Working Genius in Public and State School Systems

Public and state school systems are full of capable people doing difficult work under constant pressure. The problem is not usually effort. It is that schools keep asking the wrong people to carry the wrong kind of work for too long. Working Genius gives school leaders a practical language for that problem because it separates work into six types: Wonder, Invention, Discernment, Galvanizing, Enablement, and Tenacity.

That matters because the wider workforce signal is already flashing. Gallup State of the Global Workplace 2026 reported global employee engagement at 20 percent in 2025, while Gallup U.S. engagement update reported U.S. engagement at 31 percent in 2024 and found only 46 percent of employees strongly agreed they knew what was expected at work. Gallup defines engagement as "involvement and enthusiasm of employees in their work and workplace." Schools cannot solve every systemic pressure, but they can reduce the avoidable confusion that makes good staff feel wasted.

The education-specific data is just as blunt. Pew Research Center teacher report found that 77 percent of U.S. public K-12 teachers said their job was frequently stressful, 68 percent said it was overwhelming, 70 percent said their school was understaffed, and 84 percent said there was not enough time during regular work hours for grading, planning, paperwork, and email. OECD TALIS also tracks teacher and school-leader well-being, job satisfaction, autonomy, and intent to stay across international systems, which is a reminder that this is not a personality issue. It is an operating-system issue.

The official model describes Wonder as "pondering the possibility of greater potential and opportunity" and Tenacity as "pushing projects or tasks to completion to achieve results." Those are not interchangeable talents. A school that treats every teacher, deputy, and head of department as equally suited to every phase of work will keep creating avoidable friction. A school that maps the work honestly can protect energy, improve meetings, and finish more of what it starts. For the full framework background, see the Working Genius model.

1. Map the leadership team before you restructure roles

Before you change reporting lines, map the Working Genius profile of the principal, deputy principals, heads of department, business manager, and any senior teacher leaders. Then list the actual work each person carries, not the work their position description says they carry. A public school leadership team may look balanced on paper while being overloaded with implementation work that only one or two people are naturally energised to do.

The simple test is whether all six types of work are represented somewhere in the team. Wonder questions whether current priorities still make sense. Invention designs new options. Discernment evaluates what is worth doing. Galvanizing builds energy for action. Enablement coordinates support. Tenacity finishes the details. If one of those is missing, restructuring alone will not fix the leadership load.

2. Stop using availability as the main assignment rule

Schools often assign work to whoever has capacity, whoever is reliable, or whoever says yes. That is understandable in a stretched system, but it is a costly default. If a teacher with strong Invention keeps receiving procedural compliance work, the school gets the task done while slowly draining a person who could be designing better solutions. If a Tenacity leader keeps being asked to brainstorm without finishing anything, they become frustrated for the opposite reason.

A better assignment rule is to ask two questions before handing out work. What type of work is this really? Who is energised by that type of work and has enough capacity to carry it? Capacity still matters, but it should not be the only lens.

3. Audit the work that sits with deputy principals

Deputy principals often become the pressure valve for everything that has no obvious owner. They handle behaviour escalations, staff cover, parent communication, policy follow-through, compliance, data, timetable problems, and the project that was launched in last term's meeting. That role can become impossible even for a brilliant leader.

Use Working Genius to divide deputy work into thinking, deciding, rallying, coordinating, and finishing. Then compare that work with each deputy's profile. If the same person is carrying most of the Enablement and Tenacity work, you have found a structural risk. The answer may not be a new job title. It may be a cleaner split of work by type.

4. Diagnose meeting fatigue by type of work

Meeting fatigue is not only about meeting length. It is also about asking people to sit through work that drains them. A curriculum meeting may be heavy on Wonder and Invention. An operations meeting may be heavy on Enablement and Tenacity. A decision meeting may require Discernment. When every staff member is pulled into every type of conversation, energy drops and the quiet people are misread. For a deeper meeting application, see school leadership meetings.

Take the last three meetings that felt flat. Label the dominant work type in each one. Then ask whether the right people were in the room for that phase of work. The fix may be smaller meetings, clearer meeting purpose, or separating ideation from implementation.

5. Build curriculum review teams across all six phases

Curriculum reviews often attract the people who love questioning and designing. That is valuable, but it is incomplete. If Wonder and Invention dominate the review team, the school may get a thoughtful report without a realistic implementation path. If Enablement and Tenacity dominate too early, the school may tidy the current system without asking whether it should change.

A stronger review team includes people who can question assumptions, create alternatives, evaluate the options, build staff support, coordinate the rollout, and finish the details. The review should not end when the document is written. It should end when teachers can use the new approach without heroic effort.

6. Separate strategic planning from implementation planning

Strategic planning sessions can produce energy and still fail. The failure usually appears later, when the school discovers that nobody owns the dependencies, communication, resources, milestones, or completion checks. Working Genius helps leaders see that strategy and implementation are related but distinct work.

Run the strategic conversation with strong Wonder, Invention, Discernment, and Galvanizing voices. Then run a separate implementation conversation with Enablement and Tenacity leaders in the room from the beginning. Do not hand them a finished plan and ask them to make it work. Let them shape the plan while there is still time to make it realistic.

7. Protect the reliable finishers from becoming the dumping ground

Every school has people who can be trusted to finish. They become the default owners of events, compliance tasks, parent notices, spreadsheets, excursions, handbooks, and final edits. Their strength becomes a magnet for unfinished work. Eventually the school mistakes their reliability for unlimited capacity.

List the work currently held by your most reliable finishers. Then sort it into work that genuinely requires their Tenacity or Enablement and work that has landed there because other people avoided it. Redistribute the second category. The school may become slightly less efficient for a short period, but it becomes healthier and more resilient.

8. Use Working Genius to improve staff development conversations

Professional development should not only ask what skills the school needs. It should also ask what kind of work a staff member is built to grow into. A teacher with Galvanizing may need opportunities to communicate change and lead buy-in. A teacher with Discernment may need mentoring in decision forums. For a broader development angle, see the employee development guide.

This does not mean people only do the work they enjoy. Schools need adults who can stretch. But development is more sustainable when stretch work is named, time-limited, and balanced with work that gives energy back.

9. Rebuild committees around the work they actually do

Committees are often formed around representation. That matters, but representation alone does not make the committee effective. A curriculum committee, behaviour committee, facilities committee, and wellbeing committee each demand different work. A committee full of thoughtful questioners may never finish. A committee full of finishers may never challenge the premise.

For each committee, name the dominant phase of work for the next term. If the committee needs to evaluate options, make sure Discernment is present. If it needs staff adoption, include Galvanizing. If it needs delivery, include Enablement and Tenacity. Representation and work fit should both be visible.

10. Give early-career teachers language for energy, not just competence

Early-career teachers can confuse exhaustion with incompetence. They may assume they are failing because a particular type of work drains them. Working Genius gives mentors a better conversation. The issue may not be whether the teacher can do the work. The issue may be whether the role is asking them to spend too much time in work that consumes energy.

In mentoring conversations, ask which parts of teaching create energy and which parts require disproportionate recovery. Then look for patterns. This does not remove hard work from the role, but it helps new teachers understand themselves before discouragement turns into resignation thinking.

11. Design professional learning communities by phase

Professional learning communities often try to do inquiry, design, decision-making, communication, coordination, and completion in the same group. That is a lot to ask of one structure. Working Genius lets schools create cleaner PLC roles without creating hierarchy.

One PLC might explore the problem and design options. Another might evaluate which options are viable. A third might coordinate implementation and gather feedback. The same teachers do not need to own every phase. This is especially useful in larger state systems where initiatives stall because ownership becomes too diffuse.

12. Stop treating slow decisions as healthy collaboration

Some school decisions need broad consultation. Many do not. When every decision is treated as a consensus process, leaders with Wonder keep exploring, Invention keeps redesigning, Galvanizing keeps seeking buy-in, and nobody with Discernment is allowed to make the call. The result is not collaboration. It is drift.

Create decision rules before the discussion begins. Name who contributes ideas, who evaluates them, who decides, who communicates, and who coordinates the next step. This protects staff voice while preventing endless circular meetings.

13. Align communication work with the message type

A parent update, a staff change announcement, a compliance reminder, and a vision-setting message are different kinds of work. Schools often ask the same administrator or deputy to write all of them. That can flatten the message and drain the writer.

Match communication to genius. Vision communication often benefits from Wonder and Invention. Change communication needs Discernment and Galvanizing. Procedural communication needs Enablement and Tenacity. The principal does not need to write every message personally to retain accountability for it.

14. Use profiles to lower conflict between complementary leaders

Many leadership conflicts are not values conflicts. They are phase-of-work conflicts. One deputy wants to ask whether the wellbeing system still fits the school. Another wants to finish implementing the current system before changing direction. Both may be right. Without language, they experience each other as obstacles.

Put the profiles on the table and name the work phase each leader is protecting. Wonder protects possibility. Tenacity protects completion. Discernment protects quality. Galvanizing protects movement. Once the contribution is named, disagreement becomes easier to use.

15. Build change initiatives with a handoff map

School change often fails during handoff. The idea is clear, the staff launch is energetic, and then the work moves into the quieter phase of coordination. That is where Enablement and Tenacity become essential. Without them, even good ideas become background noise.

Before launch, write the handoff map. Who questions the problem? Who designs the response? Who evaluates the option? Who builds buy-in? Who coordinates support? Who checks completion? A change initiative without a handoff map is relying on goodwill instead of design.

16. Make workload discussions more specific

Workload conversations are often too general. Staff say they are overloaded, leaders acknowledge it, and the school still does not know what to change. Working Genius gives workload conversations sharper categories. The question becomes not only how much work a person has, but what kind of work they are carrying.

Ask staff to name the work that drains them fastest and the work that restores energy. Then look for repeated mismatches. A teacher may have a manageable quantity of work but an unhealthy mix of work. Another may be energised by the type but carrying too much volume. Those are different problems.

17. Use the model carefully in performance conversations

Working Genius should never become an excuse for poor follow-through or a label that traps someone. It should help leaders distinguish unwillingness, skill gap, capacity overload, and genuine energy mismatch. Those require different responses.

In a performance conversation, start with the work itself. What outcome is required? Which phase is stuck? Does the person have the skill, support, time, and energy profile to carry it? This makes the conversation more practical and less personal.

18. Plan student-facing projects across the full work cycle

Student projects often reward one kind of student repeatedly. A project that values ideation but not completion suits some learners. A project that values compliance but not invention suits others. Working Genius can help teachers design projects where more students experience a meaningful contribution.

Build the project through the phases. Students ask better questions, create options, evaluate choices, rally group action, coordinate tasks, and finish the product. The point is not to assess children with an adult workplace tool. The point is to notice that learning work has phases, and students need language for those phases.

19. Pair teachers for complementary lesson design

Collaboration works best when teachers bring different strengths to the same work. Two teachers with strong Invention may create exciting lesson ideas but run short on completion. Two teachers with strong Tenacity may produce structured lessons but miss opportunities to redesign the approach.

Pair teachers across the cycle. One teacher can design the fresh approach while another tightens the resources, timing, assessment, and follow-through. This is not about ranking contribution. It is about making collaboration less accidental.

20. Use the model to improve staff induction

Induction often gives new staff information, policies, logins, and names. It does not always explain how the school gets work done. Working Genius can make induction more human by showing new staff who to involve for different types of work.

A simple induction map can name who helps with strategic questions, who designs solutions, who evaluates options, who builds support, who coordinates resources, and who checks completion. New staff then learn the informal operating system faster.

21. Keep the model out of labels and in the work

The fastest way to misuse Working Genius is to turn it into a label. A person is not Wonder. They may have Wonder as an area of genius. A person is not bad at Tenacity. They may find sustained finishing work draining. The distinction matters because schools are communities, not sorting machines.

Use the language to discuss work, not worth. Ask what the work requires, what the person brings, and what support would make the next phase healthier. The model is most useful when it increases generosity and precision at the same time.

22. Create a school work-alignment matrix

The practical asset for a school is a one-page work-alignment matrix. Across the top, place the six types of work. Down the side, list recurring school work such as curriculum review, behaviour-system change, parent communication, assessment moderation, events, compliance, staff development, and strategic planning. Then mark which type of work dominates each task.

This matrix helps leaders spot predictable strain. Curriculum review may need Wonder and Invention early, Discernment in the middle, and Enablement and Tenacity at the end. Events may need Galvanizing to recruit energy, but Tenacity to finish the details. Once the pattern is visible, assignments become less political and more practical.

23. Run a small pilot before rolling it system-wide

Large systems can overcomplicate useful tools. Start with one leadership team, one faculty, or one project. Run the assessment, map the work, change one meeting structure, and adjust one set of responsibilities. For facilitation ideas, use Working Genius group activities or the practical guide on how to run a Working Genius workshop.

A pilot gives the school evidence before it turns the model into another initiative. The goal is not to make everyone fluent in new language. The goal is to remove one point of friction that staff can actually feel.

24. Measure whether the work mix changes

Do not measure the success of Working Genius by whether staff enjoyed the workshop. Measure whether the work mix changes. Are meetings shorter and clearer? Are initiatives handed off more intentionally? Are reliable finishers protected from default overload? Are early-career teachers having more specific mentoring conversations?

A useful measure is to ask staff three questions at the start and again after a term. Which part of your work gives energy? Which part drains energy fastest? What recurring task should be reassigned, redesigned, or better supported? That is enough data to make the next adjustment.

25. Ask for help when the stakes are high

A school can use Working Genius internally, but high-stakes moments often benefit from external facilitation. This is especially true when a leadership team is already tense, when a restructure is being considered, or when a system-wide initiative has stalled. An external facilitator can keep the conversation focused on the work rather than personalities. You can also read more about working with a Certified Working Genius Facilitator in Australia.

The best use of Working Genius in a public or state school is not a colourful profile session. It is a disciplined way to ask better leadership questions. What type of work is this? Who is built to contribute here? Where are we draining people unnecessarily? What handoff is missing? If you want support introducing Working Genius into your school or leadership team, reach out at jonno@consultclarity.org.