Life after headship: ten years on
Ten years ago, in the summer of 2016, I left headship, looking for new challenges. I was appointed to my first headship before I was forty and was leaving headship at the age of fifty-three. I still had a few years left in the tank, not least family commitments and bills to pay, so what was the plan?
Well, there wasn’t and there never really has been a plan. Not that it was all completely random. I knew I wanted to be a teacher, and I knew I wanted to be in Catholic education. Headship came my way in 2001, almost by accident. I was looking at the time for a senior role in a Catholic school, maybe deputy head. In a conversation with my headteacher at the time – what I know call the tap on the shoulder - I was encouraged to look at a small Catholic secondary modern school in the south of the diocese that was looking for a headteacher. That would be ideal for you, he said.
To cut a long story short, I went for the job, and was invited for interview, with no real expectations of getting it. I was in that small room of doom with the other candidates, who all seemed to be battle-hardened deputies, with endless stories from the front line. I was Head of English with a minor role in SLT in a leafy Catholic school. I think I’d been sworn at once by a pupil.
Maybe it was because I was so relaxed that I interviewed well. My lack of experience was evident, there was no need to cover for that. What I did seem to get right – and looking back was why I got the job – was that I ‘got’ Catholic education. I believed in the mission of the Catholic school and was able to articulate that reasonably well.
The job was tough, it involved a long commute, but I learned a lot. In two and a half years the school did improve, thanks to the efforts of a lot of good people. I then applied for a headship closer to home in a bigger school. Not an easy decision, but it would help the family and, to be honest, I was not immune to the status-kick of headship in a bigger secondary school.
That’s where I spent the next twelve years. It was a thrilling journey - a battle at times - but we got the school to Outstanding (twice), opened a sixth form, and established its reputation for excellence in the city and beyond. I could’ve stayed on, but I felt that the work that I could do was done. It was that tug in the heart again. Something niggling – calling – to move on, maybe into leadership at scale.
I was hoping to move on to a senior role in a diocese, but soon learned another lesson. The right job doesn’t always come up at the right time. I ended up moving to the Catholic independent sector and working there for two years in a supporting, national role. I was never entirely sure I was in the right place, but looking back – that’s where the wisdom lies – I know now that I learned so much and met so many inspiring people that I’m still in contact with today.
“I was never entirely sure I was in the right place, but looking back – that’s where the wisdom lies – I know now that I learned so much and met so many inspiring people that I’m still in contact with today.”
Only two years into that role came another tap on the shoulder, from a Catholic multi academy trust – at the time the largest CMAT in the country – which was in deep trouble. I’m not the bravest person in the room, but some brave people had gone in before me and were already making a difference. The job was stressful, no point in saying otherwise. It was far from home and sitting alone in my little rented house of an evening working until bedtime, I did sometimes wonder what I was doing.
It was then I realised that what I was bringing to the project, again, was that strong sense of vision, mission and values. After two years, I felt that all that was in place and I was feeling the tug of launching out into freelance work. I handed my notice in and two months later we were in lockdown. Great timing, great start to my freelance work with every space in the country closed down. My wife has never let me forget that.
I took up the offer of an interim CEO role in a CMAT, to give me time to think what to do next. The wind was taken out of my freelance sails. Everything at that time seemed to be stop-start in terms of social distancing and events. What I didn’t expect to come along - I’m sensing a theme here – was the role of CEO of Caritas Social Action Network, the domestic agency of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, convening a network of fifty Catholic charities doing remarkable work on the front line of human need.
In my years in headship, I hadn’t heard of Caritas Social Action Network (CSAN). CAFOD, yes, but not CSAN. This was largely due to the historical trajectories and set ups of the respective organisations. CAFOD had been up and running for fifty years, was one big organisation with a powerful sense of mission and brand recognition. CSAN was a small team trying to look after a big network of independent charities focused on combatting poverty and exclusion in our nations.
Not seeing an immediate future for the freelance work, I applied for the job, not knowing then how different the voluntary (or third) sector was to the public sector where I had spent most of my professional life. Still, I got the job, happy to still be working in the Lord’s vineyard, if in a different corner. And it was different. I had assumed – somewhat arrogantly looking back – that leadership skills were transferable, and I’d be fine in this role.
Well, not quite. There was a lot to learn. The charity sector is much more complex than the public sector when it comes to funding and much harder to get right in terms of governance, team-building and collaborative working. It was then I realised that what I was loving about the journey post-headship was that I was still learning – and learning about myself - and learning and self-awareness were the keys to being a good leader, in any context.
“Looking back over ten years since leaving headship, I would not have predicted the journey, nor could I have imagined the learning, the wisdom and the inspiration from others along the way.”
I started the CSAN job in April 2021. The trustees allowed me to work for the first four months at 0.5 to enable me to finish the book I was working on at the time, The Formation of the Heart: the Why and How of Being a Catholic Today. I then went back to work full-time, but I soon felt the itch of freelance work again. My trustees were very supportive and allowed me to go to 0.8 so I could develop my freelance work, mostly with schools and CMATs.
I’ve been at CSAN for five and half years now and I feel that familiar tug of the heart again. Time to discern, to wait for the unexpected, to be surprised by what God has in store next. In 2027, I’ll turn 64 (there’s a song about that) and hope to develop my freelance work further, looking for creative projects that play to my strengths.
Looking back over ten years since leaving headship, I would not have predicted the journey, nor could I have imagined the learning, the wisdom and the inspiration from others along the way. For those in headship today, or any role in education, I’d say there is life after life in school. If you want it, that is, if it feels right. Sometimes you just need to take a risk, to step out into the deep, as Peter did when he was called by the Lord.