#EdInfluence
In his inimitable style, Nick unearths the secrets of good leadership from his guests.
Trusted by thousands of education providers across the country, Browne Jacobson is an award winning national law firm helping clients and partner organisations shape and influence education policy.
#EdInfluence
S03 – E06 with Rebecca Boomer-Clark.
In this episode of EdInfluence we hear from Rebecca Boomer-Clark is the Chief Executive Officer of Academies Enterprise Trust, one of the country’s largest multi-academy trusts.
An experienced school leader, she was Director of Secondary at Ark Schools from 2017 to 2021. Prior to that, she worked for the Department for Education (DfE) as Regional Schools Commissioner for South-West England and was National Education Director for Oasis Community Learning.
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Welcome to the latest episode of Ed Influence. I'm Nick Mackenzie from Browne Jacobson, and today I'm delighted to be joined by Bex Boomer-Clark, CEO of a AET. Thank you Bex 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. Well, first of all, hi. Hi, Nick. It's great to be here. A story from my life. I probably would always go back to my childhood, because one of the things I'm most grateful for is that I was, I had a, you know, a really blessed childhood. my parents were, were supported, supportive, and interested in what we were doing. I think, and I think the formative experiences live with you, throughout, throughout your life and certainly in factual leadership. and I'd probably go back to being the sort of eldest of, of three. I do think that that sort of sense of having a strong sense of responsibility for others, right from the earliest days, I think is something which, which stays with you. and, and certainly when I was growing up, my, my sister's only 11 months younger than me, but I was certainly the one who always took control. we both went to boarding school. so less a story, more a bit of context, I guess. and I think that that's definitely had an influence on, on my, my personality, my, my sort of my characteristics. And definitely I think my, my outlook, um, I was eight. Kate was eight when we, when we first went to boys school because my dad was in the Navy. and I think that that gave us a sense of, well, we had to have it a sense of self-reliance, a sense of perspective, a sense of actually you had to make your own luck and find your own, find your own path through difficulties, because there wasn't always somebody there to sort of, to pick you up. so I think I'd probably lean into that less, less than a sort of direct, direct anecdote. So, the eldest sibling went to boarding school, and I guess the other sort of formative influences that I've always been really active, interested in, in sort of sport and physical activity, I think that that probably plays out in a sense of competitiveness now. But, , but I wasn't sort of, although I played team sports, I wasn't sort of naturally a sort of, my sort of competitive instinct is more sort of holding myself to account for a high bar rather than, rather than necessarily, holding up one others to account. You talked about your sister going with you then. Was, was that about you as a team or you having the responsibility of feeling like you had to look after your little sister? Oh, I think it was definitely about, we were a team. although I would probably say that Kate was quite happy to ignore the fact that she was my younger sister for large periods of our, of our schooling. we were a team, but there was definitely always a sense that I was looking out for her. and even if you sort of take sort of basic things, so our, my parents lived in, in South Devon, and we went to school in Cornwall. you know, so from the age of eight we'd be traveling to and fro on a train together. I always bought the train tickets and sort of looked after them, when I actually left school. I say Kate was already in the sick form by then, and we had this strange, strange rec recollection that actually this was the first time that she'd bought train tickets because I'd always done it for her. so I think, I think that does sort of stay with you and, and becomes a sort of characteristic of your leadership style. Some might call it controlling Thank you. So if we fast forward to today then, what, what would you say is the, the main motivation of your leadership today? I just have an enormous, enormous belief in the potential of each generation of young people. I always knew I wanted to work in education, right? From sort of the earliest, the earliest of ages. and once I went into sort of education, I, I knew that I wanted to, I knew that I could have the biggest impact actually and influence if, if I, um, if I stepped into leadership. And I think that the things that drive me today are exactly the same things that took me into education in the first place. I just think that unless we get that right for every young person in this country, we will never realize our collective potential. Um, and I really do see it as a, as an entitlement, um, today working across 57 schools up and down the country. I guess the, the way that I, the lens I see that through most, most regularly is this sense of what will it take for context and family wealth to no longer be the greatest determinant of young people fulfilling their potential. And the reality is, is that although many of the barriers are very similar in different parts of the country, actually, the contextual influences are very different. And therefore the solutions are very different. But for as long as it matters too much where you are born, and, in terms of, in terms of enabling you to access, you know, the very best start in life through your education, um, I'll be, I'll be driven to continue to make a difference. Thank you. And I was, just to get a a sense of, um, your, your day to day, what within the, about, I'm conscious, this is a podcast going out, so there'll be limits in what you can say, but what sort of things are on your mind this week? What are you thinking about? What am I thinking about about this week? Well, this week it's half term, so sort of, it was a bit of an unusual week, I think, in a sense that, that I, I mean, I've always worked in school, so I'm really sort of wedded to, um, the, the sort of rhythm of the academic year, the sort of running hard for, for a period of time, then sort of stopping, taking check. Um, so in, in the half term weeks and, and the, and the breaks, I really appreciate the opportunity and the chance to just sort of think clearly, but slightly further ahead. and, and I think that that's a, that's something which I've built in as a real habit and a routine now. I am, this year in particular, I'm quite sort of fixated on this concept of having a, a time strategy, you know, time as our sort of greatest resource. and, and how we utilise that as an asset both for ourselves individually, but also for our sort of our sort of organisation collectively. And so I'm, I'm really thinking hard about, well, what will, what, what is it that we have to do this year in order to realise something that's never been achieved before in the context of our sort of 20, 28 ambitions, in five years time? So yeah, it's a, it's a, it's not a sort of, there's, there's not a long list of issues. It's that sense of taking time to stop and take stock. And I think that's a really important thing to do and to build time, time to do. That's interesting. I like that phrase, at a time strategy at some. So what, outside half term, what do you do in a, in a busy week to make time to think as a, a lead? And what, what, what are the sorts of questions you like to get to, when you're, when you're thinking? I mean, outside, one of the great things about my job is that no week is the same. there is, I like to have a rhythm. I think the weeks where, where I don't have a sort of rhythm and a routine, I sort of feel that a little bit. I, for me, it's when I exercise, so I, I run a lot and that's, that's my thinking time. and I make, I make time every day to do that. And I think that that bookend to the day is, is vital to both sort of, is ahead and plan and sort of think through, think through conversations with individuals, but also then to sort of reflect back on the end of, at the end of each day and to sort of think about, well, actually what was my personal influence and impact in each of the situations that I found myself in? And I wouldn't say that I do that in sort of a, a rigid way. I don't, I don't particularly take time to sort of journal or write diaries or anything like that, though I have huge admiration for people that, people that do. But I definitely have a sort of mental rhythm and a routine. so I, yeah, and I've built that into my sort of daily commute and daily travel. So it, it just, it happens whether I like it or not. So one of my, earlier guests, Ann Limb, she, talks about the power of quiet influence in leadership. And I was wondering whether you could share your reflections on when deciding when to lead by using say, quiet influence and when to use the formal power of the role. So for example, the power of being a CEO? Well, I think the people that know me well would know that sort of quiet is probably not, not something that they would necessarily associate with me., but I think it's something that actually, particularly in this role, I've had to sort of learn to step back and take greater pleasure from, from sort of stepping back and seeing what's happening. you know, once removed, I think that there is a reality. We, we have 57 schools, so that's sort of 58 sites if you count our sort of central office. and although we are one organisation, actually, you have to, you have to have confidence in the power of sort of quiet influence when actually you need to lead through, for us 57 school principals, you know, it's not some, it's not a, it's not a role where you can be directive. I think that, I think that it's easier to lean into that space if you have got a clarity of direction and vision and that is, that's saved. And so I think it's, it's important for us to be able to exert a quiet influence, but it comes from a real clarity of direction. and I think that, that there's a wider piece. I mean, I'm speaking into the importance of influence within AET, in that context, but I take really seriously our responsibility to the system and the sector and my personal responsibility to the system and the sector. and sometimes when you have a platform, it's important that you use that to speak out on behalf of others who may not, may, may not have such a significant voice. Yeah. And picking up on, on that theme, how, how would you say you use your leadership and AET lose uses its leadership to, to lift others up? One of the first things that I, that was important to me was to create what we call, what we now call project H. I've been a believer for a long time that actually it's all of our, the sector is all of our responsibility. and I think when I was working in the southwest and, and David Carter was the RSC, he used to say that actually if, if you are leading a great school, but schools around you are, are struggling, um, that's not strong system leadership. And I think, I really believe that that's true. and we, we speak to our leaders as being responsible for 33,000 young people, many of whom they'll never meet. So Project H was, is, a movement really, um, a platform where we made a commitment to, to share our journey, if you like. I hate the phrase journey, I think it's overused, but you know, I, inherited an organisation that had been through a period of quite a tumultuous period of financial turnaround. and very much the work is making sure that we now realize the educational potential of all of our schools and, and our young people through them. but also that sense that what can we do to document the progress that we are making year on year in a way that actually adds value to others. And so we have, we, we share, we share, you know, often through sort of, through blogs and articles at the moment, but sort of increasingly through, through events where we have sort of direct discourse between people, both what's working, but also what isn't. Because my experience has often been that people wait until something is incredibly shiny, and well proven. And very often the gap between where that organisation or that resource is, and actually the people that could learn most from it is too wide. and part of that is implementation. Part of that's context. And I also firmly believe from my own leadership that I think you sort of learned from your, from your mistakes. And I'm sort of not think, not sort of the big catastrophes, although you, you have to take learning from those two. But also the things that, the moments where actually, if you've just taken a slightly different approach, you may have, you may have got further faster. So yeah, project H is our, is our big sort of platform vehicle. And we also wanted to sort of try and break down what's become an increasingly, I think, tribal discourse in education. You know, polarized camps where, where conversations are are, are essentially taking place with people waiting for the right moment to sort of prove their point as opposed to sort of listening to the, listening to the wisdom indifference. Um, and we're excited, you know, it's, it's a slow burn piece and it's, it's also important for us internally because if you have that commitment to sort of publicly share what you are doing, it's like it lifts the bar in terms of expectations of sort of quality and rigour. so there's a, there's a cultural factor to it. That's interesting. I was just wondering as I was listening to you speak,'cause you, you started off saying how competitive you were in terms of that, that feature in leadership. And I was wondering whether that that competitive drive drove you to you. I, you talked about, sometimes people wanna wait till it's polished and perfect before sharing the, the learnings, but sharing it raw, that's, that's that, was that a brave step or did it just feel like a natural step For me, it felt like a natural step, and it's just a real privilege to be in a position to be able to take something which is possibly as much about personal conviction as anything else. And to make that something which is, you know, relevant to both the, the heart of our organization, but also that sort of wider system contribution. And I think there needs to be, I think it's really important that we all step into that space, um, space. And I, I think it's possible to be competitive and collaborative. I think where that comes into difficulty is where you are, competitive and, and constantly comparative. and I think that's the challenge. That's one of the biggest challenges that we have, certainly in terms of the, sort of influence of, of public accountability on schools and what that does for the psyche of leaders, um, across the sector. So I, yeah, I'm all for competition, but I, I believe in, in collaboration. And, um, think thinking about, um, you as an organisation, I imagine, you have a challenge or two and it can conflict and challenge your, core values. You, described your motivation and what, what was driving you, I was wondering whether you could talk to him about the how, how you sort of navigate the challenges of ensuring that your leadership stays true to your values and what you are driving for when you're buffeted by those inevitable crosswinds headwinds. And that, I suppose I'm thinking about navigating situations where you are, you are faced with doing the expedient thing or, or taking perhaps the harder path that may have some short-term pain that is truer, feels true, and more authentic to what you're trying to do. I mean, I think my natural position is always to sort of take the hard path. Um, and I have a sort of tendency to run towards challenges, you know, right from the earlier stage of, of, of my, of my first headship. I was attracted to, to challenge. And I think that you can't be attracted to challenge, and not realise that you actually are going to need to do some things differently and to, and to sort of realize new paths that, that no one's that nobody's followed yet. So how do I say to yourself, I think that there is, that there is something that's quite natural in me. I also think it's so important that you have people around you who will just be, you know, your fiercest critics as well as your, as your, as your most loyal friends. And, and I think that I am fortunate enough to have people around me be that sort of colleagues, friends who know me well enough to be able to sort of always course correct and keep, and keep me honest. And, and I think it's important to be proactive in terms of seeking other people's advice. and I, yes, I, I'm really, really fortunate in that, in that space. And then now as I've sort of, you know, we've got our senior team at AET is now established. I think it's building a culture in a high performing executive team, um, to be able to sort of challenge one another, um, in a way that's sort of supported, but candid. And how have you got about creating that, that team? Could you share some of your, your reflections of, from joining AET and how you got about that? Yeah, I mean, I think there are people, there are critics who've looked at, the team in AET from afar who said, what are those strange job titles? I think I always had a sense of, I understand the sort of premise that running a multi academy of trust is effectively running a very large school that's operates across multiple sites. And I think that there are many ways to do this job well. but actually our, our role as a sort of central organisation is very much to sort of facilitate and enable each of our schools and each of the leaders in our schools except, and that means providing them with different support and challenge be that related to sort of context or geography or levels of performance. and so we need to be quite agile as a team. And I set out to sort of get a balance of, of different skillsets. So we have got people on, on our team, but myself included, there were three, three members of the senior team with direct experience of, of leading schools and education. but by far, the greater number of people on our team have come from a wide range of different career paths. And I think that that diversity, of thought and experience is, is something which we, I actively sought, but have also, but also now sort of daily appreciate. So we've got, um, uh, our, as my chief operating officer, James that came originally from RMM in technology, um, I've got, director of strategy came from, from Bay as a management consultant. So just a really different breadth of breadth of experience. We've created a new role. So we have a, I think what is first of the sector, a chief talent officer, so to separate out, sort of transactional aspects of HR and, and, and our people work and, and really have an absolute focus on talent. And Joe originally came to us from, from the private sector as well. So, so I think getting that balance is really important. And then building routines, one thing which I, it might be a little unpopular, I've, although I accept that, that the hybrid, the reality of hybrid working is here to stay. I'm also really insistent that we spend enough time together in person, because I think it is incredibly challenging to build those sorts of social bonds and set and, and a depth of trust by interacting with people over a screen, even when you are making an effort to sort of create sort of strange artificial, um, relaxed interactions. I just don't think that you get the same level of performance. So I think that there's that breadth of breadth of experience and diversity, but also time together, um, is really, really important. And that, how's that going in terms of getting that, that balance of the time together? Are you where you want to be? I mean, I probably always want a little bit more if I'm, if I'm honest, but I sort of, I, I accept that, that, you know, the world is in a different place now, coming, coming out of outta the pandemic. what I think we're really clear about is when we do come together, what the purpose is, because equally I recognize that in a world where people were together sort of five days a week, actually, there was quite a lot of wasted time. Um, so I think that we see those that, that time together as, as incredibly important and precious, and it needs to be well structured, and we need to have a clarity of a clear sense of, of what our, our key objectives are. Um, I mean, we're, we're sort of in a place where three days out of five we're together. Um, and often it's more than that, sometimes it's less than that. and we run to the rhythm of the academic year. So we take a slightly different approach outta term time. I very much believe that, that, you know, we exist to serve our schools and there is a, you know, there is a rigidity to the model of schooling, which I think we need to be respectful of from when we're sort of, we exist in service of them. Thank you. And there's, when we talk about leadership quotes are often thrown around and they're often misattributed. But I was wondering what your reaction was to one that I stumbled across relatively recently where, um, it is a leader is a, a dealer in hope. How, how important do you think cope is in a leader? I think it's incredibly important. I think if you were to push me and say, what are the sort of what's essential to see you through challenging times, but also to navigate a path to realise the full possibility of any organisation, particularly one in education where we're actually, you know, we trade in human potential, uh, I think that optimism is absolutely essential. and I would set that alongside hope, as you mentioned. I'd also said that alongside the sense of ambition, um, at which is tempered by, by a real sense of imagination, I would, I go back to my first experience leading a school where I became, um, I became the principal of a incredibly challenging secondary school in the first phase of the academy's movement in really unexpected circumstances, and was hugely under underqualified for the job. I'd been the deputy for 12 weeks. and, and that was my first deputy headship. And in that context, which as I say, at the time, the school was the lowest performing secondary school and the lowest performing local authority in the country. So it kind of, it doesn't, it doesn't really get, get much more difficult than in, many respects. But when you are faced with what could seem like insurmountable challenge, actually the ability to see what, see the possibility in those difficulties, but also to seek the solutions that are in front of you, I do believe that the majority of solutions are in front of you. That's not to say that you shouldn't seek outside influences and council, but actually most of the challenges that organizations and schools face at the, you know, the, the, the resource, um, the talent, the expertise to actually take control of a situation and be the master of your own destiny is very often within, within each organisation. and so I think you have to have a degree of hope to be able to, to sort of step into that adversity, but also see where it could go. Um, and the school that I led had been struggling for, you know, multiple generations, multiple generations. It had, it had not been good for a couple of decades, by any judgment. And, and so in that particular context, you kind of, I remember going there on my first day when I was in for my interview, and I nearly walked away because I, I recognized immediately the level of challenge. And I'd never actually seen a school that was in such a state of such a state of chaos. there are many reasons why I didn't walk away. Um, but I think that that's been a really us helpful leadership lesson, which is the sense of you can step into any situation so long as you have a clarity about actually that what it could become. Um, you can, you can work your way through the challenges that are in front of you, and most of the tools and resources are also alongside you to, to, to sort of make progress. You, you've talked a few times about heading directly towards challenges. I was wondering when things get really tough, where, where, how do you go about finding people who give you energy to, to keep you with that ambition? I mean, to be fair, it's not hard when you work in schools. You know, if it, the greatest moments that that sort of reenergize me, and when I get to spend time in our schools, when I get to meet our young people, um, I always get a huge amount of, you know, a huge amount of sort of energy. when I meet our new trainee teachers, you know, we talk a huge, a great deal, don't we, about the recruitment crisis in education at the moment. And, you know, that is absolutely, that is absolutely a challenge for all of us. Um, but actually we don't talk enough about, um, the incredible talent that we are tracked into the, into the profession every single year, and the sort of sense of possibility, um, that they, that that they bring to those sort of early years of training and, and, you know, the quality of that, um, which is, which is, is so far away from, you know, the quality of teacher training when I first, when I first started out outta university. So I think that there's something in just the fact that we work around young people in schools that, that, that is innately energszing. and then as I said earlier, I think it's about having people around you that keep you, that keep you honest. Many of my, many of my friends are my oldest friends from my time at boarding school. yeah, they, they'd certainly give me a, a sense of perspective and, and, and know me well, know me well, which I think is, it's important. Like one of the, one of the things piece of advice that I would give to anybody stepping into a challenging leadership role is that you should always take your work seriously, but you should never take yourself too seriously. Indeed. And the, just listening to you talking about some of your, your oldest friends still having the connection and being part of your support network, I was thinking of, Owen Eastwood wrote a wonderful book called Belonging, which was essentially reflecting on the primal need of humans to sort of belong to a group in order to, to thrive. And you talked about it as an executive group thinking of the organisation on a bigger scale. What, what would your reflections be on how you've gone about fostering that sort of feeling of belonging at AET, or, you know, even within teams within AET? Yeah, I mean, I think it was probably one of the biggest challenges when I joined, um, the organisation had, had, had been, I guess, galvanised by the adversity of financial turnaround. but, but it wasn't looking very far and far ahead of itself. and there was, there wasn't a sense of, there wasn't a sense of enough space for the brilliant people within AET, to actually come together, collaborate, talk about the things that really matter, and, and work together to around, around shared and common problems that, I mean, that, that was essentially the gap. and projectH as I say, was a really important vehicle in terms of stepping into that space. The other thing that's been absolutely essential is to say, you know, it's, it's absolutely right that our school should reflect the color and context of their local communities. And we talk a lot about localism, you know, although if you are, if you're serious about every child having an entitlement to accidents, regardless of what part of the country they live in, um, there have to be some things that you hold true in all of your schools. but we definitely don't believe in sort of a cookie cutter approach to education. And I get very concerned, when I, when I sort of observe the headship role gradually being eroded. Yeah, the most important leaders in, in our organisation are our, are our, our heads. and they have to have the space, the agency, the autonomy to be able to, to be able to operate. And I really believe that if you take all of those resourcing and resources and decisions and centralise, and it just becomes a role of implementing an education blueprint, you know, we are gonna have an enormous leadership crisis, on our hands because talented people just won't be attracted that as a proposition. but that said, if you're serious about an entitlement, you, you need to be clear about what that means. And we, we talk about that in terms of what we call 80 for 90, and 80 for 90 are the, ambitious goals that we've set ourselves, which is to, to be the first organisation that breaks 90% for, chronological reading age for phonics, at the end of year six in read, write, maths, spread the standard, and in grade four basics in English and Maths, at the end of year 11. And we went public with those goals. And I actually, when I first spoke to our, to our heads of conference and, and sort of said, look, many of you'll think that I've temporarily taken leave of my senses. but actually I think we have to ask ourselves a question of what will it take, what will it take for 90% of our young people to reach? What if we're really honest about is not a is is not an inaccessible bar? Um, and actually for those, that that is, that that is insurmountable actually the 10%, what's seriously ambitious in terms of success for them. And that's so important because we have, um, you know, we have five special schools within, within our network of schools. Um, and reimagining what success looks like for those young people is just as important to us. and it has been a galvanising force. So we've got the young people that are in our secondary joining our secondary schools in year seven, age sort of 11 this September. The young people who are in the year two in our primary schools, we ask ourselves every day, you know, what is it going to take to realize the full potential of the young people in front of us? and, and recognise that we will need to do many things better, but that will probably only get us to 70%. And actually starting to think about, well, what is it that we need to do fundamentally differently to realise the level of performance has never been achieved before? And that has been, as I say, incredibly powerful because sometimes setting a goal, but also creating the enabling conditions around leaders for them to feel, well, why shouldn't it be us? Why, if not, why not us? Why can't we be the, be the team of leaders and professionals who who find, find the way to enabling more and more young people to fulfill their potential? that I think is, is really sort of liberating, slightly terrifying at times, but really liberating. And does that feature into Project H in terms of some of the lessons you learned? Is that part of the, the stuff you're sharing through that project as well with, with Others? Yeah. yeah, definitely. And what, what's the response been so far from others that, where you, you've shared that, what's your learnings, reflections on early sort of Sense? I think, I think many people externally, although I dunno that they tell say this to me directly, probably think it's a pretty risky strategy, um, to go out there and say, this is what we're going for. I'm really relaxed, actually. I, I think that, and I've been very clear, we might not get there, we might not get there, but we will get an awful lot closer to 90% by making that our goal than we will do if we, if we settle for less. And for me, it's a statement of our belief in the potential of our young people. and it's, placing upon us a sense of responsibility to, to release that potential. So I do think that there are many who probably go, Hmm, that's fairly punchy. I also think there's something about being clear that you are going to stay the course. So when I took on this role, I knew that this was a 10 year commitment at least, and I just don't think it's possible actually to do something significant and difficult at scale. if you only see it through sort of 2, 3, 4 year cycles. it comes back to that sense of time. You know, you asked how you weather, how you weather adversity in different different challenges. You know, if you are, if you've set your sights on, on a goal, which is in the future, and you've got, when you've made a personal 10 year commitment, actually you're in a much stronger position to sort of weather the challenges that, and the storms that buffet you in the day to day and the here and there. And, on the talent piece you mentioned, the talent director in your senior team. What, what are some of the ideas, things you're looking to work on there? Because you said you thought it was a a first perhaps in the sector? Yeah, I mean, we've, we've recently, well last year we, uh, established our new operating model. Um, so we've got five, we've got a five regional model, which is really important to us, um, particularly in terms of that belief in localism. we've got regional education directors, so primary and a secondary region education directors that, um, wanted two in each region. and so one of the starting points was to really think hard about that role because there are, you know, there are many people who have the title of sort of regional director, regional education director, um, but I think it's one of the most challenging roles actually in education, because generally the people that move into it have been really successful heads. And I often say to heads that you'll never have more autonomy and space than you have as a head, even if you, it doesn't feel like that all the time. In reality, you will never have more autonomy. Um, and it's quite a difficult thing to step into a space where you need to be a leader of leaders where you are leading through people where actually you need to have a sort of an external profile within, within a local, a local area, but also you've got, you're operating within a, a wider network and not, and so we've, we were really, really keen to be thoughtful about that role because I've seen many examples of regional director roles just becoming sort of captain in compliance functions. And I think that's a, a sort of, it's, not sort of particularly nourishing leadership role for, for an individual to undertake. I don't think it plays to the talents of the people that we want to attract into those roles. I don't think it builds the next generation of CEOs, which I think is a real responsibility, particularly in, in sort of large networks of schools. And I think it often makes head teachers miserable, um, if they feel that they've basically got a whole load of checklists, compliance checklists, to, to sort of, to, jump through. So for all of those reasons, we wanted to be thoughtful about how that role was developed. And so the starting point for Joe was to, was to, to really break down what that role is and isn't to create a framework which sets it into context of the experience that people bring into the post, but also the experiences you want them to gain, through the first three years in those roles. And we've been very clear, again, this sense of time, you can't come into this job and do it well unless you are going to give us at least three years, preferably five. and so that sense of that sense of commitment, which means that we can be much more thoughtful in terms of the development. What else we done, we've been, we created, from in the first year, um, we forged a partnership with ARC Teach training. I was at ARC before I was at AET in my opinion, it's one of the very best, teacher training programmes in the country. Uh, we didn't have the capacity or the expertise to establish our own teacher training route within AET, but I think it's so important to bring that talent in, so straight away. We, we've sort of established that partnership. We've seen the first cohort go through. We've got the next cohort going through, having a clarity about how somebody can build a career with a ET, um, through the different phases of both their work, but also their sort of wider life outside of work. And it to feel sustainable and energising, is, has been really important. So yeah, a huge, a huge amount of difference. And then we've done the other piece of work that, that Joe is developing is thinking hard about actually how do we design work in schools to properly start to get underneath the workload challenge?'cause it's not about just asking teachers to do less. Um, I think it's, uh, about asking us to work differently. and that's, that's an interesting space which starts to encroach on the possibilities of technology as well. You've, um, mentioned a few times you've referred to network of schools. I was just, that struck me in terms of as quite a deliberate use of phrase. What what's behind that? Um, I think one of the most powerful forces in, any context of the power of networks, um, are people, what people can do when they're connected behind a sort of shared endeavor or common purpose. And I think that naturally we can be quite hierarchical in education. Um, and I think that that can have a constraining influence. And I certainly think it sort of speaks into the sort of public accountability challenge of, I think we're much, we're much more focused on lifting the bottom than we are of sort of elevating of this country. There are many reasons for that. but I think that, but I think that that is a real, a real challenge for us. Um, so I've lost my train of thought actually on terms of that. Well, take me back to your, to your question. So, so I was, I was asking what was behind in terms of you thinking of your oh, network piece schools as networks? Yeah, so I, I'm back on track. So if you think about, if you think about the how networks act, so I'll show my age now, um, think about Facebook and how that took off, um, in a, in a certain direction. It's, you have to be prepared if you believe in the power of network dynamics to have a degree of space. And you have to have the confidence to know that actually people will run into spaces that you haven't anticipated. So that sense of a real clarity of direction for us through four 90, a real discipline in culture, which is developed through Project H, but then having the space for brilliant people to be connected and to take us in directions that we may not anticipate and to be confident enough to go with them, has been really, really important. And so we describe, we describe it as our, as our architecture for collaboration. And I think one of the fundamental roles, of a national trust in particular, but I would say in any trust is actually for us, the challenge as a fundamental for us because of our scale and sort of relative dispersion, is to find ways for people to stay connected. So, you know, every, every subject and phase leader in, in a is connected to, to a, a subject or phase group that is led by one of their peers. Um, we don't dictate the agenda for those groups, um, but we do resource 'em to go in different directions and it takes a bit of time. So it's not something that you can force or inflict upon people. it very much is about wanting to create a, a movement, I think where people are like-minded people can come together and do their best work. and to get away from that sort of caption compliance tendency, I don't get me wrong, I think that you can only, you have to create the conditions to be able to collaborate. So, you know, one of the most powerful, most powerful sources of, sort of insight is our, is our sort of academic data set. You know, unless we were teaching children of the same age, the same things at the same time. And that's, I'm not saying on a day by day on lesson, by lesson basis, but certainly across the course of an academic year, we couldn't assess meaningfully. And if we can't assess meaningfully, we lose access to a, you know, a rich source of insight. So there are certain things that just, you know, we can't all be out there. You have to sort of have the structures and the frameworks that make it possible, but getting the, finding the sweet spot where between having those structures and frameworks, which are evidenced informed, but also creating the space for individuals, you know, be they leaders or be they, or be they sort of teachers in our schools, to have the space to innovate, is really important. And it's, you never quite get that. It's, it's constantly sort of seeing how it, how it's being held in tension. The, um, unfortunately we're, we're starting to get towards the end of our tone. There's a few few things left. I just wanted to, to, to ask, ask you one, one I'm struck a a number of times you've talked about particularly yourself, a very long-term thinking, long-term view and taking some sort of tough calls and sort of really raising the bar, setting some challenges. I was wondering whether you could talk a bit about your, your relationship and how it works with the chair.'cause I imagine that's quite a key, a key part of taking some of these decisions and views. I was just wondering for as A-C-E-O-I imagine the, the chair role is quite a key one for you. Yeah, and I think if I was going to be, if I was advising somebody who's thinking about stepping into a CEO role, I think even if you've had exposure, um, working with boards before, I think don't underestimate actually how much of your role is actually working with your board, working with your chair, building a strong relationship, and getting maximum value out of people who are essentially volunteers, but come with sort of a, a, a sort of rich breadth of different experience and expertise. I'm merely fortunate in that my chair and actually our wider board of trustees, um, naturally I think take a longer term view. they are, they encourage us to be, to take, you know, informed risks. I think they have seen recently we've sort of made pleasing improvements in terms of our sort of sort of academic outputs and, but also in terms of, in terms of our sort of internal sort of engagement indicators, which give them a confidence to sort of push us to go harder. So, so I think that I'm very fortunate in the sense that that, you know, often it's me that's saying, you know, actually I'm not sure we can go quite that far just yet. we, you know, we need to have, we need to have another year of gains in order for us to be, to be confident that we can, that we can, we can take, we can take those risks, but certainly in the space. And, and I think our board are naturally curious. So in the space around time and technology, um, they've been really thoughtful and encouraging in us sort of exploring that. I think just looking at the makeup of the, of, of the, um, exec team, at, you know, that's a, that's sort of, that's a board which is comfortable with, with engaging with external influences and bringing them to bear in education. So it's, yeah, I feel, I feel fortunate in that respect. Two final questions and feel free to, just to to be quite brief in, in, in your answer, Beck. So what would you say brings you, let's say, 80% of your joy as a leader, Seeing others be successful, be that, be they adults or children? What would be the best advice that you would give to an aspiring or a, a learning leader? think be thoughtful about your own personal leadership. Um, know yourself well enough to know the habits and routines that you need to follow in order to be able to sort of sustain your own levels of energy. experience is important, but it needs to be coupled with expertise, um, and learn how to work hard and play hard. Brilliant. Well, thank you, so much Bex for joining me today. I've thoroughly enjoyed our discussion and I do hope our listeners have too. and I look forward to you joining us in our next, in our series of Ed Influence podcasts. Thank you.
