David

3/3 🧵
I’m grateful for the armchair and the simple feeling that I don't need to be anywhere or anyone else to make today count. Sorry, no leadership lessons here—just the realization that, today, all is well.

2/3 🧵
Half term is coming, and for once, it’s a pause rather than a collapse. A son turning 21, a trip to Budapest on the horizon—space in the diary that doesn't feel borrowed. It’s taken a long time to learn what deserves my energy and what doesn't.

1/3 🧵
Evenings like this: daughter in the kitchen, the clatter of pans, a long-distance chat with Dad. No drama, no big breakthroughs—just the steady, quiet music of domestic life. It’s remarkable how much it matters when everything finally feels in its right place.

February Fragments: Balancing Act. Full post on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/posts/david-...

Another reason every leader should be a reader - not for optics, not for book lists.
Because reading trains you to sit with complexity, hold opposing ideas, and change your mind without losing your nerve.

Son just landed last minute #deftones tickets on me. Standing tickets. On a school night. Carnage will ensue next week.

Longer post on LinkedIn if you have it. www.linkedin.com/posts/activi...

Our most valuable resource at work is time. The best use of it is often talk, not agenda driven meetings but real human connection. When people have space to listen and think together, trust grows and the work usually moves more safely afterwards.

Output not outcomes

It's about building a practice and sticking with it.
I would still be writing if I were the only person reading it. Thinking is the point. Writing keeps it honest and keeps it moving.
Nothing here is winding down. This is steady work, and it has plenty of road left in it.
2/2

Some people assume Shakey Leadership will run out of steam. That assumption usually comes from the sidelines.
January had a post every day. February will too. Before that came the 42 Laws of Primary Leadership. This was never about momentum or attention. 1/2

4/4
Reading matters because it builds worlds, not just skills. “Good enough” was never about cutting corners, but reliability under pressure.

Stability is underrated. Leadership isn’t about having the right answer — it’s about creating conditions where better answers can emerge.

3/4
Good leadership borrows shamelessly from good teaching: clear expectations, humane pacing, attention to conditions.

Consensus feels comfortable but often hides avoidance. Agreement is not the same thing as clarity.

2/4
Memory is persuasive but unreliable. Leadership gets safer when we stop treating our recall as evidence.

Pressure doesn’t make people careless; it makes systems visible. What breaks under strain was already fragile.

1/4
Wellbeing isn’t improved by measuring it more often. If the survey itself raises your blood pressure, something’s off.
Blind spots aren’t moral failings either — they’re habits we stopped noticing, like assuming what made sense in our head arrived intact in someone else’s.

This week's Shakey Leadership wisdom thread 🧵 👇

You have my word, and I think you've read enough of my posts to know I place a lot of value on keeping it. Stay connected and keep in touch.

It's a MAT SLA - it's changing next year but I do not have a say in where we transfer to sadly, otherwise I know where I'd come. X

Thread 🧵 3/3 🔚

I just don’t believe we’re very honest about the emotional load we place on the people expected to absorb it, translate it, and keep steady anyway.

Wellbeing, it turns out, doesn’t move in one direction.

It circulates.

Thread 🧵 2/3

This is while the thing most damaging to leader wellbeing is reading that database carefully, thoughtfully, and at 8pm on a wet Thursday.

I believe in listening. I believe in feedback. I believe discomfort is part of the job of leading.

Thread 🧵 1/3

Staff wellbeing surveys are designed to help leaders listen, which is necessary.  there’s a strange irony, however, in discovering via an anonymous database, that the thing most damaging staff wellbeing is leadership decisions.

Exploring my blind spots through the Johari Window has shown me this: clarity in my head doesn’t guarantee clarity in the room, and confidence in memory isn’t shared understanding. Leadership lives in what others actually see, hear, and carry forward.

Longer piece here if you have LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/posts/activi...

One of the best bits of leadership advice I ever got was to run a school the way I ran my classroom. Not treating adults like children, but remembering what helps people work well: clarity, trust, fewer priorities, thoughtful feedback, and leaders owning the conditions.

The amazing @pepsmccrea.bsky.social
posted about Educational Entropy this week - giving a name to something I've long been skirting around capturing. I'm looking forward to the series. In the meantime, here are my initial thoughts on Linkedin.

www.linkedin.com/posts/activi...

The amazing @pepsmccrea.bsky.social
posted about Educational Entropy this week - giving a name to something I've long been skirting around capturing. I'm looking forward to the series. In the meantime, here are my initial thoughts on Linkedin.

www.linkedin.com/posts/activi...

Good enough is when “works every day” matters more than “impresses once.”
In schools, in systems, in leadership more broadly, work is rarely perfect - but it must be trustworthy.
Sometimes the most serious leadership decision you can make is to stop refining and start serving.

Why Sundays don't drag me down anymore.

In short: because I'm not borrowing anxiety from a future I’ve learned I can handle.

"Leadership isn’t about energising all the time - it's about regulating. Schools don’t need leaders who constantly turn the dial up."