I received a complimentary review copy of this book. That has not influenced this review.

Most of us have worked for all kinds of leaders, some good, some bad, some outstanding, others dismal, plus the odd one or two whose presence or absence appears to make no difference at all. But what makes someone a great leader?

According to Simon Sinek, the short answer is someone who puts their team first. This is summed up nicely in the title. The true leader makes sure everyone on their team is fed before settling down to the meal themselves.

This sounds blindingly obvious, but Sinek delves far deeper into why that is a good strategy. He does so in two main ways.

First, he discusses how the kind of trust that is built up in a military unit is crucial to the survival of its members. Each of them has to know that any one of them would look out for anyone else in a crisis. Although life in the commercial world (or the educational one) is not usually so dramatically filled with life or death moments, the principle still holds. If the workforce feels that their bosses are looking out for their interests, that they are inside what Sinek calls a “circle of safety”, they will go the extra mile.

It’s interesting because while I was reading the book I was thinking “Oh yeah? What about Jack Welch then?”. He was known as “Neutron Jack”, because every year he would fire the bottom 10% of General Electric’s managers (as measured by their divisions’ contribution to share price), and give the top 20% stock options. That strategy made a ton of money for GE and its shareholders.

However, Sinek believes that an alternative measure of a leader’s success is how the organisation fares once they’ve left it. On that basis, he says, Welch’s record is not quite so good.

One of the consequences of the focus on (short-term) shareholder value, according to Sinek, has been an increase in accounting fraud.

Let’s take a moment to reflect on how these insights might be applied in education. In England today we have a teacher retention crisis. According to figures reported in 2019, over 30% of teachers who had qualified five years previously had left the profession. That is an astonishing rate of attrition by any standard. Whatever the actual reason given by individual teachers, such as workload, surely what it boils down to is that teachers simply don’t feel looked after. Every new Secretary of State for Education makes a debut speech promising to “drive up standards”, completely deaf to the collective groan that rises up in response.

For individual teachers and leaders the emphasis on standards, however measured, gives rise to a perverse incentive to, if not actually cheat, at least game the system. For example, one head of Computing told me that he always teaches the easy aspects of the subject last, so that his students’ grades appear to rise as the year progresses. The fact that as far as I am aware most teachers or leaders do not behave in this way is a testament to their commitment to certain principles, and no doubt far-sighted senior leadership. But how many of us would not engage in such tactics if we worked for a boss whose sole concern was how good the school grades looked when the next Ofsted inspection took place, and made the life of anyone who didn’t measure up intolerable?

Sinek’s second approach is to analyse behaviour in terms of the neurochemicals cortisol, dopamine, endorphins, oxytocin and serotonin. Now, I don’t intend to explore this underlying theme of the book, as I don’t feel qualified to, but it does make a lot of sense. For example, the dopamine hit one gets from achieving a short-term goal is addictive — just ask anyone who keeps checking their phone every ten seconds.

The book is very compelling, and what makes it a particularly enjoyable and convincing read is Sinek’s writing style: story telling. Everyone loves stories, and those in the book are very enjoyable and enlightening.

The inclusion of a chapter on dealing with Millennials (a “practical guide”) is a nice touch. I am fairly certain that all of the suggestions would work in an educational context.

Although the book was written with the corporate world in mind, its insights and recommendations are definitely relevant to leaders in education. Whether you lead a small team in a particular area, a head of department in a large secondary school, or are an aspiring headteacher, read this book.