Authority versus Leadership: who says you're in charge?

The central thesis of this posting may not quite fit with dictionary definitions but I do believe a personal reflection on this topic is crucial in establishing your leadership whether of a department, a phase or a whole school. This posting is all about authority and power, and how I believe (or by redefining them) they are very different. I don’t want to get bogged down in semantics and I hope that you will see beyond any frailty in literal definitions and see that this is an important topic on which school leaders should reflect if they are to gain the respect of those they lead.

It should firstly be stated that leadership is a very personal thing. I have found that much leadership training has a fundamental flaw, it attempts to squeeze a broad range of diverse individuals into a narrow set of beliefs and definitions. The problem I have with this is that I believe leadership is hard enough without having to become something or someone you’re not. I also believe that a great deal of leadership training is actually management training and is more concerned with processes than relationships.

Schools need leaders and teachers should not be put off leadership because they perceive that their personality is at odds with the current paradigm of school leadership.

                                                     

Assuming you have made the leap into leadership it is important that you decide how you are going to go about doing the job and this is when a reflection on “authority” and “power” is timely. The way in which I have defined these (though potentially at odds with dictionaries) is all about perception. I have tabulated some of the differences between these styles (as I define them).

At the heart of the difference is how authority and power are achieved. Anyone can have authority and that is because this is in the gift of your colleagues. It is an idea at the idealistic edges of politics, the concept that those who lead us are our representatives and only have authority because of our vote. To the best of my knowledge school leaders are not products of a democratic system (which is probably a very good thing!); this actually makes leadership harder. The best way to have someone come with you on a journey is for them to want to come on that journey, they want to be led and they grant you the authority to lead them.  

Authority	Power
Granted by those you lead	Granted by those above you
Not contractual, can be exercised by anyone	Contractual, you are given the right to act in certain ways
About respect and relationships	About position and control
Sustainable	Hard to maintain
Sharing of responsibility	Responsibility rooted in position
Leadership	Management

I’m sure we have all experienced school leaders who fit into these definitions. Ask yourself which type you preferred being led by and why? Have you worked for someone who exerted power and had no authority? Have you worked in a school where the staff have essentially downed tools and just down what was on their contracts because of the school leadership? Reflect on your own personality; are you confident enough to exercise authority or do you need to exert power?

Gaining power is easy compared to being granted authority. Your contract gives you power but your staff grant you authority. For the former you need to impress at interview whilst for the latter you need to impress far more people on a daily basis. Authority comes from respect, respect comes from leading with compassion and intelligence. Listen to your colleagues, value their ideas and experiences, recognise that you don’t know everything and that others may have better ideas than you, lead by example, work longer and harder, and show you truly care for your staff, your pupils and your school. Gaining authority is hard work and is not achieved over night, however stick with it and you will have success.

In my current school I am particularly proud to see young and relatively inexperienced colleagues exercising authority. They have no contractual power but by virtue of their ability, dedication and professionalism they are respected by their colleagues and are able to lead. This can happen if you establish a culture of authority rather than power. This is where it really pays dividends as others step up to the challenge and this can (and should) take some of the pressure off you.

It is far easier to exercise power when you have authority, when your staff respect you, have faith in you and follow your lead. In reality this is a continuum; there are times when we do have to exert power but I have always found that being granted authority by my colleagues has produced far better outcomes and a happier school than would be achieved by exerting power over them.