Reviewing the self-assessment of governing body performance in colleges and schools in England

Introduction

There is a widely expressed view that all bodies formed for governing, whether comprising directors, trustees or governors and ranging from corporate boards to school or college governing bodies, should practise self-assessment periodically. This view is based on the assumption that self- and group-reflection is beneficial and can lead to continuing improvement. This study, which focuses particularly on the governing bodies of schools and colleges in England, exposes a considerable gap between the rhetoric and the practical difficulties associated with self-assessing the contribution of governing to the leadership of educational institutions. Furthermore, the study suggests that, in the light of the practical difficulties identified, there is a shortage of evidence that self-assessment by governing bodies is an effective tool for improving the contribution of governing to the leadership of schools and colleges.

Context for the governing bodies of schools and colleges

This study is situated in a rapidly developing context for schools and colleges in England operating in a business-like way in a learning marketplace with local and national accountability and an external inspection regime. This context has the following characteristics:

Expansion from a predominantly compliance agenda towards a leadership agenda and aligning with commercial corporate governance changes (described by Morgan et al., 2009: 41) such as the active engagement of stakeholders, which ‘takes a (governing body) beyond compliance to mitigating potential risks and looking for opportunities in the relationship between business and society’.

Ofsted (2011) advises that the best school governing bodies ‘constantly reflect on their own effectiveness and readily make changes to improve’.

There is advice from audit service providers and influential bodies such as the National College for School Leadership, the National Governors Association, National Co-ordinators of Governor Services and the Association of Colleges that governing bodies of schools and colleges should regularly review their contribution to the leadership of their institutions.

The UK Corporate Governance Code includes two relevant sections which may influence practice by governing bodies and inform the advice from the power field around schools and colleges. These sections are (a) the undertaking of a formal and rigorous annual evaluation of boards and their committees and individual directors and (b) the expectation that the annual report from the board will describe how the performance evaluation has been conducted (Tricker, 2012).

Similarly the document Good Governance: A Code for the Voluntary and Community Sector (National Council for Voluntary Organisations, 2010) advises that, under Principle 3 (an effective board will provide good governance and leadership by working effectively both as individuals and as a team), the board should set aside time ‘to reflect on the performance and functioning of the board and its committees as teams and identifying and dealing with any areas of improvement’.

For those further education colleges which have adopted the Colleges’ FE Foundation Code of Governance, there is a ‘commitment’ to undertake an annual self-assessment of the governing body, including the specific review of the chair and individual governors.

There is an increasing appreciation of the importance of the leadership role occupied by the chairs of governing bodies, as shown in studies by Cornforth et al. (2010) and James et al. (2012), and this includes the practice of the personal and collective review of governor performance.

There is an expectation that teachers, professional support staff and managers will adopt a reflective approach to their development and continuous improvement, for example the case presented by Schon (1987) in his book Educating the Reflective Practitioner, which, arguably, should be matched by the reflective practices of the school or college governing body.

The role of the governing body in the performance management and review of the chief executive (the principal, head teacher, etc.) (Epstein and Roy, 2005), where the governing body acts as employer, prompts reflection on the respective roles of appraiser, that is, the governing body, and appraisee, namely the chief executive.

There is recognition from the Association of Colleges’ Review of FE Governance (2013) and the Become a School Maker 2014 (SGOSS) campaign for schools that governing body membership could be broader and more diverse in membership, and there could be an improvement in the calibre of governors.

The case by Keep (2014) in his engagingly titled article What Does Skills Policy Look Like Now the Money Has Run Out? makes clear that at local level the governing bodies of colleges and schools will have to rethink their purpose and viability for the future. This process will inevitably present a very difficult test for all governing bodies.

This context for schools and colleges and their governing bodies connects to the questions encouraged by Blackburn (2014) about ‘self’. When thinking about self-assessment, what is the ‘self’? Is it some notion of the collective intellect of the governing body or the sum total of individuals who make up the governing body? How can either or both of these interpretations be properly addressed? These fundamental questions should be borne in mind throughout this paper alongside the rhetoric associated with the self-assessment or self-review of governing bodies.

Having sketched out a range of contextual influences for the self-assessment of the performance of school and college governing bodies, the next section looks at how self-assessment of boards can operate in theory.

Framework for board evaluation

Kiel and Nicolson (2005: 615) describe the potential benefits of a corporate board evaluation across three levels of organisation, board and individual director if conducted properly. Note, we will return to this critical proviso later in this paper. Kiel and Nicolson advise

Boards who [sic] commit to a regular evaluation process find benefits across these levels in terms of improved leadership, greater clarity of roles and responsibilities, improved teamwork, greater accountability, better decision making, improved communication and more efficient board operations.

Kiel and Nicolson offer the following framework for board evaluation (starting at the top and working through each stage):

What are our objectives?

In effect, our study of school and college governing bodies attempted to understand how such a framework for board evaluation operated in practice.

From the application of this framework for board self-assessment there are a number of assumed benefits. The next section provides further details.

Benefits of self-assessment by school and college governing bodies

Tricker (2012: 422) identifies the potential benefits that accrue from a ‘competent and regular board performance review’. The UK Corporate Governance Code states that ‘the board should undertake a formal and rigorous annual evaluation of its own performance and that of its committees and individual directors’. In the context of a school/college governing body, Tricker’s (2012) benefits would be as follows (excluding items that relate specifically to corporate circumstances such as shareholder matters):

Assess whether an individual governor’s school/college business knowledge and its strategic situation is up to date

Such reflection can, for example, provide an ongoing challenge to attitudes in governing bodies with long-serving governors, create the climate if a change of chairing is needed and identify specific governor training and development priorities.

Given Tricker’s expression of the benefits for boards from self-assessment, the researchers wished to understand how school and college governing bodies were self-assessing and to appreciate what the perceived usefulness of such self-assessment was. However, there are differing approaches to board review, which require some appreciation first.

Differing approaches to board review

In the corporate sector there are differing models for board review. A selection from an extensive literature search provides the following models:

Review all aspects of board structure, processes and practices (Gill et al., 2005; Tricker, 2012)

These differing approaches have relevance for school and college governing bodies too. They prompt fundamental questions about what is being self-assessed by governing bodies. This premise is addressed by the former Learning and Skills Improvement Service with such advisory documents at The Effective College Board: A Set of Diagnostic Tools for College Governing Bodies (LSIS, 2013), which asks 17 self-reflective questions, and Learning to Balance Support and Challenge (LSIS, 2009), which encourages reflection on governor behaviour and style.

There is no standard or articulated governing model in use in the school or college sector. In practice, there has been a tendency towards a compliance focus to address statutory and funding requirements, thus providing the necessary confidence to stakeholders. However, with the rapid extension of accountability of school and college governing bodies by the government and its funding agencies within an increasingly deregulated learning marketplace, governing bodies are having to engage with more creative governing (Gleeson et al., 2009) as well as maintaining compliance governing. In this context there is a combining of ‘stewardship’ and ‘supervisory’ governing processes (ICSA, November 2013) into a behavioural/intentional model of governing.

Before considering the evidence from interviews with individuals with substantial experience of governing and governance, there are some important notes of caution.

Some general notes of caution

Firstly, Blackburn (2014: 64) reminds us about individuals and self-reflection in general. He states,

We are good at deceiving ourselves about our own merits and only need to believe that we have done better than others to become satisfied that this is what we are like. It is as if when it comes to failures, we coat ourselves in Teflon and they do not stick, whereas our supposed successes sit firmly in our memory bank. We also give different kinds of attention to success and to failures. The former are due to ourselves; the latter due to bad luck.

Dunning et al (2004) explore the ‘psychology of faulty self-assessment’ (2004; 99) in considerable detail. In summary Dunning et al explain that people’s self-views hold only a tenuous to modest relationship with their actual behaviour and performance and also people overrate themselves (op cit; 69). Perhaps this is evidence of the inner spin doctor at work (Macaro, 2013).

Secondly, sample literature recognises that the performance of a ‘group’ (the board or governing body) has a number of powerful and complex characteristics in operation. Baron et al. (1993) highlight three important aspects of any group performance: group setting and context, group definition of what is believed to be true and good, the group as a source of social identity and comfort. Janis (1972: 3) observes that ‘[g]roups, like individuals, have shortcomings’, and he goes on to expand the possible consequences of group dynamics to become ‘groupthink’ which Janis (op cit; 9) defines as ‘a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when members’ strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action’.

More specifically, Lencioni (2002) suggests five team dysfunctions to be aware of

Absence of trust

Taking the general and the more detailed observations about the operation of groups or teams into account, there is a considerable note of caution for any governing body attempting to review its own performance.

Thirdly, if we accept the expressed case for undertaking board/governing body performance reviews/self-assessment, there are issues within governing and governance that require further thought. Gill et al. (2005: 271) explain, ‘The establishment of causal links between effective boards and strong organizational performance is fraught with difficulties’.

Furthermore, as Schmidt and Brauer (2006: 14) comment, many writers reviewing corporate activity recognize the lack of a credible link between ‘structural governance and firm performance’.

So, in summary, governors (as with all people) will have a tendency to overrate, governors when in groups can be subject to distracting group dynamics, and understanding the impact of the governing body on the educational institution may require considerable sophistication as causal links are ‘fraught with difficulties’.

Methodology

This study was based on a series of nine interviews with highly experienced commentators who, in all cases, had experience of acting as a governor, and/or trustee and/or non-executive director including self-assessing board/trust/governing body performance. These interviews were mostly conducted face-to-face, using a semi-structured interview procedure by the authors of this paper. It should be noted that both authors have considerable experience of working with governing bodies in the further education college sector in England in either a clerking or advisory capacity. In both cases the authors also have experience of being a board or governing body member.

The majority of ‘highly experienced commentators’ were recommended to the researchers (who are the authors of this paper) and were not previously known to the researchers in a working colleague capacity. Beyond the professional status of interviewees, there was no way of verifying the standard of the interviewees with respect to their reflections on governing and governance of schools and colleges. For example, as there is no nationally prescribed qualification to serve as a governor of a school or college, there is no commonly understood starting point from which to discuss governing practices.

The interviews took place between May and November 2013.

Interviews

In reflecting on self-assessing boards/governing bodies, the nine interviewees provided examples from their governing experience of self-assessment practice. The researchers understood that, whilst there was support for the theoretical benefits of governing body self-assessment, many of the interviewees were reluctant or unable to provide a clear account of self-assessing due to the limited and/or doubtful success of that aspect of their governing experience. However, all interviewees felt able to offer advice on the conditions necessary for useful governing body self-assessment and, in some cases, the particular techniques to be employed.

All interviewees accepted the difficulties in getting beyond the tendency towards delusion in self-assessing – that is, delusion by either overrating or misunderstanding the performance of the governing body which could produce ‘a self-serving assessment’ (Epley and Dunning, 2000). Through discussion with the interviewees, the researchers were able to identify conditions which were believed to be necessary to be in place before effective self-assessing by governing bodies could commence. Establishing the presence and status of these conditions becomes, in effect, the first test of a self-assessing governing body. If these conditions are valid and present, it is possible that delusional ‘reflecting’ could be reduced. This significant finding regarding the importance of pre-assessing conditions and the nature of the necessary conditions are both discussed in detail further in the paper.

The interview responses derived from experience of governing and advice in the light of this experience. (The numbers in parentheses in the next section identify individual interviewees for the researchers.)

Conditions for self-assessing governing body performance

From the responses to the interview questions there was much more focus on the conditions for conducting self-assessment than on the techniques for self-assessment and the resulting follow-up. This emphasis was determined by respondents rather than the researchers. Whilst all respondents had experience of self-assessing governing bodies, there was a general reluctance to articulate self-assessment techniques and processes used and, importantly, outcomes achieved.

Clearly establishing the appropriate conditions for self-assessment is an important part of preparation for self-assessing. A table (Table 1) shows a summary of the essential enabling conditions and also a summary of conditions which are likely to hinder useful self-assessment by governing bodies.

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Table 1.

Favourable and restrictive conditions for self-assessing governing bodies.

Favourable conditions		Restrictive conditions
Leadership by the chair of the governing body		Poor chair – governor relations
Commitment to self-assessment by individual governors		Poor chair – principal/head teacher relations
Understanding by all governors what constitutes ‘good governing’		Lack of induction and development for governors in governing body effectiveness reviews; inappropriate questions for governing body review
A culture of openness and honesty by the governing body		Groupthink and clique practices; lack of diversity of membership; lack of refreshment of membership
Consideration of facilitation – external or from within the institution		Inadequate or inappropriate third party facilitation
Risk focus to performance review		Lack of connection between performance review and key organisational risks
Willingness to discuss outcomes and follow up with improvement actions		Weak governing bodies may need extra support to review and follow up with actions

There is, of course, a testing situation for governing bodies at the very start of reflection on the performance of the governing body. All governors would wish to support the ‘favourable conditions’ and would like to believe that these conditions are present with their governing body. The degree of openness, honesty and perception of the governing is in question at the very beginning – indeed, as those involved with governing know, these qualities are at the heart of governing.

Summary and conclusion

In summary, this paper has assembled a range of recorded experience of self-assessment by governing bodies of various kinds, including school and college governing bodies. Alongside this recording of experience, there is advice on how to achieve useful self-assessment. Whilst there is value in the views and perceptions expressed, the researchers were disappointed to be unable to gain clarity on one of their key interests: how to overcome delusional tendencies in self-assessing governing bodies. Each of these conditions requires careful consideration and does not simply consist of a checklist. Beyond the necessary conditions, no clarity or consensus emerged from this study on the most effective methodologies for self-assessment of governing body performance.

A possible explanation for this position is the absence of an articulated rationale and model for governing. Beyond the expression of the governing body’s responsibilities and words of wisdom about ‘good governance’, the processes, practices and intentions of governing require more understanding. With this understanding might come ways to review the contribution of governing to leadership. Indeed, many of the themes emerging within the experience and advice above, for example governor training and role of the chair, can be addressed with greater precision if connected to a model of governing.

However, at present, this study cautions that the assumed and emphasised benefits of school or college governing body self-assessment are unlikely to be achieved given (i) the conditions necessary to undertake an honest and useful self-assessment of governing body performance, (ii) the reported cautions regarding personal and group behaviour and (iii), in any case, there is no clear understanding of any connectivity between board and institutional performance and (iv) no defined, articulated governing model to review. Self-assessment by school and college governing bodies may be a worthy notion but is probably very overrated in its likely impact. In any case, little evidence was presented by the contributing commentators that self-assessment by the observed governing bodies had been effective in improving governing.

From this study we advise policy makers, inspectors and auditors, stakeholders, governors and senior staff that self-assessing the performance of school and college governing bodies needs to be considered with great care and sophistication. This may not sit easily with the significant accountability now given to school and college governing bodies, but the flaws in self-assessing practice need to be understood and mitigated.

Perhaps with a clearer and owned definition of governing ‘tasks’ and an articulated ‘model for governing’, an improved self-assessment by school and college governing bodies might follow. From such progress, ways to identify and improve the contribution of governing to school and college leadership can be charted and, ultimately, could result in improved educational experience and success.