What Makes Leadership Sustainable?
- Aug 17
- 8 min read
Claudia Cubbage is known for her work in leadership and career development, particularly within education. She is the founder of RenewEd Ltd and is currently developing the RenewEd book series, drawing on over 25 years of school leadership experience.
The Headteacher Compass offers a practical way to examine whether leadership can remain effective over time. Its four connected dimensions, Balance, Clarity, Impact and Renewal, move the conversation from sustaining schools to sustaining the people who lead them.
Schools invest enormous amounts of time discussing sustainability. These conversations matter because schools are expected to achieve more than ever before while responding to increasingly complex challenges. Yet, for all the conversations about sustainable schools, we rarely stop to ask whether the people expected to sustain them are themselves being sustained.
Over time, I found myself wondering whether we had been asking the wrong question. After ten years as a secondary headteacher, I had seen schools facing remarkably similar circumstances produce very different outcomes. Some continued to improve despite significant challenges. Others, with equally committed staff and carefully considered plans, gradually lost momentum. It wasn’t always obvious why.
It wasn’t until I stepped back that I realised the difference rarely lay within the systems themselves. It lay within the capacity of the people leading them. That observation has stayed with me ever since.
Today, through my work as a headteacher coach, executive coach and leadership coach, I continue to see the same pattern emerge across schools of every phase and in every context. The schools that remain steady over time are not necessarily those with the fewest challenges. They are often those led by headteachers who have retained the capacity to think clearly, make proportionate decisions and sustain themselves through complexity.
This framework builds on my earlier Brainz article, Why sustainable schools depend on sustained headteachers, but asks a different question, what conditions allow a headteacher to retain the capacity to lead well? That distinction also matters because burnout is an organisational responsibility, not a personal failure, and sustainable leadership cannot be reduced to individual resilience.
That led me to a different question. Not, "How do we build sustainable schools?" But rather, "What makes leadership itself sustainable?"
Looking beyond systems
We analyse attendance patterns, behaviour trends, staff wellbeing, curriculum sequencing, safeguarding culture and pupil outcomes with increasing precision. Those conversations are essential. However, they all have one thing in common. They assume there will always be leadership capacity available to hold everything together. That assumption deserves greater attention because leadership capacity is not limitless.
Education Support’s Teacher Wellbeing Index 2025 reports that 86% of senior leaders feel stressed and 81% say they have too much to do and not enough time. Those figures do not prove that every leader is depleted, but they make it unsafe to treat leadership capacity as an unlimited organisational resource.
Every day, headteachers carry an extraordinary level of cognitive responsibility. Many of these responsibilities cannot simply be delegated. They remain with the headteacher because, ultimately, accountability remains with the headteacher too.
Leadership rarely becomes unsustainable because of one particularly difficult week. Most headteachers do not suddenly lose confidence in their leadership. They gradually lose the space to think as clearly as they once did. Without recognising it, strategic conversations become operational conversations. Long-term planning becomes immediate problem-solving. The quality of leadership gradually changes because the conditions in which leaders are expected to think have changed. This is not a capability issue. It is a capacity issue.
The pattern I kept seeing
Looking back across my own headship and now through my work coaching school leaders from different contexts, phases and trusts, I have become increasingly convinced that sustainable leadership depends on something that receives surprisingly little attention, protected thinking space. The greatest gift leaders can give themselves is not more hours in the day, but moments to think before they are required to act.
Although every coaching conversation was different, the themes were remarkably consistent. Some leaders were trying to regain balance after prolonged periods of sustained pressure. Others were seeking greater clarity because the role’s complexity had begun to cloud their thinking. Some were questioning where they could have the greatest impact rather than simply working harder. Others were trying to rediscover the sense of purpose and energy they once brought to leadership. The circumstances varied. The underlying themes did not.
Those observations eventually became the foundation of what I now call the Headteacher Compass. Not another accountability framework. Not another school improvement model. Not another leadership initiative. Instead, it became a practical way of thinking about what enables headteachers to remain effective, intentional and sustainable throughout one of the most demanding professional roles in public service.
The Compass is built around four interconnected dimensions. I chose the word Compass deliberately. A map assumes certainty, a compass assumes uncertainty. It helps us keep our bearings while deciding the best way forward. The four dimensions are Balance, Clarity, Impact and Renewal. Individually, each matters. Together, they create the conditions in which sustainable leadership becomes possible.
Balance is about more than workload
When people hear the word “balance,” they often think about reducing their hours or achieving a better work-life balance. Leadership has always required commitment, and I do not believe sustainable leadership is achieved simply by asking leaders to work less. Instead, balance is about maintaining equilibrium while leading through complexity.
It is knowing when to step into operational detail and when to remain focused on strategic direction. It is recognising that every problem deserves attention, but not every problem requires an immediate reaction.
Schools naturally take their emotional cues from leadership. When leaders become reactive, organisations often become reactive. When leaders remain calm, proportionate and intentional, that approach gradually shapes the wider culture. Balance, therefore, becomes far more than a personal well-being issue. It becomes a leadership responsibility.
Clarity begins with creating space to think
If balance provides stability, clarity provides direction.
Headteachers rarely struggle because they lack ideas. More often than not, they are trying to think strategically while being pulled relentlessly towards operational demands.
This is why protected thinking space has become such a central part of my coaching practice. Not because leaders need more time, as every headteacher would like more time, but because they need something more valuable, permission to step back from constant operational thinking long enough to regain perspective.
Impact is measured long before outcomes improve
Schools quite rightly measure impact through attendance, behaviour, attainment, destinations and inspection outcomes. These indicators matter. They tell us whether our decisions are making a difference. However, they all have one thing in common. They are measures of organisational performance, not measures of leadership itself.
One of the hardest disciplines in headship is recognising which decisions genuinely require the headteacher’s attention and which are better strengthened through the leadership of others. Yet sustainable leadership is not about solving every problem personally. It is about creating the conditions in which others can solve problems confidently themselves. That requires trust and clarity of vision.
Perhaps one of the most significant transitions in headship is moving from being the person who provides answers to becoming the person who develops others’ capacity to find their own. That shift changes everything. Schools become less dependent on a single individual. Leadership becomes distributed with purpose rather than by necessity.
This is where impact becomes sustainable, not because the headteacher is doing more, but because the organisation is becoming stronger. That distinction matters.
The most effective leaders are rarely remembered for solving every problem themselves. They are remembered for creating schools where good decisions continued to be made, even when they were not in the room. For me, that is one of the clearest indicators of sustainable leadership. It is measured not by how indispensable the headteacher becomes, but by how capable the organisation becomes because of their leadership.
Renewal is not about recovery
Of the four dimensions of the Headteacher Compass, renewal is probably the one most easily misunderstood. Recovery restores what has already been lost. Renewal protects what matters before it is lost.
Renewal is intentional. It is the deliberate process of protecting leadership capacity before it erodes. This is why renewal deserves far more attention than it often receives, because many school leaders become exceptionally skilled at continuing despite increasing pressure.
People need space to reconnect with themselves before they can make good decisions about what comes next. That is why renewal should not happen only after exhaustion. It should become part of leadership itself.
Just as schools regularly review improvement priorities, leaders also need opportunities to reflect on their own direction, energy and purpose. Not because they are struggling, but because they are leading.
Perhaps this is where headteacher coaching makes its greatest contribution, not because coaching provides the answers, but because it creates the conditions for leaders to step back from the relentless pace of the role and ask questions they rarely have time to consider.
What makes leadership sustainable?
When I first began thinking about sustainable schools, I assumed the answer lay in better systems. Years later, I no longer believe sustainability begins there.
Systems, structures, strategy and culture all matter, but they all depend upon something that receives far less attention, the capacity of the person expected to bring those systems to life. That is why I developed the Headteacher Compass, not as another leadership model or another accountability framework, but as a practical way of helping school leaders reflect on the four conditions that, in my experience, underpin sustainable leadership.
Balance helps leaders remain steady through complexity. Clarity enables them to think intentionally rather than reactively. Impact helps them focus energy where only the headteacher can make the greatest difference. Renewal protects leadership capacity before it erodes.
These four dimensions are deeply connected. When they are intentionally nurtured, leaders are better able to navigate complexity without losing perspective, purpose or effectiveness. The Headteacher Compass is not intended to provide another checklist or leadership initiative. It is an invitation to pause, reflect and think.
Sustainable leadership is not created by working harder. Nor is it created by simply becoming more resilient. It is created when leaders deliberately invest in the conditions that enable them to lead well over time. That is why I believe sustainable schools begin with sustainable headteachers. It is also why the Headteacher Compass sits at the heart of my work as a headteacher coach, school leadership coach and founder of RenewEd Ltd, and why it became the foundation of my book, RenewEd Leadership: How Coaching Transforms Headteachers and Schools.
Before we ask how to sustain our schools, we should first ask how we sustain the people entrusted to lead them. Sustainable leadership is not simply good for headteachers. It is fundamental to the future of every school they lead.
To explore how the Headteacher Compass could support your leadership, book a confidential coaching conversation with RenewEd Ltd. Visit here to find out more.
Read more from Claudia Cubbage
Claudia Cubbage, Headteacher and Career Change Coach
Claudia Cubbage is a UK-based career change coach and headteacher coach specializing in sustainable leadership and purposeful transitions. After a decade as a headteacher and 30 years in education, including 25 years in senior leadership roles, she brings deep, practical insight into the realities of leadership. She supports headteachers and school leaders to lead effectively while balancing the demands of complex roles, alongside professionals from outside education navigating career change. She is the founder of RenewEd Ltd and the creator of the Compass framework, which underpins RenewEd Leadership coaching. Her work focuses on helping people lead and work in ways that are sustainable, values-led, and confidence-building.
