Your guide to managing staff wellbeing

The Key for School Leaders
Your guide to managing staff wellbeing
Interview with a national leader
of education: Kylie Spark
Kylie Spark has been headteacher at Tyntesfield Primary School in Sale, Cheshire since 2008. She is a national leader of
education and has over 13 years of headship experience. Tyntesfield was rated ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted in 2013 and is both a
national support school and a teaching school, as part of the Trafford Teaching School Alliance. Here she shares her insights into
the teaching profession, what she does to safeguard her staff and advice on how other school leaders can boost morale.
Over the course of your career, how have you
seen the teaching profession change?
It has changed considerably. I think the biggest shift
is in regards to accountability, at all levels, and this
feeds in to every aspect of teaching. Plus, budget
constraints present more and more challenges,
and those constraints are only getting tighter. The
expectations on senior leaders and teaching staff to
do more with less are getting higher and higher.
Do you believe teaching has become a less
attractive career choice?
I don’t believe so, no. Teaching is a fantastic
career! It is important that people go in to the
profession with their eyes wide open – it is a hard
and demanding job. It can be time-consuming
and emotionally draining too. However, the
opportunity to make such an impact on children’s
lives is so rewarding. That’s why I still love
teaching and believe it’s a great career.
A recent survey by LKMCo found that the
second most common reason for teachers
leaving the profession (after workload), is
poor leadership. What can school leaders do
to boost retention in the profession?
Tyntesfield hasn’t had a problem with retention but
where teachers have left this has most often been
due to promotion and professional development
opportunities. As school leaders we must start with
the individual and take their career development
opportunities seriously, whether that’s to benefit
your school and have an impact on teaching and
learning now, or for individuals’ personal and
professional development. It is our responsibility
to encourage, support and develop staff and give
them every opportunity to progress.
Being aware of wellbeing and managing
workload is also important, not creating
paperwork for paperwork’s sake. If it’s not
contributing to teaching and learning, why are
you doing it? At Tyntesfield, our staff do planning,
of course. But they don’t plan for the senior
leaders, they plan to have a clear focus on
learning and how the teaching and the tasks
will achieve this.
It’s also important to encourage communication
among the staff and with school leaders. Staff
should be comfortable voicing their thoughts and
concerns and confident that they can speak up if
something isn’t working or pressures are becoming
too much. As leaders, it is our responsibility to
listen and address the issues as best we can
whilst ensuring the highest standards of teaching
and learning are maintained. Even if it is just
acknowledging the problem and letting staff know
you are listening – don’t ignore their concerns. That
goes a long way to creating a positive environment
and making the school an enjoyable place to work.
Our staff are our best asset in everything we do –
they are our greatest resource, our most expensive
resource and our most valuable. Staff should be
valued and feel valued and we should invest in their
wellbeing and professional development.
What strategies does your school have in
place to address staff morale and wellbeing?
We place a big emphasis on working with staff
as a team, listening to them and valuing their
contribution in tangible ways. We involve our
teachers wherever possible in the development of
policies. We have discussions about good practice
and then develop the policies in line with their
input. Teachers are on the front line, recognising
the real issues, interacting with pupils every day –
they are the experts, so tap in to that!
All our staff are involved in everything we do –
senior leaders, teachers, teaching assistants and
support staff. Everyone is involved in training and is
part of our development of teaching and learning.
We also take an individualistic approach to
appraisal. We measure teacher progress in
much the same way we measure pupil progress,
by seeing how they have developed, rather
than setting a benchmark. We start with where
teachers are at now and look at their areas
of expertise and, conversely, how best to
develop them as professionals and individuals.
Recognising the strengths of your staff not only
helps to identify areas for improvement, but also
makes it possible to tailor responsibilities and
ensure your team is as strong as it can be.
One of the biggest things I stress is
understanding that staff have a personal life as
well as professional life. They all have pressures
and commitments at home, perhaps they have
their own children who have a sporting event,
or a recital, or award presentation, and they are
entitled to appreciate that family life as well.
Give support to your staff and they will give it back
to you, in school with their performance. A happy,
supportive environment means an enjoyable
workplace. Opportunities for the staff and children
to smile and laugh together is so important. And if
staff enjoy coming to work, they will perform better,
their quality of teaching will be higher and they will
be more engaged in their roles.
What advice do you have for senior leaders
facing staff morale and wellbeing challenges?
Make an effort to really understand the situation
– of the school, the staff as a collective and the
individual.
Address what you can. You can’t fix everything,
but you can acknowledge everything and
tell your staff why you can’t fix it at this time.
Communication is key. Having that dialogue and
that link with your staff is essential. Let staff see
you care, even if you can’t solve everything.
Be clear about what is expected and have a shared
vision with staff of where you want the school to go.
I place high demands on staff, but they understand
why – we don’t do anything for the sake of it, only if
it adds value to teaching and learning.
You can hear more insights from Kylie
at our conference on teacher recruitment
and retention in London (see page 2 for
more details).
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