Understanding why leadership position matters for some and not others is the question driving this chapter. I believe that answers to this question are essential for explaining why there should be two leadership pathways, rather than the continued dominance of positional leadership as the default option. I see non-positional options as worthy of greater acceptance and prominence acknowledging that teachers, whose professional growth adds immeasurably to the quality of students’ educational experience, are in fact leading their colleagues as they converse about matters of mutual interest with respect to students’ learning. To justify my support for non-positional forms of leadership (teacher leadership) I structure the chapter in eight sections. The first presents illustrative vignettes to demonstrate the uniqueness of teachers and their work contexts and their decisions to seek leadership work. I assert that this variation largely explains why some teachers are driven by personal ambition whereas for others, a broader moral purpose (namely the improvement of students’ learning), is the driver. The second section concentrates on readiness for leadership work and how readiness influences a teacher’s next options. The focus for the third and fourth sections includes a discussion of the concept of professionalism and the learning orientation of teacher leadership activity. The fifth and sixth sections feature leadership actions as spheres of influence and teacher leadership as a complex concept. This is followed by the seventh section offering a stocktake of the lessons learnt from second-stage teacher leadership research and practice. The remaining section draws together key understandings about teacher leadership concluding each of the preceding sections, enabling me to offer my own emerging definition of teacher leadership at the conclusion of the chapter. I offer this definition as a way of providing a succinct explanation of a number of the processes which I am convinced are indispensable to teacher leadership practice. At the end of Chap. 7 I add further elements to this definition based on learnings from my continuing longitudinal involvement in the TOPs with early career teachers.

Vignettes Illustrating Pathways to Teacher Leadership

There is no doubt in my mind that the teaching profession needs to play its part in ensuring that leadership work or activity is seen as an imperative for the next generation of teachers. As I have argued, opportunities for leadership need not be solely restricted to formalised roles but instead should include situations in which teachers are able to share their expertise with colleagues, extend their sphere of influence, and continue developing their teaching expertise at the same time. The vignettes which follow bring to the fore three early career teachers’ transitions into leadership work, revealing the sufficiency of their own efforts and the support available from on-site mentors. All three teachers found their attempts insufficient and they realised that they needed others as sounding boards and people to consult when the going got tough. One had to go beyond the school for that guidance because it was unavailable within the school. What these three vignettes have in common is a view that preparation for later leadership work is related to experience in a variety of named roles, responsibilities, and positions. What I later argue is that these roles are not the only ways to engage in leadership work or to be a leader.

Vignette 1: Tan

Tan is the kind of teacher who believes her students deserve nothing but the best from her. She has experienced a variety of leadership roles including team leader, tutor teacher, and professional development coordinator and facilitator working across schools. People have always looked out for her, nudging her into what she needs to learn or do next and supporting her to do it. While definitely interested in leadership work she hasn’t waited for it to drop into her lap, but instead has done the work and sought opportunities. She appreciates education is always changing so therefore she has a moral responsibility as a professional to be able to adapt her practice. When her marriage ended, Tan was prepared to move into other geographical areas for another teaching position. One principal had suggested that knowledge of all teaching areas was important for a future principal so she took that advice, later describing it as a turning point. She also joined the National Aspiring Principals’ Programme and embarked on postgraduate studies in leadership. These helped her to think about the kind of leader she wanted to be and raised her awareness of how to have learning conversations with staff. Her professional development experience as a numeracy facilitator across schools had contributed to her confidence in articulating and justifying her practice with good evidence and strong pedagogical understandings. Tan has been fortunate in her choice of schools and their learning cultures because she is continuing to deepen her expertise as a teacher as well as through a named position.

Vignette 2: Inga

Inga described her first leadership role as team leader in a new school as hard going. She did not have a lot of support because she was new and found leading a team of six established staff somewhat challenging. This leadership role was on top of full-time classroom teaching responsibilities. Her hour and a half release time per week went nowhere, only allowing her time to get ready for the next meeting. She has also led a professional learning group across the school looking at readings on inquiry learning and group process. Again she found this challenging because the group discussions had no impact on practice as discussions remained in the abstract. She was unable to develop either a shared sense of purpose or a focus on experimenting with actual classroom practice because the staff were accustomed to more passive professional development. Putting her academic study of educational leadership into practice was harder than the literature suggested. Her school was a high decile (that is, high in socioeconomic status) school with high rates of achievement and she struggled to establish a joint focus for change and doing things differently.

Vignette 3: Jack

Jack has worked in the same school and experienced different roles each year. He has taken responsibility for supporting beginning teachers and the gifted and talented program before moving into pastoral care work as a year-level dean and more recently to DP Pastoral with oversight of five other deans. Jack has appreciated the way his principal has talked through issues, explained his actions, and looked for opportunities to develop leadership in his staff. Jack has always felt his principal had time for him and knew when to provide key professional development opportunities to assist him in his pastoral care work. One example was his attendance at a restorative justice course. Jack acknowledges that he is ready to find a new school but will only contemplate a shift to a school with a good reputation. He has wanted to enrol in postgraduate study to inform his leadership work but to date has not managed this, having become a father.

These vignettes illustrate some of the opportunities which have helped early career teachers to develop leadership experience. Tan and Jack had principals who made a special point of supporting future leaders. Inga, on the other hand, was given roles but received little, if any, guidance from the senior leaders at her school. Instead she depended on her own support sourced from beyond the school. While she had academic credentials in leadership study, she still needed guidance about how to work with particular team members who did not respond in the way she would have liked. Jack, on the other hand, was taking plenty of advice from his principal but had only undertaken short courses to support his pastoral care responsibilities.

Two key points for teacher leadership that I take from the experiences of these three teachers are:

  • Emerging teacher leaders need advice and support from existing leaders to make the transition from teacher to teacher leader. It requires support from others rather than individual effort. The same applies to those moving into formal leadership to take positional roles.

  • Leadership credibility is associated with progression through named roles.

In the next section I return to the work of other researchers as I continue the discussion on what helps early career teachers become interested and ready to engage in leadership work.

Readiness for Leadership Work

The period beyond full teacher registration has many names in the literature. The term “second stage teachers” was adopted by The Next Generation of Teachers Project members and has already been explained in this book as the years following a teacher’s full registration status. It is a time of consolidation for these teachers, of increasing experimentation and deepening of classroom expertise often seen as an extension of formal or informal roles beyond their own classrooms which may be instigated by the teachers themselves or by others who see opportunities for them. Amongst second-stage teachers, there will be those who are actively interested in seeking positions of added responsibility as formal routes into positional leadership, as evidenced in the three vignettes beginning this chapter. However, not all teachers see upward movement into formal positional roles as their preferred career trajectory or route to career fulfilment, as shown in the previous chapter. Those teachers regarded as highly accomplished pedagogical experts need not depend on positional roles to gain leader status and recognition. Another way to gain satisfaction and fulfilment is to understand leadership as collective work rather than the work of an individual with positional status. In this way expertise develops from collaborations in the interests of students’ learning, as knowledge is both given and received. I offer a revised version of the career pathways (see Fig. 5.1) referred to earlier, so as to begin making sense of experiences which shape conceptions of and preparation for subsequent leadership work.

Fig. 5.1
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Revised teaching career pathways showing career options where teachers are making improvements to practice

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Needless to say, what dominates advancement in teaching is the prevailing traditional view associated with leaving the classroom behind and moving into management or administrative positions. Advancement is not usually associated with growth in pedagogical expertise. The traditional upward route was the pathway taken by Jack as explained in his vignette. But for those who stay in classrooms, leadership work may be viewed as work on top of their classroom teaching or as a responsibility to contribute to school-wide improvement initiatives. Typically, teachers who interact with others beyond their own classrooms, at their own initiative, engage in focused talk about classroom teaching, share issues and concerns with colleagues, and offer ideas and support to others, as illustrated by the vignettes of Tan and Inga. Teachers who realise that dialogue about practice with colleagues will be richer when informed by research are those who have transitioned from teacher to teacher leader. They will see conversations, observations, and opportunities for collaborative planning and teaching as ways to extend their own expertise as teachers and that of their peers. This is leadership as activity or practice grounded in the moral purpose of actions that help students to learn. I now place the three teachers featured in the above vignettes on a career continuum first indicated in Chap. 4 (see Fig. 5.2).

Fig. 5.2
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Teachers’ places on the career continuum (according to their vignettes)

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The respective positioning of these three teachers shows that for Jack, career advancement was towards senior management roles and away from the classroom. Likewise, Inga thought of career advancement through named positional roles but she had her first taste of leadership work as a team leader. She also saw postgraduate-level study as another means to signal her readiness for advancement. She is positioned towards the upward career advancement end of the spectrum, because while she has connections with classrooms she is ambitious for promotion up the career ladder. Tan, on the other hand, has been positioned closer to practice-focused improvements than the other two teachers. This is because her role as numeracy facilitator, while a formal leadership role, still keeps her connected to the practice-focused improvements of classroom teachers. Her leadership is signalled by and dependent on that positional role. The positioning of these three teachers on such a continuum demonstrates that early experiences vary for each individual according to personal preference and how others identify their next steps, create opportunities, prepare and support them in transitioning to leadership work.

In beginning to answer the chapter’s focus question of why leadership as position matters for some and not others, I am able to say:

  • There are alternative opportunities for leadership which do not involve leaving the classroom behind. For example, pedagogical concerns can provide ample opportunities for teachers to influence one another and share their expertise around matters of practice; and

  • Leadership involvement by teachers need not be about moving up a hierarchical leadership ladder, nor is it expected or necessarily apparent all the time. It occurs because teachers see the benefit of working together on matters related to pedagogy and students and therefore have a reason to influence each other.

Acting professionally is about responding to the magnetism of the moral purpose of schooling and understanding the call of teaching. I am conscious that this magnetism is also what draws teachers into leadership activity which is known as teacher leadership. I believe the concept of professionalism provides some useful clues to explain why it is that teachers see value and need for learner-to-learner relationships with their colleagues rather than relationships where position dictates a power over colleagues. I contend that interactions prompting teacher leadership activity are drawn from opportunities for sharing expertise which help teachers to determine their next pedagogical actions. It is this concept on which I now focus.

The Concept of Professionalism

Having discussed professionality with reference to Evans (2008) and Hoyle (2008) in Chap. 4, I now introduce the related concept of professionalism. This, I argue, brings together pedagogical knowledge and competence using a set of tenets to demonstrate professional actions (Eraut 1994). These tenets, when applied to the context of teaching, mean: the work done is in the interests of students and their learning; there is an obligation to self-monitor and review work effectiveness; and there is an acceptance that expertise is developed when teachers extend and reflect on their teaching practices. While professional standards exist to ensure these tenets feature in teachers’ work, there are multiple ways to achieve them, some of which involve a need for personal discretion and agency when the action required is not subject to rules or set procedures. Professional standards provide a scaffold for individuals and a framework for quality assurance in the profession. The notion of professionalism is a key driver for teacher leadership because of its anchoring in teaching practices which enhance students’ capacity to learn.

Connecting teachers to one another through dialogue about practice is part of the socialisation process into the profession and for newcomers transferring from other schools. Beginning teachers experience this during their induction period but on gaining full registration, they are expected to play their part in socialising other newcomers into their schools. Timperley (2015) advocates that knowledge about how to maximise professional conversations and improvement-focused feedback contributes to the professional growth of all teachers. Learning by talking about practice is considered an active and reciprocal form of learning which Timperley describes as “adaptive expertise”. This signals that professional learning can be shaped by individuals asking questions of each other in the particular context in which they work, no matter their years of experience. The actual learning possible is dependent on personal dispositions such as being open and willing to explore practice, coupled with a concern for the quality of interactions with colleagues. These interactions can take a number of forms, such as intentional mentoring or coaching as well as formal conversations about practice encountered during appraisal processes. I say more about intentional or formal mentoring and coaching in Chap. 7. For now, Timperley’s (2015) explanation is sufficient to highlight the importance of conversations about practice. She claims:

Professional knowledge is constructed through social interaction and is situated and enacted in social communities of practice. Conversations are essential to its development. Effective professional development depends on the quality of conversations as teachers negotiate meaning with one another and learn from those with specialist expertise. (p. 4)

However, while some teachers may be comfortable sharing their views with colleagues, others will find this “overly challenging, uncomfortable or inhibiting” (Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano 2013, p. 7). In part, the difference in willingness to engage in professional conversations with colleagues can be attributed to work contexts and the extent to which contexts support or hinder teachers being open and honest with each other about issues of practice. I develop the importance of work contexts here by highlighting the significance of working relationships between colleagues. I argue that, for some, interpersonal relationships falter because of a lack of trust. Trust is defined by Tschannen-Moran (2001, p. 318) as “one party’s willingness to be vulnerable to another party based on the confidence that the latter party is benevolent, reliable, competent, honest and open”. My argument is that professional conversations are ways of influencing and being influenced by colleagues and when linked to shared learning about practice can be interpreted as leadership activity, especially as, more often than not, this activity focuses on the educator’s moral purpose—improving students’ learning in the short term as a means of improving life chances in the long term.

As I continue exploring the question of why leadership as position matters for some and not for others, I find myself increasingly drawn to leadership as activity as a compelling justification for a different conception of leadership. I see this as dependent upon:

  • the frequency, quality and ease of interactions with colleagues about matters of teaching and learning rather than a response to personal ambition and the drive for, position, role and status as a leader.

I now take the discussion of professionalism a step further to emphasise that it is the learning orientation of teacher leadership work where teachers learn alongside one another which enables teachers to find answers to both enabling and constraining issues of practice.

The Learning Orientation of Teacher Leadership

My optimism about the profession, and I have ample evidence from our TOPs teachers to reinforce that optimism, tells me that teachers are motivated to deepen their expertise as a consequence of their desire to be more responsive to their students’ needs. Given this understanding, the link between leadership and learning becomes immediately apparent to me. When teachers realise the mutuality of personal influence on others and others’ influence on them to achieve this quest, they enter into a form of collaborative leadership activity. I believe that the profession itself could do more to help early career teachers see the learning orientation of teacher leadership. This orientation is important because teachers’ learning is enhanced when there are opportunities for collaboration and dialogue with colleagues. For the full potential of teacher collaboration to be realised, there is a need to understand why some teachers find this easier than others. Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2013) suggest this is about finding a “match between a teacher’s way of knowing and the challenges and expectations he or she faces in work and personal life” (p. 7). This is also about individuals understanding themselves as professionals and showing personal agency. As professionals mature, they become more aware of what it is they need to know and do, as well as how much effort is required. Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano argue a learning-oriented leadership model “highlights the importance of caring for how people experience their realities by attending to how they know or how they make meaning” (p. 4, emphasis in original). The profession has a responsibility to find ways to unlock the potential of teachers and accept that individuals face unique challenges and opportunities. This should not be left for individuals to work out on their own, nor should it be assumed that each individual will have the same needs or respond in the same way to professional learning opportunities. These points on where responsibility lies for ensuring there is a pool of future leaders, confirm the words chosen for the sub-title of this book, namely “opportunity, preparation, support and pathways”. Each of these ideas implies the collective commitment of individuals and others in the profession.

Looking to theory to support this view, I draw on Kegan’s (2000) work describing constructive-developmental theory as helpful because “differences in our behaviours, feelings and thinking are often related to differences in how we construct, interpret or make meaning of our experience” (Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano 2013, p. 4). Understanding how meaning is made from experience is crucial to being responsive to teachers’ professional learning and for teachers themselves to realise what will help them become more effective practitioners.

Four pillars of practice are offered by Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2013) as a way of highlighting how opportunities can be created for teachers to collaborate and engage in professional dialogue about practice. Such dialogue, they argue, “engenders collective reflection around the assumptions and values that guide leading and instructional practice and reflection as tools for professional and personal growth” (p. 15). These four pillars of learning are teaming, collegial inquiry, providing leadership roles, and mentoring.

The first learning pillar, teams, represents one strategy to address the isolation of teachers. Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2013) suggest that “when teams are structured with developmental intentions they provide a rich context for building collegial relationships and also create the conditions for supporting adult growth” (p. 17). At their best, teams offer time for focused talk about practice, articulation of what works and what does not (explained as “craft knowledge”, p. 16), observations of colleagues’ teaching, and opportunities to support colleagues. Exposure to different perspectives and practices helps teachers to think about their own beliefs and, if necessary, revise them. Teaming opportunities can help to confirm practice and, when necessary, co-construct circuit breakers as alternatives to practice.

Collegial inquiry, as the second pillar, is often referred to as shared dialogue (MacBeath and Dempster 2009). Likewise, Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2013) remind us that individuals will differ in the ways they experience collegial inquiry because of their ways of knowing. They highlight three differences in the ways feedback may be offered and received when giving consideration to ways of knowing. An instrumental way of knowing is one where feedback is sought on a question such as “am I doing things the ‘right’ way?” A second way of knowing emphasises the importance of socialisation (referred to as socialised knowing) where the input of the “other-focused self” helps an individual’s capacity to reflect on practice. The remaining type of knowing is deemed “self-authorising” and is a more advanced response to feedback from others. Here the feedback is weighed up and related to the individual’s own thinking about experience before deciding whether to accept it or not. All three types of knowing emphasise the importance of thinking how others will respond to interactive dialogue and feedback. Such knowledge helps others appreciate the level of support expected and required to strengthen individuals’ conceptions of their own practices. It is this responsibility that I suggest school cultures could better accommodate. I contend it is these ways of knowing and, where possible, overt support for teachers that will move them towards self-authorised knowing. But it is important to recognise that most teachers will encounter and benefit from feedback related to all three types of knowing.

The third pillar, providing leadership roles, includes formal and informal roles. Once again individuals’ ways of knowing will impact on how they respond to leadership opportunities. Opportunities for shared leadership encompass a range of spontaneous initiatives as well as formal roles. Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2013) list these as:

  • an inquiry into a dilemma;

  • research;

  • starting a new program;

  • leading within a department or team;

  • leading across a school;

  • leading beyond a school;

  • mentoring new teachers;

  • leading school improvement efforts or curriculum development; and

  • providing professional learning opportunities for colleagues (p. 21).

Another initiative not included in the list above is the matter of addressing initiatives for particular students.

The remaining pillar, mentoring, I address later in Chap. 6. For now, it is sufficient to simply name mentoring as a strategy for supporting professional learning, noting that it occurs within the context of an interpersonal relationship which can begin between expert and novice and develop into a learner-to-learner relationship where participants serve as leaders and followers at different times depending on their expertise. Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2013) caution that mentoring, like the other pillars, is influenced by individuals’ ways of knowing. Mentors will need to be particularly aware, to shift their approach over time “beyond right answers toward open-ended discussion which will broaden perspectives and stretch thinking” (p. 24). In this way, mentoring can serve the purpose of helping mentees become self-authorising, able to turn inwards rather than looking outwards, always dependent on what a mentor thinks.

I add here to my evolving answer to the chapter’s question, why it is that leadership as position is not appealing for some teachers. One important reason is that:

  • a shared desire to make meaning from practice is what prompts teachers to collaborate and see each other as reciprocal sources of learning.

This is an early indicator of leadership as collective activity rather than individual work. Realising that colleagues have insights to share with one another is why teachers come together to talk about matters of practice. They do so more readily when the issues of power, accountability, and compliance are quiescent, allowing a mutual interest in helping students learn to move to centre stage. In the next section I refer to this sharing of expertise as an indicator of moving beyond self to influencing colleagues. This is a clear indicator of teacher leadership in action.

Leadership as Spheres of Influence

I use here another way of exploring transitions into leadership—identifying teachers’ spheres of influence. I refer, in particular, to the work they do with colleagues to improve teaching and learning in their respective schools. Fairman and Mackenzie’s (2015) later study (previously discussed in Chap. 2), reporting interviews with 40 teachers across five different American schools, informs thinking about spheres of teacher influence both within and beyond classrooms. Their findings emphasise that teachers’ motivations to initiate changes are based on their desire to create the conditions necessary to enhance student learning. Explanations of the teachers’ spheres of influence establish how they exert influence, their understandings of their own and others’ leadership, and what this conveys about their own leadership development. Strategies for influencing colleagues include modelling, coaching, collaborating and teaching together, as well as advocating within and beyond schools and communities for improvements to practice. These strategies are developed in some detail in Chap. 7.

Interview comments from Fairman and Mackenzie’s (2015) research reveal the nature and scope of teachers’ work aimed at effecting changes for student and school improvement. Their findings recognise “the importance of interpersonal skills of respectful listening and openness to others’ ideas” (p. 76). Professional learning gains include how to mentor, negotiate, and encourage reflection with colleagues and an awareness of personal strengths and areas for further development. Interestingly, many show reluctance to describe themselves as leaders but instead “described what and how they were learning to influence others to effect change” (Fairman and Mackenzie 2015, p. 75)—both, indisputably, leadership processes. Likewise, sharing responsibility for student learning and achievement with colleagues constitutes collective action on the moral purpose of schooling—again, emphatic leadership processes. Engagement in leadership activity, therefore, occurs best when feelings of being vulnerable with colleagues are replaced with trusting relationships, and recognition that collegial critique and support help make the shared goal of student learning possible. Leadership, when achieved from within one’s own ranks, is more attractive to peers than hierarchical position, because the development of trust has come from “within”—from knowing that colleagues can achieve more when they combine their expertise and share the same moral purpose.

I draw attention to spheres of influence as a further component of my answer to explain why position and activity are contrasting conceptualisations of leadership. I suggest leadership as activity develops when:

  • teachers move beyond their own classrooms and develop trusting learner-to learner-relationships with their teaching colleagues about how to improve students’ learning.

Building on the earlier review of York-Barr and Duke’s (2004) synthesis of 140 studies of teacher leadership, Fairman and Mackenzie’s (2015) conceptual model depicts nine particular spheres of influence. Like the earlier review, their work confirms that teacher leadership occurs in a number of forms (formal, informal, direct, and indirect) as teachers work with individuals, teams, and the school as a whole to benefit students and their learning. Fairman and Mackenzie suggest that further work is now needed to identify teachers’ readiness to take on leadership roles and for schools and education systems to be more deliberate about providing supports to encourage leadership activity, whether it be formal or informal.

The next point to be included in my answer to the chapter’s key question explains why encouragement of an alternative to positional leadership is deemed necessary. I suggest:

  • Leadership should be encouraged whether it is regarded as formal or informal work; and

  • Formal leadership will continue to dominate at the expense of informal leadership unless the benefits of teacher leadership activity are identified, understood, acknowledged, encouraged, and realised in transparently practical ways by the school’s hierarchy and more particularly by teachers themselves.

The intent of my comments above is that teacher leadership occurs across a continuum. It can be positional and formal, non-positional and informal, and anywhere between. It is not a case of favouring one over the other, as all are necessary. Informal leadership can be seen as a valued form of leadership in its own right, able to satisfy teacher leaders without being restricted by the trappings of formal leadership. It can also be seen as preparation for later formal leadership work. I explore the complexity of teacher leadership as a concept in the next section.

Teacher Leadership Is a Complex Concept

Teacher leadership is not a straightforward matter to introduce or encourage. Johnson et al. (2014) suggest there is a need to know more about teachers’ views of leadership, how they respond to opportunities provided or denied them, and what it takes to initiate leadership themselves. Their study shows the extent to which principals demonstrate genuine interest in teachers’ views and contributions. Furthermore, they report that teachers resent principals using “instrumental” approaches and respond by retreating to their classrooms, with some even considering leaving their schools. By an instrumental approach, they mean actions by the positional leader which exert control over teaching performance rather than allowing teachers to resolve their own issues of practice amongst themselves. The outcome of an instrumental approach is the possible outright rejection of teachers’ contributions and endorsement, or of their perfunctory adoption.

I agree with Johnson et al. (2014) that while the potential of teachers’ contributions has been realised with many schools creating new roles for expert teachers, this action alone is not sufficient. Johnson et al. report that new roles (such as curriculum leaders or leaders of special projects or leaders of special needs programs) have often been vaguely defined in terms of a general expectation to increase instructional coherence and improve student performance in one or more areas of the school, and little, if any, support is given regarding how to accomplish this. Furthermore, they say that while teachers want to participate in developing and implementing their school’s plans for change, it is how principals use their formal authority which often determines teachers’ willingness to participate. Johnson et al. write, “principals can use this [formal] authority to deliberately promote, redirect or restrict the exercise of leadership by teachers in their school” (p. 8). When teachers and others see themselves as leadership partners, they are more likely to have opportunities for practising negotiating and debating alternatives—which are important leadership skills—and they are likely to feel empowered by this learning. This kind of partnership creates attachments quite different from the feelings of compliance provoked by the principal’s solutions. Without recognition and ownership, teachers are likely to react accordingly. Johnson et al.’s findings apply to teachers working in high-poverty schools, where there are increased pressures for whole-school commitment to improve student outcomes. My view is that their findings apply to other types of school contexts as well. There is convincing evidence that involvement, ownership, and genuine inclusion are essential companions of innovation and improvement initiatives (Hargreaves and Fullan 2012). In support of this contention, Johnson et al. have found that when a school is regarded as an interdependent organization as opposed to an amalgam of isolated “egg crate” classrooms, bona fide “ongoing interaction among adults is at the heart of leadership. Then administrators and teachers should be encouraged to invest and interact in new ways, bridging boundaries and sharing responsibilities” (p. 34).

In an earlier article, Johnson (2012) suggests that paying attention to the ways schools are organised matters for teacher effectiveness. This, I argue, also applies to teachers extending their roles beyond classroom teaching into leadership. Johnson’s suggestions for ongoing professional learning include:

  • ensuring that teachers have better access to expert colleagues and instructional coaching;

  • more time to work with grade-level or subject teams;

  • meaningful supervision by principals or peer coaches who understand instruction; and

  • support from a school culture that encourages effective teaching and learning (pp. 107–108).

These actions constitute opportunities for teachers to work alongside colleagues, marking the beginnings of influence beyond self—a leadership given. Johnson argues too that positional leaders need to create differentiated roles for new teachers to thrive and ensure their schools are supportive places for teaching and learning. Not doing so means schools will be “left with ineffective veteran teachers and a daunting, expensive dismissal process” (p. 119). Leaving teachers unsupported to make their own paths to improving their practice is negligent employer behaviour which fails to value the next generation of teachers and help them to realise their potential. For me, the preferred practice is for teachers of all years of experience to share a sense of collective responsibility for their schools and students, recognising that this will necessitate ongoing learning with and from colleagues (Kardos and Johnson 2007). Figures from Kardos and Johnson’s work with 486 first- and second-year teachers across four American states in 2007 indicate that there is still much work to be done to avoid new teachers being left to plan and teach alone. That their findings confirm half of their sample of new teachers in California and Michigan and two thirds in Florida and Massachusetts are left to their own devices is indeed alarming. Why have their colleagues deserted them? Where are the teacher leaders? What is preventing teachers from exerting their influence and support outside their own classrooms? These are clearly questions which need to be addressed and I do so in Chap. 7 with mention of school cultures that support the development of teacher leaders and the opportunities afforded to teacher leaders in programs of school-wide pedagogical reform. I concentrate now on the second-stage teacher phase in order to signal that the time after gaining full teacher registration is a time in a teacher’s life when opportunities and support from significant others can determine whether or not they develop tastes for leadership work.

A Stocktake of Lessons Learnt from Second-Stage Teachers

There are lessons to be disseminated from work with second-stage teachers. These lessons are discussed in terms of the need to include rather than isolate this group of teachers and for them to be given opportunities for differentiated roles with accompanying support to succeed. As individuals, second-stage teachers will need to consider whether leadership work will be part of their career aspirations and, if so, what form it will take. Thus, the chapter’s question of why leadership as position matters for some and not others will be relevant as they form an answer about how to proceed next in their career. Their answers to such a question will be shaped by their own emerging conceptions of what it means to be a leader and what is deemed to be leadership work, conceptions which are shaped by how they see others engaging in leadership work. Likewise, the extent to which actions of colleagues serve to either support or constrain opportunities to engage in leadership work will determine how they answer this question.

The Need for Inclusive Rather Than Isolationist Strategies

Research studies disseminating accounts of second-stage teachers’ experiences are valuable because they highlight professional identity formation including aspirations and expectations, the extent to which these can be realised, as well as the supports needed. A clear finding from such studies is that when efforts to include rather than isolate or ignore second-stage teachers are made, these teachers find new opportunities which increase their job satisfaction as they discover the joys of working out how to help others and at the same time continue refining their own practice. One informative example is the study by Gronn and Lacey (2004) following a cohort of aspiring primary and secondary principals using e-journal reflections as identity narratives to reveal feelings, challenges, and uncertainties about future formal leadership. They suggest that these narratives “provide the aspirants with an opportunity, through semi-private reflection, to begin positioning themselves for leadership” (p. 405). The notion of a “positioning space” is offered to show how a supportive holding environment can help aspirants to explore their leadership conceptions and identities. Gronn and Lacey note, “within this transitory zone of professional work … there exists no regime of legitimized feelings and for which there are few clear navigational aids in the form of rules and conventions” (p. 405). This notion of a positioning space is a further indicator of what the profession can do to help discover the potential of second-stage teachers.

Other work on second-stage teachers has emerged from The Next Generation of Teachers Project team. Kirkpatrick (2007) maintains second-stage teachers are “an important yet infrequently studied subgroup of teachers” (p. 2). She describes second-stage teachers as those who have typically gained sufficient confidence to be thinking about their next steps and what they might be. A particular concern she raises about second-stage teachers is the possibility of isolation following the completion of their induction programs. Moreover, she comments “informal reports suggest that their work is often characterized by limited interactions with other teachers, sparse feedback and little reward and recognition” (p. 5). Kirkpatrick’s research on teacher engagement establishes what motivates teachers to remain in the profession and how higher engagement can be encouraged. It must be noted, though, that these levels of job engagement are determined by the personal characteristics of individuals and how supportive their work contexts are. I argue that job engagement is increased when teachers recognise opportunities for teacher leadership and see themselves contributing to the improvement of teaching practice outside their own classrooms.

Kirkpatrick’s (2007) study examining job engagement of teachers in their fourth to 10th years of teaching reveals marked variations amongst the 12 teachers. While some invested more time and energy into their work, others redistributed their energies with some investing less energy because of family demands or simply because they had reached a professional competence plateau. That many of the participants reported being left alone to decide whether and how to invest in their teaching is an alarming finding, prompting Kirkpatrick to argue that “schools may need to be more active in how they support and guide second-stage teachers’ engagement and investment” (p. 7). How the teachers described their investment in teaching helps to reinforce this point, because Kirkpatrick highlights four categories representing partial or dwindling investment. These categories appear as “active investment”, “judicious investment”, “coasting”, and “idling”. Moreover, Kirkpatrick suggests “the autonomy that these teachers experienced ironically might limit their development as second-stage teachers … their autonomy did nothing to help them realize what they had to learn or what they might stand to gain from different types of investment” (p. 26). When some teachers did invest in their teaching, a lack of recognition for their efforts impacted on their future career plans. This again demonstrates that the profession could do better in supporting second-stage teachers. Kirkpatrick argues that rather than accepting what teachers do works, the focus should be on how their practice can be even better. She maintains this requires

determining what they [teachers] do extremely well and strategizing how they can share these skills with others. It also requires determining how they could improve, and not leaving them alone to find an opportunity or activity that will help them focus on those areas of improvement. (pp. 28–29)

Use of research-informed knowledge about teaching and learning will also be important to ensure that talk about practice moves beyond just being talk to reach deeper levels of understanding. A leader will also be more credible if knowledge extends beyond one’s own practice to include research studies from a variety of contexts which inform those actions. Reliance on practical experience may limit options while a deeper knowledge of existing research findings may open up added opportunities. An underlying caveat is, however, that individuals must be willing to talk about their successes and failures if dialogue is to be a useful prompt for closer interrogation.

Szczesiul (2007), another member of The Next Generation of Teachers Project, claims second-stage teachers typically want to shape how state and district initiatives impact on their own and others’ classrooms. Indeed, Szczesiul suggests this is a point of difference from earlier generations of teachers. She argues further research is needed to “investigate the optimal balance between individual autonomy and professional support among second-stage teachers in contexts of high-stakes accountability” (p. 32).

A lesson I take from this stocktake of second-stage teachers to answer the chapter’s key question is:

  • The profession cannot afford to neglect or isolate those with potential to lead others in learning when they do not have a leadership position.

Second-stage teachers’ close proximity to classrooms means they are well placed to work alongside teachers to raise the quality of teaching and in turn, student learning and achievement. This work needs to be opened up rather than restricted to those holding named leadership positions. Opportunities for leadership are no guarantee that teachers will find them professionally satisfying. Showing leadership potential and being able to exercise it amongst colleagues can offer further challenges for teachers as leaders. Opportunity must be accompanied by preparation and support. I take up the issues of how to prepare and support second-stage teachers for leadership work in the next section.

The Promise and Challenge of Differentiated Roles for Second-Stage Teachers

Insights gained from 20 second-stage teachers in a study by Donaldson et al. (2008) reveal that differentiated roles serve two purposes. The first is the benefit to schools through teacher leaders’ contributions to school reform efforts, whilst the second is the benefit to the teacher leaders themselves when provided with new challenges to extend their professional expertise. Despite the potential of these roles, an important finding is the resistance from colleagues because of the relative inexperience of teacher leaders. Donaldson et al. suggest that as more veteran baby-boomers retire, this resistance to teacher leaders will continue, noting it challenges norms of equal status, autonomy, and seniority, especially since recognition has often customarily been a matter of tenure and time in the profession. They urge the profession as a whole and schools themselves to “anticipate this resistance and think proactively about how to respond” (p. 1109) so that the necessary support is provided to teachers engaging in leadership work. Suggestions to support teacher leaders include being more explicit about reform agendas, and providing training to understand where resistance is coming from, why it occurs, and how to respond in ways that build trust rather than alienation. If these matters are given attention, then second-stage teachers may find differentiated roles more attractive. These suggestions are needed to support growth in the pool of teacher leaders as well as those aspiring to formal, positional roles.

Again I emphasise that the emergence of teacher leadership is dependent on:

  • existing positional leaders creating leadership opportunities and support for teachers who engage in leadership work; and

  • personal agency, not the acceptance of opinions on what leadership work should look like by those in hierarchical positions. The latter view will limit the pool of future teacher leaders.

I now conclude the chapter with my own thoughts regarding an emerging definition of teacher leadership which has been shaped by my consideration of the research findings about second-stage teachers. My definition draws together the key points I have offered in my answers to the chapter’s initial question.

My Emerging Definition of Teacher Leadership

My analysis and interpretation of issues and ideas in the teacher leadership literature has led me to begin unfolding my own definition to this point. I offer the following.

The activity of teacher leadership takes a variety of forms. It recognises that teacher leadership is collective rather than individual work, and pedagogically focussed. It emerges from shared understandings of student learning with collaborative outcomes. Its improvement orientation addresses the moral purpose of schooling, necessitating the engagement of teachers as leaders and learners about practice. The development of teacher leadership is somewhat dependent on positional leaders creating opportunities, providing support, and valuing the contributions of those closest to classrooms and student learning. Alongside a need for others to provide support and opportunity, teacher leaders need to show agency in determining their own knowledge and skills to ensure that their leadership is all about professional learning for their own and others’ practice.

I now take each of the aspects included in my emerging definition into the remaining chapters of the book to explain how teacher leadership can be developed and supported, noting actions that can be taken by individuals and those who work with them in schools. As I proceed through these chapters, I will be watching out for what I may add, in the last chapter, to the definition stated above. A more complete picture is my ambition.