Sometimes you need strawberries

I ended up in governance because of strawberries.

A friend wouldn't stop talking about it while we were picking them, so I gave in and said yes to a role on a school board.

My career started in industry. Then I moved into schools. I had the privilege of working in some incredible communities in East London, and then across the country. I felt pretty well versed in governance, but it turned out I was wrong.

All my work in schools has been about creating safe spaces. Places where people can actually say what they think. You can call it 'communities of enquiry', but really it's simpler than that: it's about giving people room to breathe. Once, I'd been in that place myself - the kind where you keep everything bottled up because it feels like there's nowhere safe to share what's really going on.

Here's what I keep seeing in schools:

One board will be brilliant. The next will be broken.

It's not about the people. Every head I've met wants to build something good with their governors. And most governors have good intentions. They want that partnership. The kind that moves a school forward. 

But it's not happening. At least, not everywhere.

And that's the part that drives me crazy.

It shouldn't be this random. This hit-and-miss. Not when we know what works. Not when we've seen it done right.

But here's what I know:

➡️ As a school leader, your board should be your ally, not your obstacle.

➡️ Strong board relationships don't happen by accident. They require deliberate effort.

➡️ Board meetings can become powerful spaces for strategic thinking and genuine progress. But only if we intentionally design them that way.

I've been everyone in this story: the lost governor; the frustrated educator; the person who needed a safe space. 

Now I use this, and my experience in coaching and facilitation to help school leaders fix governance when it's not working.

Sometimes you just need someone who's been there. 

And sometimes you need strawberries 😉