A review of Singapore principals’ leadership qualities, styles, and roles

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a review of empirical studies on principal leadership in Singapore. It seeks to provide a general picture of Singapore principals’ leadership qualities, styles, and roles. Design/methodology/approach – This is a systematic review of empirical studies, using a “bounded” approach with a focus on the main findings of the reviewed studies. In all, 36 studies were selected for the interview. The findings of these studies were open coded, synthesized, and clustered into different themes. Findings – The review revealed several qualities, characteristics, styles, and enacted roles of Singapore principals. While there are similarities between Singapore principals and principals elsewhere in the world, the review brought out some features unique to Singapore principals. Originality/value – This review contributes to the growing literature in comparative research on principals’ leadership and their enacted roles, and concurrently functions as a guide for further research on school leadership in Singapore.

Bringing context out of the shadows of leadership

“…equality of participation, value of individuals versus groups). Yet, some of these values are in potential conflict with prevailing values held in Confucian societies with highly structured education systems such as China, Vietnam, Taiwan and Singapore (see Dimmock and Walker, 2005;Hallinger and Kantamara, 2000;Hallinger and Truong, 2014;Ng et al, 2015;Pan et al, 2015;Truong et al, 2016;Walker and Hallinger, 2015;Walker et al, 2012). In Thailand, for example, the concept of 'distributed leadership' has been interpreted and applied in ways that are consistent with its hierarchical culture but clearly at odds with the value assumptions of western proponents (e.g.…”

Successful school leadership: case studies of four Singapore primary schools

“…Ng, Nguyen, Wong and Choy (2015a) provided a review of Singapore principals' leadership qualities, styles, and roles that extended Wang's review to 2013. The influence of systemic leadership training programs in Singapore seemed to explain a high degree of conformity and uniformity in leadership styles, combining both "initiating structure" and "consideration" leadership styles, and roles as vision providers and change agents.…”

“…Past the review of Ng et al (2015a) there has been further interest to explore issues related to school and leadership success. Ng (2003) provided a policy analysis paper of the then newly created School Excellence Model, a way for schools to self-assess their educational effectiveness, and ten years later, Ng (2013) explored the perceptions of 36 Singapore vice principals in regards to school accountability.…”

“…Unlike earlier research in Singapore which suggested principals were largely responsible for school vision (Ng et al, 2015a), the development of school vision was conducted collectively at each of the school's envisioning exercises, and involved a repertoire of stakeholders including teaching and non-teaching staff, parent representatives and school board members. In conducting the envisioning exercise, the principal of Robin Primary School said:…”

Exploring Challenges in Practicing Instructional Leadership: Insights from Senior Secondary Principals

“…In this sense, all school leaders are expected to conduct high quality teaching and learning, tracking and monitoring on teachers' competencies and students' academic performance. To fulfill these tasks, principals should obtain assistance from their middle level leaders in dianogsing and monitoring teachers' competencies and students improvement on academic performance [32]. Third, in developing a positive culture, it is the duty of the principals in protecting and maximising the instructional time, motivating teachers and students through positive incentives for improvement [4].…”