As a young senior leader, the person I identified as one of the best HT's I ever worked for was a fantastic communicator. She could stand and speak to audiences of staff or parents at a moment’s notice. She was credible, never used notes, concentrated on eye-contact,...

and controlled her arms, and she was hence very natural. I drew the conclusion that to be a successful leader, I needed to be great at speaking, and I enrolled on a public speaking course. The public speaking course was helpful. I am a better public speaker as a result...

of going on the course. During that course I received a lot of advice. Amongst the tips and tricks I learnt, the key bit of advice I received was to “speak about something you know”. The best practice speech I delivered was about Weston-super-Mare football club, mainly...

because so much of the material I knew inside-out. It was firmly ingrained in my long-term memory. It is of course true that one can become a better public speaker by practising public speaking, and indeed by preparing speeches and learning them so one doesn’t need to refer...

to notes. But the most significant improvement comes from knowing one’s subject. In the case of the headteacher I refer to, her knowledge of education was broad and deep, and her knowledge of her school was close to total. This knowledge allowed the performance of public...

speaking to appear effortless. Consequently, I know even now that when speaking the ‘performance’ of speaking depends on a number of factors, but one of the most important is that I know what I want to say and I am talking about something I know about.

I hypothesise that this is similar with most of the 'features' of school leadership that people look up to - they are so dependent on knowledge - either tacit or formal - to be effective. We miss something if we just urge leaders to copy the features of successful school leaders.