Overcoming the Allure of Toxic Leadership

The current administrative environment seems to be a breeding ground for toxic leaders. Ian Craig makes connections to toxic leadership and accountability pressures, the changing education landscape and the fragmentation of the school system.

In The Guardian newspaper on 8 July 2017, Michael Savage reported that of the 27,500 teachers who had qualified since 2011, almost a quarter had already left the profession.¹ The retention (and indeed the recruitment) of teachers poses major challenges for education systems across the world. This article attempts to identify what may be a major contributing factor – an increase in toxic leadership.

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      string(362) "... agenda, in Journal of Management, 39, 1308-1338 ■ Lipman-Blumen, J. (2005) The Allure of Toxic Leaders: Why we follow destructive bosses and corrupt politicians – and how we can survive them’, New York: Oxford UP. ■ Mehta, S. and Maheshwari, G. (2014) Toxic leadership: tracing the destructive trail, International"
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      string(5899) "and damage of other parts of pupils’ learning more generally. As Walton (2007) says: ‘Toxic leaders will “make it happen” and “get things done”, but how they go about this can be profoundly damaging to those around them and, potentially, to the business itself’. In a research project conducted with 411 leaders of UK academies Hill et al (2016) looked at the ‘types’ of school leaders that are most effective. They classified school leaders into five types that they called surgeons, soldiers, accountants, philosophers and architects. You will be able to identify the ‘types’ from these titles! Architects, who believe that it takes time to improve a school and, therefore, take a long-term view of what they need to do were considered to have the most positive long-term impact – up to 23% higher than the other types of leader.Toxic leadership is therefore corrosive to organizational health and this has knock-on effects upon performance and should be discouraged wherever it is encountered. This means challenging many of the views of what might be the best ways for encouraging enhanced performance of a school. Padilla et al., (2007) say that it is: ‘the interaction between abusive leaders, vulnerable followers and their environment that leads to dysfunctional organisational culture and corporate underperformance’. Although toxic leadership and management may improve test scores, and drive short-term measurable gains for pupils, evidence is that these are not generally sustained, and will almost certainly be extremely damaging in the longer term. It may be the case that in many schools, teachers are being deterred from remaining in the profession, and only those who are prepared to act in a certain way, complying with a preferred style, are putting themselves forward for headship. The implications for leadership developmentThe current pressures being placed on school leaders, teachers and other staff are not likely to go away in the foreseeable future, so what can be done to challenge toxic cultures? Firstly, we need to recognise that toxic leadership does exist and it is then essential that it is recognised in the training of our current and future school leaders. Bubb and Earley (2005) have said that ‘much has been written about the “bright” side of leadership, about best practice and effective leadership for example, but in the meantime, the “dark” side has been largely ignored’. Understandably, leadership training is currently focused on positive practices, and dysfunctional leadership and its consequences are often not considered. They should be.Leadership trainers must recognise that all headteachers are working within a potentially toxic environment. Trainers need to highlight the dangers of accepting, supporting and replicating such leadership within their schools. Mehta and Maheshwari (2014) conclude their own discussion of toxic leadership by saying that ‘if leadership toxicity is an inevitable disease of organisational life, the sooner it is recognised in the development of leaders, the better it is’.Tackling toxicityFor high performing schools, ‘leadership’ is now considered by many to be more, or at least equally, important to the quality of the teacher in the classroom.  Government promoted preparation and continuing professional development programmes on leadership are plentiful. This article suggests that the issue of ‘toxic leadership’ should be highlighted in such programmes, counselled against, and attention drawn to its consequences. It should be a topic to discuss in all school leadership programmes. In terms of well-being, all teachers (and indeed other staff in schools) should be alert to the issue of toxic leadership, and how to deal with it. Staff should be encouraged within their informal networks to explore different strategies that can be used to address it, and what recourse they have if informal strategies do not work. It should not remain a silent issue in schools – like all bullying, it is supported and grows with silence. It is not the sort of issue that is best addressed through ‘formal’ CPD activities, but course leaders should be alert to the issue and raise it where appropriate A fuller discussion of this topic can be found in Craig, I (2017) Toxic Leadership, in Earley, P and Greany, T (2017) School Leadership and Education System Reform, London: Bloomsbury, which provided the basis for this article.ReferencesBall, S. (2008) The Education Debate, Bristol: Policy Press. ■ Bell, L. and Stevenson, H. (2006) Education Policy, London: Routledge. ■ Bottery, M. (2000) Education, Policy and Ethics. London: Continuum. ■ Bubb, S and Earley, P (2005) Unprincipled principals? Towards a research agenda for the understanding of rogue principals and their practices. Paper presented to the Belmas symposium at the Educational Management Association of South Africa, 11-13 March 2005. ■ Hill, A, Mellon, L, Laker, B and Goddard, J (2016) The One Type of School Leader Who Can Turn Around a Failing School. Harvard Business Review, 20 October 2016. ■ Krasikova, D., Green, S. and LeBreton, J. (2013) Destructive leadership: A theoretical review, integration, and future research agenda, in Journal of Management, 39, 1308-1338 ■ Lipman-Blumen, J. (2005) The Allure of Toxic Leaders: Why we follow destructive bosses and corrupt politicians – and how we can survive them’, New York: Oxford UP. ■ Mehta, S. and Maheshwari, G. (2014) Toxic leadership: tracing the destructive trail, International"
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Leadership Assessment

When Leadership Turns Toxic

19 Nov 2018

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      string(347) "... s cognitive, social and emotional development; the implications of maltreatment on childhood and adulthood wellbeing; evidence concerning the outcomes of interventions by the courts and children’s social care; and timeframes for intervening and why they are out of kilter with those for children.
Leadership Briefing issue 7.04 (76)"
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      string(356) "... abusive or neglectful parental behaviours, are affected.· Chronic exposure to trauma through aggressive, hostile or neglectful parenting can lead to stress system deregulation. Exposure to toxic stress in early childhood can cause permanent damage to the brain and have severe and long-term consequences for all aspects of future learning ..."
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      string(592) "This research by the Childhood Wellbeing Research Centre aims to bring together key research evidence to facilitate understanding among professionals working in the family justice system in areas relating to: neuroscience perspectives on children’s cognitive, social and emotional development; the implications of maltreatment on childhood and adulthood wellbeing; evidence concerning the outcomes of interventions by the courts and children’s social care; and timeframes for intervening and why they are out of kilter with those for children.
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      string(5618) "language, to reason and make plans have already been laid.· Executive function skills, necessary for both learning and social interaction, begin to develop shortly after birth, with dramatic growth occurring between the ages of three and five years.· There is a short window of opportunity for certain types of development. If the types of experience upon which they depend do not occur within a pre-determined timeframe, children will not move on to the next stage of development and their long-term wellbeing will be compromised.· Early interactions between the primary caregiver and the baby play a significant role in establishing the normal range of emotional arousal and in setting the thermostat for later control of the stress response.· Both very high and very low levels of cortisol are indicative of abnormal development of the stress response and can cause long-term physiological and psychological damage.The impact of abuse on child development:· Exposure to domestic violence and/or parental substance misuse in utero can have a long-term negative impact on the unborn child.· High quality care can determine the extent to which children who are genetically predisposed to mental illness or learning disability, or who are exposed to abusive or neglectful parental behaviours, are affected.· Chronic exposure to trauma through aggressive, hostile or neglectful parenting can lead to stress system deregulation. Exposure to toxic stress in early childhood can cause permanent damage to the brain and have severe and long-term consequences for all aspects of future learning, behaviour and health.· Neglected children may experience chronic exposure to toxic stress as their needs fail to be met. This is compounded by a lack of stimulation and social deprivation.· Severe global neglect (i.e. severe neglect in more than one domain) during the first three years of life stunts the growth of the brain.· Adults who have been physically abused in childhood show poorer physical and intellectual development, more difficult and aggressive behaviour, poorer social relationships and are more frequently arrested for violent crimes than their peers.· Children who have been sexually abused may experience sleep problems, bedwetting or soiling, problems with school work or missing school, and risk- taking behaviour in adolescence including multiple sexual relationships.· Adolescents who have experienced abusive or neglectful parenting in childhood are more likely to engage in risk-taking behaviours such as substance misuse and criminal activity.Bringing the research evidence together: decision-making within a child’s timeframe:· One of the most important issues to confront in promoting better outcomes for abused and neglected children is a mismatch between three timeframes: those of the developing child; those of the courts and those of the local authority.· The birth of a baby is often a catalyst for change. Children who remain with parents who have not made substantial progress in overcoming adverse behaviour patterns and providing a nurturing home within a few months of their birth may continue to experience maltreatment for lengthy periods.· Social work decisions concerning permanence are made after lengthy and meticulous deliberations. There is a tendency for delays to occur once a temporary solution has been found and the pressure to resolve a crisis has been relaxed.· The Children Act 1989 embodies the principle enshrined in human rights legislation and policy that children are best brought up by their own families. Identifying the very few children whose parents will not be able to meet their needs within an appropriate timeframe requires professionals to set aside much of the culture of their training and practice.· On average, care proceedings take a year to complete; data collected between 2008 and 2011 indicate that courts in only eleven local authority areas meet the previous target of 40 weeks.· Factors that contribute to delays in completing care proceedings include: resource issues; waiting for parenting assessments and the results of attempted placements with parents; resolution of disputes and changes of plan.· Repeated assessments of birth parents are a major source of delay, as are sequential assessments of different groups of relatives. These are sometimes undertaken in spite of obvious contraindications. 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Leadership

Child Development And The Impact Of Maltreatment

15 Nov 2012

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      string(364) "... number of sub-topics and for each of these, a collectionof questions and resources. To get you started, I have included a couple of possibilitiesbelow.Leadership vs. managementThe topic of leadership vs. management encourages leaders to investigate to whatextent their school and its systems are focused on management, as opposed ..."
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      string(5700) "leadership■ thinking strategically■ leading innovation and change■ leading teaching and learning■ leading and managing resources■ leading people■ collaboration■ engaging with students, parents and community.For each, we have identified a number of sub-topics and for each of these, a collectionof questions and resources. To get you started, I have included a couple of possibilitiesbelow.Leadership vs. managementThe topic of leadership vs. management encourages leaders to investigate to whatextent their school and its systems are focused on management, as opposed toleadership.What is your opinion of the following quote?‘The evidence suggests that many school leaders are too involved in operationaland delivery matters and that this has been, to some extent, at the expense ofembracing their more strategic imperatives … But these ties to the operational spacealso seem to be related, based on our interpretation of the evidence, to a mindsetamongst some school leaders which is often more comfortable with an operationalthan a strategic role.’2Discuss this with a colleague: is this a fair criticism of your own school? What is thebalance in your own team between management, leadership and administration (withadministration defined as work which could be done by an intelligent 16-year-old,i.e. routine procedures)? A quick analysis of the minutes from your previous term’sleadership team meetings might be an interesting place to start. Note the occurrenceof the words listed below and use this to investigate your school’s position on thecontinuum between management and leadership.Management LeadershipImprovement TransformationControl TrustTight LooseConformity CreativitySystems RelationshipsStandards ValuesInstruct CoachRules EmpowerWhat does this indicate about the balance in your own school’s leadership? Have youspent more time focusing on management or on leadership? Are you holding schoolmanagement meetings rather than school leadership team meetings? Use this analysisas the start of the discussion in your team, not as the end point. Are you happy with theconclusion you reach? If not, what is the team going to do to address it?Perhaps move your focus onto the systems within your school. For example, howdo your school policies, job descriptions and performance management criteriadistinguish between leading and managing? Is this distinction understood and actedon by all leaders and managers?34Vol 6.6School Leadership Todaywww.teachingtimes.comLeadershipSkillsProfessionaldialogue Sometimes the ‘battles’ in the media and on Twitter could lead us to believe thateducational problems have simplistic answers – that it is a case of finding the rightanswer, and that one ‘side’ has to be victorious. This, however, is rarely the case. In thisexample, a school clearly needs both leadership and management; a healthy balancebetween the two needs to be found. A school that only spent time ‘leading’ could finditself with serious lapses in its systems and routines, whereas a school not focusingsufficient effort on leadership may become so tied to ‘the way things have alwaysbeen done’ that they do not develop to fit the needs of the modern learner. What isimportant is to have a dialogue about where you are on the continuum and to considerif this is the most productive place for your institution. There is not a perfect point thatyou can reach, ‘tick a box’ and go off and look at something else; instead, as a schoolmatures, it will need to continually examine and shift this balance in order to meet theever changing needs of society.United in ethos?Another important question you might find useful to investigate is: who is setting thedirection in your school and are you happy with this?To begin this debate, cut out ten arrow shapes and on each, write down one of thegroups who have an input into the school. You will need to include:■ governors■ pupils■ staff■ leaders■ the head■ national government■ Ofsted■ parents■ sponsors/LA■ local community.Lay these on your meeting table, facing towardsone end. Now discuss whether they are all currentlypointing towards the same goal. Are they like a flightof arrows all heading to the same target? Or are someof them very clearly aiming elsewhere? If, for example,the group believe the ‘parents’ arrow is heading ina different direction to most of the other groups, isthis something the team should just ignore, hopingit will improve? I would suggest not! Fundamentaldifferences in ethos rarely fade over time; in fact, theytend to strengthen when not addressed.Recently, in carrying out this task with a schoolprincipal, he obtained a moment of clarity as to whyhe was so unhappy and stressed in his role – his arrowwas in a different direction to that of his sponsors andgovernors! It is often easier for school leaders to brushover issues highlighted by this task, saying ‘That is justthe way it is’ or ‘What else do you expect these days?’.However, a healthy leadership team will focus on whatcan be done to address the problem. In an age whereeverything connected to Finnish education is looked to for guidance, it is importantto realise that much of this success can be attributed to the common approach toeducation across the country. The ethos is broadly aligned across all stakeholders, andthere is a general agreement about what education is for. This is a debate desperatelyneeded in many other areas of the world; a system with clarity of ethos is almostcertainly a successful one.You may not feel up to addressing the"
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Leadership

How quality conversations can transform your school

17 Jun 2015

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      string(5618) "the importance of honest reflection and evaluation. If anything, the ways in which initiatives fail have equal value to the way in which they succeed. Indeed, there are so many variables within a single classroom that we cannot ultimately determine whether something is or is not entirely effective. Perhaps this is best left to larger control trails such as those conducted by the Education Endowment Foundation. Instead, classroom enquiry can be a journey of self-exploration and an authentic reflection of our own practice. If this is something that you engage with as a teacher or school leader, then the emphasis of the process should be on reflection, rather than ‘success’. Especially when linked to performance management, a clear policy that outlines that evaluation of both successes and failures is essential.‘That’s not my job’It is very tempting, when a colleague says that engaging with research is not part of teaching, to simply reply “yes, it is”. Kindness and open dialogue are key. Maybe they have a point? If you are closed to the idea of debate on the issue, perhaps you have an agenda contrary to genuine enquiry? The relationship between leadership and teachers is magnified with a shared focus through educational research and lack of buy-in from teachers may be an indication of wider systemic issues of trust in a school or MATs leadership or values.If there are individuals who still feel that research engagement is not part of their role, educational leaders may find themselves in a catch 22. The level of understanding a person has and the extent to which learning is internalized is limited to the extent to which an individual values the knowledge that is being transmitted. Pragmatically, one solution would be to demonstrate the presence of the need for research informed practice in the Teacher Standards and if appropriate through performance management targets. I cannot stress enough that this should be a last resort to be reserved for teachers who actively resist any form of engagement with research that has been used to develop school policies. School leaders have a responsibility to ensure that all teachers feel included and actively involved in the school’s ethos and culture. When the motivations behind a project are centered around improving the quality of education for children, there are very few staff who will not be willing to work together.Ability to engage with the educational literatureOne of the key principles on which effective engagement with educational research is the ability of ‘experts’ to share knowledge. This must be done with and a focus on relevance for teachers. This is not easy as the theoretical and philosophical and the empirical and the tacit must be consolidated into a codified and practical message for teachers to use as part of their practice. Even with the efforts of organisations such as the NFER and BERA, most of the research surrounding education is written for an academic audience. There are colleagues who have returned to university at some point in their career to undertake an MA in education or their subject/specialism, but for many their teacher training has been the last time that they have engaged with academic literature. It is thus not condescending to support teachers to rediscover how to critique an argument or find useful books and journals online. If we are charging teachers with research engagement, then a clear guidance handbook and suitable CPD in this area is essential. This could be an important aspect of the research lead’s role (discussed later in this article) or you are very welcome to use and adapt one I have created.Lack of TimeThe fact that many teachers feel overworked or under considerable pressure to perform should not be a surprise. Within the UK setting, teachers are under large amounts of pressure as a result of myriad factors such as the pressure of accountability, unrealistic marking polices and lesson preparation. 57% of teachers disagreed with the statement that their stress levels were acceptable, with 82% of teachers and 32% of senior leaders citing workload as the reason for their stress. As it happens, there are organizations that now break down educational research into manageable reads of no more than two or three pages, whilst still ensuring the essential essence of academic rigor. The Chartered College of Teaching’s journal Impact is fast becoming seminal to research engagement for the busy teacher. As a middle leader, I allocate time for teachers to read articles published by the Historical Association or Chartered College which are then debated in our meetings. Not only does this deal with the issue of time management, but it also supports the message that this is a worthwhile undertaking linked to our curriculum intent and implementation.The problem with the individualAs a research lead for a small multi-academy trust, I was often faced with ‘imposter syndrome’ in my role. When a teacher had an issue in their classroom, I was delighted when they approached me for a solution in the literature. This delight was balanced with a sense of fear that I would not automatically know what to advise and not necessarily know a lot about the topic. This is the issue with the Research Lead – the double-edged sword that both creates a level of importance of and platform for engagement with educational research, whilst at the same time, misleads teachers into thinking that the research lead must have the answers.There is a history of focusing on influential individuals in education, from"
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Professional Development

Teacher Research Engagement - Overcoming Barriers

21 Feb 2021

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