(Alice Sharp,  Mrs Patterson and Mr Patterson – but not Mrs Patterson Mr Patterson – also along for the ride!)

It seems like a long way to go to talk about Leadership and Home Learning, but nothing can underestimate the quality thinking time offered when attending conferences (even as the speaker); and Scotland is always a place to watch when it comes to the Early Years, not least in terms of Government strategy. The National Parent Strategy (designed to ‘Help Make Scotland the Best Place in the World to Grow Up’) is a laudable ambition. I would love a similar one for England, not least so we at LEYF could add our own vision of ‘Building a better future for London’s children’ into the mix.

Anyone who knows me understands that I am a dreadful passenger, and so driving on dark, wet roads from Glasgow out to Inveraray had me crossing all fingers, with eyes wide shut the whole way. Alice is an inspirational speaker, a proud advocate for Early Years and a stunning developer of resources… but not my first choice for chauffeur! The tighter the bends, the faster she went, as we hurled towards Loch Fyne with Paul in the front reacting like many of the characters from the Angels’ Share (as those of you that have been reading this blog for any time must already  know, one of my favourite films, and one for which he has recently won the Scottish Bafta).

The conference focused on leadership and home learning, and how we try to create an environment where we better engage with children through their families, and perhaps understand the issues many families face which affects their ability to succeed.  Paul gave a very personal story which illustrated such points, and I can always regale an audience with a few stories, not to mention examples of our mistakes and new ideas we are testing. It led to one of the audience suggesting that I might be a suitable candidate for Fascinating Aida. (Yes please, but only for one night!)

Home Learning is a key strategic objective at LEYF, and it forces us to think and respond quite differently. It is not as many people think purely a matter of setting up some learning bags or arranging for some cameras to go home; it really demands that staff set the family at the very heart of the community, weaving a multi-generational approach into their work and (like Bruner’s spiral curriculum) blending all of these factors into a mutual learning culture.

LEYF’s Home Learning strategy also relies on us getting really good at casual pedagogical conversation: those random but regular opportunities to chat with parents, whilst explaining what and how the child is learning in a way that makes sense and encourages shared interest. It is then that such foundations are built on and further supported by nursery activities, community activities and home learning resources. It is a new journey and one recently celebrated by parents at our Eastbury Children’s Centre nursery, who positively delighted when staff recently sent a little piece of the nursery home. It’s the only way, even if you have to first take the road to Inveraray with Alice at the wheel!

So, Home Learning is definitely the way forward: it adds value to the core service, whilst at the dsame time building in additional social impact.

Last week Ofsted produced its Annual Report, the first from her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Education, Children Services and Skills, Sir Michael Wilshaw. It also had the First Ofsted Annual Lecture on Early Years given by the Director of Education, Sue Gregory. The report admittedly was slightly overshadowed by the news of the Royal pregnancy, but the findings merit as much attention as the Duchess of Cambridge’s morning sickness.

The report used findings from 24,559 inspections of which 6074 were in nurseries or childcare on non-domestic premises. The report was framed within the usual context that good quality early education is critical to children’s subsequent educational progress and life chances, and that education in the Early Years has an impact on children’s later learning and achievement. And so say all of us.

The report confirmed what we always knew, namely that the large majority of the 1.3 million places available for children under the age of 5 are provided by nurseries, that the sufficiency of places is variable across the country and there remains considerable turnover in the sector.

On the standard of service, the report noted that 74% of Early Years provision is now good or better, compared with 65% three years ago. There was, however, little improvement between this year and last in terms of proportion of good or outstanding. This suggests that improvements brought about by the introduction of the EYFS are levelling off. A third of children had not reached the required standard in language and literacy by the age of 5, a figure that rose to two fifths in deprived areas. Overall, nurseries were rated better at preparing children for school than childminders.

Unsurprisingly, the provision remains weakest in areas of highest deprivation. This is particularly true in the case of childminders, where the gap between the quality of provision of high and low deprivation is wider than for any other type of childcare provider. In the UK, children from the poorest fifth of homes are on average 19 months behind children from richer homes in their use of vocabulary by the age of five. This is worse than two of the three major English speaking countries (in Canada the gap is 10.6 months, and Australia 14.5 months).

In her lecture, Sue Gregory commented on the disproportionate funding for schools and alluded to a special premium for those Early Years providers operating in poorer neighbourhoods or with higher proportions of families living in poverty. In its recent report, the IPPR said that Early Years and youth have seen cuts of 20%. At the Daycare Trust Annual Conference on Tuesday, Lucy Lee of Policy Exchange noted that since 2000 funds to Early Years had gone up just 5.6% while schools had received increases of 55%. So for all the talk about how important we are in setting the scene for successful education, we are still short changed both in reputation, funding and correct support. Is it any wonder that the poorest areas are still feeling the pinch and getting the worse deal?

The Ofsted report findings show that what makes the most difference is the quality of the interaction between adults and children, which leads them to developing good quality early skills. In the best settings, children’s interest is constantly stimulated and adult intervention is well timed so as to respond to children’s curiosity and to challenge their thinking. That will only happen with the involvement of well qualified professionals with at least a relevant Level 3 qualification. The Nutbrown Review 10 year timescale is considered unambitious because it is longer than most children spend in the whole of their early years and primary school education. The report also found that the quality and type of local authority (LA) support for early years provision was variable and often not targeted effectively at those providers that most needed improvement. They listed the top ten LAs and the worse ten. Luckily LEYF is neither operating in the top 10 LAs or the bottom ten LAs. This suggests we are in the satisfactory majority of 132 LAs. Apparently, what makes for outstanding is where LAs offer tailored support to meet the requested needs of particular groups or providers.

Overall, the report notes that too many children are still entering school without the basic skills they need to learn. However, pre-schools and nurseries are better than childminders at preparing children for their next stage. While most childminders provide children with good level of care, many have found it more challenging to provide for the learning and development set out in the EYFS.

The report includes a suggestion that the quality of early learning would benefit from strong links between weaker and stronger providers. It also suggests that good and outstanding providers with high quality leadership and management should operate as nuclei or hubs for networks of childminders and weaker group care providers in their area.

So, what does this report say that we don’t already know?

• The Early Years matters a great deal
• To get the best from the sector we need well qualified staff who have all received relevant and robust training
• Funds need to reflect what we do and be equitable to schools
• Pay attention to our poorest children, they deserve the best
• Make all nurseries communication-rich environments at every level
• Ensure the quality of the interaction between adults and children is rich, stimulating and well-timed so as to respond to children’s curiosity and challenge their thinking (a critical factor for high quality)

The Minister, Elizabeth Truss, had obviously read the report because her speech at the Daycare Trust Conference reflected these very points. Unfortunately, she tempers her thought with continual references to deregulation and reduced ratios. In my view, this will be the unraveling of all the work we have done to get to 74% good and outstanding, with still much to do to get 100% in all areas.

To have high engagement with small children, you need a lot of capable staff. I spent the day with two year olds the other day to remind myself of the demands they place on staff, both physically and emotionally. We had twelve children and four staff with a fifth available… and me! We worked hard to ensure we were responding to those children, following their schemas, playing and talking to them, giving them cuddles while keeping them safe, fed and clean. Fewer staff would have been a high-risk strategy. Babies also need hips and we each have just two.

The Minister is fond of quoting Europe, but the OECD has admitted that the statistics that often finds the UK towards the end of the league tables are old, unreliable and insecure. In fact the OECD is about to re-do them. The European child-adult ratios are lower than ours, but that does not make them right. French visitors to LEYF last week noted how they admire our ratios and want to follow us, especially in their crèches which offer services to those under the age of 3 years.

Let me leave you with the thoughts of a young struggling teacher, Ursula Brangwen in DH Lawrence’s book The Rainbow. In the light of all our research, ask yourself is this what you want for staff and children?

And before this inhuman number of children she was always at bay. She could not get away from it. There it was, this class of fifty collective children, depending on her for command… there were so many that they were not children. They were a squadron. She could not speak as she would to a child. Because they were not individual children; they were a collective inhuman thing.

The Rainbow, DH Lawrence (p376)

The Margaret Horn Big Conversation happened last week on Social Enterprise Day. We brought together a panel of great women who each brought their own take on the question at the heart of The Great Women’s Trade Off: Helping Women Succeed at Work. (Luckily, none of us wanted to become a woman bishop or we would have been stymied from the start.)

Interestingly Maria Miller, Minister for Women and Equalities, had announced only the day before that we needed to be more competitive, and not stifle the achievement and ambition of 50% of the population. She rejected quotas for Board Rooms, but set out the Think, Act and Report initiative to get businesses to promote gender equality in the workplace. She then blotted her copybook by announcing a £2m scheme to boost childcare by giving those wanting to set up a nursery access to £500 grant to cover set up costs! Clearly, she has not spoken to any of us in the sector who would have explained the real costs of setting up a childcare business.

The panel was chaired by the inimitable Associate Editor of the Sunday Times, Eleanor Mills, a woman unafraid to speak her mind.

Emma Stewart from Timewise focused on the issue of part time and flexible working. This week she and her partner Karen Mattison announced the inaugural Power Part Time Top 50 women (88%) and men who are proof that it’s possible to have very senior posts and work part time. It caught the eye of the press, as it is a good way of keeping women in the workplace while remaining cost effective for businesses. The aim is to have more women break the habit of long hours at the top by showing smart working is the way ahead, and in doing so then make it possible for women lower down the ranks to work part time too.

Naturally enough I covered childcare; a subject for which we are damned if we do and damned if we don’t! I will talk about this at length in future blog posts. Meanwhile Alice Weighman, a very elegant woman who runs Hanson Search, talked about her research among communication and marketing companies aiming to find out what they could do to help retain their best female staff who leave to have children.

Kate Bamford, a partner at Ernst and Young, was described by some of the audience as the woman to break the ‘EY mould’. She was certainly very positive and gave off a really agreeable vibe. She talked about mentoring and sponsorship – I only wish I had been mentored by someone like her twenty years ago, maybe then I would have ended up leading a FTSE 500 company wearing really smart clothes and Loboutins.

Our final panel member was Baroness Tina Stowell, the Government’s spokesman in the House of Lords for Women & Equalities as well as for Work & Pensions. She is a Government Whip for the Home Office and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, as well as the Conservative Party’s Deputy Chief Whip in the House of Lords. A very busy lady, but one still willing to give up an evening to support other women.

The evening raised many issues, from ambition to expectation, to changing work practices for all women and men. It challenged the narrowness of the work-life balance concept which could in itself be a strait-jacket. We also looked to the needs of ordinary women doing ordinary jobs with little power or influence in their workplace. Like any big subject, the discussion was wide-ranging, as it should be – after all we are trying to consider half the population aged from 18 to 70!

At the end of the evening Neil Fenton, LEYF Director of Finance & Social Enterprise (and one of the few men in the audience), bravely asked the question: “Well what do you women want?” I laughed at the idea there could be a simple, single answer. It reminded me of the chick flick PS I Love You, when that rather gorgeous Irish actor Gerard Butler asked Hilary Swank to share the sacred secret of what women want. She whispered in his ear… we do not know.

Perhaps ironically it was The Spice Girls who better summed up the breadth of the issue…

I’ll tell you what I want, what I really really want,

I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna really really really wanna zigazig ha.

Whether you were able to attend the event or not, if you have something you’d like to add to this timeless debate, let me know in the comments section below.

It was a brave move when Isabel Dunn, recently retired chair of the Scottish Preschool Playgroup Association (SPPA) asked me if I would give this year’s keynote speech to their annual SPPA Conference at the Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow.  I always enjoy coming to Scotland, not least because I get to spend time with the lovely Alice Sharp from Experiential Play, who fizzes with ideas and is a mainstay of the LEYF Annual Conference (this year to be held again at Pimlico Academy, on Friday 2 November).

Counter to the stereotype, I always receive a warm and generous reception in Scotland, having shared the LEYF way across this mountainous country from Stornaway to Inverary Jail. And this trip was equally pleasant, despite having traveled on EasyJet which needs to replace its strapline with ‘EasyJet – great travel for those willing to wait patiently in queues and who don’t mind a scrum’.  Apparently having listened to their customers they are going to reintroduce booked and allocated seats.  Alleluia and not before time.  How many more companies would have saved themselves a lot of reputational risk if they had listened to their customers?

I stayed at a Citizen M hotel – which is really a trick hotel! Firstly, there is no foyer or reception until you go upstairs.  Then you have to check in on a screen.  (Great I suppose if you are looking for a private room to conduct a torrid affair.)  Most notably, and especially if you are a Luddite, everything is controlled by remote control – and I mean everything, from blinds to lights to TV.  Not the best hotel to bring the husband then if the statistics are right, and they tend to hang on to the remote (or the ‘mote’ as one apprentice described it, having never heard it given its full descriptor in her house).

Another thing I love about Scotland is dinner; always a more generous affair with lots of chat well into the wee hours. And this time I was particularly pleased when my pudding request was understood, as the clue came through my recalling my favourite Scottish detective’s name – not Taggart but John Carnochan. (As I’m sure you rightly guessed, my pudding was a Cranachan.)

As a smaller, more cohesive country, the Scottish have always been willing to think more creatively about the service they offer to small children. They have also been extraordinarily strategic and focused, and their ambition to make Scotland the best place for children to grow up is laudable.  The conference was opened by the youthful Children’s Minister Aileen Campbell, who gave an overview of the raft of initiatives she has announced that left everyone so speechless they had to be coaxed to ask a question.  She talked about the Scottish strategy for Early Years including a specific strategy for parenting backed by a national campaign.

She reiterated the need for collaboration across the private, voluntary and statutory sectors in order to succeed – especially true if they are going to provide 600 hours free childcare for two-year-olds from poor and disadvantaged families. In the course of my own speech later on, when I gave them a more realistic version of the struggle we are having in the South to meet the 510 hour requirement, it struck me how we are planning to spend more than a billion pounds of tax payers’ money on supporting these children, yet there is no special advisor on Early Years.  (There is one for women and Scotland!) Aside from this, I had been asked about leadership, a subject I often talk about because it’s really hard to do.  If it were easy, we would not be so short of truly capable leaders across all sectors. In the end, the audience was lovely and responsive, and I enjoyed them as much as they seemed to enjoy me.

The Minister touched on three areas which have an equally high focus at LEYF at the moment: the parent journey, home learning and our multi-generational approach. I was delighted that Scottish colleagues have discovered the validity and importance of these ways of working.  I have already started to use Alice Sharp’s Tickle Giggle Experience and her home learning fun cards. At LEYF we have been leveraging the EPPE research for our approach to home learning, and especially the five activities that the EPPE team tested.  The Scottish have 30 ideas which I shall certainly share with my colleagues, including tickling your child and looking up in the sky to spot an aeroplane!

I also told the conference about how at our impending Staff Conference in November – A journey to a better future for more of London’s children - we have invited Alice and five colleagues from the Scottish Islands to help extend our multi-generational approach into all our nurseries, and learn more ways to create little villages through each nursery.

Another Scotsman – our Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove MP - gave a very uplifting speech at last year’s LEYF staff conference.  This year I asked a Londoner, our Mayor Boris Johnson, to open the event, but his people said ‘No’.  I have to admit that I was disappointed, as I think he would have added a real lift to the proceedings; not only for a London childcare organisation, but one that has been taking apprentices for many years without the encouragement of the Evening Standard. Well hey ho… or maybe Ho Hum, I smell the blood of an Englishman!

In any case, I’m delighted to say the LEYF Scotland partnership seems set to continue, so if anyone from a Scottish university or organisation would like to extend it – by helping us measure our Home Learning impact or the multi-generational impact – they would receive a very warm welcome, lots of tea, wine and curly wurlys – and we may even manage a Cranachan.

Every year on 15 November, we hold our Margaret Horn Lecture to celebrate Social Enterprise Day. This year I want to focus on the issues facing women who work. However, I am struggling with all the complex and contrasting arguments about the role of modern women. As someone who was a keen feminist in the 70s and an avid Spare Rib supporter, I feel really anxious that some of what we demanded has backfired and women are in a worst situation now. Women in the workplace is one area which needs to improve, especially as the majority of working women need to do so.

My anxiety about the whole sisterhood stuff was not helped by my going to see Anna Karenina last week on top of my re-reading Madame Bovary. Fact is I found it hard to like either of them, not least because of their responses to their maternal duties.  Maybe the theatrical representation and rather one dimensional interpretation of Anna Karenina did not help?  I am trying to excuse Emma Bovary by giving her post-natal depression!

I know very little about Margaret Horn but one thing I know was that she was a pupil of Octavia Hill, and that alone is a step in the right direction in my book.  Many years ago when I first discovered Octavia Hill I saw her as a role model: I loved her enterprise, energy and ambition. I did not agree with all she stood for; for one, she was not very keen on her Suffragette sisters and frankly I think we need the vote. However, she was a woman with a vision to improve the lot of us all and took her duty seriously, which included training up the next generation of women – not least of which Margaret Horn, who was key to founding Westminster Children’s Society, which we more recently re-shaped into the London Early Years Foundation to help build another element of the legacy.

So this year’s lecture hopes to look at how women who lead businesses can help shape the future for other women with children.  In particular, as someone running nurseries, I want to examine what more we can do to help women better balance their lives. Too many women feel guilty about working after they have children.  It’s crazy that we make them feel bad because they want and feel a need to use the skills, knowledge and achievements they have worked so hard to get.  However at least now we are beginning to agree that children also need their mothers. (And of course their fathers too, but right now we are focusing on women.)  What we have to do is find ways that we can offer a suitable compromise that meets the needs of all and is accepted by society as a good option. Much as I disliked Anna Karenina, I sympathised how, when making a decision that broke society rules, she faced being ostracised and held in contempt.  While we may not shower working women with that level of opprobrium, we can no longer continue the knee jerk reaction of the press and commentators that working mothers are to blame for society’s problem families. Instead we need to reach a point where we use what we know as good working practices to support a whole society response to the challenges of working mothers.

Therefore if women are to be agents of their own destinies, we must look at how we can support them.  My hope with this year’s Margaret Horn Lecture is that we begin one set of responses by engaging with women leaders and first see what they can do to help. The wider debate is often very focused on high flying professional women who may have more to lose and more to gain.  However, the majority of working women are ordinary women in ordinary jobs. To help give them the chance to become extraordinary we need to reduce a key hurdle, by influencing the Societal response to working mothers which aligns the needs of children and families and aims for a more positive legacy.

Job descriptions for leaders and managers always stipulate a need to communicate. And as a CEO, I am expected to be able to talk to many different audiences on a number of subjects, often at the drop of a hat. (LOL I hear you say in my case, since born in Cork, I have certainly benefited from its proximity to the Blarney Stone.)

While public speaking doesn’t faze me (in fact I rather enjoy it), I have recently had to do more TV and radio.  And whilst for me TV is a challenge (not least since there’s nowhere to hide),  I recognise that it’s a great way to make people more aware of what we do at LEYF; it also forces me to be good at sharing our message in no more than 2 to 3 minutes. So, under pressure from my Chair, I agreed to undertake a one-to-one media training session.

When asked what I wanted to achieve, I said that my worst nightmare would be finding myself in front of Jeremy Paxman; trying to convince him that if we were nice to babies we could end up with world peace. As ever, he is in tip top Rottweiler form – yep just imagine! (Remember that poor young politician Chloe Smith).  My only goal would be to survive and retain an ounce of credibility.

The trainer never balked at such a task, and immediately started to unpack my anxieties about answering questions and sounding credible. She reassured me by telling me how people we consider great orators, like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, were much improved by some serious training on the art of communicating.

So here are some great tips that will help us all become as smooth as Obama:

• Get your message clear in your head
• Be clear about your desired outcome and what you want people to hear
• Don’t worry about your strategy for answering the question – just use the time to make the point you want!!

And if this last point got your attention, here are the rules for doing that:

• Acknowledge the question (using words and phrases like ‘interesting’, ‘useful question’ etc; just try not to sound like a politician – sorry President!)
• Broaden the question so it fits into the bigger picture and allows you to refocus on your issue
• Clarify your point or throw the ball back to the questioner
• Decide on your action (this may be where you apologise, agree action or flirt like mad)

Some other useful pointers you might like to try out for yourself:

When making your point, remember the interviewer will be operating the 80% / 20% rule between fact and opinion.  They will at times be a cat who likes fact, respect and challenge – and if you don’t give it will play with you like a trapped mouse – while at other times you need to be the dog, seeking approval and a pat by being warm, engaged and liked.

Remember the Jerry Springer mantra: “Talk to the hand ‘cos the ears ain’t listening”. Well there is something in that, not least because the audience spends as much time watching your hands as it does looking at your eyes.  Palms up means open, opinions and some entreaty; palm down says listen to me, I am giving facts here and I am knowledgeable.

I always thought working in Early Years set you up for life.  Remember the importance of giving children a space to answer the question?  Apply that rule when making your point.  Try and keep silent for at least two long pauses.

When giving a speech with certain key words use the rhythm of a nursery rhyme to make your point:

Mary had a little lamb
Its fleece was white as snow
Everywhere that Mary went
The Lamb was sure to go

And finally, breathe steadily; it will slow down your pace and tone.  I always feel that when making a very important point it’s easy for your voice to scale up so you end up sounding like a character from Neighbours, when everything sounds like a question, or Beatrice from Much Ado about Nothing, ready to eat you alive.

Some of my next speaking engagements include:

• Launch of the South Westminster Timebank at 121 Marsham St
• Childcare Expo in Coventry on ‘How to ensure we give two-year-olds the best deal’
• National College for School Leadership Conference on Early Years and Academies
• Scottish Pre School Play Association in Glasgow on Leadership which keeps Children at its Heart
• 11th National Sure Start Conference on how to ensure an economically viable future in financially challenging times
• Rachel MacMillan Early Years Conference arguing that children in the UK go to school too early

So if you want to see how successfully I manage to put anything I learnt into practice, come along to one of these. Just be kind, and not a Jeremy Paxman wannabe ready to pounce…

Meanwhile,  if you have any tips that work for you, let me know in the space below.

The influence of the modern supermarket on our daily lives is remarkably powerful. We take the big five for granted, rarely questioning  their hold  on how we shop, eat and behave.  Occasionally, we get very worked up about their part in the ruination of the local High St, or the damage they do as they squeeze the life blood out of local suppliers.  It’s trickier to justify this anger though, when they calmly tell us that what they do is designed to improve the customer experience and keep prices low.

So it’s no wonder they hold sway, when the deal is they rule the roost and we in turn acquiesce, only so we can walk into a clean store 24 hours a day and buy a range of food, healthy or otherwise. Personally, I have to own up to describing the whole food shopping experience as Sainsbores.  (No offence Sainsburys!)

While I am not a regular visitor to Tesco, I have always been interested in how Sir Terry Leahy pushed the posh boys out of the way (Sainbury’s and Marks and Sparks) and headed to the top.  I was therefore interested to read his new book Management in 10 Words. How would he describe the business methodology of growing a retail business to number one in the world?

For starters, I was surprised by his use of warm words – such as loyalty, culture and values. You would think Tesco was set up to save the world, not sell crisps. However, he is clearly a Tesco man, through and through. Passionate and obsessive leaders all have that in common. I met someone who works in Compliance at Barclays last year, and I asked her what was Bob Diamond really like?  She said he really seemed to be a Barclays man. He also talked about culture and values, as you will have read in my last two blogs.  In his own words:

Strong values underpin successful businesses.  They give managers a sheet anchor, something that holds their position and keeps them from being smashed on the rock when caught in a storm. Values govern how a business behaves, what it sees as important, what it does when faced with a problem.” (P 109)

Leahy was clearly a man with a big vision and a habit of doing things quickly. He says that intention is never enough and plans mean nothing if they are not effectively enacted.   He commented on his time at the Co-Op, at being frustrated by the length of time the democratic management processes took to make decisions. I am sure many others recognise the danger and destruction that slow and complex, unclear decision making can wreak on a business – especially one with growth ambitions.

Interestingly, we have introduced a decision-making model at LEYF known as ‘RAPIDs’ (courtesy of the excellent work from our SBT partners Bain & Company) to ensure speedier decisions.  It is something that also affects a culture; we want a culture of speed and intelligent response, not processes that actually work against the success of the business.

For me, the main thrust of Terry Leahy’s book was that it was all about the customer. You need to understand your customers and give them what they want.  It’s the only way to get loyalty, which in turn means a steady stream of income. For him, the Clubcard was key to his success, because it gave Tesco more direct access to customer’s data and better ways to talk to them.  The customer conversation became critical to the culture of the new Tesco, and meant they could provide the right products in the right places at the right price. It’s certainly the key lesson I have learnt from his book.

Whether you have read the book or not, what are your thoughts on the importance of  the customer experience? Is the customer always right? And what’s the best way to learn from them. Let me know below.

Getting comfy in Noah’s Ark

The other morning, I watched The Record , a programme on BBC Parliament which gives a daily run-through of key events in Westminster.  Obviously, the interview with Bob Diamond by the Treasury Select Committee featured, and if we were to tag the keywords, leadership was certainly the big hitter.

Questioner after questioner asked Mr Diamond about how he viewed his responsibility for running a company that had behaved so dishonestly.  He was asked if he was complicit or incompetent when he said he knew nothing about such mendacious practice. He was challenged about how bad it had to get before it floated to the top of his inbox and he saw the incriminating emails.  ‘Did your staff not feel able to tell you about this?’ was the question from one incredulous MP.

He argued that once he knew of the mal-practice he dealt swiftly, i.e. he sacked the traders. He was asked what he could do now to reassure the public about the value of the Barclays brand.  He was challenged quite a lot about his stand on culture and how he had not spotted that his culture was going bad. His rebuttals about it only being a small amount of staff etc. were rebuffed and so the questions went on for three hours.

He might have garnered some sympathy had he not continued to refer to the MPs by their first names. In a formal situation, with them calling him Mr Diamond, his persistent use of John, George, Andrea rankled and did him no favours. It certainly didn’t help his apparent credibility. Did he learn nothing from the Fred the Shred debacle?  Leaders must be credible. Weasel words and beating of breasts will not cut the mustard. Mr Diamond failed to acknowledge his duty;  a favourite word of mine and one that needs to come back into fashion.  Indeed, I was so pleased to hear it used on the Radio 4 programme The Moral Maze that I stopped ironing and sent a tweet. (What a choice, ironing or tweeting!)

Personally, I am very proud to be leading a growing organisation, albeit the size of a pin head compared to Barclays. I worry a lot about checks and balances, and how you know that what you say on the tin is still happening when you get further away from the front line.  It must be much harder for a larger company, and I often wonder how places like Sainsbury’s manage. On paper, it’s about things such as leadership, systems, operating manuals, key people practices (hiring, induction, performance management and training), communication and engagement with all customers and staff. In reality, it’s about all of that – but mostly it’s about trust and culture. On that matter Mr Diamond is right.

So, what to do?? Give up and run for the hills?  Mr Diamond can do this with the £95m he has paid himself, but it’s not such an option for the rest of us mortals. You could question and worry to such a degree that you might end up on the psychiatrist’s couch. It might be worth it, if only to join the Billy Crystal school of analysis and end up sharing the couch with Robert de Niro.

Well the bankers are in trouble again. Is it a case of money corrupts? Poor Bob Diamond (former CEO of Barclays Bank). Last year he proudly announced that culture is the most important thing in an organisation because it is what people do when no one is looking.  He said that bankers must always operate in a way that brings the best service to customers. He looked like he was leading a ‘good bank’.  Aside from the political impact (now evident), it must have galled him to know that some of his staff lost sight of this culture and values when they behaved so dishonestly.

According to Patrick Lencioni in his book The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive, culture is set by the leader; it has to come from the top. In another book, How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, Ken Robinson describes culture as a means of creating contagious behaviour by embedding the attitudes and behaviour that are acceptable and unacceptable across the organisation.

Funnily enough, I spent last week reflecting on our own culture at LEYF with my fellow directors. We have always known that culture is critical, especially when growing an organisation: staff need to ‘get the vibe’ and, without even thinking about it, know what behaviour and attitudes are the LEYF way. We summarised our three cultural behaviours  as  Nurture, Excellence and Innovation.  This culture then has to align with the core values of the organisation.

These words sum up a whole set of behaviours that are designed to ensure that we are a high performing organisation.  And culture is the behaviour that underpins high performance. Many of us have previously worked in organisations with a culture of underperformance, accepting shoddy work, high absenteeism and lack of care and concern for the customers.  It’s a most de-motivating and depressing place to be for children, parents, staff, students and visitors.

So ‘Nurture, Excellence and Innovation’ sounds good to me, not least as a set of demanding cultural norms:

Nurture is about training, development and encouragement. It’s about supporting positive connections, bonding and bridging.  It is also about being able and willing to deal with poor behaviour. Children who are nurtured and encouraged learn about what is right and wrong, what they can and cannot do.  The same goes for adults.

Excellence is about how we operate our core business. We need to be smart and develop intelligent strategies, marketing plans and financial models which sustain our service and give us a competitive edge. But we also need to be healthy and have the right leadership, support services, communication and engagement that allows us to be top of the class. Children deserve the best so we must give it to them.

Innovation is how we use our action research to reflect on, consider and review what we do and how we do it.  It’s about examining new ways of making things better.  It’s about intelligence, about thinking creatively and courageously about what works and whether it is right.  Certainly a brave culture, but one that keeps us all on our toes.

The challenge for LEYF and indeed any organisation is how to make sure this culture permeates every nook and cranny. It’s feeling assured that everyone gets it and those who want to break the code are held back by the power of the cultural norms. For us, the best way to do this is to…

• Build and maintain a cohesive leadership team
• Create organisation clarity
• Over-communicate organisational clarity
• Reinforce organisational clarity through people systems

If we get this right we are less likely to end up vilified like the banks, as Allister Heath journalist at City AM says:

Barclays inability to ensure that some of its staff behaved appropriately was a major failing of its corporate controls. People knowingly broke the rules.  Shame on them… Too many people turned a blind eye to the wrongdoings of others. The City’s reputation as a trustworthy marketplace will take years to recover.

No one can afford to get into this mess. So let’s ensure we have the right culture from the start, and at every level.

This was a busy week for Early Years with the announcement of the Government’s Childcare Commission, the publication of the final report from the Nutbrown Review and the annual two-day NDNA conference which I always attend (partly because I am a Trustee of the NDNA and the London regional representative, but mostly because I also like to take some LEYF staff along with me as my guests).

This year’s conference was in Birmingham, a city which has some gems but is yet to benefit from a visionary urban architect. Julie from Colville, Connor from Katharine Bruce and Nicky from Micky Star (above, starting second from the left) joined me to catch the train from Euston and we spent the first evening walking and bussing around Brum. Finding somewhere to eat proved quite a challenge.  Nicky, our delegated map reader, used her iPhone to great effect, as we traipsed through the labyrinthine streets of Birmingham. (I only wish little Brum had appeared to drive us around in his little yellow car.)

The weather was generally wet, which was good as we were indoors the whole time cogitating, debating and considering all the issues facing the sector. I decided to tweet throughout, although I have to admit to being unsure if any of the hash-tags I used got as far as New St Station, let alone out into the wider world.

Minister of State for Children and Families, Sarah Teather MP, opened the conference and was generally welcomed. The NDNA audience is quite discerning, but I guess as practical business people there remains some sympathy for a Government with good intentions but no money. The main Government initiative at present is the Two Year Old programme, only the challenges remain the same: inadequate funds for the free offer, cost of training, demise of local authority support, challenging occupancy and cost of childcare to parents.

The Minister announced that Mott MacDonald had won the contract to provide strategic support for this programme  to the sector, stating that we would need to work with them to ensure they had our input in how they approach the work.

I asked the Minsiter about the Childcare Commission, as yet no more than a title. I suggested it might be the perfect place to have a proper discussion as to what we want as a nation for everyone’s children. Later in the day, John Carnochan, Director of the Scottish Violence Reduction Unit,  remembered with fondness speaking at the LEYF Staff Conference last October as he opened his speech at this event with a bold statement:

We want Scotland to be the best place to bring up children.

John Carnochan

If anything, we should be saying this across the whole of the UK, as we then link and weave all our policies and practices to the same vision, rather than our current approach which is to fire fight and apply sticking plasters; some of which are so random they have little more effect than those plasters with cartoons, designed to stop children crying but not necessarily healing the cut.

The Minister said that an official response to Nutbrown will not appear until September, much to the relief of the civil servants in the audience, who must all be on overload with the number of reports and reviews they have been drafting of late. There will be training costs associated with the Nutbrown recommendations, especially getting the whole sector to Level Three. There will also be at least a few challenges, as we work out the perfect diploma and develop pedagogical leadership programmes. On the plus side, we are not without experience, knowledge and ability. I loved Nutbrown’s theme all the way through, that the sector is a maturing industry and as such must lead some of this development. Let’s take some control for our destiny and shape our own future, before someone else shapes it for us.

For me, one of the most interesting presentations of the day was from Kathy Sylva, following some research done with NDNA nurseries (including LEYF!) on parent engagement. So much so, it deserves a blog all of its own, which I promise to do next week.

So, if day one of a conference is this good (and it was), the real challenge is then to maintain that level of engagement and enthusiasm for day two, especially when  the subjects include a business forecast and an update on the new Ofsted. Either way, it starts slightly later, if only perhaps to help those who attended cope from the effects of the Awards dinner the night before. (The band that played at the Edgbaston Stadium was so loud that it was a wonder any of us could talk the next day. Still, for an oldie like me, it’s great to be able to dance to songs which have rhythm and to which I can sing along.)

Courtney Donaldson from Christie and Co did her best to balance the economic situation with some good news. She warned us to keep our eye on the ball and use the right data to give real and timely management information (something I hope we will get better at doing across LEYF with our soon-to-be modernised systems). She pointed to an increase in distressed businesses (especially those in deprived areas), occupancy drop, increase in part time places (81%) and a reliance on NEG places which are causing fault lines to run through the sector.  Like the rest of the conference, she could see no easy solution to the shortfall in NEG payments. Doing her best to finish on an up-beat note, she said there were opportunities (31% expect to expand, especially in the South East) and those who had survived so far were more likely to do so in the continuing economic climate.  A quote shared by John Carnochan sums up how I feel about this:

The challenges we face converge, intertwine, and often remain largely beyond our understanding. Most of us suspect that the “experts” don’t really know what’s going on and that as a species we’ve released forces that are neither managed nor manageable.

Thomas Homer-Dixon

Finally, we learned that Ofsted is changing again in September. The audience was warned to go easy on the speaker as she was but the messenger. And of course, Ofsted is a quango which has lots of power and so always draws criticism from the sector. The biggest complaint in any case remains the differences in the way inspectors inspect, which was also mentioned, especially as Ofsted is busily recruiting new inspectors.  However, to get a real grasp of the changes, which is highly recommended, I urge everyone to examine the website in detail. Meanwhile, the changes essentially boil down to inspections every 47 months, unless triggered by a complaint, child protection issue or change of manager. The inspection will  now have a more powerful emphasis on leadership and management – along with learning and development – with a formal meeting with the manager and joint observations with the manager and the EYP. The issue raised questions for me about how we prepare the deputy and the rest of the leadership team to be able to manage this new inspection, which will continue to be a no notice event, so managers can go on holiday and not be constantly on tenterhooks once an inspection is due.
Conferences are great opportunities for learning, and I have come back with fresh ideas and suggestions for better communication and more effective practice. As a leader having quality time with staff is a very good idea, even if it means traipsing up to Birmingham.