Are you a head of school with divisional principals reporting to you? Are you a school board member or an international school owner? In these roles, what are your priorities? Delivering a high-quality academic programme, hiring highly-qualified and experienced teachers, building state-of-the-art facilities?
Although these are important priorities, I propose we pay greater attention to the job satisfaction of the principals heading up different sections of your school.
Why?
My research shows that a school leader’s job satisfaction is strongly associated with an international school’s performance. A school’s performance with a principal with lower job satisfaction is worse than with a principal with higher job satisfaction. Satisfied principals also tend to cultivate satisfied teachers. Satisfied teachers and school leaders stay longer at a school. Therefore, recruitment, onboarding, and training costs are lessened.
Let’s unpack job satisfaction
Job satisfaction is an affective orientation towards one’s work. It can also be an attitude, an internal state, and a feeling an employee has about their work. Job satisfaction can represent the extent to which workplace expectations are met.
Psychologist Edwin Locke’s definition of job satisfaction is commonly used in organizational research. Locke described job satisfaction as a pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or job experiences.
There are several factors that influence job satisfaction. Salary, benefits and an organization’s job promotion system influence job satisfaction. Leadership quality, management styles, and supervision also effect job satisfaction.
“Locke described job satisfaction as a positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job.”
A few studies in recent years relate to job satisfaction within the international school context. Most studies focused on the job satisfaction of teachers. One study measured the job satisfaction of IB-MYP coordinators in international schools. One of my studies measured the job satisfaction of international school principals.
Consider measuring the job satisfaction of your principals three times a year so you can track changes over time. You can measure it at the beginning of the year, middle of the year, and end of the year. Here is a simple tool you can use to measure job satisfaction.
Think of your job in general. All in all, what is it like most of the time? Besides each word or phrase below, select:
“Yes” if it describes your job
“No” if it does not describe it
“?” if you cannot decide
- Good
- Undesirable
- Better than most
- Displeasing
- Makes me content
- Excellent
- Enjoyable
- Poor
A “yes” response is worth three points, a “no” response is worth 0 points, and a “?” is 1 point. You need to reverse score the negatively worded items (“undesirable”, “displeasing”, “poor”). So, if someone chooses “yes” for “undesirable”, change it from 3 points to 0 points. Then, add up the eight scores for an overall job satisfaction score. If you have three principals who completed the survey, calculate the average score.
To increase the job satisfaction of your principals, you could try:
– Offering a more competitive compensation and benefit package
– Providing opportunities for growth and development
– Fostering a positive and collaborative work environment
– Encouraging work-life balance
– Recognizing and rewarding achievements
– Increasing autonomy and empowerment
As you pursue your priorities as a head of school, school board member, or school owner, I hope you choose to pay greater attention to the job satisfaction of your principals.
If you have any questions about measuring and improving the job satisfaction of your principals, contact Wayne through LinkedIn or email waynoza@icloud.com