The link between school leadership, staff job satisfaction and retention

This paper presents new evidence on the link between staff perceptions of school leadership and job satisfaction, drawing on three waves of The Engagement Platform data collected from over 4000 members of school staff in England.

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25.2.2025

The link between school leadership, staff job satisfaction and retention

In almost every industry, one of the most important resources available to an organisation is its staff. For instance, in education, several studies have shown the benefits to children of being taught by a higher quality teacher (Hanushek, 2014); seminal work conducted by Hanushek and Rivkin (2010) suggested that a pupil taught by one of the most ‘effective’ teachers makes between 0.1 and 0.3 standard deviations more progress over the course of an academic year than their peers taught by an ‘average’ teacher. It is therefore vital that schools can keep talented individuals motivated and engaged in their job, and do not lose their best members of staff to other employers (either within or outside the education sector).

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What's inside

The main issue that the paper addresses is the link between staff views on school leadership, their job satisfaction and staff retention. Our main finding is that staff views on school leadership in the autumn term are linked with their job satisfaction and whether they have left their job by the end of the academic year.

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