As my family and I strolled through the garden centre my phone buzzed - again. It was the fourth email in an hour. The first? Safeguarding issue. The second? A request for data from a colleague. Third? Curriculum questions from a head of department. This one? A parent requesting to meet to discuss an unnamed concern.

As a senior leader, it is easy to think that, as the buck stops with you, such questions all require a response, and quickly. After all, if we didn’t, it would all fall to pieces, right? The events of recent weeks have undoubtedly challenged all leaders, and made many feel more overwhelmed or unable to switch off.

However, it is vital that we, as education leaders, protect our own wellbeing and preserve a positive work-life balance for ourselves - whatever the circumstances.

This is easier said than done, of course, but there is, thankfully, a growing recognition of the importance of wellbeing - it’s one of the buzzwords in education now and its inclusion in the 2019 Ofsted School Inspection Handbook was a welcome one.

This seems to be an implicit recognition, at least, that there is something fundamentally wrong with education currently, reflected in the recruitment and retention crisis. Its presence in the handbook isn’t a panacea and I don’t think it’s something just for schools to resolve, but it is a start.

The crucial thing, however, is to ensure that wellbeing is not addressed just as a tick-box exercise nor as something that is paid lip service to in case of an inspection. As leaders, we have to ensure that this is something that we fully sign up to and embrace for the good of ourselves, our staff and the future of education.

If we are to do this, then leaders have to practise what they preach and ensure that they value their own wellbeing so they can ensure that their staff do the same.

Of course, the reality is that the higher up the school leadership hierarchy you are, the more complex the work becomes and the harder it is to disengage when you go home. Let me be clear here, though: this absolutely does not mean that leaders work harder than classroom teachers.

Every member of staff at my school is working at the limits of their capacity - from the NQT at the start of their career through to the principal.

For senior staff, though, the work can be more complex or harder to streamline; there are policies to write, trust meetings to prepare for and attend, governors’ papers to write, parent meetings to attend, social care meetings to attend and, of course, global pandemics to provide a coherent response to.

However, because the issues are complex and challenging, and the responsibility lies with us to solve them, we must learn to switch off and take time for ourselves.

This is important for two key reasons. Firstly, on a basic level, it is important for our own self-preservation and good health. Secondly, we need to model that behaviour for staff in school who watch our actions more so than they listen to our words.

The leadership of a school creates the workload culture; if the bar is set at a standard that is unhealthy and unsustainable then that becomes the norm. Staff can easily feel compelled to attempt to meet it and guilty if they cannot. If the leadership encourage staff to adopt healthy habits towards work, that becomes the standard.

So how can school leaders ensure that they really do maintain a positive work-life balance? These tips are not revolutionary nor groundbreaking - they are simply things that have either worked for me or I have seen modelled well in others. Even making small changes to the way that we work can have a hugely positive effect on our wellbeing and work-life balance.

1. Acceptance

We know that the to-do list is never-ending, no matter how much time we spend attacking it - but accepting that fact can be a lot harder than it sounds. It is as certain as the dip in students’ behaviour three weeks into a new term, yet the number of highly experienced colleagues I know who still get anxious about how much they still have to do suggests that there is a belief (or hope?) that one day it will all be done. It won’t. Accepting the fact that you will always have a lengthy to-do list can save a lot of anguish and time worrying about it.

2. Be a little bit lazy

This is not about being sloppy; rather, it is about looking for the corners that can be cut and not being afraid to cut them. What tasks take up a lot of your time but add little value? What would no one notice if you stopped doing it? A good touchstone to return to when determining the value of an action is whether or not it will, ultimately, benefit the children that we educate and look after. If the answer to that question is no, then honestly ask yourself why you are doing it. If you are doing something new, what are you now not going to do to make time for it? The amount of hours in a day is fixed - we cannot conjure more up when we need them - so therefore we have got to be somewhat ruthless about how we use our time.

3. Compartmentalise your time

Set aside time for work, home and family, and yourself, and - here’s the important bit - stick to it. You wouldn’t walk your dog or visit family during the school day so don’t allow work time to encroach on your family time. Personally, I do not work on a Friday night and Saturday and, apart from the odd exception, I have not done this for a number of years. It can be done.

4. Prioritise

When you’ve accepted the fact that you will always have a long list of things to do, streamlined the list and set aside specific time in which to complete tasks, then you need to prioritise what you are doing. What is urgent and needs to be completed right away? What can you take more time on and do in stages? Can anything be delegated or shared with someone else?

5. Be smart in your use of tech

Technology is a brilliant aid to working life and definitely helps with cutting corners, but it also can make the working day feel 25 hours long if used badly. Simple things like an automatic “do not disturb” every night on your phone, out-of-office email notifications when on holiday and only checking your emails when you are in a position to properly read and respond to them can bring back a sense of control and calm to working life.

There is a long way to go to solve the teacher wellbeing/work-life puzzle, and arguably a lot of action needs to be taken at a much higher level even than school leadership. However, in the meantime, there are changes that we can make to benefit our own lives and workloads and to support other colleagues and in so doing ensure the long-term sustainability of an overworked but vitally important profession.

Sarah Arney has been an assistant principal for four years and prior to that she was head of department and faculty for seven years. She teaches history and politics at a secondary comprehensive in Kent

This article originally appeared in the 24 April 2020 issue under the headline “Five ways to boost work-life balance and wellbeing”

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