After 17 years as the CEO/director of large education organisations, I have come to the conclusion that “Imperfect Leadership” is one of the best terms to describe my own leadership. This is not something I am ashamed about; I am proud to be an imperfect leader.
I believe that the concept that we need to be good at all aspects of leadership is not only unrealistic, but also bad for the mental and physical well-being of leaders. The more we seek to become the perfect leader, the more likely we are to disempower those around us. And the need to be perfect will do nothing to attract new people into leadership.
In our new book Imperfect Leadership in Action, Marie-Claire Bretherton and I outline the ten aspects of what we call the “imperfect leadership mindset”. Imperfect leaders are self-aware. They know their own strengths, but they also know their weaknesses, including their default behaviours when they are tired or stressed. They tune into their changing context and ask “What kind of leadership is needed from me now?”
“The more we seek to become the perfect leader, the more likely we are to disempower those around us.”
Because they know they don’t know it all, those with an imperfect leadership mindset appoint people to their team who are noticeably better at things than they are. They regard asking for help not as a weakness but as a strength. They understand that within the school this can build a sense of collective responsibility, with colleagues feeling more valued and their voice heard. They also understand that asking for help from those who know more about an issue than they do can help them to make better decisions.
Those with an imperfect leadership mindset try to have a balanced and healthy ego. Nobody wants to be led by a leader whose ego is so small that they lack confidence and are constantly seeking reassurance from their team and never see difficult things through. Equally, those leaders whose ego is too big can sometimes intimidate those around them and close down any discussion. This approach often leads, in the end, to complacency and to narrow thinking, with one person generating all the ideas and making all the decisions.
This is something I have wrestled with throughout my career. Sometimes I have lacked confidence and not known what to do to move my organisation forward. I have become embroiled in self-doubt. At other times when the organisation I have been leading has been having some success, I have sometimes become over-confident and become too complacent – not opening myself up sufficiently to challenge and to new perspectives.
“Sometimes I have lacked confidence and not known what to do to move my organisation forward.”
I know that I am at my best when I have the balance right between confidence and humility – when I am neither overwhelmed nor overbearing. The key point here is that having imposter syndrome can be a good thing. If we never doubt ourselves that will make us a less effective leader. If we always doubt ourselves and don’t have any confidence at all then we are probably in the wrong job.
If we have an imperfect leadership mindset, we are willing to take on new challenges. We are restless learners. But when we do make mistakes, we are kind to ourselves and then move on to the next challenge. Our aim is not to be perfect but to be a better version of ourselves tomorrow.
“We should ditch all the striving towards perfection and focus on doing what’s right for the students.”
Being a school leader can be a lonely and demanding role. The parents are entrusting their children to your care. All the school staff are relying on you to lead them. The sense of responsibility can be overpowering if we dwell on it, and this is even more challenging during a pandemic. But it will be made even more daunting if we have a view of leadership as some kind of transformational, individualistic model that most of us can never aspire to be. Once we adopt an imperfect leadership mindset, it doesn’t sort out all our problems, but it does stop us from trying to pretend that we are someone we are not, and it does help us to feel less isolated.
If we want sustainable, well-led schools and if we want to attract the next generation into school leadership, we should ditch all the striving towards perfection, focus on doing what’s right for the students, genuinely ask for help from others and celebrate the fact that we are imperfect leaders.
Steve Munby is Visiting Professor at University College London Centre for Educational Leadership. His new book: Imperfect Leadership in Action: A practical book for school leaders who know they don’t know it all, co-authored with Marie-Claire Bretherton, was published in March 2022 (Crown House Publishing).