This paper presents critique of the development of “co-leading” (Spillane et al., 2008) practices among principals’ and teachers’ in a distributed model for school improvement initiative implemented in primary schools in a Swedish municipality. “Co-leading” is a collaborative practice whereby principals and teachers, as middle leaders (Rönnerman et al., 2018), work in a distributed leadership model for school improvement. “Co-leading”, recommended in the state public inquiry report The Trust Delegation (Bringselius, 2018), draws on the theoretical framework of distributed leadership which values the mutual execution of leading (Spillane, 2006). The notion of distribution argues for others than formal leaders to have authority to lead (Liljenberg, 2015) in orientations focused on ‘power-with’ rather than ‘power-over’ (Møller, 2002). “Co-leading” is built on a foundation of trust, openness, transparency, tolerance and reciprocal accountability which require genuine collaboration and communication between the leaders. Importantly, ‘accountability’ means recognising the mutual relationship between answerability, responsibility, and capacity-building (Hatch, 2013). Over four years a distributed leadership model involving principals and teachers as “co-leaders” with site responsive assignments focused on leading school improvement was developed in the Stenungsund municipality. The project design, inspired by Ekholm’s (1989) infrastructure model based on Miles’ (1965) understanding of social life in organizations, involved principals and teachers as middle leaders being assigned tasks, responsibilities, and mandates to lead school-based activities for teachers’ professional learning. Critical reflection, evaluation, and analysis of participant feedback found that to make the distributed leadership practice work, requires leaders at all levels to take explicit accountability for their assignments. Lack of clear assignment descriptions tended to limit co-leaders work to simply passing on information and administration (Harris, 2014). Multiple dimensions of accountability were found, including: • Individual teachers’ accountability for instructional development. • Teaching staff’s collective accountability in educational practice development. • Individual “co-leaders” accountability in collective developing an improvement area. • “Co-leader” networks collective accountability in developing an improvement area. • Networks coordinators’ accountability for the development of “co-leaders” learning and leading of teachers’ learning. • Principals’ accountability in leading individual “co-leaders” and their network. • Head of schools’ accountability in leading principals’ learning and leading. Findings provide insight into ways the co-leader initiative has implications for designing professional learning through a systematic and collaborative process where co-leaders work together to develop mutual understandings of what reciprocal accountability must entail. Results also show that a successful distributed leadership practice including teachers builds capacity for middle leader development.

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