Leading with Explicit Empathy

It isn't enough to have empathy - we need to communicate it clearly to our teams.

There’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately: how often, in school leadership, we feel empathy…but we don’t necessarily say it out loud.

Emperor Penguins huddling together

In a huddle of Emperor penguins, there is a wave sent rippling across the flock when one penguin moves 2cm away from the others - it triggers a response that the flock needs to shift in order to keep everyone warm. Teachers can’t send out similar wave signals to us; it is crucial that we, as school leaders, do everything in our power to recognise what sort of conditions a main scale teacher experiences and to communicate to them how we are shifting dynamically and bearing their struggles in mind.

Teachers can’t see the empathy we felt in the meeting when we made a strategic whole school decision which will affect their day-today.
They only see what we choose to communicate.

That’s where this idea of explicit empathy comes in.
For me, it simply means: don’t be afraid to say the quiet part out loud.

Name the pressure.
Acknowledge the reaction.
Show your workings.
Let people see your integrity.

If you don’t, the message lands badly, even when the thinking behind it was completely fair and well-intentioned.

Leadership Distance Is Real (and Not a Moral Failing)

We don’t always like to admit it, but the structure of school leadership creates a natural distance between leaders and the everyday realities of the classroom. It just does.

Even if you teach a lot (as an Assistant Headteacher I teach many hours a week), you still don’t quite experience school the way a full‑timetable teacher does. And if you’re in the Deputy or Headship tier, that distance has potential to grow - not through lack of care, but simply through the nature of the job.

Because of that, being empathic isn’t enough on its own. You have to be Explicitly Empathetic.

The Lens That Keeps Me Grounded

Whenever something new comes across my desk such as a policy, a reminder, an expectation - I try to look at it through a very simple lens:

“Right. What would a teacher who has five periods today, plus a break duty, plus a parents’ evening this week, actually think of this?”

This lens is invaluable. It doesn’t always mean the initiative gets scrapped - often, the idea is still absolutely valid. But it does help shape it. And when it doesn’t change the idea itself, it definitely changes how I talk about it.

This is the bit leaders sometimes forget: we think with empathy, but we don’t communicate that empathy explicitly and so staff assume “Well, they’ve not thought about us at all” when actually… we have. We just didn’t say we had.

An Example of Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud

Here’s the kind of phrasing I mean - and it’s based on something I heard just this week from our Headteacher:

“We’re asking all staff to attend CPD on Monday night. Although this is a statutory part of our calendar, I completely understand that many of you will be feeling the pressure of mock marking and finding it hard to see the benefit of an hour spent on CPD.
Remember that you are the most expensive commodity we have in school, and time spent developing your professional skill set is never wasted. We also try to make these sessions as practical as possible, so that you leave feeling you’ve gained something rather than simply had time taken from you.”

Same expectation = staff attend CPD. Same professional message = CPD is important.
Explicit empathy woven through it = real examples of the things real teachers are facing.

Being Clear About Flex - and Clear About Limits

Explicit empathy doesn’t mean “anything goes.” It’s not about lowering expectations or abandoning routines. It’s simply about naming the “upper and lower limits” of what’s reasonable.

Let’s take a request for teachers to start each lesson standing at the door. We brought this in to calm the corridors and to foster belonging through lesson starts.
Is the itinerant teacher, sprinting across the building to log into a slow computer, “non-compliant” when they’re not standing at their door greeting students? No - they’re simply adapting. A good leader will notice and appreciate that.

Great leadership sounds like:

“Here’s the expectation”

“Here’s why it matters”

“Here’s where we can flex, and here’s where we can’t”

“Here’s what we expect you to do if you’re struggling”

That is Explicit Empathy.

The Difference Between Authentic and Performative Empathy

Here’s the thing: teachers can spot performative empathy a mile away.
Saying “we know it’s a busy time” when you haven’t actually thought about the reality of 22+ teaching hours, itinerant rooming, or SEN paperwork does the opposite of what was intended.

For empathy to land, it has to be:

real

felt

informed by lived experience or careful listening

visible in the decisions you made before communicating anything

specific, not generic

And leaders need to actually say the bit where they show their working:

what alternatives they considered

why they discounted them

what pressure points they named

which groups of staff they thought about

where the flex points are

This is what makes teachers feel seen rather than managed.

Who This Really Matters For

If I had to pick the group most often forgotten, it’s the colleague with the full timetable, no TLR, and no protected leadership time - just quietly carrying the school on their shoulders.

Explicit empathy is, in many ways, written for them.

A Simple Ask for Leadership Teams

If you take nothing else from this, take this:

It is not enough to have integrity.
You have to show it.

Maybe bring this to your next SLT meeting:

• Where do we unintentionally create pressure without naming it?

• Who in our staff body feels the weight of our expectations differently and how can we communicate that explicitly?

One leader using Explicit Empathy can shift relationships. A whole SLT using it can shift culture.

Thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed this article. Please let me know if there are times when you have gone out of your way to be Explicitly Empathetic.