It’s nearly lunchtime and the school kitchen staff are busy putting the finishing touches to hundreds of portions of chilli con carne. The cook is doing her final dietary requirement checks and making sure that the daily menu information is up to date, while also keeping a watchful eye over the new kitchen assistant, who is still learning the ropes.

Officially, the cook is not a part of the school’s leadership team, but there is no doubt that she is the leader here in the kitchen.

This is a good example of what we call “distributed leadership”. Instead of focusing on the characteristics of individual leaders, distributed leadership looks at how tasks are shared in an organisation, and the context and social processes involved in leading.

In most schools, leadership is, indeed, distributed through delegated responsibilities. However, it is not always distributed in a way that empowers staff. Does the head cook, for instance, feel that she has the power to take creative risks in the workplace?

If an organisation truly follows a model of distributed leadership, then every member of staff should see themselves as a leader, who is empowered to make decisions aligned to the central vision of that organisation. Every person should be encouraged to be continually reflective and creative in their thinking and practice.

Within the traditionally hierarchical leadership models of schools, this is rarely possible. So I am arguing that we must move away from hierarchical leadership, which has the potential to stifle reflection and creativity, in favour of a more authentically distributed leadership.

Why should schools bother? For starters, doing so will support the wellbeing of all staff and have the added effect of reducing workload across the school.

Too often, teachers are left isolated in the classroom, bombarded with requests to perform tasks that they can see no value in performing from those in removed leadership positions. This will, ultimately, always be demotivating. Instead, teachers need to be given a voice; a role in making decisions about learning and teaching.

The first rule of distributed leadership is that every member of staff not only sees themselves as a leader, but crucially also has a voice in leading, and influencing decision making.

The cook is, quite rightly, the leader in the kitchen; the midday team are leaders in the playground at lunchtime; a teaching and learning assistant is a leader in the group that they are working with; and teachers are the leaders in their classrooms. All these members of staff need to be empowered to make informed decisions in the best interests of the children in their care. Too often, teachers are stripped of this power by well-meaning senior leadership teams - expected to bite their tongues after lesson observations, or put into practice a new initiative that they had no hand in devising.

How, then, can we enable effective distributed leadership structures in our schools? I believe there are four key principles that we need to follow.

1. Have a shared vision

I am the headteacher of a primary school, but I do not see myself as more important than any other member of staff. It is not my job to tell people what to do. My job is to inspire, to motivate and to communicate that all members of the team have the same goal: the social, personal and academic learning of the children at our school.

My staff need to know that they are not doing something simply because their headteacher has told them to do it, but because everybody believes that it is the right thing to do in line with the collective vision of the school. In fact, the vision and values for the school should be so vivid and strong that every person could effectively make leadership decisions.

2. Allow the space for staff to lead

If you truly want staff to lead, they need to be given the opportunity to do all the things that great leaders do: take risks, innovate and always seek to improve and make changes to their practice.

When school leaders give teachers leadership responsibilities, are they really encouraging them to do these things? Or is it more a case of ensuring that all the boxes have been ticked in preparation for Ofsted?

If you are going to give a member of staff leadership responsibilities, don’t then spend your time constantly monitoring their work. Doing so will stifle their learning and their confidence. Middle leaders must feel able to make decisions in leading their year groups or subjects, within a culture of high trust and high accountability.

3. Make collaborative decisions

No single leader in a school, including the headteacher, should ever feel that they have sole responsibility. All decisions should be made collaboratively and based upon authentic professional dialogue.

Decisions made by leaders should be based on the effective co-construction of knowledge about where the school is at and what changes need to be implemented to move the school on.

Having a coaching culture and a clear system for peer learning can help to facilitate this, as all members of staff will then be encouraged to take opportunities to take risks, make mistakes and learn from them.

The result will be a collaborative learning culture that welcomes challenges, and a school-wide can-do attitude.

4. Personalise responsibility

I believe that a headteacher should view their staff in the same way that a class teacher views their pupils: all children are different and their individual learning requirements need to be taken into consideration.

Good leaders are inclusive in their approach and ensure that staff are valued for their individual skills and achievements. Everyone should be supported to continue to learn and be challenged to be the best that they can possibly be.

Many of the responsibilities held by senior leaders within schools - for example, timetabling, organising cover or data collection - should really be the responsibility of a highly skilled office team.

Shifting this responsibility will enable all members of the senior leadership team to focus on the area in which their training and passion more likely lies: the core business of learning and teaching.

Within this model, all teaching staff would be encouraged to teach, including the headteacher.

Ultimately, if we can make school leadership authentically distributed, we can ensure that all staff feel genuinely integral to the core mission at the heart of what schools do: helping children to learn.

Kulvarn Atwal is executive headteacher of two large primary schools in the London Borough of Redbridge. His first book, The Thinking School: developing a dynamic learning community, is out now. He tweets @Thinkingschool2

This article originally appeared in the 5 June 2020 issue under the headline “Why all teachers should be a leader in their school”