This roundtable focuses on the view that leadership can only be understood within the context in which it is exercised. Scholars have recognized that leadership is bound by context (Foster, 1989; Gronn & Ribbins, 1996). Consequently, it has been argued that context should act as the means to empirically investigate the ways in which leadership is understood and practised (Foster, 1989; Gronn & Ribbins, 1996). However, the field of educational leadership research has been dominated by positivist and behaviourist perspectives (Apple, 2004; English, 2011). The adoption of such perspectives has contributed to a separation of schools and school leadership from their cultural contexts resulting in an incomplete picture of this topic (Bates, 2006; Leithwood & Riehl, 2003). Given the current international context of policy reform and changing environments, there is a need to focus on the extent to which contextual factors influence the nature of educational leadership (Bates, 2006; Botha, 2013; Lemon, 2004).

A growing number of investigations has uncovered how various contextual factors influence the nature and character of educational leadership (Hallinger, 2011). This body of work has shown the effect of macro-level factors, such as globalization, national policies, and technological changes, on schools (Bottery, 2004, Dimmock & Walker, 2005). It has been maintained that this range of factors has contributed to a greater number of tasks being given to leaders (Bottery, 2004; Bush & Glover, 2003; Keddie, 2015) and has created new leadership roles, for example the role of ‘system leader’ (Woods & Simkins, 2014). In addition, the research has illustrated how schools are affected by micro-level factors including the school’s size, type, and location as well as its socio-economic status and culture (Bush & Glover, 2003). This connects with investigations which have focused on the ways leadership is understood and practised in various types of schools including small, remote schools and faith-based schools (Brezicha, Bergmark & Mitra, 2015; Clarke & Wildy, 2004; Striepe, Clarke & O’Donoghue, 2014). These investigations have highlighted how a school’s environment and aims can influence the nature of a leader’s daily activities. The studies have also highlighted how a person’s values, morals, and religious orientation can influence their perspectives on educational leadership. Such findings relate to the work of Loder and Spillane (2006) which has highlighted the extent to which personal level factors, including past experiences and ethnicity can shape a leader’s perspective of their work. In sum, this body of work has helped to increase the professional knowledge base within the field of educational leadership. However, it is has been argued that further research needs to be undertaken on contextualizing leadership across different settings in order to understand how various factors have a bearing on the ways in which leaders interact with their particular working contexts (Bush, 2014; Loder &  Spillane, 2006).

Consequently, this roundtable constitutes a conceptual paper based on the pertinent literature.  Its purpose is to stimulate debate and discussion about how contextual factors impact on a leader’s day to day work. More specifically, the session poses the following questions: what is the nature of the contexts which influence a leader’s work? What are the strategies school leaders adopt to deal with the complexities of their work?  To what extent are contextual factors, particularly national policies, reconfiguring the nature of school leadership roles? And how might investigations of leadership take into account such influences? It is envisioned that this session would encourage the development of research agendas which are designed to move beyond the view of leadership as a set of habits, characteristics, and traits to a more comprehensive, detailed, and realistic account of this complex topic.

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