L8. Don’t drop the ball
Follow through on promises and details. Reliability builds confidence.
Resources to support growth in this behaviour
Whether this behaviour has been chosen through Step 1. Diagnose, highlighted through reflection or coaching, or identified as a school or trust priority, you can now follow the steps below to develop and embed it in your daily leadership practice.
Step 2. Learn: Read Everyone Succeeds: 54 Leadership Behaviours to Transform Your School to understand what great leadership looks like in practice. Each behaviour is grounded in research and real examples from schools and businesses.
Step 3. Reflect: Use the Everyone Succeeds Workbook to apply ideas to your own context.
Guided reflection, practical actions, and space for planning turn understanding into improvement.
Step 4. Apply: Work through the Leadership Toolkit for this behaviour. Use the Don’t Drop the Ball toolkit to manage commitments tightly, follow up quickly, and build trust through reliability.
Step 5. Coach and practice: Use the Don’t drop the ball Coach and Practise Frameworks to strengthen the behaviour through reflection on follow-through and systems, rehearsing reliability so trust is maintained.
These can be used individually or with colleagues to embed key behaviours.
Step 6. Plan: Set measurable goals using the 90 Day Leadership Planner.
Turn improvement into action by tracking your focus and progress over time, with completed examples for different career stages.
Step 7. Lead: Apply your learning to real situations through the Scenario Finder.
Over fifty scenarios link directly to the behaviours that help you solve the challenges that matter most in your school.
One book suggestion
The Speed of Trust – Stephen M.R. Covey (2006).
This text supports the behaviour by illustrating how reliability and follow-through build credibility and strengthen relationships. Buy the book.
References from the Everyone Succeeds book
Edmondson, Amy C. (2011). Why Teambuilding Fails and What We Can Do About It. Harvard Business Review, September 2011. (Harvard Business Review Affiliation)
McKibbin, L. W., & Duncan, J. W. (1989). Top management team strategic consensus and the efficacy of strategic decision making. Strategic Management Journal, 10(3), 339-351.