What did doctors, nurses and other healthcare workers need from their leaders in the early days of the Covid-19 crisis? A small qualitative study was set up to find out. The researchers conducted listening sessions to explore how medical staff felt about how their leaders could effectively support them to do their crucial roles as well as possible and reduce their feelings of anxiety associated with working within the pandemic.

The responses are not surprising, but they are important - highlighting to us how effective leaders might behave to support their staff at moments of stress and anxiety.

They wanted leaders:

• To be visible and present.
• To see and listen.
• To respond in a timely and tangible way to the ever-changing challenges they faced.
• To actively and responsively look for solutions to enable staff to get on with their jobs.

As leaders in schools, we can learn a lot from this study. Among the challenges for those working in schools are constantly changing demands and expectations. So we have used these findings as the basis for a framework that structures the weekly check-in meetings we offer to every member of our school.

1. Hear me

We begin with a general open question, asking each person to share how they are and rate their feelings from 1 (cool as a cucumber) to 5 (exploding). This helps to begin the conversation in an open way and allows the member of staff the opportunity to share anything they wish to.

2. Protect me

From there, we ask if they feel secure and if they are aware of and using everything in place to support them. It is easy to forget habits and processes - particularly those that are new and unfamiliar.

3. Prepare me

We ask if there is anything extra we could do to help with their role - any training or information that would be helpful or if they have any questions or suggestions about how we could tweak what we are doing to make things better.

4. Support me

Next we move towards looking forward, asking if there are any challenges on the horizon that we need to prepare for.

5. Care for me

We move from the individual and their role to the wider context of family, ensuring that we are as supportive as possible.

6. Honour me

We finish with unconditional positive regard and thanks.

It is at times like this that we realise, once more, that it is not the spreadsheet or the timetable that makes a school effective. Schools are about the people within, around and in between them.

Thank you - two words that mean the world.

Megan Dixon is a senior associate at the Education Endowment Foundation and director of English/co-director of the Aspirer Research School

This article originally appeared in the 24 July 2020 issue under the headline “A friendly ear is just what the doctor ordered”