Schools and the recruitment of teachers in the international sector

Being a school leader provides a very different challenge to being a teacher. Here are our top five tips for excelling and becoming one of the best.

Know your Stakeholders

As a leader you will be interacting with multiple stakeholders on a regular basis – parents, students, staff, the Board of Governors and regulatory authorities to name but a few, and you will need a different strategy for dealing with each of them. The main advice that we can offer is to get to know their key drivers and make sure that you are always one step ahead in anticipating what they are going to need and when they will need it. Also communicate with all your stakeholders regularly. No news is never a good sign. People want to know what is going on – all the time!

Be a Great Role Model

The staff and students in your school will look to you for leadership and guidance so you need to role model the behaviours that you expect to see in others. “Walk the Walk” and “Talk the Talk” so to speak and keep on re-emphasising your expectations. Make your culture and values very visible and reward those that are adopting the behaviours that you want to see. Have wall charts all round your school with key messages that keeps adding positive re-enforcement to the values that are important for your school.

Always Look for Continuous Improvement

It doesn’t matter if your school is the top performing school in the region or further down the leaderboard, complacency is never a trait found in a great leader. If you are doing well, there will always be things that you can focus on to remain the best in your field. If your school is struggling then it is a great opportunity to hone your leadership skills to drive through some big changes. Never accept the standard that you achieved this academic year into the next – always strive to get that little bit better. There is nothing more motivating for staff and students than to be able to meet challenges that are stretching them.

Run your School Like a Business Enterprise

Top school leaders are not only inspiring leaders of people, they are business gurus as well. You need to have your finger on the pulse in terms of finance, marketing, school operations and human resources and have metrics in place for all of them that you constantly monitor to make sure you are managing every part of your domain.

Make Sure that Excellence in Student Learning is at the Core of Everything you do

Over and above everything else never lose sight of the fact that student learning must be your number one priority. Your raison d’etre whatever type of school you are leading is to give the students in your care the best learning and personal development experience that you possibly can. This is not just about achieving academic success, it’s about making sure that when your students graduate from your school, they are armed with the life skills that they need to become valued citizens in society.

TIPS FOR EFFECTIVE SCHOOL LEADERSHIP

THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW

For more information, contact recruitment@bbd.ae