Creating Positive School Cultures and Communities to Improve Learning with Hayley Taylor

Jenny Cole: 1:02

Hello and welcome to Positively Leading the Podcast. I'm Jenny Cole, your host, and it's my absolute pleasure today to be joined by Hayley Taylor, who is currently the principal of Canning Vale Primary School, a school south of Perth in WA. Welcome, Hayley.

Hayley Taylor: 1:17

Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here this morning.

Jenny Cole: 1:20

So, while this podcast is predominantly for new and aspiring leaders, I was really keen to have Hayley on she's in a leadership role for a long time, but I wanted for you to hear her story to show you that ending up in the school that you envision that you will be in as a leader is really a linear process. In fact, it's sometimes more like a cha-cha, with plenty of compromise and moving backwards and forwards depending on where you are and what's in front of you. So, hayley, perhaps we can start with you sharing your leadership journey from a tiny little school in the weight belt up to where you are now. Do you want to share with us your journey?

Hayley Taylor: 2:04

Yes. So I guess I had a really short stint as an early childhood teacher but started my career out in the country. So I think in the country you're given the opportunity to explore things at a more rapid rate. So I was on maternity leave from having twins and the school where I was at called me up and asked me to apply for the deputy's position at the time. So I went from a stay-at-home mum to a deputy. That was short-lived. There was an incident at the school and the principal at the time was removed from the school and so I got tapped three days out from term four to take on the principal's role. So I guess my start to leadership was quite quick and quite was an interesting time.

Hayley Taylor: 2:50

So we stayed out in the wheatbelt while our kids were little. My girls did Kingi right through to year eight at the school where I was at, which was the district high school, and we chose that so that they had stability and it was a really great place to sort of grow up. That they had stability and it was a really great place to sort of grow up. And then we decided to relocate to the Metro so that they could finish their secondary schooling and my husband had started FIFO, so we actually moved in 2020 and I took a level three position at a little level three primary school here in the Metro, at Jarredale, which was a wonderful little school.

Hayley Taylor: 3:29

But it was an opportunity for me to downsize so that I could focus on our family and the transition. For us moving to school, the demands weren't as much and I had more time to be family focused. And then, once I'd sort of spent some time at Gerardale and put some of the things I needed to put in place, I then started looking for more of a challenge, which is where I'm at now. I've moved back up to a level five at Canningvale Primary.

Jenny Cole: 3:57

Yes, so the whole range of schools small schools, big district high schools, primary schools. You talked about making decisions based on what your family needed, and I think that's something that we underestimate or we don't talk enough about. When you and I met, which was some time ago, I was working for growth coaching and you were really new in your leadership role and knew nothing. You had twins, they were toddlers and you were balancing all the stuff. There's two questions in there One's about balance, but one's about how do you make those decisions about your career when you're doing everything for everybody else?

Hayley Taylor: 4:35

I think I've come to realise that balance is an enigma, so I don't think it really exists, but I feel that I've had to sort of manage my expectations. So if school was really busy, so say like term four, where you've got reporting and other stuff, I know that I need to bed down that time and ride through it and then so some things at home don't get done or they don't get prioritised because my focus is at school. But then some of the terms where you've got more of a relaxed term if there's even such a thing but you know you've got some time to invest in some things at home as a family. So I feel like it's just knowing the ebbs and flows of the job and your family and being able to divert your energy based on where it needs to be essentially Prioritising. You've got to just focus on the things that are actually important and not get bogged down in things that essentially don't actually really matter. Learning to say no, oh excellent advice.

Jenny Cole: 5:40

I was going to ask you about the time when you said yes. So you were a young mum, two small kids, way out in the bush and people are tapping you on the shoulder to say will you step into this really complex role? Do you remember way back when, when you were a young mum and two small children and someone's tapped you on the shoulder to take over a very complex, underperforming school? Do you remember what helped you make the decision? Why did you say yes?

Hayley Taylor: 6:11

So why did I say yes? Because I knew that it made the difference to the staff and the kids. So I could see that some things needed to sort of be put in place and I could see that the community and the kids and the staff were really struggling. And I'm quite competitive. So the idea of the challenge and I think as educators we're people pleasers, so you know, you kind of just like, yep, sure I'll do that, yep, I'll take that on. How hard could it be? Sort of thing you don't quite realise.

Hayley Taylor: 6:42

I did six months in apply for the position, substantively, and I got given the job and I was like, can I think about it? Because I wasn't actually sure if I wanted the job in a permanent capacity, because it's quite a daunting task when you first take on that role, particularly if you don't have a really good support network of people around you. But I guess at the end of the day, the reason educators do their job is because we love people. Schools are all about relationships and the not wanting to let people down and try and do the right thing by the school and the community was kind of what drove my decision to take it on and the fact that I like to have a challenge.

Jenny Cole: 7:26

Yeah, I like that. I like the fact that you're competitive and willing to own that. Talk to us about turning that school around from an underperforming to an excelling, to a high performing team. In the time that you were there, what did you specifically do and what did you have to be aware of?

Hayley Taylor: 7:45

Yes, so I think the first two years was a really hard slog. It was. The behaviours at the school were pretty drastic, so we had a red flag in suspensions and the behaviours at the school were mirrored within the community as well. So it wasn't just a school-based issue, it was a wider community issue as well and, given the circumstances that I took over, that left some distaste within the community as well. So I feel the behavior was the first focus. You know it's that you need a safe learning environment for the kids to be able to learn. You know you need an environment that's functioning so that teaching can take place and learning can happen. So we started with that and I created a PBS team and we undertook the Positive Behaviour Support School program, which was a good way of us just being able to reflect on all of that.

Hayley Taylor: 8:41

I think probably the biggest impact was that within the community and the kids there was a line in the sand. So previously decisions were made based on who it was and the reaction you might get. So then there's no consistency of or fairness of, consequences and or expectations. So I don't even know how many prohibition orders I wrote in my first two years to families just saying you know if you want to be on school grounds, this is the way you need to behave. So it was really tough the first couple of years, but I just kept the line and just said this is how we behave when we're in this environment Employed some really great staff.

Hayley Taylor: 9:24

I think the team that you have around you are really essential and it's tough going when you've got some really tricky behaviours at the school, but if you've got really good processes in place and you listen to your staff and you're there for them, so I see our role as leaders and educators as we're a service to the community. So I have always tried to make my teacher's job easy by making sure I'm removing as much of the other stuff so that they can focus on teaching and if they know you've got their back if it's needed, they're happy to sort of muddle through and try and do things on their own. When it comes to the crunch, they've got somebody there that will support them. And I think this sort of banding together consultation created this really cohesive, really strong, positive culture within the staff, which then molded out to the kids, because you're modeling. The way you're treating each other is then modeled and the kids are seeing that and then out from there to the community. So I think it's a really slow progress.

Hayley Taylor: 10:32

But there's that saying. I can't remember who the guy's name is. I used to have it up on my wall at school. The standard you walk past is the standard you accept. It's just the little day-to-day saying doing what you say you're going to do following through, having consistency, same expectations for staff as well as students.

Hayley Taylor: 10:52

So you can't ask something of the kids if, as a staff, you're not prepared to follow that as well. So it's walking the talk and just ensuring that all the decisions that you have or that you're making are for the kids. So really early on, when I was making decisions as a new leader, you're like, oh my goodness, like it took a lot. Decision-making was a skill that you have to build and develop, but knowing that is this in the best interest of the kids, yes, then you can sort of go home at night knowing that you've done the best you can with what you've got.

Jenny Cole: 11:28

I really like that. We talk a lot about high expectations and what I heard there was you had high expectations for your staff, for the community and for the kids. It wasn't just one or the other, you needed all three. And the other thing that I kind of heard was a real. They talk about moral purpose, but it's about what are my values and morals, and if my value is that we're all going to learn here, then setting up those systems and processes and expectations so that everybody learns, everybody grows, everybody's safe. And you talked about decision-making. Once you've got that kind of moral purpose or your values, does that make decision-making easier.

Hayley Taylor: 12:10

Yeah, definitely.

Hayley Taylor: 12:11

And I think as a leader, as a classroom teacher, you constantly get feedback from your kids and from families and it's often praised and you develop these really two-way relationships, whereas as a leader you don't get that same feedback. So the feedback you often get is the negative the parent complaints, the staff complaints, the difficult children so your interactions are very one-sided compared to a teacher. So I feel like early on in my career I felt, no matter what I did or what was going on, it was never enough, because you're only getting that one side of the coin essentially, and I feel like as a leader of a school, unless your moral compass is aligned with the vision and what you're trying to do, it's never going to be successful or authentic, because you can't live, eat and breathe a vision or a value or a school that doesn't sit authentically with who you are. So I think like shopping for a school is like shopping for a partner in a relationship, because it needs to be able to match up and you need to have a similar moral compass, I feel.

Jenny Cole: 14:46

That's such good advice. Some students don't fit into some schools or into some classrooms or into some teachers, but I think the same is for leaders. I've got a couple of people that I coach who are in schools that just don't feel right, and they've done everything that they can do and it doesn't seem to be a match. You know they're being perfectly good principals, but there's this school is not for me, and so for you to articulate that there sometimes can be a mismatch and sometimes you can get over it, but sometimes there's no, this is not for me or it's no longer for me. It's time to move on. I think that's really good advice for people to know that you won't be successful, it won't feel authentic everywhere.

Hayley Taylor: 15:29

Yeah, definitely. And I just to say, yeah, schools are like a little ecosystem, and so, yeah, if you're not thriving in that, then it's time to find another one.

Jenny Cole: 15:39

I know that you've done some work with independent public principal mentoring programs and the Future Leaders Framework. How have these experiences shaped you and what kind of advice do you give or how do you support both established principals and those who are perhaps looking to leadership? What sort of advice do you give? What sorts of support do they need.

Hayley Taylor: 16:04

So I guess IPS like when we transitioned to an IPS school it was the way of bringing the community on board. So the staff and the school were already believing that we were a high performing school and the changes we've made were really good. So then the transition to IPS was just a way of bringing the community along. In terms of advice to middle leaders, I feel like the transition for middle leaders if you're transitioning from a teacher to a middle leader in the same school, can be really tricky because you already have relationships that are established in a colleague sort of role and so when you transition to leadership there can be teething problems in terms of that role change and the relationship change. I guess probably the best advice I can give them is to not take on other people's monkeys. So as leaders or an executive team, everybody just feels like it's your job to fix everything, but that's not actually the case. It's your job to run an efficient and effective school and the way that you do that is by everybody doing their job and their role effectively. It's your job to support and facilitate them so that they can undertake that.

Hayley Taylor: 17:20

So I think really early on in my leadership career I just about killed myself because everybody would come to me and say you know, hayley, I need you to fix this, and then I'd go about my day trying to fix stuff. That was essentially not my job and I think the first sort of six months of my principal job I did more teaching and deputy roles than I actually did principal roles. So I think asking the question, what do you need? How can I support you, is different to yep, leave that with me, I'll fix that. It's facilitating and supporting and upskilling people to be able to undertake the job rather than you taking it on.

Hayley Taylor: 18:01

I guess also, as a leader, you need to be intrinsically motivated, because you're not going to get that external feedback from kids or parents saying what a wonderful job you're doing. Well, you do sometimes, which is lovely, but it's not the same as a classroom teacher. So you need to be pretty clear on your moral purpose and ensuring that at the end of the day, you're going home and you've done the best you can with what you had and the decisions you made sit okay with, because you're never going to be able to please everybody. That's just the job. But if you're making decisions that serve the most amount of people for the right reasons, then you just need to be comfortable with that.

Jenny Cole: 18:46

Yeah, how do you become comfortable with that discomfort?

Hayley Taylor: 18:50

I think being able to develop the skills to leave school at home. I know, really early on I'd be at home and I'd have guilt that I was at home with the kids. But I wasn't really at home. My head was still at school. And then when I was at school, I felt bad because I was at school and I felt like I should be at home. So my head was never really in one place at a time. It was kind of trying to manage all of it all at once. So I'm really careful about bringing work home. Now, when I'm at school, I'm effective and efficient. Now, when I'm at school, I'm effective and efficient, but when I leave school, I try and leave school and come home and be with the family or do something that fills my bucket.

Hayley Taylor: 19:33

I think we spend all day with people asking stuff of us and you're constantly serving people, which is very draining and emotionally. Being a principal or a leader of a school is one of the most emotionally draining jobs you can do. So you need to be able to fill that bucket, because you can't. I've got a quote on my desktop at school that says self-care means the world gets the best of you, not what's left of you. I feel like you need to be segregating that so that you've got energy and capacity to actually do your job. Does that answer the question?

Jenny Cole: 20:12

Oh, that is such good advice. That is such good advice. The question I have is you said when you're at school you try to be as efficient and as effective as possible. What sort of strategies have you developed over the years to be super efficient when you're on campus?

Hayley Taylor: 20:27

So I guess the realisation that you could spend 24 hours a day at school and the job still wouldn't be done. So it's not a job that you're ever going to have a to-do list. That's clear, because as soon as you do one, there's three more that join that. So I guess, being strategic in how you prioritise what needs to be done, so we will have a yearly plan based on the business plan, which then gets broken up into terms, which then gets broken up into weeks. So as an exec team, we have a look about okay, what are our priorities for this year? How are we going to make that happen? Let's break it down into chunks of workable things for each term and then we're diverting that workload out. Okay, so who's responsible for this? Who's responsible for this? And just being able to really prioritise. In saying that, you also have to be super flexible. So reading, gauging the energy levels and the capacity of your staff constantly through your teams and your collaborative teams.

Hayley Taylor: 21:33

I've implemented a lot of change in a short period of time at Canningvale and it kind of snuck up on everybody. So this year, going forward, I made a statement and I said to everybody look, I acknowledge we've had a lot of change and a lot of things that we've implemented. So 2025 is about embedding, consolidating. So let's do what we're doing and do it really well, but I'm claiming that there'll be limited new change that we're going to introduce. So you need to be able to manage how your staff are travelling with what you're trying to do, because you're never going to be successful at implementing your business plan if you're not actually gauging how the staff are coping with what you're hoping to implement.

Jenny Cole: 22:18

That was going to be my next question. It's a fairly established staff where you are, with some people who've been there for a considerable length of time, which is great. They are experienced and keen. But with the change agenda which you said has been quite fast, how have they coped and what have you done to push people through the changes?

Hayley Taylor: 22:41

yeah. So I guess, yeah, very blessed to have a really stable staff at Canningvale. So, and I've never met a school like it. So all of the relief staff at Canningvale are all most of them are ex-teachers, so that level of support there is amazing. So I think for me the staff were quite apprehensive.

Hayley Taylor: 23:01

As a new leader coming into a school, you always have to be mindful of how you're presenting to the community, because you don't want to come and override everything that they've done. Because, like you said, I have foundation staff members that have been there the life of the school so they've seen principals come and go, they've seen department changes come and go. So I feel that, particularly at Canning Vale, they need to have collaboration and they need to have input and they need to have conversations around why we're doing it and what we're doing and then bringing it back to the kids. I feel that if you implement change at a slower rate so if you pick some people that are really keen to have a go at what you're wanting to implement and then they see the benefits of it, then they talk to their peers about how yeah, this has had a really positive impact in my class Then staff in general.

Hayley Taylor: 23:58

You don't get into teaching because you don't want to help kids. You get into teaching because you want to help kids and do the best by the kids. The staff can see the benefits of what that change is having in their classroom or in their day-to-day running of their classroom. Then they're open to that. So it's just finding a process that works with your staff and within your school to be able to collaborate, consult and then implement it at a rate that's going to be sustainable.

Jenny Cole: 24:29

And that comes down to knowing your people relationships. I know one of the things that you've tried to do is expand the middle leadership roles and increase the number of middle leaders in your school, which has been about building different relationships with those teachers that have stepped up into those roles. How have you developed those middle leaders and what kind of relationships do you need to build with them that are perhaps different? Just a regular standard classroom teacher?

Hayley Taylor: 25:01

Yes, and going back to that change thing as well, I think trust is a huge thing at the school I'm currently at. It's a huge thing at all schools, but particularly at Canning Vale. I had to sort of really follow through in what I had said and just proving that you genuinely want their feedback and you're interested in their perspective. You know, as a leader, I haven't been in the classroom for 15 years, so I don't claim to be a professional. I don't claim to have the skill set of a classroom teacher, so I need them to give me feedback of what it's like, what's happening in the classroom, so that we can work as a team. So I kind of sold it as a communication collaboration between the classroom and the exec. So the changes and things that we're doing with strategically are then being fed back to the classroom and then we're getting feedback back from them, which has been really positive, and we've been able to also gauge the well-being of and also we did some training.

Hayley Taylor: 26:06

So the middle leaders got training and they got to know a little bit about them as a person and what their strengths are and how they operate with people, because I think the better you know yourself and the more reflective you are of who you are as the person and how you interact with others, the better you can lead other people. So I'm a bit of a self-help junkie in terms of podcasts and books and things like that, so being able to sort of understand your working so that you can better support others. So our middle leaders did a DISC profile and they did a workshop as well around what it takes to be a middle leader. I think that's still a work in progress and the feedback we got at the end of this year was that they did feel like they were just given everybody's problems to then come and vent that back to the exec. So we've put some stuff in place to make it so that we've got more purpose and planning behind those meetings to ensure that it's not just about venting, it's actually for school collaboration.

Jenny Cole: 27:12

Great answer because it depends on the context of your school.

Jenny Cole: 27:15

So, with very experienced teachers who are very keen and committed and most of whom were really good at their craft, that doesn't necessarily make you a good leader, but it seems like prior to you coming in, great teaching staff and then leadership was somewhat disconnected and you provided those middle leaders as a conduit of information up and backwards and, as you say, to consult and to collaborate.

Jenny Cole: 27:42

But that's had its life. Those group of leaders that you trained up, they want to do more. They actually want to perhaps be leading the instructional change rather than just sitting, having a whinge fest and being just a communication conduit. And so this is a way you know, things evolve over time and it depends on the context of your school, and what impresses me is that you can see that from the outside and just let it happen, provide the training and let them guide you as to what sort of support and structures they need. Going forward, do you have plans that they will be driving more of the instructional leadership? Where are you up to with that, your instructional framework and those sorts of things?

Hayley Taylor: 28:24

Yeah. So we decided to keep a two-year cycle for the hit leaders because with the union dilemma we had at the beginning of this year a lot of our meetings and stuff that got interrupted, so they felt like they didn't have a really good year. To sort of consolidate that. We've also had a look at levels of leadership within the school and potential other areas of middle leaders, so instructional coaches, some curriculum leaders, so looking at different sort of roles versus leadership. So when I arrived they sort of said, oh, we do lots of leadership here, and so one person did sort of the prac students and I was like, well, that's more of a role. That's not necessarily leadership. So being given an extra job isn't necessarily a leadership role. So trying to really clarify the levels of leadership and what you need to undertake in each of those levels We've got a number of senior teachers, so then asking them to sort of step up and take on some extra bits that they're passionate about.

Hayley Taylor: 29:25

So I'm really big on developing leadership, but it needs to be around your strengths. You're never going to fit somebody into a box if that's not where their natural sort of strengths are. There's skills that you can develop as a leader I have no doubt about that. But then some people have a natural affinity for certain aspects. So I feel that when you're starting out as a leader, it's so much easier to work within that than it is to try something that you find doesn't come as natural.

Hayley Taylor: 29:59

And I think distributed leadership at a school is doing a expertise analysis or an interest analysis of all of the staff of your school and going okay, so this is something you're really passionate about. How would you feel about leading that? So it's about tying in strengths and expertise across your school so that you're sharing the load and also you don't want a school where this was a little bit of what happened to me. So the deputy that I had was a foundation staff member. She was with me for a term and then had to take a very long leave of absence. The knowledge that amazing lady had was copious, but nobody else had that knowledge. So then when they're not at the school, that makes it really really tricky. So distributed leadership and having multiple people that are upskilled then has a sustainability benefit as well, because you're not stuck with one person. You know the gospel of your school.

Jenny Cole: 30:57

Yes, yes, so it's a real risk in any organisation for one person to have all of the information. But I love what you said there about focusing on people's strengths and interests, because then it won't feel like just another job. They're doing the thing that they're passionate about, whether that's literacy or say or whatever it is. It will feel less demanding for those classroom teachers if they're doing something they love?

Hayley Taylor: 31:21

Definitely yeah. It's an energy builder, not an energy taker.

Jenny Cole: 31:31

That's exactly right. You said you're a self-help guru. What have you read? What have you focused on? What's the stuff that's made the biggest difference to you as a human, but also in your career?

Hayley Taylor: 31:37

Me as a human, so podcasts were kind of my thing. So I love Lewis Howes, which he's the school of greatness. Jay Shetty, Mel Robbins there's millions. Brendan Bouchard he's the motivational guru. So I will regularly listen to the cast driving to and from work and when I run or I'm out walking I'll cast it. Just, you have access to so much information from so many different people without having to read like an entire book, so essentially like an hour podcast with a person, you're getting the snippets of the best stuff. And then I've potentially gone and bought multiple books of different people based on books, based on podcasts that I've listened to. I love Brené Brown, I love Simon Sinek, Covey, the Trust is really been essential for me. And then Educational Leadership by Viviane what's her name?

Jenny Cole: 32:34

Robinson Viviane Robinson.

Hayley Taylor: 32:36

So that's it. Yes, so that's been one of my more recent things, but I feel like my focus has been around around the organisational culture and I feel like if you get that right, everything else falls into place. So if you have a orderly learning environment with staff that are engaged, then the rest just happens. You don't really have to try that much. So I guess the things that I've looked at are an analysis of my leadership and the impact of my relationships and how I show up to work every day to make sure that I'm supporting or doing the best I can by the staff that I have. So I guess probably one of my strengths is being able to sort of meet people and meet them where they're at and know how I need to alter my interaction to be able for them to feel comfortable, safe, valued and to be able to get the most out of them. And I know that sounds like you've been a bit of a chameleon. One of the best pieces of advice I ever got given as a beginning leader was that your staff are like your classroom. So every day you walk into a classroom as a teacher and you alter your interaction as a classroom teacher for all the little people in your class. So some people love quiet praise and some people need to be acknowledged in public and so your staff are exactly the same, just in a bigger forum. So it's been able to sort of pick up on all of that low-level things that you need to know so that you can then alter how you're interacting with everybody.

Hayley Taylor: 34:22

And as a new leader to Canningvale, like, it took me a bit to find the currency. So our staff are very competitive and so I found doing a big whole school staff sort of fun activity once per term is something that they love and thrive on and it really builds the energy and momentum of the staff. So that's something. But it's trial and error. You have to trial different things. So I tried like little acknowledgement tickets that people could write for each other, but that wasn't sort of taking off. But that's something that worked really well in my last school. So it's just trialling different things to see what the currency is of the staff that you have and then, yeah, working to that.

Jenny Cole: 35:11

I like the analogy of your school is your classroom, because, just like your classroom, you start each year and repeat your expectations and you adapt according to who's in front of you, and sometimes you go faster or slower than you want to, but you have good planning, so you know where you're heading towards. I think that analogy is beautiful, but what I particularly liked hearing you say was that you adapt according to who's in front of you and people often question whether or not that's authentic if you're being that chameleon, but I actually think it's emotional intelligence which is who's in front of me, what do they need and what do I need to give them.

Hayley Taylor: 35:49

Yeah, I guess you're adapting, but you're still being yourself. Does that make sense? So you're not promising things or you're not being yourself? Does that make sense? So you're not promising things or you're not being ingenuine? You are literally just modifying the interaction so that it's meeting that person's social needs. So, yeah, it is emotional intelligence. It's about the way to read people and meet them where they're at. In saying that you still have to have a level where staff are adhering to the code of conduct and you know. So there's that line between, yes, I'll meet your needs, but you also need to be professional in meeting the needs of the department and the school. So it's not allowing things that aren't allowable, but it's altering your interactions so that you're getting the most out of your personnel.

Jenny Cole: 36:38

Yeah, fantastic. And the other sort of part of the authenticity is everything that you've described, because when you described your previous school and this one, or your previous big school and this one, it was all about that orderly learning environment, that making sure that people were supported and felt safe, and by that parents, kids and staff, that making sure that people were supported and felt safe, and by that parents, kids and staff that's your authenticity. You know, that's what Hayley's known for. I'm going to make sure that this organisational culture is a particular thing. Looking ahead, do you have any goals? You said you're competitive. What are your goals for yourself in the next sort of chapter of your leadership journey? Yeah, so I've been asked this a lot.

Hayley Taylor: 37:18

So my girls are 18 in. What have we got six days? And so everyone sort of said to me what are you going to do with this newfound freedom of having adult children? You know, I feel like there's so much to be done at Canning Vale, where I'm at, and the school and the community will actually. Let's be honest, all schools and all communities thrive on consistency, so having constant change of leadership is really tricky for schools. But I would really like growing people is where my sort of passion is, so I'd like to try and develop that in some way. I'm not sure what it's going to look like yet, but yeah, sort of broaching, maybe potentially looking at sort of supporting the Leadership Institute or just investigating ways that I can sort of broaden my reach. I love the mentoring of principals and I really like the mentoring of staff and building capacity of people. So I feel like that would be sort of my next step, but how and why and what that's going to look like yet to be decided.

Jenny Cole: 38:25

So what advice do you give to aspiring leaders? What's the best piece of advice you got? What advice do you give to others that you work with?

Hayley Taylor: 38:34

The best piece of advice I got given, I guess it is just keep the kids to the heart of all the decisions that you're making. So schools are so relationship based, but there's just layers and layers and layers of relationships. So I feel like the core business often gets a little bit muddled because you're trying to appease so many different people on so many different levels, and what's best for the kids isn't always best for the staff or isn't always easiest for the staff. So I've really tried to make sure that the decisions I'm making are in the best interests of the most amount of kids, so that we are doing the best we can with what we got.

Jenny Cole: 39:17

Yeah, lovely. And when you look back over your career, what's a mistake or what's something that trips you up over and over again, what's a lesson that you're still learning and still working on, or something you'd do differently if you had your time again? I wrote myself some notes.

Hayley Taylor: 39:34

I do remember early on, my regional executive director at the time said to me just tell them that this is what's happening, because you're the big boss and that's why you get paid the big bucks. That advice did not work for me very well at all. So I guess, yeah, yeah, you would think as a regional executive director, that you'd be getting better advice, but anyways. So I just think that knowledge between staff want to be consulted, they want to be collaborated with and they want to know that they have a voice because the school is as much theirs as it is yours. But at the end of the day, you need to balance that collaboration with decisiveness because at the end of the day, you are the person who is end-line responsibility for those decisions. So I feel like this is probably the biggest lesson I've learned.

Hayley Taylor: 40:23

Early on I over-collaborated A because I was not confident in the decisions I was making, because I was new and making big decisions has a huge impact on people's lives. So you want to make sure you get it right, but you can over consult. So, knowing that balance between consulting, getting people's feedback, getting a gauge of where everybody is and how everybody feels about it, but then at the end of the day, it's your job to make the decision. That's been my toughest. Yeah, it's still my toughest yeah.

Hayley Taylor: 40:57

It's still a work in progress, oh absolutely Absolutely.

Jenny Cole: 41:01

But I, like I think that's a journey for everybody is that sometimes we do over collaborate, or the opposite is sometimes true for some new leaders. We just think we've got to make all the decisions and yeah, and so those lessons we learn over and over again and sometimes we get better and sometimes we don't. So, hayley, it has been an absolute pleasure talking to you, as always, and it's been delightful for me to follow your journey from brand new and super scared. I remember, seriously, you're out on the farm with two little kids and a husband who was off somewhere and you were like, should I be a leader? And I'm like, hang in there, girl. You're was off somewhere and you were like, should I be a leader? And I'm like, hang in there, girl, you're getting there. And you've hung in there and you're doing a great job.

Jenny Cole: 41:43

I love some of those self-help books. I've got a list of books that I go back to and all of those are on them, so I will link to some of those and some of the podcasts in the notes. But thank you so much for joining me and if you are listening to Positively Leading, we would love you to rate and review, because that way more people can hear from our fabulous guests. So until next week, thanks for listening and we'll see you then.

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