Sparking debate and conversation in girls’ schools. The Girls’ Schools Association sat down with Dr Jill Berry to get her views.
1. From the inside out: You’re an experienced educational leader and now coach Heads and senior leaders. What leadership pressures are new in girls’ schools today – and which ones have simply become louder or more exposed?
I think the challenges of headship are fairly consistent. After my headship I completed a doctorate, focussing on making the transition to headship. From my reading and research I discovered that what makes that transition challenging – and rewarding! – hasn’t changed dramatically over the decades, and it’s also consistent across different parts of the world.
Nurturing and supporting girls is made increasingly problematic by issues such as the rise of misogyny and mental health concerns, but such challenges have always been there – they are just now more openly discussed, and, as a result, steps are being taken to address them.
2. Leading in Girls’ schools: Do girls’ schools require a different kind of leadership right now?
Girls’ schools require the strong leadership they have always needed – at all levels. Middle leaders, senior leaders, headteachers and leaders of groups of schools working with governing bodies and the whole school community can establish clear vision and values, underpinned by sound judgement and secure knowledge of their context, building the most positive relationships founded on mutual respect and compassion. Effective communication is key, collaboration makes us stronger, and leaders need always to value, invest in and develop those with whom and through whom they work in order to offer the students the best possible education and care.
3. Talent, confidence, and self-doubt: In your coaching work, where do you most often see confidence leaking among brilliant educators – particularly women – and why do you think that still happens in 2026?
As a leader, and a coach, I have always been keen to spot and nurture potential in others – sometimes women, in my experience, have potential they themselves haven’t necessarily recognised – and help them to find that self-belief and to build their capacity and confidence.
4. The “good girl” leadership hangover: To what extent do you see leaders – especially in girls’ schools – still carrying unhelpful habits of compliance, perfectionism or over-responsibility into senior roles?
I think we have to remember that ‘Good enough is good enough’. Perfectionism can cause stress and burn-out. All leaders need strategies for switching off and unwinding. There are many different ways to do this, and we have to find our own path. Teaching and leading in schools is a job – an important job, but still a job. The best leaders I’ve worked with haven’t been those who worked to the exclusion of all else. They were the ones who found a healthy, sustainable balance.
5. Coaching vs fixing: Teaching is famously solution-driven and time-poor. What’s hard about introducing a coaching mindset into schools that are used to fixing, firefighting and cracking on?
Teachers, and leaders in schools, are problem-solvers. We have to recognise that good teachers and strong leaders work with others to help them to resolve their own issues, not to take their problems from them and encourage a culture of dependence. Developing those you lead is a key part of your responsibility.
6. Female Authority: Girls’ schools often talk about modelling leadership to students. What does “authority without hardness” look like in a Head, a deputy, or a middle leader?
Leaders need ‘presence’, and showing warmth and humanity should be part of this. If we find the right balance of support and constructive challenge in our dealings with those we lead, we hold them to account but do so supportively and show we care about them as people, not just as professionals.
7. Middle leadership: the pressure point: Where is leadership talent most at risk of being lost in schools right now – and how can coaching help retain and stretch people before they burn out or step away?
I work with aspiring and serving middle and senior leaders, and heads, and meet so many impressive individuals who are responsive, keen to learn and eager to embrace the next professional challenge. It gives me hope for the future!
Leaders need to think carefully about how they model leadership and ensure that those who may aspire to leadership in the future see the rewards and the potential for joy in leadership, not just the stresses and the pressure.
8. Courageous conversations: What are the conversations school leaders most avoid, and how does coaching help them step into discomfort – with staff, parents, governors, or even themselves?
Recognise that as a leader you need to step up, rather than to step aside or step back. If leaders can be trained and supported to navigate conflict and confrontation as positively and effectively as possible, they will earn more respect and be more successful.
Confrontation is an inevitable part of our personal and professional lives, and it’s not necessarily a bad thing – if we deal with it courageously, what people often remember is that we listened, we empathised, and we worked together to find a way forward.
9. The system vs the individual: How honest should we be about the limits of coaching when systemic pressures – inspection, accountability, recruitment – remain so intense?
Because of the pressures schools and leaders face it’s even more important that we give time to the structured reflection that coaching encourages. We need the opportunity, prompting, and time to think, so that the steps we take to address every challenge are considered and intentional and not just reactive.
10. When you design leadership development from scratch: If girls’ schools want to grow the next generation of confident, ethical and bold leaders, what should they stop doing – and what should they start to do?
When schools are addressing financial pressures, they need to ensure that they are targeting resources as effectively as possible and investing in the future. When I hear of schools dramatically reducing the budget for the professional learning and development of staff, it alarms me. That’s what I would stop.
In terms of what they should start, I would say it’s about continuing what is working well. I’m a great fan of Appreciative Inquiry, a credit, rather than a deficit, model of improvement which maintains that if we want to make things better, we should focus on the ‘bright spots’, what is working well, what can we learn from it, and how can we do more of it – rather than obsessing about what is broken and how we can fix it.
Dr Jill Berry
Jill taught for thirty years across six different schools in the UK, state and independent, and was a head for the last ten years. She was a GSA deputy, a GSA head, and GSA President in 2009. Since 2010 she has completed a doctorate, researching the transition to headship and written a book about it: ‘Making the Leap – Moving from Deputy to Head‘ (Crown House, 2016) and carried out an extensive range of leadership development work. She has also published four novels.
Jill is an advocate for the opportunities presented by social media for networking and professional development, including on LinkedIn, and blogs about education.
Photo credit: St Hilda’s Harpenden