She'd been on the board for three years when she handed in her resignation. The letter cited personal commitments. A change in her professional situation. The usual language of an exit that doesn't want to cause trouble. The chair thanked her warmly. The headteacher sent a genuine note of appreciation. Everyone was gracious about it. And nobody asked the real question. Nobody said: what actually happened here? I'm going to tell you what happened. Not in this specific case - I

We talk about defensiveness in leadership as though it is a problem to be managed. A response to be controlled. Something to notice in yourself and smooth over before anyone else notices it too. But I think defensiveness is more interesting than that. And in school leadership particularly, it is worth paying much closer attention to what it is actually telling you, because it is almost always telling you something specific, and something useful, and something that arrives, fr

You've probably spent more than you'd like to admit trying to fix your board relationship. Let's be honest. There's the governor training. The governance review that promised to clarify roles and responsibilities. The consultant who came in, observed a meeting, and produced a report that everyone agreed with and nobody acted on. The away days that felt productive at the time and changed nothing by the following term. Then there's the hours. The late evenings and Sunday aftern