Evolving your leadership style as your organisation improves

As an executive coach, I often work with headteachers, directors and trust leaders who’ve achieved good inspection outcomes, strong performance data, resilient systems and processes and positive feedback from stakeholders, but who also instinctively know that they need to refine and adapt their leadership style and approaches to ensure their organisation continues to strengthen and achieves even more.  

They operate on the principle of ‘Kaizen’ - a Japanese term meaning "change for the better" or "continuous improvement’.  It is a philosophy that emphasizes making small, incremental changes over time to achieve significant improvement.

Recently, I had a powerful coaching session with a headteacher of a one-form entry primary school. She is a participant in the Ambition Institute NPQEL programme.

Over the past five years, this leader has worked tirelessly to lead the school from a place of vulnerability to being securely good. The school is now stronger: teaching and learning is at least good, the staffing structure is stable and pupil outcomes are far better. To achieve this, her leadership has been clear, decisive, and courageous.

But now, this leader wants more. She wants the school to continue to incrementally improve and achieve even greater success. And she recognises that to do this, her leadership style needs to evolve.

Leadership Style for a New Chapter

Research tells us that leadership styles should be strategically sequenced to stabilise organisations and then to elevate them from, as Jim Collins would say, ‘good to great’.

In the early years of her headship, this leader had to adopt a directive, autocratic and pace-setting style to ensure clear expectations, and change at pace. It was what the school needed at the time: clarity, urgency, and high expectations. Research shows that organisations perform 27% better when led by a directive style to stabilise. However, prolonged use of these directive styles correlates with decreased innovation and engagement.

This leader knew that if she maintained the same leadership style, she might inadvertently limit the development of others, as well as the collective capacity of the team.

We discussed how her natural strengths, problem-solving, and helping others, had served her well so far. But we also explored the shadow side: when a leader steps in too often or too quickly, others don’t get the chance to stretch, struggle, and grow.

To move from 'good to great', she recognised the need to adapt her leadership style in order to empower others, foster innovation and maximise performance through collaboration.

Together, we explored alternative leadership styles that would enable her to strengthen the distributive leadership in her team, as well as improving the quality of teaching and learning. We considered the transition from directive to transformative and finally participative leadership styles, which can yield 70% greater climate satisfaction, and 30% increase to organisational effectiveness. 

During our coaching sessions, the headteacher considered ways in which she could deploy a transformational leadership style; how she might influence others by demonstrating high ethical standards, integrity and a clear sense of purpose.

We considered ways in which she inspired members of her team through articulating a compelling shared vision to foster a shared sense of purpose. And finally, how she might intellectually stimulate others through recognising each team member's unique strengths and needs, offering encouragement and opportunities for growth.

Moving Towards Empowerment

We also spent time in her coaching sessions looking at the variation across her team. 

While the staff are capable and committed, not everyone was yet where they could be in terms of their ability to lead others, or achieve stronger outcomes with pupils.. Subtle shifts in classroom practice, communication, and leadership could make a big difference not only to pupils but to the school culture as a whole.

The leader reflected on two particular teachers with different developmental needs and, through the reflective questioning and thinking that my coaching brings, began designing professional development that was more responsive and personalised. We explored options like triads and coaching pairs, which would allow collaboration, ownership, and accountability.

Crucially, she also committed to a courageous conversation with a key middle leader, to offer support, but also to raise expectations. The aim - to develop not just subject expertise but improved interpersonal skills and impact.

Leading With Intentionality

The coaching session closed with a set of clear actions:

🔸 Diagnose staff development needs with curiosity and care, to inform the approaches she would use moving forward

🔸 Create a professional development plan that balances whole-school priorities with individual growth

🔸 Empower others to lead, resisting the urge to solve everything herself

This headteacher is now moving into a new phase of her leadership journey. It’s a shift from driving the improvement herself to building a culture where improvement is co-owned. It’s no longer just her vision; she's creating purpose and momentum towards a shared mission of a strong, resilient culture and educational excellence.

And that’s what makes a school, or trust, great.

------------------------

Are you leading an improving organisation? Here are some questions to consider:

Q1: What leadership style have I defaulted to in times of pressure, and is it still serving me and my team well?

Q2: How do I spot the signs that it’s time to shift my leadership approach?

Q3: What structures or habits could I build into my leadership to intentionally develop others, not just support them?

------------------

And if you know that working with an experienced coach, who totally understands the pressures of leading in schools and trusts, and can support you and your team to strengthen:

• culture and strategy,

• school improvement and quality assurance systems,

• distributive leadership,

• pedagogy,

• or tackle pupil inequalities,

Then please send me a DM or email info@claireplattcoaching.co.uk

Let’s see if we can create something extraordinary together!