Abstract

This research investigated the question: ‘What are the characteristics and conditions needed for effective leadership of educational redesign?’ The focus on the importance of educational leaders who see continual improvement as a key part of their brief has been evident in the recent spate of literature about ‘transformational leadership’ (Hallinger, 2003), ‘invitational leadership’ (Novak, 2005) and ‘constructivist leadership’ (Lambert, 2002). In the main this literature has focused on school leaders and redesign at the local level. Little has been written about the role of project leaders in educational redesign initiatives even though the impetus for redesign often comes from schools’ participation in funded projects. This paper explores the roles of both the Project Manager and a number of school leaders in the South Australian educational redesign project Learning to Learn. The research aimed to illuminate the characteristics of leaders of educational redesign and the conditions which sustained them. A qualitative research design was used with data collected through interview, written survey, document analysis and field notes. The findings revealed eight characteristics of participants’ leadership and related conditions that will be presented in this paper.