Down with management speak, the contentment revolution starts here!

On a recent holiday I was sat on the hotel balcony mulling over various matters and my wife asked me what was wrong. I explained that "I've got a problem". Without hesitation, but with tongue firmly in cheek she replied "A problem should be seen as an opportunity". Well this was like a red rag to a bull, and in a stream of consciousness and "robust" language I issued forth with a rant against this sort of nonsense.This is that rant.

My initial problem with her response was very simple, a problem is a problem, if it had been an opportunity I am sure that I would have said "I've got an opportunity". I am reasonable bright and I know the difference between the two, one is positive and one is negative. Maybe I'm being negative but I see a flat tyre as a problem, a nuisance, an inconvenience, rather than an opportunity to spend my time getting grubby and frustrated.

I have heard this trotted out on many occasions, so-called motivational speakers telling me (not discussing and debating, just telling) about opportunistic problems, but this is a case of the Emperor's new clothes, it isn't there. This is an opportunity to work harder and sort out something that someone else has done to make your life more challenging. In reality these management aphorisms have created their own mythology, a mythology which at its heart is designed to pile pressure on people, make workers compare themselves to each other, and to apply pressure to fit the mould of being an effective manager. Failure to turn a problem into an opportunity is seen as a failure.

I am not completely dismissive of all of this, there must be some wisdom here. Stephen Covey's "7 Habits..." states as Habit 7 that we should "sharpen the saw", in other words look after ourselves. But even this is still business focused, look after ourselves to make us more effective rather than for the sake of personal happiness. Unfortunately most of these maxims seem to be regurgitated junk or manifesto statements of sociopaths trying to squeeze the last drops of juice out of the orange by playing on feelings of guilt and inadequacy.

Behind the language is an implicit relationship between employer and employee. Business success and personal economic prosperity are at the heart of a majority of the books which populate the management bookshelves in airport bookshops (just an aside why are there 10 times more of these books than science or 100 times more than poetry?). I must admit that during my leadership career I have read many of these books, both general business management and specific educational management. My worry is that most of these books seem to ignore the humanity of colleagues, they are about the individual and just see others as cogs in a machine, cogs that either drive you or cogs that you drive. These cogs are generally not seen as a mutually beneficial machine, cogs are metallic and hard, impersonal and unemotional, but the reality of organisations is that the cogs are organic, these cogs are emotional, vulnerable and unique. Relationships are seen through an outcome-focused lens, a lens that equates professional success with output and profit. I would question if such a belief is sustainable and certainly whether everyone comes out on top.

This may sound like a socialist take on leadership, and may be it is, though for me emotions are as important as economics. At the beginning of the Bruce Springsteen's live video of Born to Run he says "remember in the end nobody wins unless everybody wins". When I first heard this as an idealistic teenager it stirred me, but now as a gnarled middle-aged man I still see it as a plausible maxim for ethically sound organisations, and especially schools. [A small aside I suspect staff at my previous school feared that it would be renamed Bruce Springsteen School].

Most schools are not profit making machines (even most private schools just break even and are charitable concerns) so why would we be wanting to use the language and philosophies of business where the raison d'etre is rarely the betterment of the whole community? Whilst schools operate within tight budgets, have expensive outgoings and often struggle to get to the end of the year, they are not businesses is the sense that the local supermarket is. I therefore feel that we need to be a little sceptical about adopting the philosophies of profit-making organisations where success is often judged in terms of profits and dividends. Ultimately what I am calling for (and also actively promoting) is a different metric of success. Can we see beyond the power, ego, personal gratification and wealth that apparently makes us "happy"? Can we aspire to be content? Can we make our ambition to achieve contentment? That contentment may be achieving good exam results with your classes, seeing low ability children make excellent progress or seeing a colleague thrive, none of which will make you richer. Could we have a simple ambition, to be content? Could school leadership set its main target to achieve whole school contentment?

We need to do something, teachers are leaving the profession in droves, there is a crisis in leadership and stress is going through the roof. Let's be brave, let's be content.

Save some time to dream - or what John Mellencamp would say about the pressure of workload

Read this:

Teachers are more likely to work unpaid overtime than staff in any other industry, with some working almost 13 extra hours per week, according to research.
A study of official figures from the Trades Union Congress (TUC) found that 61.4 per cent of primary school teachers worked unpaid overtime in 2014, equating to 12.9 additional hours a week. 
Among secondary teachers, 57.5 per cent worked unpaid overtime, with an average of 12.5 extra hours.
Across all education staff, including teachers, teaching assistants, playground staff, cleaners and caretakers, 37.6 per cent worked unpaid overtime – a figure higher than that for any other sector.

from "Teachers work more overtime than any other professionals, analysis finds" 27th February 2015 TES Online kaye wiggins

I once worked out that if I took all the hours I worked in a year and then divided them out on the basis of working a 37.5 hour week, I would need about 60 weeks in a year and to take no holiday.

 

Schools do not receive sufficient funding to reduce class sizes and increase PPA time by recruiting more teachers. There will currently be headteachers up and down the country laying-off teachers and increasing class size rather than the recruiting and decreasing.

 

I firmly believe that well-marked work is central to improving outcomes for pupils. I have taught so many Year 11 classes with more than 30 pupils that I would struggle to mark their work to the standard I know I should. We forget that teachers do believe in what they do, they don't want to let their pupils down and they do want to do their best for them. But how can they when they are working 60 hour weeks.

 

I have also noticed that workload creates significant resentment and division within schools. Be honest with yourself (don't have a go at me), how many Y6 teachers have resented their Y3 colleagues over workload, or how many secondary teachers have looked at PE and Art teachers with envy. The problem is that all teachers work hard. Put it this way, two people stranded in the middle of the Sahara are going to die, the one with a little water will be envied by the other and may last a little longer, but both are ultimately going to face the same fate.  

I'm sure we can all make a list of the things that make up our days and how overfill our time but on a daily basis lesson prep and marking are by far the most time consuming activities. Add to this reporting, writing schemes of work, undertaking CPD and so on and the time load becomes overwhelming.

In his book "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People", the author Stephen Covey includes "sharpening the sword". This is about self-care and personal development. When do teachers find the time? Mental health suffers because we have no time to slow down, relax, reflect, put things into perspective, to do the things we want to do. How many of you dwell over issues from school, sleepless nights are a reality for so many in this occupation and this creates further problems.

 

We often feel that we are competing against our colleagues and that coming up short when judged against those who are also working ludicrously long hours will make us look lazy and unprofessional.

I do believe that school leaders recognise this and they would reduce workload if they could. Schools have insufficient income to reduce class sizes and increase PPA time. The best that can be done is that school leaders need to be sensible about planning expectations and adopt a marking policy that benefits children whilst being realistic. The planning expectations of some schools are ludicrous and are a sure-fire way to increase work-related stress and breed resentment. The best school leaders understand that all teachers are different and respond individually to pressure. The worst unfortunately believe that because they didn't break on their way up through the profession that others should also have this resilience.

You must look after yourself. Your pupils need you. You are the difference between success and failure. You make a difference.

Please check out this from John Mellencamp Save Some Time. Listen to the words and reflect.

So who's looking out for the heads?

You will find that most of what I write is about the well-being of teachers but occasionally I will focus on senior leaders and especially headteachers as too often they are a group of teachers who are ignored due to their positions. A recent survey suggested that only 5% of teachers aspire to headship and I suspect that this is because most teachers recognise the workload of heads but do they also recognise the level of pressure and risk of stress. Just bear in mind that no-one is immune to the stresses of leadership. I would urge you all to click here to read the tragic report of the suicide of one of our colleagues.

You may be unsympathetic to the principal characters in this piece. They've made your life miserable and so good luck to them.You may think that they get paid enough and they chose the job so let them get on with it, but schools need heads and they need good heads. Have you experienced working for a poor head? How does that effect your experience in school? How does the presence of a poor head put you under increased pressure? Schools cannot function as Utopian collectives, schools must have leaders to weigh up the range of push-pull factors and plot the course which they believe to be right for the school and all those who sail within her!

Doing your best for your staff is demanding, physically and emotionally. Must of us want to please others, our friends and families, our colleagues, our pupils and so on, and heads are no different. Heads are human (yes, they really are), they want to do the right thing, they want to be liked and they want to be valued, but you can't please all the people all of the time. And so I've adopted the following mantra (which I openly share), I would like to maximise happiness of staff but in reality I have succeeded if I minimise discontent.

Headship is a lonely job with few opportunities for emotional sharing. Inevitability if you unload at work you are unloading on someone who is not your equal in the staffing structure, which can be very unwise.

I could list all the tasks I do which place pressure on me and will be experienced by fellow heads but I would be typing all day and you would be reading all night so I'll just pick a couple of examples. Experienced by me or heads I know.

Heads are responsible for budgets, and this isn't simply about textbooks and photocopying. You will all appreciate that they greatest draw on a budget is staffing and there are times when heads cannot set a budget whilst maintaining the number of teachers. Heads end up releasing staff, making them redundant. Before you stamp your feet in rage at me I know it is worse for the teacher being laid off but the emotional drain of making these decisions and telling the teachers is immense.

Heads spend a lot of time covering for colleagues. How many times have you done something wrong and thought that this will come back to bite me and nothing has happened? There's a good chance your head fell on a sword for you, soaked up the challenges of parents, inspectors or whoever and took the hit. You may have an inkling when they say "next time could you try to..." but you didn't see the furious parent or demonic inspector making the life of the head extremely difficult. I have fallen on swords protecting teachers from parental complaints, from authority officers, from inspectors and I am sure I am in the majority of heads who do that. It comes at a price.

Finally I'll mention the constant influx of new demands. There are few weeks that go by without something else coming into schools that need dealing with. A majority of these demands go no further than the senior leadership team. From time to time changes happen that impact everyone, but these are mainly curriculum and assessment demands. The quantity of other stuff is staggering. From safeguarding to food standards the list of demands seems endless.

With the exception of some independent schools where the proprietor is also the head every headteacher has an employer. They have a duty of care to ensure that their employees, including the head, work in an environment in which they are safe. I wonder how many boards of governors, LEAs, academy chains and so on take the time out to sit down with heads and ask "how are you? no really, how are you?".

I would also suggest you all read the article by Viv Grant which appeared in the Guardian in February 2015.