Conference Agenda

Though the position varies, the principal or head teacher position is near-universal. Over the past few decades, two lines of research from Europe and beyond, have advanced our understanding of the relational nature of the principal’s work– the visibility or public-facing nature of the job and emotional labor. First, several scholars have studied the public-facing nature of principalship and the press to be visible to stakeholders (Hallinger, 2005; Lortie, 2009; Shaked, 2025; Whitaker, 1997). Second, scholars have explored the different forms of emotional labor that principals engage in including surface acting, deep acting, and feeling rules and how the intensity of this work differs depending on the principal and their situation (Berkovich & Eyal, 2015; Maxwell & Riley, 2017; McKay et al., 2022; Wharton, 2009; Blackmore, 1996; Blackmore, 2010; Brennan & Mac Ruairc, 2019; Ispa-Landa & Thomas, 2019; Mills & Niesche, 2014). These two lines of research discuss novice principals’ sense-making about their new occupation, exploring how they come to understand the visibility imperative and in turn how the visibility imperative contributes to principals' engagement in, and sense-making about, different forms of emotional labor.

We motivate and frame our analysis with three empirical and theoretical literatures. First, we use a sense-making perspective to conceptually frame novice school principals’ socialization into the profession. Socialization includes how newcomers come to see certain norms, values, and behaviors as natural and appropriate in a situation (Van Maanen & Barley, 1984; Van Maanen & Schein, 1979). Using a sense-making framework we examine how school principals’ on-the-job socialization as they work to figure out their new position and environments and the changes, contrasts, and surprises therein (Louis, 1980). For novice principals, the surprises that come with changing occupations, and often changing organizations, involve situations where existing scripts fail and necessitate sense-making on the part of novices (Crow 2006; Crow & Glascock, 1995; Meyer & Patuawa, 2022).

Second, we use an empirical literature that documents the visibility imperative to motivate our paper and literature on impression management to frame our analysis. The demand to be seen cuts across all domains– instructional, managerial, and political –of the principal’s work. Research suggests that effective instructional leaders are frequently seen by students, faculty, and other stakeholders (Hallinger, 2005; Lortie, 2009; Shaked, 2025; Spillane & Sun, 2022; Whitaker, 1997). However, the visibility imperative is not simply about being seen; it is about being seen to be in particular ways by diverse stakeholders - in ways that not only affirm their own legitimacy as principal but also the organizational legitimacy of their schools (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983; Scribner & Crow, 2012; Suchman, 1995).

Third, we employ literature on emotional labor in sociology to frame novice school principals’ sense-making about their emotional labor. As defined by Hochschild (1983), emotional labor refers to the “management of feeling to create a publicly observable facial and bodily display” in order “produce an emotional state in another person” (p. 141). Scholars have documented how school principals engage in all forms of emotional labor-- including surface acting, deep acting, and feeling rules --as they manage their own emotions and the emotions of others (Berkovich and Eyal, 2015; Blackmore, 1996; James & Vince, 2001; Rajah et al., 2011; Zikhali and Perumal, 2016).

Using data from a longitudinal study of novice school principals on the job socialization, we

examine two research questions:

1. How do new principals experience and learn about the need to be seen and seen to be?
2. How does the visibility imperative, in turn, shape novice principals’ sense-making about the emotional labor aspect of the principalship?

Research into school leadership over several decades has arguably informed a global consensus on the features or core tasks of successful leadership (Thomson et al 2021). This consensus is supported by a series of systematic and meta-reviews which synthesise evidence on how leadership can improve teaching quality and wider school environments in ways which accelerate pupil outcomes (UNESCO 2024; Robinson & Gray 2019; Liebowitz & Porter 2019; Gumus et al. 2018; Hitt & Tucker 2016). These reviews adopt differing terminologies, but the core argument is that successful school leadership combines a mix of transformational (vision and values), instructional/learning-centred (improving the quality of teaching and learning), and distributed (collective efficacy) approaches. This global consensus has pervasive impact, shaping national headteacher standards, training programmes and qualifications, appointments, appraisals and accountability.

This paper explores whether this global consensus holds true at a time when the needs of children, families and wider societies are changing rapidly in a context of global polycrisis. The term polycrisis (Morin & Kern, 1993) was coined to reflect how many global challenges are not isolated but interconnected and mutually reinforcing, arguably creating a systemic planetary crisis. Lawrence et al (2024) argue that our current polycrisis results from a series of constituent crises which include the Covid-19 pandemic, geopolitical conflicts, rising ideological and religious extremism, political instability and climate heating, with issues playing out differently in different national and local contexts. Until now there has been limited debate on the role that education should play in a context of polycrisis, but it seems clear that the impact on schools and education systems can be significant (Moss 2025).

The findings of our mixed methods study of sustainable school leadership across three UK nations (England, Northern Ireland and Scotland) indicate a clear discrepancy between the global consensus on what leaders ‘should’ be doing and the daily reality of what they are doing. We demonstrate that school leaders struggle to find time to focus on instructional leadership – i.e. the core requirement of the global consensus – in large part because of a growing need to provide care. Leaders refer to this care work in different ways, including inclusion, special/additional learning needs, mental health, well-being, safeguarding, behaviour, attendance, and so on. At times, this care work stretches beyond what might traditionally be considered ‘education’, for example encompassing welfare and health issues. Leaders commonly describe this care work as physically and emotionally demanding, highlighting complexities, tensions and ethical dilemmas coupled with lack of support.

Drawing on feminist care theories (Tronto & Fisher 1990), we argue that care work should not be seen as a distraction from the ‘core’ work of leaders, but as an essential and integrated feature of contemporary educational leadership. We call for a re-evaluation of the global policy consensus on school leadership to encompass an ethic of education and care and suggest that school systems must be more care-full in how they support school leaders to achieve this.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how school leaders and employees construct problem representations within problem‑solving conversations in schools. Grounded in the assumption that problems are socially constructed through interpretive processes (Bacchi, 1999; Kitsuse & Spector, 1973), the analysis focuses on the narratives produced by both leaders and employees during these interactions. The leaders participating in the study have undergone training in relational trust‑building and problem‑solving aligned with Robinson’s theory of open‑to‑learning conversations (Robinson, 2020). This training emphasizes collaborative approaches to problem‑solving, which have been shown to be more conducive to sustainable solutions than strategies based on persuasion or defensive argumentation (Argyris, 1993; Mumford et al., 2017). Persuasive and defensive strategies, in contrast, tend to evoke extrinsic forms of motivation—typically driven by a desire to avoid sanctions or obtain rewards—and are therefore less likely to foster enduring behavioural change (Gagné & Deci, 2005).

Our analysis is inspired by Bacchi’s (1999) “What’s the Problem Represented to Be?” (WPR) approach, which conceptualizes problems as socially constructed. A problem representation encompasses the constructed causal relationship between a concern, its perceived causes, and the proposed strategies for addressing it. Such representations delimit what can be articulated as possible or desirable, as well as what becomes framed as impossible or undesirable (Bacchi, 1999, p. 3). Analysing problem representations requires careful reflection on the claims made about the nature of the problem, the implications of framing the issue in this particular way, and the matters that remain unarticulated. The constructed causalities are of particular interest because they raise questions about responsibility for change more broadly, including who is positioned as the one who ought to change (see Markström et al., 2011). Consequently, our empirical analysis centres on the language, concepts, and categories employed by both leaders and teachers to frame the issue under discussion (Bacchi, 1999, p. 2).

A shared feature of the theoretical frameworks underpinning the open‑to‑learning approach (LeFevre et al., 2024; Robinson, 2020; Robinson et al., 2021) and the WPR framework (Bacchi, 1999) is their ambition to explore implicit presuppositions and assumptions that underlie competing interpretations, thereby making these explicit. Whereas the open‑to‑learning framework emphasizes inquiry and relationship building in interpersonal dialogue, the WPR approach focuses on how problem representations are socially constructed. Issues that gain traction and appear on a shared agenda do so ‘simply because someone has made claims about them’ (Bacchi, 1999, p. 58). Consequently, it is not only the concerns articulated within problem‑solving conversations that warrant analysis, but also those that remain unspoken. Examining such silences becomes essential for understanding how issues are framed, legitimized, or marginalized in conversations between leaders and teachers. Power operates not only through the ability to place matters on the agenda (Lukes, 1974) but also through the capacity to construct problem representations that define reality (Peterson & Carlberg, 1990).

We think of problem-solving conversations as being integrated in micropolitical processes, motivated by competing values, and/or by instrumental interests to reach specific goals. Furthermore, we understand school organizations as open systems in which power pervades all social relations. Actors and groups of actors will defend and promote different interests and preferences, making conflicts and coalition building a natural part of everyday life (Hoyle 1982; Blase 1991; Blase & Anderson 1995; Ball 1987; Saldivia 2020). Problem-representations in problem-solving conversations between leaders and employess are thus constructed in relation to – not in isolation from – that micropolitical context.