There are, inevitably, many calls on a headteacher’s time. In addition to senior management team meetings and regular catch-ups with your direct reports, there are many people who lay claim to your time, be that current or prospective parents, board members, regulators or colleagues.
It’s easy for there never to be enough hours in the day.
The inevitable result is that many school leaders have little work-life balance and many are heading for burnout.
But carving back time in your diary is key for effective management - so here are four ways that school leaders can do just that and create more time.
1. Have a meeting-free day
In my first couple of years of headship, it felt as if my PA’s sole mission in life was to fill my day with meetings.
But I soon learned this was unsustainable. So, about twenty years ago, I took the decision to always block out one day a week where I have total control of my diary and is free of meetings.
This allows me time to do some of the paperwork that I need to get done, be that writing board reports or working on a particular project.
It also means I know that I have a day when I can arrange off-site meetings, say, comparing notes with the principal of another school.
It also means there is latency in your week should something unexpected happen - as it often does - that you can find time to deal with it.
2. Manage events and parental engagement
One of the easiest traps into which most headteachers and principals fall is to feel an obligation to be (and be seen) at every school event.
There is no doubt that senior leadership attendance is a great morale booster for staff and is noted and appreciated by parents, but it is likely to be an impossible aspiration for the principal to be at every event.
Of course, in the early months at a school, these can be important opportunities to introduce oneself to a community and so the time investment is worthwhile. But it is important to find a level that is sustainable for you (and your family).
One approach is to share out these responsibilities with colleagues. In a previous leadership role in Berkhamsted, we endeavoured to have at least one member of the senior team at every major event.
At Kellett, we have adopted a different approach whereby the headteachers and their senior teams in each of the three schools take the lead on pupil events, such as concerts and plays; whereas my engagement with parents is via a weekly podcast and by running regular Principal’s Forums on topical issues.
3. Schedule your work
Consider moving away from having a to-do list, to scheduling time in your diary to do a particular piece of work.
There are a number of advantages to this. First, in a world where many colleagues can see and book into my diary, I no longer have a block of time that I had allocated in my mind to write a report, as it was hijacked by a meeting. Secondly, it is an antidote to prevarication.
The trouble, for me, with the to-do list is that I found myself cherry-picking the task that appealed most, continually relegating the important but dull work to the bottom of the list where it festered until it hit the urgent-important box.
Thirdly, it is very efficient: I find myself treating the piece of work as my next meeting and don’t have to go through the time-wasting exercise of trying to remember what I am meant to be working on next.
4. Audit your diary and meetings
Given that a significant portion of any headteacher’s week is taken up with meetings, it is very important to get a handle on how these are conducted.
One thing that has transformed the quality of our leadership meetings at Kellett is that we are recording them electronically in shared documents that serve both as the agenda and the record of the meeting.
Meetings are minuted live, but each participant is expected to pre-populate their report in advance, saving important time in the meeting.
The same principle applies to our regular one-to-one meetings.
The danger with electronic diaries is that meetings are scheduled to last a multiple of 30 minutes and there is a tendency for us all to fill the time available.
Instead, try to complete the meeting ten minutes early, giving time to carry out the actions of the meeting, whether that is sending an email or scheduling a piece of work.
Furthermore, it is too easy to schedule a weekly meeting when a meeting every two or three weeks might suffice.
With one-to-one meetings with direct reports, it is worth reviewing the purpose and frequency of the meetings: are they a briefing to let me know what is going on? Or are we meeting to make decisions?
It is important that this is a two-way conversation and that both parties are getting what they need from the meetings.
Time to decide...
The big question is how are you going to use the time that you create? Perhaps you will be able to get out of the office and get around the school catching up with staff face-to-face.
Or perhaps you will have time to read or listen to podcasts to engage with new ideas. Or perhaps you will find the time to look after yourself better and keep the job in perspective.
Whatever you decide, I hope that not only will you find that you have more time; but that you also inspire those around you to do the same.
