Reconciling one tension at the heart of middle leadership
One of the things I’ve been reflecting on recently is about the role of middle leaders within a school. I’ve just left a role as a Head of History, to take on a senior leader role, as teaching and learning lead, where I’m working a lot with Heads of Department, as well as classroom teachers.
I’ve been thinking particularly about the role of middle leaders within broader school leadership. As a Head of Department, I conceived of my role to be the champion of my subject. As I saw it, I had to fight tooth and nail to protect the interests of my subject, and the teachers in my department, from factors within the school that might undermine that. Whether it be ensuring we had the right amount of curriculum time, or making sure I had the teachers that I wanted teaching the classes I wanted them to teach, or protecting the distinctiveness of the pedagogy needed for History within a whole school framework, I felt that it was necessary to be combative in dealings with senior leadership.
That being said, I’d had experience of whole school middle and senior leadership before taking on the Head of History job, so I also had an appreciation for the need to have a whole school insight. I could see, for instance, that English, Maths and Science would need to be prioritised in lots of ways over my own subject. Ultimately, if English and Maths results weren’t good, the school would suffer. If History results weren’t as good, but English and Maths were strong, the school was likely to be in a stronger position (not that the two things are completely incompatible). I might disagree (strongly) with certain whole school policies, but need to support their implementation in order to help make the school function. And by the way, I’m not saying I was 100% perfect in doing that — I certainly was not!
I also saw myself as part of a team of other middle leaders. At my previous school, I think the heads of department were a fairly tight-knit bunch that would do a lot to help each other out, be a sounding board for each other, and would work together to tackle difficulties in behaviour. I could always turn to the Head of Science if I needed someone to bob into one of my other colleague’s lessons with a tricky class when I was teaching at the same time. I would be about to help shoo kids into class around the corridors if I wasn’t teaching that period. I also know that playing a role within whole school leadership, whatever that might look like, is important for middle leaders who aspire to senior leadership, and you need to grab opportunities to do that with both hands sometimes.
In my new role, I think I see the goal as to create a synergy between the two strands of middle leadership. On the one hand, teaching and learning at my school needs expert subject leads to drive their curriculum areas forward (or expert pastoral leads to drive their year groups on). They have to be the absolute nerd for their area and passionate about it being the most important part of the school curriculum (even if, in the case of subjects like Geography, it obviously isn’t).*
But we as senior leaders need our middle leaders to be part of the wider school leadership community. We need them to be visible in supporting the implementation of the behaviour system, leading the way in ensuring the whole school routines are followed, and playing a key role in supporting the whole school CPD agenda (by presenting in staff briefing, for example). We need them to hunt for problems proactively, rather than reactively, and not being afraid to alert senior leaders to looming issues.
In a sense, we need to move from the model above, to the one below (if my diagram makes sense).
As a senior leader, my role now involves empowering those middle leaders to be part of whole school leadership, while supporting them (and, where appropriate, constructively challenging them) in developing the practice within their teams, all the while ensuring they have access to the training and development they require. I’m very much at the start of that journey and feeling my way through it — no doubt I’ll make a few mistakes on the way, but I feel that’s where we need to be.
Perhaps a better metaphor is the juggling act — middle leaders often get it from both ends, challenged by the people above them in the hierarchy, as well as those below them. A lot of people with conflicting demands need to be kept happy. It’s a really tough job — an interesting one, but demanding for sure. As I progress into senior leadership, I very much want to make sure I keep the memory of my middle leadership experience going to help inform my actions moving forward.
