The comments painted a consistent picture:
Heads of Department are some of the most committed, capable people in a school, but often the least supported.
They’re promoted for being great teachers, not necessarily great leaders. They’re given new responsibilities, more meetings, and greater accountability, but little clarity about what success looks like or how to get there. One commenter put it perfectly:
“It’s one thing to be a great teacher, but middle leadership requires other dispositions and skills which need to be learned and developed through effective professional learning.”
The Leadership Gap
Most Heads of Department are appointed because of their deep subject expertise or classroom success. But leading people, managing conflict, and driving change are entirely different skill sets. As one teacher wrote, “Many HoDs are thrown in the deep end: undercooked and overwhelmed.”
This isn’t an individual failing, it’s a systemic one. We talk endlessly about developing students’ 21st-century skills, yet too often we expect our middle leaders to lead 21st-century schools with 20th-century leadership preparation.
Autonomy, trust, and clarity
A recurring theme in the feedback was autonomy, or rather, the lack of it. Many middle leaders described feeling accountable to everyone but trusted by no one. They’re expected to implement every new initiative, report on every data point, and lead thriving teams.
When autonomy is stripped away, leadership becomes administration. And administration rarely inspires.
Yet, when senior leaders create space for autonomy and trust, everything changes. One commenter shared:
“The most empowered I ever felt as a HoD was when senior management outlined three strategic drivers for the year and allowed us to choose one as our departmental focus. Just that small amount of choice made a huge difference to our buy-in and energy.”
That’s what empowerment looks like, not chaos, but clarity with choice.
Defining “what good looks like”
Leadership isn’t innate. It’s learned, practiced, and shaped by culture. As several readers observed, schools rarely define “what good looks like” for a middle leader. Without clear expectations or mentoring, even the most passionate HoDs can lose their way, pulled between competing priorities.
The schools that get this right take a deliberate approach:
- They define what great middle leadership looks like in their context.
- They invest in professional learning that develops the human and relational skills of leadership.
- They create structures that protect time for middle leaders to coach, mentor, and collaborate, not just manage.
The bridge, not the barrier
The best middle leaders aren’t the “meat in the sandwich.” They’re the bridge: connecting vision to reality, strategy to practice, leadership to learning.
But to play that role, they need trust, clarity, and ongoing development. When we invest in them, we strengthen the entire architecture of a school.
As one commenter so wisely said: “The best school strategic plans live or die with the middle leaders.”
Perhaps it’s time we stopped sandwiching them between competing pressures — and started lifting them up as the pivotal leaders they truly are.
Empowering Heads of Department starts with giving them the right tools, not more tasks. That’s where the Vivedus Planner comes in.
It gives middle leaders the visibility, alignment, and agency they’ve been asking for. Through one platform, they can:
- See every teacher’s planning and practice at a glance, reducing oversight time and freeing capacity for real instructional leadership.
- Identify where support or professional learning is needed, using live data instead of assumptions.
- Collaboratively plan with their teams online, breaking down silos and building shared ownership of pedagogy.
Rather than adding to the workload, Vivedus replaces fragmented systems, bringing clarity to complexity. It transforms planning from a compliance exercise into a conversation about learning.
Not only that, but the Vivedus Planner invites all staff to provide feedback about the level of trust in the school’s culture, because we know that when trust is high, people thrive.
When Heads of Department have the right tools and support, they stop feeling like “middle managers” and start leading like architects of learning. And that’s when schools move from managing change to leading transformation.
References
Dinham, S. (2007). How schools get moving and keep improving. ACER.
Grattan Institute. (2022). Making Middle Leaders Matter.
Robinson, V., Lloyd, C. & Rowe, K. (2008). The impact of leadership on student outcomes. Educational Administration Quarterly.
Hargreaves, A. & O’Connor, M. T. (2018). Collaborative Professionalism. Corwin Press.
