Five keys to an effective leadership development approach

/

There is an extensive research base that demonstrates that leadership is the key contributor to organisational change and improvement. For example, the evidence highlights, that under the right conditions, leaders can transform and significantly reverse the fortunes of failing schools and struggling education systems. Therefore, more needs to be done to develop and support leadership that is of consistently high quality across the whole learning ecosystem. How do we support educational leaders to grow and develop throughout their whole careers?

Key 1: Focus on strategies that matter the most

While there is no silver bullet for successfully developing leaders, there are key actions to be taken which will increase the chance of success. According to research by McKinsey & Co., there are strategies that appear to matter most. These include:

1.       Focusing on behaviours that really matter, based on context

  • Determine how mindsets and behaviour need to change

  • Translate strategy into required leadership qualities/capabilities

  • Focus on leadership behaviours most critical to performance

  • Be futures oriented and anticipate behaviours that will be needed in the future

2.       Designing programmes for the transfer of learning

  • Link programme learning to real work – dealing with real problems in school contexts, for example

  • Encourage individuals to apply their new learnings in their work over an extended period of time and practice them in their job

  • Support double and triple loop learning through reflective practices, cycles of inquiry or action research cycles

  • Provide coaching that encourages introspection and self-discovery as well as looks to the future

3.       Using system reinforcement to lock in changes

  • The system will actively support and nurture leaders at every level – micro, meso and macro or local, middle, central.

  • Investment in leadership needs to be for the long term to embed changes deeply in the system, to have the best chance of success (Harris and Jones, 2020).

  • ‘Systemness’ is defined by Michael Fullan (2021) as the sense that people have at all levels of the system that they are the system. This means they have a responsibility to interact with, learn from, contribute to and be a living member of the system as it evolves.

Key 2: Consider how adults learn best

Adult learning happens best in the following circumstances:

  • Letting people have a say on what they learn and how they learn, acknowledging that people pick up learning in different ways. A greater sense of responsibility to manage their own development contributes to self-confidence

  • A mix of training, personal/professional development and coaching/mentoring is the most effective way to grow performance

  • Formal learning is most effective when it is accompanied by coaching to discuss how to apply the learning to their role

  • Offering stretch opportunities

  • Regular catch-ups, good communication and honest feedback

  • Identifying skill gaps with clear objectives and milestones for the adult learner/leader to achieve

  • Keeping track of their training and development

Key 3: A layered coaching and mentoring approach

It is important to note that coaching and mentoring programmes typically rely on single coach–coachee or mentor-mentee matches and can sometimes be quite formal and hierarchical. However, considerable research evidence shows that many employees – especially women – prefer coaching/mentorship which is more reciprocal and mutual in character. Single mentors or coaches are less development-enhancing than robust developmental networks or coaching/mentoring ‘constellations’.

My doctoral research (2009) on coaching and how it contributed to the growth and development of educators over a two-year period found that while one-on-one, more formal coaching, generally with a senior or more experienced coach, assisted the growth and development of educators, it was learning to be a coach and practising the skills and dispositions of coaching in their work contexts that had the most impact on educators. A third learning loop of assisting others in their teams to develop coaching skills and dispositions further reinforced and embedded their learning as well as assisting the development of a team coaching and collaborative culture.

In my doctoral research, and research undertaken more recently (2016 – 2018) through the Teacher-Led Innovation Fund (MoE), I found that developing the skills and dispositions of a coach led to growth and development in the multiple dimensions of the emotional, social, cognitive/intellectual and spiritual/moral dimensions – dimensions or aspect of what it means to be human. This integrated growth and development led the educators, firstly to begin to feel like leaders, and then to behave like leaders as they made increasingly wise decisions. In fact, an exchange or integration of narratives took place over time which began with “doing coaching” to “doing coaching more” to “becoming a coach and a leader” to “sustaining a narrative of leadership” in which coaching became integrated into, or subsumed within, a sustained narrative of leadership.

Hence, a coaching and mentoring programme as part of a leadership development approach would be most effective when it is multi-layered and includes:

  • Regular and formal one-on-one coaching with an experienced senior coach

  • Learning to be a coach – learning the skills and dispositions of a coach – and using them in their work as they work with others

  • Multiple (an ever-changing constellation of), often reciprocal and mutual coaching/mentoring relationships for different purposes and needs. Learning the skills and dispositions of a coach is essential to support this development

  • A culture of coaching – where a plethora of brief “coaching” interactions-in-passing leads to increasingly transformative relationships in which coaching becomes a way “things are done around here” and a way of being

  • A culture that supports change-enabling growth and development – none of the above 4 layers of coaching will create the change if the culture does not support change-enabling growth and development

Key 4: Dynamically balancing the polarities of the approach

From the above characteristics of effective learning, some polarities emerge that need to be constantly attended to in a programme of leadership learning. These can be imagined as gauges in which a slider is moved up and down to show where it is positioned between the two extremes of the polarity. See Polarity gauge diagram.

Some polarities in leadership learning include:

·       Employee agency and autonomy – Employer requirement

·       Formal training – Development opportunities

·       Present focused – Futures focused

·       Organisational goals – personal goals

·       Support – Challenge

·       Responsive and flexible – Systematic and documented

These polarities (of which there are likely to be many more) bring to the surface some of the complexities involved in ensuring an effective leadership development approach. They illustrate the necessity of balancing the needs of the organisation and the needs of the individual employee and/or the teams within the big team, or formal and informal learning opportunities. The programme should always be looking ahead to the skills and capabilities that will be needed for the future while also being attentive to what is needed now. Balancing these polarities is not a matter of continuously making small adjustments to keep the slider in the middle of the gauge at all times (like you would with a level – always keeping the bubble in the centre), but is a matter of adjusting it to wherever it needs to be to ensure the thriving and success of every part of the system and every layer – individual, team, organisation etc.

Key 5: Continual feedback loops and systematic review

Thus, continual feedback loops, systematic review and evidence-based practice becomes necessary to ensure there is continual awareness of the current state for every layer and part of the organisation/programme and what the needs might be.

Conclusion

There is little more important for us to be focusing on right now than leadership development. Paying attention to these five keys will support leadership that is of consistently high quality across the whole learning ecosystem.