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Scoring & Interpretation:

  • Mostly A’s → Basic Listening: Fragmented and/or passive, limited trust-wide impact.
  • Mostly B’s → Structured Listening: Regular but inconsistent across schools.
  • Mostly C’s → Proactive Listening: Strategic, participatory, with growing coherence and ownership.
  • Mostly D’s → Embedded Listening: Cultural, consistent, and co-created across the trust.

Use the results from your self-assessment to understand where you are currently, and what you need to do to progress.

Listening practices

Voice

Rare or occasional, reactive, siloed

Understanding

Surface-level, monitoring trends

Action

Patchy actions, weak accountability

Communication

Minimal and/or inconsistent communication

Listening mindsets (How you listen matters)

Openness, Empathy, Responsiveness, Inclusiveness, Psychological safety

Many organisations stop at basic listening: occasional surveys, patchy actions, and inconsistent communication. The framework shows the journey to embedded listening, where dialogue is continuous, leaders model openness, and stakeholders co-own solutions. Here, listening becomes a defining feature of the organisation’s identity: a listening organisation.

Wherever your trust is starting from, there are clear actions you can take to strengthen listening. Use the guidance below to move from participation to partnership.

Basic Listening

Moving from Basic Listening to Structured Listening

  1. #1 Establish regular feedback mechanisms

  2. #2 Clarify ownership of listening

  3. #3 Make it part of your planning cycles

At this stage, listening is well-intentioned but fragmented. Feedback may be gathered occasionally through surveys, forums, or informal conversations, but it is inconsistent and heavily reliant on individual champions rather than senior leadership. Organisations at this level often focus more on what was said than on the underlying meaning or patterns. Leaders may lack confidence in their own decision-making, sometimes overemphasising consensus or reacting defensively to criticism. As a result, action is patchy, communication back to stakeholders is rare, and trust remains fragile.

Structured Listening

Moving from Structured Listening to Proactive Listening

  1. #1 Expand who is heard and what is asked

  2. #2 Involve stakeholders in interpreting data

  3. #3 Communicate progress transparently

Listening becomes more deliberate and regular. Organisations introduce controlled mechanisms such as annual surveys, staff councils, or parent forums. Leaders demonstrate a willingness to listen, but often within boundaries they are comfortable with, asking about safe topics, avoiding areas that may produce difficult truths. While data are collected and compared across groups, responses are uneven and often slow, leaving stakeholders uncertain whether change will follow. If leaders struggle to handle challenging feedback, staff, pupils, and parents may begin to feel unsafe in sharing openly, risking the erosion of psychological safety over time.

Proactive Listening

Moving from Proactive Listening to Embedded Listening

  1. #1 Co-create and co-own solutions

  2. #2 Embed listening into trust-wide strategy

  3. #3 Reinforce listening as a leadership behaviour

At this stage, listening is intentional, inclusive, and increasingly strategic. Organisations move beyond simply collecting data to analysing patterns and themes in depth, including across stakeholder groups. Leaders model emotional intelligence and create psychologically safe spaces where staff, pupils, and parents feel respected and encouraged to contribute. Feedback informs organisational planning, with stakeholders involved in shaping solutions rather than passively receiving decisions. Communication is more transparent, showing both where change is possible and why some issues cannot be addressed. Trust builds as people see a visible link between their input and organisational action.

Embedded Listening

Upholding Embedded Listening

  1. #1 Keep feedback loops alive

  2. #2 Revisit listening practices and mindsets regularly

  3. #3 Stay alert to changes in people, priorities, and context

Listening is no longer a project or process; it is the cultural norm and the organisation’s defining way of working. Stakeholders are partners in co-creation, helping shape strategic direction, course-correcting in real time, and owning the impact of their contributions. Leaders share power rather than just inviting views, and decision-making is grounded in trust, openness, and empathy. Listening is integrated into organisational storytelling and identity: staff, pupils, and parents see it as “how we do things here.” Change is easier because everyone understands the journey and feels part of it. Belonging, motivation, and resilience are high, and the organisation is better equipped to thrive through disruption.

Next Steps

Coming soon: early access to our full Listening Self-Assessment for your trust’s leadership team to complete together, plus a facilitated workshop. We’re opening a limited first cohort. Reserve your place now to get priority scheduling and launch updates.


A Call to Lead with Listening

In an era of polarisation, disruption, and rapid change, schools and trusts can act as anchors of fairness, cooperation, and resilience. By leading through listening, leaders not only strengthen outcomes but also model the values our communities need most.

Because when every voice matters, the whole school community thrives.

Talk to us about embedding listening across your trust

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