BSME Middle Leaders 2024

I had the privilege of delivering a key note speech at the BSME Middle Leaders conference with my former opponent turned teammate, Ben Bolger . It was yet another example of rugby giving back to me and the strength of relationships that can come from involvement in team sports.

We had the daunting task of speaking about skills for the future, a controversial topic to say the least. It feels like every day there is a social media post or an infographic telling schools what they should and shouldn’t be teaching. While lots of these skills are important, they rarely come with a strategy attached, never mind a how or why.

Skills of the future only ever seemed to be aimed at children and what they should be learning in school. When people talk about them, they never seem to apply them to adults. In 20 years, I will more than likely still be working, and everyone currently in school will be eligible to work too. Hopefully we aren’t being written off already, or are these skills just unlearnable for us adults?

For me, there are a lot of questions left unanswered. It’s tempting to snatch at new ideas and gimmicks when they come along. However, every day matters for the children in our schools right now, it doesn’t feel right to gamble their learning time without much deeper thought.

With the limited time we had to speak, we settled on an acid test of sorts:

·???????? Is it valuable to children now?

·???????? Are we certain it will be important in the future?

·???????? Has it been historically important?

·???????? Do we want it for our own children?

·???????? As leaders, is it something we should seek to be better at?

With the time we had, we settled on 4 things that were a good fit to that criteria. None of them are revolutionary and there are certainly more. Here is a summary of our choices and the why behind them.

Empathy

Everyone can recall a time where they have recently been treated with a lack of empathy, the case for spending more time thinking about it is already compelling. Children consume media that glamorises being alpha or sigma, they become desensitised to elements of the human experience.

Empathy is something that will either help them connect or disconnect from communities. The more we can demonstrate it as leaders and make choices to practice empathy, the more we can improve.

Communication

Most of us have hidden from someone in a supermarket because we just couldn’t face talking to them! When we talk about communication in schools, our minds always move to public speaking and presenting but less often to listening. We all have someone in our life who we value because they listen to us, it’s important to be heard. The better we listen and place value on listening not just to instructions but to each other, the more cohesive things become.

Communication is the essence of the human experience.

Accountability

Experiences in elite sport are underpinned by discussions about accountability. Doing the work is essential, in high functioning teams you are constantly accountable to the group, if you don’t do your job then someone else must. Privilege can quickly erode accountability, there’s always someone else to do it, a safety net available or someone to take the blame.

All to often we prevent learning about accountability by protecting children from controlled failure. The real learning comes from understanding afterwards what went wrong, why it went wrong and how to prevent it in the future.

Go for the Gap

We all have an experience with regret. An opportunity missed, a chance not taken or a moment left waiting in the wings when someone more confident stepped forwards. Go for the gap really speaks to me as someone who lacks confidence and spends a lot of time questioning if what I do is good enough.

The best way to encourage people to go for the gap is to praise the attempt. Outcomes are harder to control, but the willingness and confidence to put yourself out there and take a chance is always worth celebrating.

Final Thoughts

?Make the choice to practice empathy, even when it’s hard. Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

If you want to work on empathy, communication is a great place to start. The next time someone comes to speak to you, move away from your laptop, put your phone down and look them in the eye. Nobody ever listened their way out of a good opportunity.

Accountability starts with you, then extends to the group. Spend time looking at something that went wrong and understand why. Build trust in yourself and your own ability to deliver.

If you don’t go for the gap, you’ll never know the answer. When you go for the gap, you unconsciously give other people the confidence to do it too.

Thank you to Nalini Cook , Debra Forsyth Craig Halsall and BSME - British Schools in the Middle East for the opportunity.