Leadership of Schools: Chief Executives in Education

Citation

Cordeiro, P.A. (1998), "Leadership of Schools: Chief Executives in Education", Journal of Educational Administration, Vol. 36 No. 3, pp. 302-304. https://doi.org/10.1108/jea.1998.36.3.302.2

Angela Thody’s book, Management and Leadership in Education, will be of considerable interest to anyone concerned with educational leadership. The book’s twelve chapters explore the work lives of eight English chief education officers (CEOs). The text first sets the context for the reader and then describes typical activities performed by these officers. Dr Thody provides considerable contextual detail, as well as a glossary of terms for readers not familiar with the English education system. A diagram of the levels of the system showing its relation to local government would have been particularly helpful for readers from other countries.

Professor Thody provides much detail about CEOs’ daily activities including specific examples of what she labels morning “warming‐up exercises”. These are events CEOs typically undertake the first hour of each day. In a chapter entitled, “The Round of the Day”, Professor Thody presents informative tables listing activity periods for CEOs, percentages of time they spend in contact with other people, and the locations of their encounters. Thody reports a more structured pattern of time distribution for these CEOs than was the case for Mintzberg’s seminal study in 1973 in which “variety, fragmentation and brevity (p. 47)” prevailed. She found these CEOs to be “enthusiastic…bearing the burden and the heat of the long day and illuminating the conclusion of CEO Tim Brighouse that he loved every minute of his job” (p. 40). A chapter entitled “Daily Leadership” discusses the progress over four days of a policy regarding musical offerings. Discussion of events shows the “temporary distortions in workloads and policy directions” (p. 60) that can sometimes dominate the work lives of educational leaders. Another chapter details the stakeholders with whom CEOs interact. Using the words of one participant in her study, Thody discusses the “brokering” role of the CEO. Two key constituent groups for CEOs are governors and councillors. The former are members of school governing bodies, while the latter are elected politicians who direct English local authorities. Professor Thody discusses the roles of other stakeholders including the media, unions, business leaders, students, and interest groups such as sports, ethnic, and religious associations. Thody observes that in the past CEOs have been insular in seeking support and guidance from various stakeholders and that it may be time to expand stakeholder participation.

This text is of particular value for three reasons. First, there are few in‐depth qualitative studies that have explored the role of CEOs, or their equivalents in other countries. In countries such as Canada or the US, the CEO’s closest equivalent would be a superintendent. In Australia this would be sub‐state area leaders, while in many other countries this role is played by sub‐systems leaders where central governments delegate to agencies or local governments. Professor Thody provides valuable insights into the many roles CEOs play. She presents “a portrait of strategic leadership rather than of individual leaders” (p. 5). Her analysis includes colorful metaphors that contain potentially powerful lenses for thinking about the current and future roles of CEOs. These metaphors describe CEOs as “hubs of wheels” and “garage mechanic supervisors”, not glamorous roles, but realistic. Thody maintains that “the CEO appears as the servant of all the other groups” (p. 37). This is an important observation and those readers familiar with Peter Block’s notion of stewardship and Robert K. Greenleaf’s writings of the servant as leaders will see connections to Dr Thody’s conceptions of the leadership of these CEOs. The themes that emerged from this study were carefully articulated and provide sufficient detail for the reader to understand clearly the context of the examples described.

A second strength of this book lies in the detailed discussion of the methodology used for data collection. Data primarily included non‐participant observation lasting a total of 36 days. Data were collected with two cohorts of CEOs over a nine‐year period. The first cohort included five male CEOs with data collected between 1986 and 1988. The 1994‐1995 cohort involved four participants including two females and one CEO who was also involved in the first cohort. Professor Thody provides detailed information regarding selection, access, observation, note‐taking, validation, confidentiality, document sources and data analysis. She also discusses issues such as the participants’ behaviors because of her presence, her personal identification with her participants, her embarrassment in shadowing a person all day and the notion of physical exhaustion. These details will prove particularly useful to novice researchers because rarely are these topics discussed by methodologists.

The author states that her lack of a feminist viewpoint “may seem an opportunity missed” and that she “fleetingly reflected on differences that may have affected... data gathering” (p. 199). These are important points and the many times when Dr Thody quoted a CEO, it may have proven insightful to tell the reader the gender of the participant. The sample was too small for comparing and contrasting differences of style; however, if readers approach this topic from a feminist viewpoint, adding gender of the CEO when discussing them may have proven informative.

Third, Dr Thody’s style sets this book apart from any other educational texts exploring leadership. Thody has infused an academic text with “the novelist’s descriptive technique to add interest and readability” (p. 7). At various points throughout the book she cites David Lodge’s novel, Nice Work, which explores a senior business executive who is shadowed by a university researcher. Additionally, in the epilogue, she takes the reader 100 years into the future and discusses the Managing Director of Education. This whimsical ride to the future not only makes the reader chuckle, but also presents some interesting notions about how the role of the CEO may change. None of us will be present in 2096, but this reader is assured that educators of the late 21st century would get a hearty laugh from Angela Thody’s predictions.

Overall, Dr Thody does a solid job of weaving in related research findings about educational leaders with similar roles in other countries. Given the rich detail presented from this study, there was, unfortunately, little room for international comparisons of the roles. This book would make an excellent background resource for a text detailing this job role in other countries so that role similarities, differences due to context, and future directions could be described; for example, Dr Thody discusses the need for more stakeholder voices to be heard. This is an educational trend occurring in many nations and might be a particularly rich area for further research.

Angela Thody’s Leadership of Schools provides a solid, in‐depth analysis of the CEO’s role. It would be a valuable addition to the library of anyone interested in the roles of educational administrators. This book would make excellent reading for graduate students preparing for leadership roles regardless of their country of origin. The findings of this study parallel recent worldwide tendencies for educational systems to, on the one hand, centralize and, at the same time, delegate additional power to the local school. This text would be highly appropriate for a course in comparative educational administration.