooms’. Each holder needs a stake to hold.
Seeing this in curriculum reform during my doctoral studies, culture transformation of huge MATs as a facilitator or human transformation within my coaching and charity work gives me a relentless belief that if we are driven and aware, evolving the system, whether our own personal ones or within education, is possible. This belief has been reinforced when leading through antiquated systems to new startup schools, leading through smooth change processes to a global pandemic. Upgrading my lens in how my knowledge, skills and behaviour is applied has allowed me to grow through the challenge to the point that I can reframe suffering as something to be valued, whilst not expecting others to necessarily see the same problem the same way and embracing the diversity of lens.
My own strength, and at times downfall, has been compassion (I have been working on clearer boundaries!). This comes from working with complex learners for over three decades which has provided me with a grounding (in my own head at least!) of what challenges learners have to face coupled with my personal experience of brain surgeries and the challenges that come with that. This has meant very little sympathy and far more drive to challenge, coach and create; adopting a ‘never give up’ mantra bestowed upon me by a learner with cerebral palsy who was determined to stand-up. Whatever challenges leadership have thrown, nothing compares to this. Like the learner, I have fallen down many times, but having a clear purpose and vision for the future of education has driven me to get up, surrounded by incredible teams who have been willing to pick me up and dust me down. Being able to clearly articulate and communicate this model which has become sharpened by so many wins and losses, and maturing leaders to evolve the system is clearly what I see as my mission to transform the vision into reality. I keep seeking innovation if we are to truly balance the system, so please do connect if this is a network and movement you want to join.
My own development would not have accelerated had it not been for a brilliant coach. Having a guide to make sense of the challenges you face as a leader, particularly as they are external and objective, allows us to objectify so much of what we face. In time we learn to self coach our own voices of doubt and fear, and truly listen to the contribution of those who shout the loudest or do not speak at all; but to get there we first need some guidance.
Reference:
Garcia, C., Krippendorff, K. & Ness, Z. (2019). Four Transformation Traps and How To Avoid Them. In The Transformation Playbook, Thinkers 50 (eds). [online]. https://www.brightline.org/resources/thinkers50-transformation-playbook/
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