I have been in an educational leadership role for seven years – a PYP Coordinator in two schools and now a Director of Learning.

I have been wondering what is wrong with me for some time. I feel depleted, drained, like the life force and joie-de-vivre has been sucked from me. I fall asleep on the sofa. I’ve stopped all my hobbies.

I am boring. So boring that I bore myself.

Today, I had a bit of an epiphany about why I might be feeling this way.

I think I’m malnourished… if we think of inspiration as nourishment.

Inspiration comes from multiple directions when you’re a teacher, it comes from your colleagues, from your students, from professional learning, from books, from that TED talk, from the world around you. It also comes, or should come, from the educational leaders in your school.

As a leader, people depend on you for inspiration, and so you provide it… and provide it… and provide it. At first, if you’ve just come out of a teaching role, it’s fairly easy and natural to do so. You have your experiences, your approaches, your materials still in your hand, still warm. But those gradually fade and your new reality takes over. People continue to take, but little or nothing replaces what is taken. You look outwards for inspiration, for nourishment, for things that re-connect you with what you loved about education.

But, where is it coming from? Where do you look for it… and why should you have to look for it? That’s kind of tiring in itself! Looking for inspiration can quickly become more work for you to add to your interminable to-do list.

People in educational leadership positions need nourishment. Even if it’s not inspiration, they need someone, sometimes to acknowledge their work, to say “hey – thanks for setting that up”. 99.99% (I just made that up) of all feedback given to people in leadership positions is negative – not “thanks for doing this” but instead “why isn’t this like that?”.

Sure, we know what we’re getting into and, as I often hear people say “that’s why you get paid the big bucks”. But, correct me if I’m wrong, none of us got into this profession for the money. And, its a well-known fact that there’s often teachers on staff in schools who get paid more than people in leadership positions.

I don’t want to turn this into a wining, feel-sorry-for-leaders blog post. Instead, perhaps it could be a provocation for the people who exist around leaders, on every angle. Have you sent your principal an example of something amazing your students did? Have you let your director know how a recent decision they made turned out well for you? Have you popped in and told your coordinator about an idea you’re developing?

Try it. Nourish them.

They’re probably hungry

by Sam Sherratt