Developing political astuteness: a leadership coaching journey

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

This paper argues that political astuteness, or the ability to use political skills in the service of ethical judgements, is a complex yet essential element of school leadership development that is underemphasised in the leadership coaching literature. It also suggests that exploring the responsible use of power requires a narrative approach which, in turn, demands certain conditions of the coaching relationship. Drawing from the author's research and teaching, the paper makes an original contribution to the field by introducing a conceptual framework for ‘politically astute’ leadership coaching, using a narrative approach. In keeping with this approach, the framework is presented through the representative construction of a professional development story. The implications of this story for school leadership coaching are then discussed and some provisional conclusions drawn.