Top 10 Tips for New School Leaders

Being a school leader is a challenging yet rewarding role. It requires a balance of management skills, leadership qualities, and the ability to navigate complex situations. The most successful leaders also have the capacity for deep empathy and a passion for education.

Two former independent school heads recently joined Blackbaud’s K–12 team. Tory Amorello was head of Waterville Valley Academy in New Hampshire and Emily Heim was head of Gardner School of Arts & Sciences in Vancouver, Washington. We took the opportunity to sit down and ask them if they had advice for someone entering a new school leadership role. While their perspectives varied slightly—East Coast to West Coast—common themes emerged in those conversations.

Read on to discover their valuable insights.

On Community Building

1. Model healthy behaviors and celebrate your community

Tory: School leadership is a 24/7 job. Even in a day school, you hold responsibility for the lives and livelihoods of so many people: students and families, sure, but also faculty and staff. It can be overwhelming, and it certainly never stops. You must find a way to make peace with the fact that the job never ends. Develop some strategies for getting out of your office and engaging with your community. This will not only support your longevity in the job but also model healthy and positive community engagement. It is both form and function!

2. Build trust within your community

Emily: Building trust is fundamental for effective school leadership. You have to actively listen to different constituent groups, including teachers, parents, students, and board members. You’ve got to discover what’s really going on, find the pain points, and understand how you can support the people involved. And you don’t always have to listen to the loudest voice in the room. They may not represent the majority or be the most important voice you need to hear. By engaging with the quiet ones—who also deserve your time and energy—you build trust within the entire community.

On Engaging with Students

3. Make time for students

Emily: Most people who become school leaders do so because they care about children. The farther you get away from that, the more you start to lose the trust of your community and the joy in your work. I would always try and get to the preschool classroom or try and read some books to kindergarten students or just go out during recess. In fact, I would plug recess into my calendar throughout the week, knowing I may not be able to do it every time.

4. Remember why you were called to schools in the first place

Tory: Be disciplined about scheduling time to interact with students. Kids are fun and interesting, and the likely reason you chose to work in education. I’d make sure I was part of the dorm duty rotation because interacting with kids in their “home life” allowed them to see me as a person who didn’t live in an office, and getting to see the kids surrounded by their own stuff allowed me to get a better sense of their interests and values.

On Time Management

5. Block off time for various stakeholders

Emily: Time blocking for different constituency groups helps maintain focus and build connections. This is true for all leaders, but especially new ones. Allocating specific times for teachers, parents, board members, and staff ensures that each group receives the attention they need. It also helps you organize your day, your week, your month, etc., so you can stay motivated and effective.

6. Schedule time for deep work and encourage others to do the same

Tory: Many days in the lives of a school leader are necessarily reactive: things happen, and emergencies, crises, and last-minute pivots can’t be scheduled. But setting aside time, whether it’s weekly or monthly, to do some writing, thinking, and visioning, will help keep your ideas fresh and enable you to lead the school in new and creative ways. 

On Building Credibility as a Leader

7. Be willing to say when you don’t know (…but let’s find out!)

Tory: As a top administrator, you’re expected to see and know everything that relates to everyone in every role. That’s just not possible. Saying, “I don’t know, but let’s find out!” models humility, openness to information gathering, and—most importantly—builds your credibility as a leader. You’re surrounded by people who are invested in the mission of your school who come with their own opinions and experience. They are essential to your success. Use them!

This also means you can delegate tasks and projects to team members based on their strengths and expertise. Admitting you cannot do everything is not a sign of weakness. Delegation is a sign of confidence—both in your own authority and in the skills within your team—and can foster deeper collaboration and professional development.

8. Learn to differentiate between problems and dilemmas

Emily: Part of the listening journey for school leaders is learning to distinguish between problems and dilemmas. Problems are day-to-day issues. Say the enrollment director identifies friction in one part of the admissions process. If you let them talk through it, you may hear that they already have a solution. So, you can say, “OK, let’s do it.” That may not only resolve the problem, but the affirmation you give also shows that you trust that person and their expertise—helping you build leadership skills within your team.

In contrast, dilemmas are ongoing challenges that require long-term strategies and thoughtful consideration. Many schools are facing declining enrollment. That isn’t something that can be fixed in one year. It may start with a 3-year plan that involves not only your enrollment staff but also your board, your business office, and your advancement and marketing teams to work together on sustainable solutions. People need to know that you have a strategy to address the dilemma, even if it is not offering immediate answers.

Final Thoughts

9. Understand management vs. leadership

Emily: I highly recommend that anybody stepping into any leadership position does some deep reading on management versus leadership. Management is handling day-to-day tasks such as setting rules, creating plans, and ensuring that everyone knows their roles. It’s about providing structure and making sure that the necessary tasks are completed. On the other hand, leadership is more inspirational and supportive. A leader is someone who brings people together, inspires them, and keeps everyone aligned with a common vision. Leadership involves creating connections, dealing with big issues in a caring manner, and supporting others in their roles. Management and leadership are both important in school administration.

10. Have a plan

Tory: As the famous Mike Tyson saying goes, “Everyone has a plan until you get punched in the face!” There are more illustrious versions of this quote, but sometimes this is just where you are. Having a plan for your school—both a high-level strategic vision that you share publicly and talk about often and a daily and weekly plan for topics and projects you want your team to prioritize—will help keep you all focused and enable you to recover more quickly from the daily hiccups that can derail progress.