Ask a group of middle leaders what good feedback sounds like and you'll have a decent answer in about ten seconds. Describe the work rather than the person. Say what you saw.
Then ask one of them to say it out loud to you, as if you were the teacher whose marking has slipped for three weeks and who has a lot on at home. Almost every time, there's a pause. Then an opening line that begins "I just wanted to check in about..." and never quite arrives anywhere.
For a long time I read that pause as a gap in knowledge, so I'd send something over afterwards. Usually a reading on how to have a feedback conversation. People were kind about it and nothing changed on the Tuesday.
Pam Grossman spent years looking at how different professions teach the hard parts of the job. Trainee doctors, lawyers and clergy don't just read about the difficult conversation. They do a rough version of it in front of someone first, badly, and then again. Teacher training picked some of this up. School leadership mostly didn't, so we hand people a framework and send them off to try it live on a colleague they'll see every day for the next decade.
It's the main reason JP Adamson and I are building levers.studio, which opens next year. Not another place to read things. Somewhere to say the words once before they matter, and then, a week later, something asks whether you actually did it. Whether anyone answers that question honestly is the part I'm least sure about.
In the meantime, here's the bit you can use without us.
Before your next hard conversation, write the one sentence that describes what you've seen. Then ask whether a camera could have recorded it. "The last three pieces in 10C's books have no feedback on them" would be on the tape. "You've let things slide" wouldn't, because it's a verdict, and people will argue with a verdict all afternoon. Then say your sentence out loud once, in the car, to nobody. It sounds far worse in your head than it does in the room, which is most of the reason the real thing goes badly.
What are you putting off this week? Reply and tell me, and I'll send you back an opening line that would pass the camera test.
Shane
PS A small group of founding schools joins levers.studio in January. If that might be you, reply and I'll tell you what's involved.
Listen to the latest episode
Click here to listen to this week's episode of my chart-topping podcast, Education Leaders