NO FAILURE, JUST FEEDBACK!

When we are dealing with the challenges we currently face and when the going gets tough we need to stay positive and stay focused on the things that matter, in our lives, our work, and in our relationships. We all face a difficult, changing and potentially chaotic future where individuals, families, children, organizations, and businesses all face accelerating change, massive challenges and increasing problems.

SUCCESS!

Success doesn't come in can'ts, it comes in cans. 

I do believe that every school can be a great school, that every child can be successful and achieve and that we can create great teams doing the extraordinary with the current people. We simply need learning leadership, beautiful systems and intelligent accountability to support us as we change the culture to focus on passion and compassion and get people to believe; to believe in themselves and to believe in our children and young people and our colleagues.Throughout my working life, people have told me that things are impossible; that we can't get every child to read by the time they are seven or eight; that we can't get every child to be a brilliant little learner by the time they leave primary school and that we can't get every young person the equivalent of 5 good GCSEs including English and maths by the time they are sixteen. I simply don't accept any of this because across the country these things are already happening in authorities, in schools and in classrooms where colleagues are releasing the magic.

NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE!

If you read the McKinsey Reports, analyse the PISA data, review the research evidence about 'what works' and listen to people like Ken Robinson, Dan Pink and Tony Wagner it is increasingly obvious that we need to develop skills, character and knowledge in our little learners and our bigger learners.

WHAT MAKES BRILLIANT!

The media, parents and the public in general have increased expectations of schools and the DfE and OFSTED unsurprisingly have continued to raise the bar...

QUESTION, CHALLENGE , DREAM, IMAGINE, EXPERIMENT, EXPLORE! AND DISCOVER!

I have visited some great schools over the last few years and each visit makes me realise that leadership, teaching and teamwork are what matters.

GOAL SETTING AND TEAMWORK MATTERS!

I caught up with an old colleague and friend today and it reminded me that setting goals and personal targets for your team is a vital tool for success. It gives us our long-term vision as well as helping us with our short-term motivation... 

BUILD BRILLIANT LEARNING!

I don't know about you but I increasingly feel that we are 'painting by numbers' in a world monitored, policed and controlled by the 'bean' counters, the 'keep within the line' checkers and the 'weigh the pig' consultants. That we are trapped in a viscious spiral of negativity, of it's not good enough so let's do something else, of let's create another Academy or Free School, of let's get more experts and of let's make sure that we find someone to blame.

BE POSITIVE !

“You can program yourself to be positive. Being Positive is a discipline … and the more adversity you face, the more positive you have to be.  Being positive helps build confidence and self-esteem”

Rick Pitino, University of Louisville Head Basketball Coach

ACHIEVING THE IMPOSSIBLE!

We are challenged all the time to do better, and to do it faster and more efficiently and more effectively... challenged to do what many people would say was impossible....

HAPPY SUNDAY!

"For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin -real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid. Then life would begin.

At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life."

Alfred D'Souza 

SELF-EVALUATION MATTERS!

RELATIONSHIPS MATTER!

"Wisdom, compassion, and courage are the three universally recognized moral qualities of men."

Confucius

I was at a meeting at Yewlands Technology College today and again being with a group of extraordinary people made me realise that we all want to be outstanding and we all want success in our lives. We want success at home, at work, at school and in our relationships...

22 Reasons for _________ you name it!

I am grateful to Mike Osborne-Town, entrust Managing Director, who reminded us all at the entrust 'National Leadership Conference' today that those 'goalpost shifting badgers' are only the start of it, according to the poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy in her wonderful poem '22 Reasons for the Bedroom Tax'. All nature is in uproar, what with rule-bending ferrets, the fact-twisting skunks and the gun-jumping foxes. As Mike reminded us all it all adds up, to an explanation which makes as much sense as anything else in recent politics!!

Because the Badgers are moving the goalposts.