Re-engaging Eeyore

How can red teaming revitalise even the most reluctant staff?

Colin Sisson

For over twenty years, I have sat through countless INSET days (and delivered a fair few). Most have been forgotten. Those that are memorable remain so often for the wrong reasons – like the time we were asked to build our dream classroom with pipe cleaners – or simply for the quality of the catering.

I’ve seen hundreds of icebergs, watched hours of grainy inspirational videos and, on one glorious occasion, stared in wonder at the Bicycle of Pedagogy.

An early INSET that still lingers long in the memory banks was specific to middle leaders using the metaphor of Winnie the Pooh as a way to identify staff characteristics within your team. Tigger was the energetic, excitable but slightly impulsive member of the team who would inevitably be the one asking questions well after meetings had officially finished. Christopher Robin had main character syndrome but was mostly absent whenever anything needed doing.  Pooh himself represented the rigorous but routine-based colleague that saw change as a threat to the delicate ecosystem of Hundred Acre Academy.

Then there was Eeyore. We all know Eeyore. Eeyore has seen their fair share on INSETs too. They’ve watched curriculums lurch forwards and backwards, seen approaches come and go. Watched countless repeats of Derek Redmond’s father carry him over the finish line as a metaphor for whatever this term’s focus is. Eeyore can’t stand songs by Heather Small.

Dear reader, I have become Eeyore.

I am not alone. And I know I am a problem. A problem that many schools are struggling to deal with – an experienced professional fatigued with an ever-evolving educational climate that looks more and more distorted from the profession we opened the classroom door to a few decades previously. A cursory look on pages like Life After Teaching suggests that some schools are opting to manage these challenges away with informal or formal support plans, forgetting the deeper divide this inevitably causes when established staff are suddenly thrown into the competency spotlight, sending worrying reverberations to even the most Tigger-like teacher.

But there is another way to re-engage an Eeyore. It came from finding my own CPD and does not need pipe cleaners.

Bryce Hoffman’s Red Teaming might have unconventional origins (he was introduced to the concept while watching the 2013 film World War Z) but has gathered evidence of its very real application in companies such as Google and complex organisations like the US military. The purpose of such a team is to try and identify threats and challenges before they become an inconvenient and stressful reality. In fact, post 9/11, there has only been one US president who has rejected the input of a ‘red team’ – I’ll leave you to guess which one…

According to Hoffman, red teaming challenges your plans and assumptions upon which they are based, forces you to think differently about your direction and consider alternative points of view, helping you scan the environment for both threats and opportunities.

The science behind red teaming lies in its ability to counter the limitations of human decision-making, a challenge that is highly relevant to school leadership and management. Grounded in cognitive science and the psychology of decision-making, red teaming challenges the long-held assumption that leaders consistently make the best possible decisions based on available information. Research over the past several decades has shown that this assumption is flawed: even experienced, well-intentioned and highly educated school leaders are influenced by cognitive biases and faulty assumptions that can distort judgment and lead to unintended outcomes. In a school context, these biases may affect decisions about curriculum adoption, staffing, student discipline, resource allocation or strategic planning. Red teaming provides a structured approach for identifying and mitigating these cognitive biases and heuristics, enabling school leaders to more critically examine their assumptions, test decisions before implementation and reduce risks that could negatively impact students, staff and the broader school community.

But Red Teaming is not a challenge to leadership. The role of a red team is not to make decisions or weaken the authority of leaders or managers. The red team’s role is to empower leaders and managers to make better decisions by providing them with a more objective analysis, raising questions to provide a more comprehensive picture of the environment and alternative options to consider based on the depth of their knowledge and experiences.

With restricted budgets facing all schools, this does not need to be a new TLR position. Yes, Red Teaming can be conducted formally through its senior leadership team, but cognitive biases like the ‘bandwagon effect’ can come into play here. As an ad-hoc committee made up of experienced staff members, selected for their vast experience or simply to provide a fresh set of eyes to examine the organisation’s strategies and plans, these previously disaffected members of the school community become proactive in shaping strategy before it becomes a reality.