Delegation makes the heart grow lighter.

I did it! I delegated!

I've been drowning under a sea of new initiatives, working parties, task groups, marking, more marking and general school stuff and I was almost a breaking point. Three nights in a row I have worked until 3 a.m. and yesterday I was frightened by my state of mind. I have had a meeting booked for me every day after school this week (and next week), I've not had a free lesson where I've been able to do any of my own work since half term and I've been struggling to support everyone after C's tragic death two weeks ago. However, the trouble with being in this kind of state is that it becomes harder to think things through logically. A very dear colleague (T) took me to one side yesterday and made a few, very sensible, suggestions, and suddenly the fog lifted (slightly). I still worked until 3 am but this morning I told the head that I would not be attending the ridiculous waste of space called CPD this afternoon, but instead would be meeting with two of my curriculum leaders to discuss and prepare for all the new initiatives, working parties, task groups, academic mentors, targeted intervention assistants, one-to-one tutors and the immersion days.

These two wonderful CLs instantly got to grips with everything, allocated the tasks, got very enthusiastic and left me with very little to do.

Now why didn't I do that before? I'll tell you why.
1. We're all over-worked and I hate burdening people with extras.
2. We've been so busy that it has been impossible to meet together to get things sorted.
3. Sometimes it's just easier to do things yourself.
4. I am a bit of a control freak.

My other CLs politely and firmly told me that I did not need to attend the Sixth Form open evening because they had got everything in hand and were more than capable of manning the subject stalls.

Now that the fog has lifted I've remembered how great they all are.

But I'll just sneak into Open Evening to check that everything is ok...