S03 – E01 with Prof Fiona Forbes.

In the first episode of EdInfluence Season 3, we hear about the importance of communication and gain a global perspective from Fiona Forbes, Professor of Practice in the School of Education at La Trobe University Victoria, Australia.

In conversation with our sector leading education lawyer Nick MacKenzie, Fiona shared her leadership insights from a 30 year+ international career in education, drawing on her experience as:

• Executive of the International Confederation of Principals (ICP)
• Chair of the Australian Special Education Principals’ Association (ASEPA)
• Board Member of the Foundation for Education Development UK (FED)
• Foundation member and participant of Atlantic Rim Collaboratory (ARC)

Let us know what you think of this episode - drop us a message and connect via LinkedIn.

Chapters

• 6:44 Motivation
• 19:28 Creating space to think
• 28:05 Instilling hope as a leader
• 34:17 A global perspective
• 38:41 The mission

Transcript

0:04

Welcome to the latest episode of Ed Influence. I'm Nick MacKenzie from Browne Jacobson, and today I'm delighted to be joined by Fiona Forbes. Thank you, Fiona, for joining me today. I wanted to start by inviting you to tell me a story from your life that would give me a picture of who you are as a leader. Thanks Nick. A story from my life? There's many of them. will tell you a little story of a small girl from Western Australia. working class background, both parents worked. I'm the fourth child of five siblings. My grandmother, who was born in Manchester, lived with us. My father was born in Scotland, and my mother was born in Australia. So, we lived in, Perth in Western Australia, actually in Fremantle, which is a port. my dad drove trucks and my mother worked at a haberdashery and fabric shop. When I was, 12, my mom had a stroke, at the age of 42, and it left her paralysed down her right side and without the ability to speak. but that didn't mean that my mother wasn't a good communicator. so we had to learn a new way. Roles within the family changed greatly. I had older, brothers and sisters, and I also had a younger brother. so it meant that my grandmother had gone to England at the time, and then when she came back, she didn't come back to live with us, so everything changed, and so roles changed and, there became a much more... someone had to leave the house. And so I think that's probably where my leadership journey began. right back then, in the early seventies in Perth, Western Australia when, someone had to take charge to make sure that the house continued to work, my dad could still go to work, and my little brother could go to school. So I think that's probably, the roots of the journey. Along with that came a lot of empathy for my mum when she finally did come home from hospital, because it took her nearly 18 months to be able to come home and then to relinquish that leadership or share that leadership with my mum so that she could re-establish her position as the lead woman in the house. so, I learnt a lot from that experience. And I learned a lot about empathy and understanding. I also learned a lot about disability, which is interesting because that is where I work. and I learnt a lot about communication, which is also another place where I currently work with students who have difficult with communication. And I was, and I am trained as a teacher of the deaf, so communication has been a big driving influence for me, and looking at other forms of communication than just verbal. because as I said, my mother was a very good communicator. People used to marvel at the fact that we knew exactly, what she was saying by gesture, facial expressions, and keywords she had. She ended up having keywords as she got older and learnt more, post-stroke. but my mum was always good for a conversation, which always amazed people that we as a family could still have meaningful, conversations with my mum. I miss her to this day. I miss not being able to, she actually, ended up in a nursing home across the road from my school. and I miss not going to see her at the end of the day and telling her about my day and getting her opinion. So, yeah, so, that is probably a good story about who I am and, and what motivates me as a leader. Thank you for sharing that. Fiona. I was struck by what you said there about the communication, piece and about your mother being a really good communicator, despite the challenges. Could you share a bit more about how that's impacted on you as a leader and how you've used that, what you've learnt there as a leader? I think it's to look for the gaps. I think that's really important because the gaps actually tell you more sometimes than the words do. And I think that's something that my mother taught me. and I think that's something that I have used in my leadership journey. I don't have a hero leader. I think that's one of the questions, but I don't have one. And I think the reason I don't have one is because I look for the gaps. Because the gaps mean, more to me than actually sometimes the action. So, and I think my mum taught me that those gaps give you opportunity, opportunity to understand more in terms of, the other language that communication has that's not just verbal. so it's looking at the whole form of communication. because body language tells us a lot. and so that's really important. I've found that really important journey with parents to understand or as soon as they walk in the door, what their body is telling me about how they're feeling, because that then, dictates what approach I'll take. So, I think that's really important. And thinking then about your motivation as a leader, you've given me a sense of it, Fiona, but what would you say your main motivation of your leadership is? I think I'm a really human leader. I think I go for understanding people and what motivates them, what they want, and then trying to find a way to ensure that they get that. So whether that be staff sometimes you can't achieve that. Sometimes you have to be the leader with the capital L and say no. but that's as important as saying yes. So I think, it's, being really clear and having a really clear purpose knowing that everybody is working towards the same goal, and making sure that those goals are really clear. I think that's part of what motivates me. I like to be really clear in the journey, and, I also don't like to, I don't like to add things in if they're not going to add value and they're going to disrupt too much in or order to appease. So, for example, governments are really good at doing this, and I work in the government sector. They're really good at throwing curve balls. Oh, we need to do this, you know, that, that's the, you know, now we have to add this in. In our school, we like to be, we like to be considered about, that. So sometimes I'm not an early adopter, so I, I might wait a bit and watch and see what happens, with a new initiative, before being an early, adopter, because that change takes time. And so sometimes you need to iron out those things, unless it's something that's really motivating for us as a school, then we, we will adopt change. No, problem. But it'll be planned and it will be considered. So for example, at the moment at school, an issue has come up about an assessment. It's not fit for purpose and it's reporting. We have a different cycle than you do in the UK in Australia, and it's mid-year reporting for us. people said we need to change that. We had a conversation around whether or not that would be advantageous for the students, whether or not that would be advantageous. So we work through things and we take a more considered approach. We will, ask for early adopters if people want to trial that change and see what the data gives us. And then if it gives us what we need, then we'll make the change, but we'll make the change in the new year so that all of that, that data, is flowing in the right direction and rather than it being ad hoc and people really don't like to be done to. I'm really mindful of that. So it's interesting. In terms of about the, what you just said about tech change there, how, how much time do you make for yourself to, to think as a leader on a typical week, do you find this time? Well, I have a 45 minute drive to and from work,(My mobile office as I like to call it). I find that, that is a good thinking time. I try not to make it a doing time. I'm a big water person. You've got to find your thing And for me, it's water whether it's the swimming pool or the shower, my best ideas I think, have come from in the shower or in, or in the ocean or in the pool or, or whatever. It's the water thing. Water. And I, seem to, have some kind of affinity, and it's where my best ideas, come from. I think thinking time is really important. I make thinking time in my leadership. If I don't know something, I'm quite happy to tell somebody I don't know. And, and that I need some time to go away and find that out. I don't close my door in my office, but if my door is closed, people really do realise that that actually, means something because I don't close it. So, I don't mind being interrupted, because usually if someone comes into my office, there's a purpose towards that. It's not aimless. I also like to keep my door open because children come to my office. So that's really important. And the door should never be closed, that they should always be able to have, access. I think I find post students at school, it's always a good time for thinking.

So there's usually that time from 3: 12:32

30 until about five o'clock when, when there is an opportunity to get some work done, but also to think about that work. I like to support my staff to support their reflection and thinking. So if we are doing something new, because I have the ability to access, the university database, I do, and I, supply people with reading, that they don't have to go looking for so that they can do some blue sky thinking about an initiative that we're thinking so they can have, other opinions. I don't just give them one opinion. I give them divergent opinions so that we can come back and have robust, um, conversations. So I think that, I think that's really important. And I think it's really important to set up communities of practice for people so that they, you know, teams of people. we had some good feedback about that. Our teams were too big, so we've, um, we've made them much smaller. They're now three or four people, because you can have more, you can get more in depth about something with three or four people in an hour and a half that you have for your, communities of practice or professional learning communities. and you can dig a bit deeper and jump into something. and currently we're looking at our instructional pathway in our school. So how do we deliver the curriculum? How do we, and, like you have in the United Kingdom at the moment, there's a big, push in Australia for, phonics and direct instruction and so on and so forth. So, we're not just jumping into one particular model. We're having a look at what our own model might look like in our particular school and how we want to develop that, rather than taking something off a shelf. So, we're looking at purpose designing that for our context and our particular students. So the staff are on a journey at the moment, and we have some coaches and some support for them to be able to really explore that. I have about 30 teachers on four different campuses, so, it's a big, concern. It's only kindergarten to year, three, which is, four to nine year olds. so it's 280 students with a diagnosed, developmental language disorder. And, and this is an early intervention. All these students will go back to mainstream classes, and it's our job to make sure that they understand the language of school and be able to access the curriculum, with whatever tools we can equip them with, with their lifelong D L D, because that doesn't go away. So, we give them the best start that we possibly can. Do you think you've become a better communicator through the time, through your work, Fiona, in terms of over the years? I think because I, right at the very beginning of my career, in my leadership career, I got involved with a professional, my, leadership professional organisation. and as that turned out, in 2009, I became the president of the Australian Special Ed Principals Association. And that meant, going to Canberra a lot. So, you know, it's like going to Westminster a lot and speaking with politicians and you get 30 minutes, that you can only have three points that you want to discuss. and two is better because you can have a bit more of a conversation. So I learned a lot about communication from that experience. I learned a lot about clarity of vision, clarity of purpose, clarity of message. so I think that probably, and hand in hand with a school that was growing and kept on more and more people would come in and that was not a released position. So, it meant that I would go to Canberra one day, come back to school the next, so I spent a lot of time on planes, so a lot of time reflecting, because those plane rides are long. It's three and a half hours to Canberra and four hours back to Perth, so that's a long time sitting. And so you were able to get a lot of work done in that time. And a lot of thinking. So I think that, that really helped me understand that clarity is really important, and, that's what people want. People want understanding and uncertainty, so, and they like to question and they like to have an opportunity to contribute. Because that's what I wanted to do for my organisation. I wanted to contribute. So I, I learned a lot through that. And then, over the years I got involved with the International Confederation of Principals. Our association was a member, and I got to be on their executive. And so I got to see that on a global scale. and then I, I was elected the president in 2017, and, or 2015. And so in 2017 and 18, I was the president. And, that was a fantastic experience because that meant I got to speak to global leaders and, and, it's still the same. You don't get a long time. So it's about clarity of message. So I, I think that's, something that is really important. Clarity. And being able to understand, like I said at the very beginning, the gaps. The gaps are really important. I love that idea of the gaps, Fiona, so I was also taken by the image you painted in terms of what you said about water. What is it about the water that you particularly find is, is that space where you can really think? That's a great question. I just there's something about water for me. You know, some people, it's the mountains, me, it's water. I just love that cascade of, of water over my head, has to be over my head. and I, I just absolutely, love, the feeling of the diving in. I think that's from being a kid. It's hot in Australia. There's something refreshing and reinvigorating from water. So I think that I find rejuvenation from water. so it rejuvenates my thinking. And if ever I'm not in a good space, water is a good place to go for me and into the water, not to the water, and to sit and to look. It's actually about going in. And I had a real thing when I was doing my travel thing that you know, oceans of the world, you know, how many, how many oceans of the world have I put my body into? And that was really important for me at one stage. They're little goals that you that you want. So that, so that, that's a sense of achievement in, in my water journey. That's my kind of thing about water. It's rejuvenating. And is there any ocean, that's on your list to tick off still? Oh, yeah, I've still got plenty, but sometimes it's too cold to put your feet in the ocean sometimes when I go. So, it's a matter of whether or not, you can go back in, in, and lakes and, you know, lots of, other places like that. There's many a body of water to put your feet into or to, dive into, which is, probably even, even better. And so when you are, you are thinking, thinking of Fiona as as a leader, what sort of questions do you, do you find, you come to, in terms of when thinking, making that thinking time as a leader? What are the sort of questions that you run over? Well... leadership changes, and you change as a person. I think, your life experiences, shape who you are as a leader. I'm a grandma. I've got five grandchildren. what happens to them at school is actually really important to me. and you know, what happened with my own two boys when they went to school was important to me as well. But, that was a different part of my journey. But for my grandchildren, it's really, it's really interesting. You're able to look at, you're able to look at your own leadership through the leadership of the leaders that they have, because they go to different schools. and, you know, there are, there are some things that I, I look at and I go, I wouldn't do that. And I wonder why that person is doing that. Or, oh, that's a really good idea, and I might use that in my way in my school. So there's quite a few things that I have taken. I think leadership, you're forever growing, and once you are not, you're in trouble and you're really in trouble. So, if you can't take some learning from somebody else, whether that's, I wouldn't do that or I would do that, but I wouldn't do it in that way, That's totally natural. That's a great idea. I can think when I see things and, and then I can say, oh, but that's not the way I do it, or that's not the way I'd lead it, because I can lead something, but my staff will take it somewhere totally different. And you have to be open to that. Once you put an idea into the ring, someone else might take it and grow it in a different way. That's change. If you are not open to that, then you won't have the courage to put anything in the ring. So, and sometimes you can massage that to, be more like what it was that you were thinking it was going to be. But I think if you haven't painted the picture well enough in the beginning, then people won't fully understand your concept that you're trying to put forward. So I try really hard to, If I'm bringing in a new idea to articulate that even in writing with dot points so that people can actually see that's where I was headed. Now, they may, especially in a leadership team situation, they may take it somewhere else, but you've got to be open to that, because if you're not open to that, then you are dictating everything. And that's not shared leadership. That's one way leadership, and that's a, for me, I think that would be a recipe for disaster. I value my team. I think leaders, really, you know, there is that saying a, a leader is only as good as the people that they surround themselves with, that are able to articulate and and bring out the vision of what that leader has. And you are only as good as what you can do to support those people to be the best leaders that they could be. So I think that's really important. Leadership for me is a human, it's a real human endeavor. It's a real communication, and it's a relationship. And the relationships that you have, some you need to work harder at than others. Some people in leadership teams sometimes I think can finish your sentences. They know you so well. Other people, you have to work really hard at, at the relationship to, to get, to get people working more cohesively. and that doesn't mean that my idea is the only idea. and I think you have to be really, mindful of that. But as the leader, you have to take the responsibility. If that, if we go with an idea, then I have to take that responsibility. It doesn't matter whose idea it is, the responsibility lies with me. If that does not work, and if it does work, we all share it. But if it doesn't work, I wear it. And so that's the difference I really, I say to people, we'll try that. I've got you. We're okay. We'll give that a go. And I really do mean that when I say, I've got you, I really mean that I've got your back. We're all gonna go in this together. And if it doesn't turn out, then I'll wear the fallout. That's okay, because that's courageous. You've got to be courageous as a leader. You can't just sit and wait and think, oh, well that probably was a good idea, but I don't know. That's bit of a risk. Well, you know, life's life's a risk. So, you, you've got to, you've got to jump in there and have a go. Can I, can I ask, as it struck me listening to you around, the human endeavor aspects of what you were just describing, how, how important to you as a leader is hope? Oh, yeah. Look, that's one of the things about the pandemic that I think was globally that I saw, school leaders around the world, because I still had access to, at that particular time, it was the end of my, presidency. and I still had connection and and I still do with global organisations, and I was privileged enough to be able to sit in on a whole lot of different global meetings. But what, at the very beginning of the pandemic, probably about May of 2020, the wise organisation from Qatar had a, a fantastic seminar. And the keynote speaker at the seminar was Gordon Brown. And it was the one thing that he talked, that he talked about, and it's the one thing that I remember him talking about, without hope, these students in this pandemic, what will they have and who's gonna give them hope? Well, I just think the other leaders that heard that, and I spent my time, speaking about that point with leaders that I spoke to because, hope is one of the most powerful, tools that we have as humans. it's a huge motivator. It's a huge driver. it can lift people forward. And so it's how do you lead with hope? And how do you elevate your staff to be leaders for their students with hope? I think that's one of the greatest things of leading in a crisis or leading in uncertainty, is that element of hope. And I think it's something that school leaders did, across the globe. I think actually it's something that school leaders in the UK did exceptionally well. And I don't think they've been given enough credit for that. I really don't. I was privileged enough through the Foundation for Education Development (FED) to be able to see and hear and participate with people on a weekly basis through FED Space that I chaired and hear the hope that these leaders were instilling within their leadership teams and their staff. But I also heard of the hope that they were instilling in their communities through some of their actions. You know, school leaders would go round to houses and deliver food school leaders would go and they would know their communities and their families so well that they would, you know, offer support to get people for COIVD testing. And it was just there, there just was a, a real selflessness to leadership at that time, which I thought brought out the best in people. I saw the best in people during that time, and I saw that level of hope being, being instilled. but I haven't seen that post-pandemic. I've seen a jump back to normal. And, and sometimes I think the learnings from COVID have been lost, and that I think would be a real tragedy. I do see that sometimes I've seen that in my own system. You know, we used to have briefings, sometimes three or four times a term, the director general would talk to us. she hasn't talked to us at all this year. Now it comes in an email. I mean, she still talks to us, but it comes in an email. We don't have the 980 schools around the state all joining in on one meeting with, with the director general, where she says the things that she says in her email, which I think would be better delivered when they come in person, you know, 30 minutes and not everyone will join in for that, but I think that's the human aspect. I appreciate the human aspect. It gives hope, it gives acknowledgement, it gives support, not everybody's leadership style is like that. That, that human aspect's coming across there very strongly. Fiona we're nearly out of time. In a moment, just one final question, but before I do, I was curious, and you've touched on it there in terms of you've obviously, worked in a number of different environments internationally in the UK and Australia. What, what do you see as the differences, similarities, in terms of as you move around the world, in terms of approaches to leadership? I think, in my experience, I, I see that leaders are all striving to be better leaders. I think that leaders, and that's probably because my experience is through leadership organizations, which really are driving forces behind, CPD for leaders. So, people are always looking for the next thing they need to add to their, leadership journey. I think that that's a really interesting one. I see a lot of similarities. it doesn't, the context is different. The skillset is the same. Sometimes elevations within that skillset will be context specific. So everybody has an element of entrepreneurialship about what they do, that might be more heightened in one particular, leadership setting than another and your entrepreneurial skills might be if you're in Africa about getting students to school. It may be about, cleanliness within your environment. It may be a range of different things, whereas in, Canada, for example, your entrepreneurial skills may be about, working collaboratively with business. And so, the same could be said in the United Kingdom. So I, think there's a, a level of sameness in the skillset, but there's context is everything for leadership, and especially because every school is different. We have schools, similar schools, and, we're all striving for the same thing, but our ability to achieve that is really related to our context. And, context is everything in leadership. So, I think that's, something that, is really important. Leadership is leadership, you know, school leadership is, school leadership is school leadership, regardless of what country you're in. China, Japan, United States, Bolivia, doesn't matter where you are. School leadership is school leadership. You have sometimes different levels of control, which is context. So systems control more, others allow you to do more. So there's different aspects within that. But everybody is working for and striving for better outcomes for students. That is the bottom line. Everybody is doing that. and, whether your motivator is external or internal, so whether that you have external examinations or internal examinations, we are all still striving for quality teaching, and learning and better outcomes for our students and to, take them on a journey where they enjoy coming to school. Because that's really important because that's where the learning happens. So I think that's probably the motivator for everybody around the world. But context is everything. Thank you. So, final question then, Fiona. what's the mission that connects your leadership roles? What's the Mission that connects your leadership roles? I think, it's a really hard one, Nick, my mission. I really think that I have a desire that everybody, well, I have a, maybe my mission is that everybody can learn. I don't think that, that there is a student who can't learn. I would say that's probably part of my mission. I'm really into, inclusive leadership and an inclusive shared leadership. I think leadership is a shared journey. It can't be something that a leader does because schools don't have one leader. If they do, that person must be just about dead, I'd say, because there's impossible to do all the roles that there are within a school. and so I think that, my mission is to share my leadership and to grow that within the profession. I'm really motivated by the fact that I have grown three principles during my time, my 30 years as being a leader. and the latest leader, won a position as a principal just last week. I think that's a real feather in any leader's cap to grow leaders. I'm away on long service leave as we have in Australia at the moment here in the UK I'm growing another leader because somebody else has stepped up to be me while I am not there. So that's really important. Growing leaders for the next to be the next leaders, is part of the mission. So I think, sustaining the profession is really important and quality is really important. Quality of the experience, quality of the journey, and quality of the outcome. So, and to do that, you have to surround yourself with quality people. And you can't do that without that. And so that might mean that you have to grow that quality as well. So, that is also part of the mission. How do we go and how do we, how do we achieve that? So yeah, I, think that's probably, the mission at this present point in time. I hope that's, an okay answer. Fiona, thank you. And thank you for joining me today. I've thoroughly enjoyed our discussion and I do hope our listeners have as well. And I look forward to you joining us for the next in the series, of the EdInfluence Podcast. Thank you very much, Nick. My absolute pleasure.