From Reading to Leading Blog

From 'Reading to Leading: Thoughts on leadership, learning and life in schools' is a reflective blog that brings together research, professional experience and the everyday realities of school life. Written by our Deputy Headteacher, Nicola Brooks, it offers thoughtful insights for leaders who want to grow, learn and lead well, always keeping children, staff and relationships at the heart of their work. Driven by Nicola’s love of reading and leadership, the blog provides a space to reflect on what she has read and how these ideas might inform and strengthen practice.

From Reading to Leading: Thoughts on leadership, learning and life in schools

Our Word Is Our Bond: Trust, Leadership and the Weight of Words and Actions

His words are bonds, his oaths are oracles,

‘The Two Gentlemen of Verona’ by William Shakespeare, Act 2 Scene 7

In ‘The Size of Trust’, Chapter 6 of ‘The Social Brain’, Camilleri, Rockey and Dunbar (2024) explore how trust is created and maintained. In ‘The Two Gentlemen of Verona’, Shakespeare reminds us that words carry weight. As leaders our word is our bond- a commitment that others can rely on. In leadership, trust is crucial, underpinning others’ confidence in ourselves and our actions, influencing their ability to feel safe and supported to work towards a collaborative vision.

Why trust matters

In simple terms, trust is about doing what we say we will. It is developed when what we say aligns constantly with what we do. This creates consistency and this in turn builds trust as team members feel secure in their relationships with us. In this way, trust becomes the glue that holds relationships and groups together. Camilleri, Rockey and Dunbar (2024) highlight several benefits of trust including collaboration, cooperation, collective learning and problem-solving, all of which are essential in creating effective, thriving organisations.

Moreover, research shows that when employees trust their organisation and leaders, they feel more committed and connected to their workplace (Chen et al., 2015). The relationship between trust and commitment may be explained by Social Exchange Theory which suggests that relationships are built on reciprocity. When people feel trusted, treated fairly and supported, they are more likely to respond with extra effort and loyalty (Boateng and Appiah, 2025).

Research also suggests that employees in organisations with high levels of trust report greater job satisfaction, have higher productivity and take fewer sick days (Lewis, 2022). Trust then, isn’t just something that’s nice to have, but something that has real benefits for an organisation, its people and outcomes.

Why trust is tricky

Trusting someone is a risk. This is because trusting others opens us up to vulnerability. It requires us to believe that another person will act with reliably, even when we’re not there, even on tricky days, and even when you’re frazzled from the Oftsed phone call.

In a recent NPQ SL session I facilitated, we discussed the tension leaders often experience between trusting and delegating. Leaders often choose to do the work themselves because they want it done ‘right’. We explored how a key element of leadership is developing other leaders and the importance of delegating and trusting others to enable them to grow. When we delegate, we are signalling confidence in someone else’s judgement and capability. Although this can feel uncomfortable, delegation is essential in signalling and building trust (as well as growing other leaders).

Trust is also tricky because its relational. As an abstract noun we can’t see trust- it comes from emotion and belief. However, we experience trust through visible leadership and daily interactions. I often reflect on whether I am visible enough as a leader. With online meetings, an overflowing inbox and so many online systems, it can often feel that you’re tied to your desk. Ensuring that there’s time everyday where you are visible and building those connections is important.

Trust is also tricky for educational settings because when someone is a recognised member of our group, we naturally tend to trust them. This is great in terms of creating a sense of belonging, but in education it can also carry risk. Familiarity may make us less likely to question actions or challenge behaviour. This can potentially create blind spots when it comes to safeguarding or professional workplace behaviour. It’s important to balance trust and accountability. A strong safeguarding culture asks us to hold the mindset of “it could happen here” and yet, paradoxically, it requires trust for people to speak up and raise issues when something doesn’t feel right.

Building trust

Camilleri, Rockey and Dunbar (2024) suggest several factors that help to create and sustain trusting cultures:

Behaving in a predictable manner. Trust is built through consistent actions. When people experience our behaviour as reliable, they feel safer. Your past behaviour helps others anticipate your future behaviour. When leaders act consistently they become dependable and predictable and, over time, this grows and reassures others, building the foundations for trust.
Reciprocity. Trust grows when leaders and teams can rely on and depend upon one another.
Shared values. If we share common ground with someone then that accelerates trust. The more we have in common with someone the more likely we are to trust them. For leaders, it’s a useful reminder that being human and revealing those small details about yourself as a person can add up to significant gains in trust.
Cultivate a sense of belonging. Feeling that we belong accelerates trust. Staff social events, bringing people together for briefing, optional staff uniform, making staff feel welcomed and valued all help create trust quickly. However, beware of the points raised in ‘Trust is tricky’ above!
Do as I do. When your actions and words match, people are more likely to trust you. This links back to the importance of behaving in a predictable manner.
Stay humble. Asking for advice and being open to learning helps generate trust.

Finally, research into team interactions suggests that when positive exchanges outweigh negative ones, teams are more cohesive and effective, creating the foundation for trust to build within groups (Losada and Heaphy, 2004).

In summary:

Trust is relational and cultural.
Trust is built through visible, daily interactions.
Acting reliably and consistently as a leader is important.
A sense of belonging accelerates trust, but leaders must balance this with professional challenge and safeguarding vigilance.
Positive interactions lay the foundation for high-trust teams.

Down the rabbit hole…….what has sparked my interest whilst writing that may feature in a future post?

I’d like to further explore the Losada–Heaphy ratio and the link between positivity and high-performing teams. Praise more and your team is likely to perform better.

References:

Boateng, R.K., Appiah, S.O. Job crafting and employee commitment: key drivers for retaining skilled talent in digitally transformed organizations. Futur Bus J 11, 201 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1186/s43093-025-00629-0

Camilleri, T., Rockey, S. and Dunbar, R., 2024, The Social Brain: The Psychology of Successful Groups. Penguin, London.

Chen, SY., Wu, WC., Chang, CS. et al. Organizational justice, trust, and identification and their effects on organizational commitment in hospital nursing staff. BMC Health Serv Res 15, 363 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-015-1016-8

Lewis, A. (2022) Good leadership? It all starts with trust. Harvard Business Publishing. Available online at: https://www.harvardbusiness.org/insight/good-leadership-it-all-starts-with-trust/ [Accessed: 23rd January 2026].

Losada, M. and Heaphy, E. (2004) ‘The role of positivity and connectivity in the performance of business teams: A nonlinear dynamics model’, American Behavioral Scientist, 47(6), pp. 740–765.

From Reading to Leading: Thoughts on leadership, learning and life in schools

Listening in Leadership, Blog Post 1, January 2026

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice

‘Hamlet’, Act 1 Scene 3 by William Shakespeare

In ‘The Medium and the Message’, Chapter 5 of ‘The Social Brain’ by Tracey Camilleri, Samantha Rockey and Robin Dunbar (2024), the importance of listening is stressed. For leaders, listening is as important as talking, yet we probably spend more time thinking about what we’re going to say than how well we hear others. This blog post draws on the ideas raised by Camilleri, Rockey and Dunbar (2024) and considers what they might mean for educational leaders.

Communication underpins effective leadership

Leadership research makes clear that communication is at the heart of effective leadership (Liu, Chambers and Moore, 2023). A leader’s communication style can influence team commitment, organisational outcomes and perceived leader effectiveness.

However, there are a few things that make communication tricky for leaders. Firstly, the meaning of words and how they are interpreted across different generations varies, something which is increasingly pertinent given that most schools will have at least 4 different generations working within them from Baby Boomers to Gen Z. Moreover, each generation tends to bring its own communication preferences and expectations of leaders. Typically,

· Baby Boomers prefer face to face or phone communication

· Generation X tend to favour emails

· Gen Z seek digital and visual communication with rapid feedback and response

Consequently, using a single communication style is unlikely to work for everyone, so leaders should consider how they can vary their communication style or follow up on key messages through different mediums. For example, when introducing a change or reestablishing vision at a January INSET, you might communicate this message in person, then follow it up with an email or one page infographic. This layered approach helps ensure key information is understood and accessible for the whole staff body.

As well as carefully crafting what we want to say, it’s equally as important to focus on how we’re going to say it. Nonverbal cues, such as tone, posture and gestures, can affect change how a message is received. Consequently, spending time practising the delivery of your message may be time well spent.

Why not try this? Ask a colleague to record you delivering your next key message. Watch the video back without sound and ask someone who wasn’t in the room what type of message you’re giving and the mood you’re in. If their reading matches your intent, then your words and body language are working effectively in tandem. If not, it may be worth pausing and considering why this mismatch is occurring and how you can change this next time.

Hearing and Being Heard

The good news is that we can learn to be better listeners and this is likely to improve how we’re viewed as leaders. Perceiving active listening in a listener supports more positive interactions over time, shaping how individuals respond in future shared experiences (Rogers, 1959). Mishra (2020) suggests that empathetic listeners demonstrate a genuine willingness to listen. This enables them to both understand the spoken message and be attentive to what remains unspoken. As leaders, how often do we reflect on our balance between speaking and listening? During a busy day, do we give enough time and space for others to share their views? And are we genuinely willing to not only receive them, but welcome them?

Reflecting on Mishra’s (2020) findings, one element of nonverbal listening that I would like to improve in 2026 is to listen without appearing occupied e.g. by shuffling items or being distracted by incoming emails. I know that I’m often worried about forgetting things, so I like to write things down, but I’m concerned that means I’m not giving the speaker my full attention. Another strategy I’d like to try, which may help me focus more on what the speaker is saying, rather than my reply, is ‘wait for 8’. This is a strategy we use in the classroom when using questioning to provide processing time. This technique may help me slow down my thinking, processing what to say after the other person has finished their point.

The Minds in the Room: the Shakespeare Principle

Within your leadership team, mentalising is likely to support your daily communication. Mentalising is our ability to understand our own mental state and that of others, which helps us predict, explain and respond to others’ behaviour. Developing mentalising skills supports leader effectiveness by enabling us to understand how our message is being received and interpreted.

Mentalising encourages leaders to be reflective, prompting questions such as, what might my team be worried about? Or, what do my team need from me right now? We use our mentalising capacity with words like, ‘believe’ or ‘wonder’. These help leaders to stay curious and respond with thoughtfulness, both of which should support emphatic listening which leads to the benefits outlined above.

Understanding our own thoughts is first order intentionality. Considering what someone else’s thoughts might be is second order intentionality. Third order intentionality involves considering what one colleague thinks about another. For example,

Noah is wondering whether Bilal’s suggestion would actually work when children are in the classroom.

Camilleri, Rockey and Dunbar (2024) suggest that most individuals can manage up to fifth order intentionality, meaning we can keep track of five minds including our own. This prompts reflection on the size of leadership teams to effectively mentalise what everyone in the group might be thinking.

Camilleri, Rockey and Dunbar (2024) also suggest that the upper limit of group size for effective conversation is 4- any more than this and subconversations are likely to occur. This is partly because of mentalising, since some people will find more than 4 minds difficult to mentalise. This again raises interesting reflections regarding group size, both for groupwork in the classroom and for staff training. Krems, Dunbar and Neuberg (2016) suggest that an optimum conversational group of 4 isn’t new, observing that Shakespeare typically limits onstage conversations to around three or four characters, successfully aligning his dialogue with the audience’s cognitive limits.

In summary

As leaders, perhaps 2026 should be the year we redress the balance between speaking and listening. By reflecting on how we communicate and providing more time for others to communicate with us, we can lead in a way that’s open, thoughtful and responsive.
Different generations have different communication preferences, meaning a single communication approach rarely works in schools. Using multiple communication methods ensures key messages are understood by everyone.
Active and empathetic listening builds trust, strengthens relationships and shapes how people respond to us in the future.
Mentalising (understanding our own thoughts and those of others) helps us anticipate others’ feelings and lead more thoughtfully.
Conversations tend to function best in groups of 4. This makes mentalising manageable and prevents subconversations.

Down the rabbit hole…….what tangents did I follow whilst reading and writing that I want to explore further at a later date?

That different generations have different expectations of leaders
That different generations respond differently to organisational change
Women and the likeability penalty
The physical attractiveness penalty

References:

Camilleri, T., Rockey, S. and Dunbar, R., 2024, The Social Brain: The Psychology of Successful Groups. Penguin, London.

Krems, J.A., Dunbar, R.I.M. & Neuberg, S., 2016, Something to talk about: are conversation sizes constrained by mental modeling abilities? Evolution and Human Behavior, 37(6), pp.423–428. Available online at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1090513816301076

Liu, E.H., Chambers, C.R. and Moore, C., 2023, Fifty years of research on leader communication: What we know and where we are going. The Leadership Quarterly, 34(6), 101734. Available online at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1048984323000607

Mishra, S., 2020, ‘Listening as a leadership tool: A survey of subordinates’ perception towards listening skills of effective leaders’, Xi’an Dianzi Keji Daxue Xuebao (Journal of Xidian University), 14, pp.1410–1417. Available online at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342170352_Listening_as_a_Leadership_Tool_A_Survey_of_Subordinates'_Perception_towards_Listening_Skills_of_Effective_Leaders/citation/download

Rogers, C. 1959, A theory of therapy, personality and interpersonal relationships as developed in the client-centered framework. New York, McGraw Hill.