School Leadership Skills: The 60/40 Rule and the CHASE Framework

You plan the lessons. You mark the books. You stay late for the parent who could only make it at six. And somewhere in the middle of all that, a question creeps in: what would it take to lead? Not just a classroom, but a department, a year group, maybe one day a school.

Most teachers never get a straight answer. Promotion criteria stay vague. Interview feedback, when it arrives at all, is a sentence long. So you guess. You add another year to your CV and hope the years speak for you.

Joanna Povall has a clearer answer. She is the Principal of Wales International School in Abu Dhabi and the author of Kind Leadership. In a Suraasa Education Leadership Series session with Manish Pandey, Associate Director at Suraasa, she set out what she looks for when she hires and how she thinks about leadership. She also explained why the teachers who grow fastest are rarely the ones with the longest CVs.

This guide takes her ideas and turns them into steps you can act on. It works whether you want your first middle leadership role, a move to an international school, or simply to become the teacher every school is trying to keep.

To hear Joanna Povall explain the 60/40 rule and the CHASE framework in her own words, with every example she shared, watch the full conversation below.

From Accidental Leader to International Principal

Povall did not plan to lead early. At 22, she found herself the only subject specialist in a department of seven. Nobody else in the team had trained in the subject. Somebody had to design the curriculum, run the meetings and make the calls. That somebody was her.

She describes it as accidental leadership. It was also, by her account, the experience that built her. Designing curricula, leading colleagues who were older than her, and making decisions without a safety net gave her the confidence she needed. By 24, she held a formal department head role.

The lesson here is not that you need to be thrown in at the deep end. It is that school leadership skills usually grow before the title arrives, not after. The title tends to confirm what you are already doing.

Look at your own school with that lens. Where are you already the person others turn to?

• Are you the one who knows the exam specification best? That is curriculum leadership.
• Do newer colleagues ask you how you handle a difficult class? That is mentoring.
• Did you organise the science fair, the reading week or the parent workshop? That is project leadership.
• Do you translate a new policy into something the team can actually use? That is communication leadership.

None of these come with a pay rise or a badge. All of them count. When you eventually sit across from a principal, these are the stories that prove you can lead. Write them down now, while the details are fresh, so you can tell them clearly later.

And if no such opportunity exists yet, ask for one. Povall's practical advice includes approaching your school leaders directly, telling them where you want to go, and asking which specific skills you need to get there. Most leaders respect that conversation. Few teachers start it.

The 60/40 Formula: What School Leaders Actually Look For

Here is the part of the conversation most teachers will want to read twice. Povall evaluates candidates on a 60/40 split, and she put it plainly:

"40% of what I am looking for is somebody who can teach... but 60% of what I am looking for is somebody who goes above and beyond."
Joanna Povall

The 40% is the baseline. Can you plan a coherent lesson? Can you deliver it so students learn? Can you assess what they understood and adjust? These skills are non-negotiable. A teacher who cannot manage them will not progress, however caring they are.

But Povall made a sharper point about that 40%. Much of the technical side of teaching, from drafting plans to building resources, can now be supported by AI. If you have not yet explored that shift, our guide to how artificial intelligence is changing teaching is a good place to start. The tools are getting better at the 40%. They are not getting better at the 60%.

The 60% is about care, enthusiasm and dedication to learners. It is the teacher who notices that a usually chatty student has gone quiet. It is the teacher who runs the lunchtime club nobody asked for. It is the teacher who emails a parent with good news, not only bad.

Here is how the two halves look side by side:

A useful self-audit: take your last week of teaching and sort what you did into the two columns. If almost everything sits on the left, you are doing your job. If you can point to several clear examples on the right, you are doing the job Povall hires for.

Why Care and Empathy Outweigh Lesson Planning

It can feel uncomfortable to hear that care matters more than planning. Teachers spend years learning to plan well, and planning still matters. A strong framework such as the 5E lesson plan model gives students a structure that builds understanding step by step. Nobody is suggesting you throw that away.

Povall's argument is about what students actually respond to. As she put it:

"The kids in school, whether they're 3 years or whether they're 18 years old, they can tell whether a teacher cares or not."
Joanna Povall

Think about what that means in practice. A beautifully structured lesson delivered by a teacher who seems bored lands differently from an imperfect one delivered by a teacher who clearly wants every child to get it. Students read tone, eye contact, patience and follow-through. They notice whether you remember what they told you last week.

Care also scales upward. The same quality that makes students trust a teacher makes teachers trust a leader. The research on teacher retention points in this direction. A report from the National Center for Education Statistics identifies administrative leadership and supportive school conditions as major factors in whether educators stay at their school, move into new roles, or leave the profession. Analysis from the Brookings Institution similarly links supportive, effective school leadership with lower turnover intentions among teachers.

So when Povall weights care at 60%, she is not being sentimental. She is describing the quality that keeps classrooms working and staffrooms intact. If you want to lead one day, the empathy you practise with students now is the same muscle you will use with colleagues later.

Three ways to make your care visible, without turning it into a performance:

• Keep a short student note log. One line per student per half term: an interest, a worry, a win. Use it before parent meetings and when a student seems off.
• Close the loop. When a student tells you something, mention it again a week later. It shows you listened.
• Share the good news. Send one positive message home each week. It costs five minutes and changes how families see you.

Understanding the CHASE Framework for Kind Leadership

Povall's book centres on a framework she calls CHASE. Each letter names a habit that separates kind leadership from leadership that is merely pleasant. You do not need a title to practise any of them. Teachers use these habits every day with students, parents and colleagues.

Communication

Ambiguity feels kind in the moment. It avoids friction. But it leaves people guessing, and guessing creates anxiety. If you lead a team meeting, end it by stating exactly who does what by when. If you set a student task, check that one student can repeat the instruction back before everyone starts.

Honesty

Povall singles out white lies as a quiet danger. "That lesson was great" when it was not. "I'll look into it" when you won't. Each small untruth feels harmless. Over time, people learn that your praise means nothing and your promises carry no weight. Honest, specific feedback is harder to give and far more useful to receive.

Accountability

Accountability runs both ways. You hold others to high standards, and you hold yourself to the same ones. Teachers who aspire to lead should notice how they respond when something goes wrong. Do you explain, or do you own it? The answer tells colleagues a great deal about whether they would want to work for you.

Self-esteem

Leaders hold a surprising amount of power over how confident their staff feel. A careless comment in a meeting can stay with a colleague for weeks. Povall's framework asks leaders to protect that confidence deliberately, even while delivering hard messages. The aim is a team that feels capable, not one that feels watched.

Ego

The final letter is the one most people skip over. Pride is natural, especially after years of hard work. Unchecked, it becomes the reason people stop listening, stop learning and stop being easy to work with. Which leads directly to the next point.

Managing Ego and Accepting Constructive Observation Feedback

Every teacher has been observed. Most teachers have received feedback they did not enjoy. Povall's view is direct: decades of experience do not excuse resistance to feedback. When a teacher uses their years in the classroom as a reason to dismiss a constructive observation, she reads it as an unmanaged ego and an unwillingness to grow.

That can sting, particularly for experienced teachers. Experience has real value. It builds instinct, judgement and calm. But experience and growth are different things. Twenty years can mean twenty years of learning, or one year repeated twenty times. The way you respond to feedback is how leaders tell the difference.

Here is a simple routine for receiving observation feedback well, even when you disagree:

1. Listen fully before responding. Write down the main points. Resist the urge to defend each one as it comes.
2. Ask one clarifying question. "Can you show me which moment in the lesson made you think that?" This turns a judgement into evidence you can examine.
3. Name one thing you will try. Even if you disagree with most of the feedback, pick the most useful point and commit to testing it.
4. Report back. A week or two later, tell your observer what you tried and what happened. This single step signals more professional maturity than any certificate.

Notice what this routine does. It keeps the conversation about students' learning rather than your reputation. It also shows the person giving feedback that you are coachable, which is exactly what a hiring principal is trying to judge when they ask about your last observation.

If you are the one giving feedback, the CHASE framework applies in reverse. Be clear. Be honest. Protect the teacher's self-esteem by focusing on the practice, not the person. And keep your own ego out of it. You are there to help them improve, not to prove you know better.

Turning Interview Rejections into Future Career Wins

Rejection is part of every teaching career. You prepare, you travel, you teach the demo lesson, and then a short email arrives telling you somebody else got the job. The natural response is to close the inbox and move on.

Povall shared a story that argues for a different response. She was once rejected for a role at a school in France. Rather than walking away, she wrote to the headteacher to thank them for the opportunity. Months later, the candidate they had chosen left. The headteacher remembered her, and she received an unexpected job offer.

A thank-you note will not guarantee a second chance. But it costs you nothing, and it does three useful things:

• It leaves the hiring team with a positive final impression of you.
• It keeps a door open if circumstances change, as they often do in schools.
• It shows the very professionalism and care that the 60% is about.

A short note is enough. Something like this:

"Thank you for the chance to visit your school and meet the team. I enjoyed teaching your Year 8 class and learned a great deal from the conversation with your department. I understand you have offered the role to another candidate, and I wish them every success. If a similar opportunity arises in future, I would be glad to be considered."

Keep it warm, brief and free of disappointment. If the rejection email invites feedback, ask for it politely in a separate line. Then use what you learn to sharpen your next application.

The Killer Interview Question Every Teacher Must Prepare For

Every interviewer has a question that separates candidates quickly. Povall's is this:

"Which book have you read, or which podcast have you listened to, or which webinar have you attended, that has had the biggest impact on your teaching practice and why?"
Joanna Povall

It sounds simple. It is not. According to Povall, teachers who cannot name a recent learning experience rarely secure roles in her school. The question exposes whether a teacher is still learning, or simply teaching the way they always have.

This is why continuous professional learning carries more weight than years on a CV. Years show that you have survived. Recent learning shows that you are growing. A principal building a team for the next five years wants the second.

To answer it well, prepare a short response with four parts:

1. Name the source. A specific book, podcast episode, course or webinar. Not "some research I read".
2. Name the idea. One concept that changed how you think. For example, the difference between assessment for learning and assessment of learning.
3. Name the change. What you now do differently in your classroom because of it.
4. Name the result. What you noticed in your students afterwards, even if the evidence is informal.

Here is a worked example. A teacher might say: "A webinar on kind leadership made me realise I was giving vague praise to avoid awkward conversations. I started giving each student one specific strength and one specific next step in every written comment. Within a term, more students were acting on feedback, because they finally knew what to do with it."

That answer takes under a minute. It shows reflection, action and impact. It is also impossible to fake if you have not done the learning, which is exactly why Povall asks it.

The best way to prepare is to stop treating professional learning as a box to tick. Our guide to planning your CPD year breaks down what genuinely counts and how to spread learning across terms. For the bigger picture, read about the role of continuing education for teachers. Aim to have at least two fresh answers ready at any given time, so you are never caught without one.

Navigating Salaries and School Transitions Wisely

Teaching should reward the people who do it well. Povall was clear about how financial growth usually happens in schools: through promotion, or through moving to a different school. There are rarely other routes.

She was equally clear that salary alone is a poor guide. Growth in teaching requires intentionality and research. Before you chase a higher figure, look closely at what comes with it.

A higher salary at a school with an unhealthy culture can cost you more than it pays. The retention research cited earlier suggests why. Leadership and school conditions shape whether teachers thrive or burn out, and no pay rise fixes a workplace where you feel unsupported.

If you are weighing a move abroad, our international teaching career guide for Indian teachers covers the practical steps. Teachers moving from a national board to an international curriculum can also follow our step-by-step guide on moving from a CBSE school to an international school.

And before you move at all, have the conversation Povall recommends. Tell your current leaders what you want. Ask what it would take to get there. Sometimes the promotion you are looking for elsewhere is available where you already are, once someone knows you want it.

Building Authentic Professional Visibility on LinkedIn

Many teachers treat LinkedIn as something to update only when they are job-hunting. Povall's comments suggest that is a missed opportunity. Hiring teams actively look at candidates' profiles on professional platforms. They want to see genuine interest in teaching and learning, and they check that a candidate's practice aligns with the relevant national standards.

A profile that springs to life the week you apply looks exactly like what it is. A profile that shows steady, thoughtful engagement over months tells a different story.

Here is what consistent, authentic visibility can look like:

• Share real classroom projects. A short post about a unit that worked, with what you tried and what students produced. Protect student privacy, always.
• Reflect on your learning. When a book or webinar changes your thinking, write three lines about why. You are also building your answer to the killer interview question.
• Engage with other educators. Thoughtful comments on posts by teachers and leaders you respect often get more attention than your own posts.
• Keep your profile current. List your qualifications, curricula and responsibilities clearly. Leaders scan quickly.

A realistic rhythm is one post or meaningful comment a fortnight. That is enough to show a pattern without turning it into a second job. The goal is not to become an influencer. It is to make sure that when a principal looks you up, they find a teacher who is clearly thinking about their craft.

Why Kind Leadership Demands Courage Over Niceness

Povall closed with the idea at the heart of her work. Kindness and niceness are not the same thing. In fact, they often pull in opposite directions.

"It's easy to be nice. You have to be very courageous to be kind because it's not easy."
Joanna Povall

Niceness avoids discomfort. It tells the white lie. It lets the missed deadline slide. It postpones the difficult conversation until the problem has grown too big to ignore. In the short term, everyone feels fine. In the long term, standards slip and trust erodes.

Kindness, as Povall describes it, means upholding policies, setting clear boundaries and offering real support. It means having the hard conversation early, privately and honestly, because you care about the person and the outcome. It is the colleague who tells you your lesson was not working and then helps you fix it.

Consider a practical example. A colleague keeps arriving late to their duty, and students are left unsupervised. The nice response is to say nothing, or to cover for them. The kind response is to speak to them directly, explain the impact on students, ask whether something is going on, and agree on what happens next. One protects your comfort. The other protects the students and gives your colleague a real chance to change.

This is where all of Povall's ideas meet. The 60% is care. CHASE is how that care shows up in daily behaviour. Accepting feedback is CHASE applied to yourself. Continuous learning is accountability for your own growth. Kind leadership is the courage to hold all of it together, even when it would be easier not to.

None of this requires a leadership title. It starts in your classroom and your staffroom, this week.

Your next steps

• Sort last week's work into the 40% and the 60%. Add one deliberate act of care this week.
• Pick one CHASE letter to practise for a month. Most people find Honesty or Ego the hardest, so start there.
• Prepare two answers to the killer interview question, each with a source, an idea, a change and a result.
• Ask your line manager for a conversation about where you want to go and what you need to get there.
• Post one honest reflection on your teaching to LinkedIn this month.

You entered teaching with a purpose. Growing into leadership does not mean leaving that purpose behind. It means taking it further, with more people relying on you to get it right.

At Suraasa, we build for exactly that journey. Through programmes like the Professional Graduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning (PgCTL), along with mentoring and our teacher community, we work alongside teachers as they grow from the classroom into wider roles. The system that starts with the teacher. And stays with them.

For the Love of Teaching.

Sources and further reading: U.S. Department of Education.