By Chris Ingate, ASCL Conditions of Employment Specialist: Pay

As we all return to normal service, hopefully with batteries refreshed from the summer break, we also return to that time-old leadership paradox of job satisfaction and sustainability. There is no doubt that working as a school or college leader can be an extremely rewarding job, but it can also take its toll.   If you are fortunate enough to work in a setting where you sense progress and improvement - where colleagues around you are supportive and focused - the chances are that you plan to stay and develop your career.  Alternatively, if the day-to-day swamps your diary, and you often feel isolated and unsupported, you will naturally be thinking of pastures new.   So, context matters to job satisfaction and a sense of wellbeing.  These parameters are also inextricably linked to school improvement and better outcomes for children.  

A challenging landscape 
For those of you who have read the Sustainable School Leadership report (February, 2026), we see a school leadership workforce under stress with an acknowledgement that the job has always been demanding but more so in recent years due to financial austerity and extra societal pressures.  In my earlier blogs, I have highlighted the concern around leaders’ workload and wellbeing and the detrimental impact this is having on physical and mental health. Whilst attrition rates have remained reasonably stable over time (with a 13% annual churn figure), we know that recruitment and retention is a far bigger concern in challenging socio-economic areas (NFER, 2025) and that headteacher recruitment is becoming an increasingly difficult matter.

So, if the Shangri-La is to aim for leadership that lasts, I guess you have to be careful what you wish for.  For example, in the world of politics, Vladimir Putin has been in charge of Russia for 26 years.  What has happened to Russia under his stewardship?  Russia arguably has become an illusion of democracy, disconnected from global society, waging a lonely war against the West.  Conversely, in the same period of time, the UK has had nine prime ministers. Is this a more successful model? Which country has the more sustainable leadership? And which country would you rather live in?    

Leadership succession
It seems that constant churn at the top impedes progress but so does stagnation and low turnover.  For schools and colleges, getting it right in terms of appointing the right senior leaders to move the school on should also have a symbiotic effect on morale and wellbeing.  In their landmark publication on Sustainable Leadership, Hargreaves and Fink (2006) state that few things in education succeed less than leadership succession.  Has anything improved in this area?  Have governors and trustees become more skilled at ‘growing their own’ or planning for change at the top?  Certainly, the fields for leadership positions have shrunk from an average of 15 for headship in 2006 to 9.2 in 2026.   

There are also some specific career-stage vulnerabilities with school leadership, for example, does NPQH adequately prepare for headship?  Are induction programmes effective?  How do you survive your first couple of years when these are often the most challenging?  Who looks after your wellbeing as you try to look after everyone else?   

Complex and challenging
Returning to the central question of this blog: What does it take to create the conditions of sustainable and rewarding school leadership alongside continuous school improvement?  This is a complex and challenging question but one which needs tackling if we are to avoid the possibility of leaderless institutions and a slump in school self-improvement.

Proactive and practical
At ASCL, we have decided to take a proactive position with regards to this issue by gathering leading academics and practitioners from across the education sector looking at sustainable leadership and sustainable schools. We hope to initiate this discussion in October and, from this, generate some practical advice for our members. We will, of course, continue to support individual members through member hotline as well as campaign vigorously with the government about workload and wellbeing.  

We will keep you updated through our twice-weekly newsletters, our website, and Leader magazine.