Hard Truths of Authentic Leadership — A Conversation with Dr Howard Stribbell

In this episode of The Common Room, Joshua sits down with Dr. Howard Stribbell — a school leader with over 28 years in international education, from classroom teacher to head of school, to strategic advisor to the owners and boards who shape the sector from the top. Howard grew the International School of Macau from 300 to 1,400 students over 12 years, and is now founder of Hive School International and the Canadian Overseas Schools Association. He holds a PhD in educational leadership from Assumption University and is the author of The Loneliest Seat, a book about what it really means to lead, and what it costs.

Together, we explore the side of school leadership that rarely gets spoken about — the weight of accountability without a genuine peer to carry it with, the gap between what leaders believe and what the role demands they project, and the slow, quiet cost of trying to lead authentically inside an institution that often asks you to do something else.

In this conversation, we cover:

• The night Howard first felt the full weight of the "loneliest seat" — sitting alone in his office at 9pm, and the mouse that kept him company
• Why he wore a mask of confidence early in his career, and the moment it started to feel more real than who he actually was underneath it
• The difference between authenticity and oversharing — and why what your team actually wants from you isn't transparency, it's clarity
• Responsibility, Accountability, and Liability — the framework Howard uses to explain why teachers, heads, and owners each carry a different kind of pressure, and why understanding the difference changes how decisions get made
• "It's not what you intend, it's the consequence" — Howard's mature leadership lesson on owning impact instead of hiding behind good intentions
• What it really takes to build other leaders, rather than just holding onto the work yourself
• Why a school's culture shouldn't depend on the personality of the person at the top — and what happens when it does

Whether you're currently sitting in the loneliest seat yourself, supporting someone who is, or simply trying to understand what leadership actually costs beneath the calm exterior, this is an honest, unguarded conversation about the weight most leaders carry alone.

A huge thank you to Howard for his candour, his hard-won wisdom, and for reminding us that the mask we wear to appear capable often costs us more than we realise.

The Common Room is hosted by Joshua Sussex — Deputy Head of Secondary and EdD candidate: researching leadership in international schools.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:05

International education. The classrooms, the staff rooms, the lives built far from home. This is the common room. I'm Joshua Susticks. Let's talk.

unknown 0:23

Dr.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Howard Strabel has spent more than 28 years inside international education as a teacher, as a principal who grew the International School of Macau from 300 to 1,400 students over 12 years, and is now a strategic counsel to the international school owners and boards who shape the sector from the top. He is the founder of Hive School International and the Canadian Overseas Schools Association and holds a PhD in educational leadership from Assumption University. He is the author of the Loneliest Seat, a book about what it really means to lead and what it costs. Every school leader has a public face. The strategy, the calm, the vision, what is almost never spoken about and rarely shared is what it actually feels like to sit at the top, the weight of accountability without a genuine peer to carry it with. The gap between what you believe and what the role demands you project, and the slow, quiet cost of trying to lead authentically inside an institution that often asks you to do something else. Dr. Howard has lived inside that reality for almost three decades, from classroom teacher to head of school, from growing a school fourfold to advising the very owners and boards that school leaders must answer to. His book, The Loneliest Seat, means what most leaders in international education rarely say out loud. This conversation goes into that territory directly. The loneliness, while being authentic, the things experience teaches you that nobody puts in a leadership manual. This episode is for school leaders at every stage, for those who support them, and for anyone who has ever wondered what the purse at the top of an institution is actually carrying. Welcome. Hi Joshua, great to be on here. Thank you very much for your time. I do appreciate it. So your title of your book, The Loneliest Seat, where did that phrase come from? And when did you start to feel that?

SPEAKER_01 2:09

Yeah, and I remember I came to McCal in 2006. I was the principal of the school there. And then four years later I became the head of school. And I remember sitting at my desk, it's 9 p.m., but there's just one cleaner who's who's still cleaning. And I think I was the only light on in the building. It just kind of hit me just how lonely it is. And you're scrambling to try to get stuff ready for the next day while at the same time trying to think about the big things, the big picture, the big questions that maybe don't have very clear answers. Um, and then funny enough, I also remember having this feeling like I was being watched. And I was like, what is going on? And then I realized there was a little mouse. There was a mouse that would run down the hallway and stop and look in my office and then go, and you would just kind of catch it out of the side of your eye. Uh yeah. Me and uh me and Mickey Mouse had uh a lot of nights together uh in that office.

SPEAKER_00 3:01

At that time when you realized you felt lonely, you acknowledged the loneliness of the role. What were the strategies you put in place to overcome that loneliness or to perhaps make sure it doesn't impact your work?

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Yeah, you know what? To be honest, I think I made the wrong decision. I decided that I had to be that leader that I had in my mind of what people were expecting from me. And so, you know, I put on this mask of this confident, um capable leader. Um, and and I try not to let you know the weaknesses, the vulnerabilities show. And I was always trying to figure out what people wanted of me or what their expectations are, as opposed to who am I as a leader? And so that worked for a while. And in some ways, we have to do that. We have to kind of fake it till we make it, especially in school leadership, because we're not prepared for these roles. We think we know what's involved in these roles until we get the promotion, and then we realize, oh wow, we had no clue. So there is a bit of fake it to make it, but there comes a point where the mask starts to become more real than who you are behind it. And uh the challenge has been over the last few years to start taking off that mask, asking myself, who am I as a person and as a leader, not just as an employee? And uh and then being open and vulnerable. So that's the internal work. The external work is building your network. And you're the only head or the only principal in your school, probably. And it does feel lonely, but it's a choice if you isolate. It doesn't have to be isolating, it can be lonely. You're gonna know things that no one else knows, you're gonna carry things that no one else has to carry, and you're going to make decisions that are going to impact lots of people's lives, but you don't need to stay in your office. You can connect with your community, your school community, your direct reports, and more importantly, start building outside of that school. So maybe there's a neighborhood school, uh, there's a school within your international school association. Uh, I was very lucky to be invited to be a board member of Acamas, the Association of China and Mongolia International Schools. And I was a very young head. I only got invited because I was from Macau. So that was the M in uh uh in Acemus. And so I got to sit around this table with these career heads of schools and just learn from them and and listen to their stories and hear what they've talked about. So definitely, if you're a young leader, go and network and find mentors. And they don't have to be mentors with a special badge or anything like that, but people who've done it before you and then build those networks.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

Did you think loneliness in school leadership is something that leaders talk enough about? Or do you think people are perhaps suffering or feeling that loneliness in silence?

SPEAKER_01 5:50

I think it's a lot of it's in silence. It's because we believe that we have to appear capable. Our teams need confidence from us. And when we don't feel confident, then we tend to fake it. And so we're not willing to be vulnerable. I think that's starting to change. I've had a lot of talks with younger leaders lately, partly through my book and through some other podcasts. And I'm seeing that they're having a much better balance with wellness. When I was coming up through the ranks, it was normal to put in 60 hours a week or work late every night. And Saturdays and Sundays were great because you add time to actually do the work and to try to catch up. I think people are starting to recognize that there's some limits to that. Now, at the same time, I'm not going to pretend and say you can work nine to five and be successful in education as a leader or even as a teacher. These are professions and you have to do above average in order to get above average results too. So I think we need to keep that in mind. I'm not a hundred percent work-life balance kind of person. I'm more about the rhythms of life. Uh, and we'll see that in education. There's times where we're super busy and times where we're less busy and we need to build recovery into it. But yeah, I don't think we're talking about it. I think as like-minded people get together, whether these are athletic directors or admission directors or heads of school, you start hearing these conversations happening. I think people are opening up more. And I think that's uh good for the industry.

SPEAKER_00 7:13

On that work-life balance, because I follow a lot of your writings on on LinkedIn and various platforms that you've been on, podcasts and things that I've heard a lot of what you're talking about recovery and well-being and that balance, just to try and pick holes in that a little bit and perhaps other people's perspective. Some people may say to you, that's fine for you to say because you're at that level now, because you've got to that point, and perhaps you've got to that point, because you didn't necessarily prioritize well-being in that work-life balance, that got you to where you are. What would you say to those people who have that opinion?

SPEAKER_01 7:44

I mean, uh, Marshall McLuhan says the luxury of being big is the is the freedom to think small. And um, it's very true. You know, I have space now in my life where I can do it. But I did have to intentionally create that space. I had to set aside ambition and achievement and work on myself, on my mental health. For me, achievement was something that really drove me. And that goes back to some core beliefs that I had, you know, as a young child, not being good enough, not being worthy enough. And the way that I could prove that I was good enough was to achieve. And so I achieved everything, you know, from straight A's to captain of the sports teams to leaders of my youth group and things like that. Uh, and then into my adult life, it helped me. I became one of the youngest principals, one of the youngest heads, and I got my PhD. I started multiple companies, I ran multiple schools, but it was never enough. You know, there's still that voice inside you that says you're not good enough. And it wasn't until I started to tune into that voice and understand that that voice had started a negative cycle in me. So that voice said you're not good enough. So I started to achieve, then I got successful. And then it was very easy to believe, see, hard work pays off, and it does, but it doesn't fill that gap inside, that not being enough gap. And so that reinforced cycle um became became problematic for me. And it's only now as I'm older that I'm able to step back, create the space to reflect, to understand it, to accept it, and then to start making some changes on it. And that's one of the reasons for the book and the reasons that I talk as much as I do is to try to get other people to avoid falling into that track.

SPEAKER_00 9:27

So it would be fair to say you would be of the opinion that you couldn't be just as successful with a higher or stronger focus on the work-life balance and ensuring that health is a top priority.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

Yeah, I think, you know, let's start with authenticity. Authenticity is the right place to be. If we're leading with masks, there's gonna come a time when the mask doesn't work anymore. And you'll see that leader blows up in a board meeting or uh a staff meeting goes wrong, or you have a meeting with a teacher and it goes sideways, it's because that mask has shifted and all of a sudden this frustration, this anger comes out. What we have to do is take off that mask carefully, in the right places, at the right times, accept who we are authentically. And just because I have a temper doesn't mean I can authentically live that and express it, right? But I have to be aware of it, accept it, and then act on it. Then when we have that authenticity, that resonates with people because people see themselves in it as well. And they're less likely to put up those guardrails, their own masks, and they're more willing to connect on a deeper level. Now, there is a difference between being authentic and oversharing. You know, we don't need to stand in front of our staff and cry our eyes out and woo-hoo ourselves and oh, woe is me, and I'm such a pathetic leader. That's not what our teams need either. But we do need to be able to stand in front of our people and say, I hear what you're saying. My initial reaction is a little bit negative, but I want to hear more. Or to stand in front of your team and say, you know what, guys, I don't know the answer to this right now. You know, I'm gonna need some feedback from some people, and then we're going to come up with a decision together on this. That kind of vulnerability and authenticity matters. Um, and the other thing is about oversharing, you know, in leadership, especially in education, we're always told transparency, transparency, transparency. First of all, your team does not want transparency. They do not want to know about the 13 different factors that influence the budget. They want to know do they have a job next year and what kind of raise can they expect, and what small factors are influencing their life. So it's not about transparency. Uh, I often used to overshare. You don't understand how much stress is on me and all these different competing factors. They want clarity. And as leaders, we're not to bring transparency, we're to bring clarity. And I think that helps us as leaders.

SPEAKER_00 11:53

So you advise owners and boards as well as heads of school, what does authenticity actually look like when you're navigating that space? Where does accountability run in every direction? What kind of advice do you offer when you're speaking to those experienced heads of schools running large schools with hundreds of thousands of students? What kind of advice do you give to support those heads of schools?

SPEAKER_01 12:14

Yeah, I've been very lucky in my career. I've been given opportunities. So, yeah, I was a teacher, I was a principal, I was a head of school, I was a school superintendent overseeing a group of schools. I've also been and still a school owner. And so I've sat at that table as a school owner and listened to a head of school have a great idea, but have no idea where the funds are going to come from it or not be able to put all the pieces together. And so one of the things that I try to do is to help each group understand the other group. Everyone wants the school to be successful. They all want the same thing. They just disagree on how to do it and usually on how fast to do it. The owners wanted them much faster, and the heads see all the obstacles that it'll take to get it there. So or try to bring a lot of empathy to both roles so that the owners and the boards can see the pressure that's on the heads, and the heads can see the pressure that's on board members and owners as well. And I think when we do that, that allows them to connect at a different level, allows them to understand each other. And in the right settings, it allows us to make a better generative decision together. Sometimes it's not collaborative, sometimes it's not generative, sometimes it's top-down. But if we understand why that is, then we can accept it a little bit better. So for example, um, I know LinkedIn on this about teachers have responsibility, heads have accountability, and owners have liability. Oh, and it's so true. But teachers are responsible to teach their subjects and get the students learn. But when exam marks go down or something happens, it's the head who's accountable to the board for those academic results. But it's the owner if those academic results lead to decreased student numbers, which then affects the budget. And now they're in a deficit. Well, who's going to put in an extra million dollars into the school to keep it running? It's not the teacher, it's not the head, it's the owner. And so it feels very different. And so understanding the difference between responsibility, accountability, and liability also helps us understand the different pressures that are on all three of those groups. And they're all important, but they're all the same.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Fascinating. What about those sort of deputy heads, assistant heads, those aspiring senior leaders? What would be your advice to those people you work with in terms of their aspirations of remaining authentic, considering well-being, considering work-life balance, but aspiring to go on to become the next head, the next CEO, whatever it may be? What advice do you give to those in that lane?

SPEAKER_01 14:44

Yeah, one, do your job remarkably well. Keep yourself humble and serve people. Bring value to people. It's not about you. It is about you and you will grow in it, but stop putting yourself and worrying about yourself. Just give value to other people. And that's that's going to help a lot. The other thing is look up and get involved in the stuff that's above your role. So that can be joining, you know, different committees. It could be job shadowing. You can ask to go visit other schools. It could be building your network and listen. Listen, I've been so blessed that I had leaders around me who allowed me to sit at the table and just listen. Now, I was a young upstart and I would say some stupid stuff and blurt out these off-handed remarks thinking I was so smart. And luckily, they didn't write me off. They kept me at the table. But listen and just see how people are thinking and how they're handling things. I think in education, we don't do a good job of preparing the next generation of leaders to move up. And that's why in my high schools group, we do something called heads council. And I bring all the heads together at remote. But I also have them bring their principals and vice principals and IV coordinators as well. I invite them so they know that it's part of the group, but the heads also have the power to invite people as well. So that now that elementary principal is hearing about the student crisis that's happening in secondary that maybe they've never thought about. For example, a rape allegation or a suicidal tendency or something like that. As they learn about that, that's going to help them be prepared to move on to a deputy head role or a head role. Or understanding about the financial implications. Typically, just heads and boards talk about it. And principals just want to know what their budget line is. But if you don't understand the whole budget and how all those factors come together from tuition increase to uh scholarships to student numbers to salary increases to health benefits, then you don't understand all the sides of the equation. So the more that we can expose them to those things, the better that they're going to be prepared to move up on when they get the opportunity.

SPEAKER_00 16:55

When you were in that position yourself, you mentioned about the motivation should be about serving people and about supporting people whilst remaining authentic. Was that how you felt at that time? Or was it perhaps slightly different? And that feeling has evolved over the years.

SPEAKER_01 17:07

Yeah, if I have to admit, I think I was very uh egocentric. Uh, I was pretty proud. I I remember even as my first vice principalship back in Canada, I remember thinking, oh, this is uh referring to the school as my school, or somehow thinking that because I'm now in leadership, I I have you know some more magical powers than than what I had. Students had to respect me more than they did as a as a teacher. Silly things. Maybe it's human nature, but I think over the years I started to see how that didn't work for myself. I definitely saw it in other people. And that's that classic thing. The thing you see in other people is probably the bigger thing that's in your own life. And so I would see what happens when other leaders let ego get in the way. And then um I started to realize, oh, wait, I'm I think I'm letting ego get in the way as well. And it's not about me. I don't need to worry about taking this personally. Um, I can serve my team, my staff, my community. And um, it's okay if I'm the one who has to apologize, even if it's someone else's fault. This was the hardest thing for me to get over. If someone else screws up, you meet with the parents, and you have to eat humble pie on behalf of that person. And to do it happily, not with resentment, but just helping to take the pressure off of that other person. Or here's a mature leadership thing. It's not what you intend that matters, it's the consequence. You know, how many times have we said this? Well, I didn't intend that. I didn't mean for you to get hurt, or I didn't mean it that way. Well, you're not taking responsibility for the way the person did take it. You're not taking responsibility for the consequence. It's all about the impact. So if what you said in the staff meeting had a negative impact, don't hide behind saying, oh, that wasn't my intention, or you don't understand, or no, own it. Okay, obviously I didn't explain it in the right way. Let me try. Yeah. As leaders, we have to constantly put ourselves back in those middle leader shoes, those uh director's shoes, those staff member shoes, the custodian's shoes, and let's not forget where we came from.

SPEAKER_00 19:10

Thank you for sharing, talking about ego and your sort of motivations back then. And I'm sure people can relate at various points of their career, or perhaps even now. What would you say to those that perhaps listen to this and think, oh, I can relate to that? Yeah, I'm reflecting and actually, yeah, do you know what? Some of this is my ego. How does one then in the staff room or in the meeting or in a leadership situation in school publicly, perhaps not an isolated incident, but how do they change? How do they acknowledge, okay, do you know what? I'm reflecting, and these mistakes have happened, and perhaps my motivations were not quite right. I do want to change it and I want to be more authentic. How would we advise that kind of person to make that change that's still comes across natural and positive for the school?

SPEAKER_01 19:51

I think there's a mindset shift. We need to intentionally divorce ourselves from the role, from the position. So, okay, you're ahead of school. There's certain things afforded you when you come into the school. Everyone's gonna say hi, the guard's gonna stand up, say good morning, your, you know, your assistant is waiting for you with some things. When you walk through the hallways, the kids are gonna say hello, the staff are gonna say hello. Even when you go into public settings with other school leaders or the Department of Education, or even in public, all of that's happening because of your role. What happens if you don't have that role? What's your influence now? Who are you as a person and as a leader? Are people following you because of your role? Or are they following you because of you as a person? And again, going back to your middle leaders, you can lead so far beyond your role. Even teachers, and teachers will say, I'm not a leader, I'm not a department head, I'm not a grade level team lead. No, you can still lead. People will be naturally attracted to you if you serve and give value, and you lead beyond the role. So I think of a great anecdote. I just read recently of someone who was in a high government position, flew to a popular conference, and then met them, rolled out the red carpet, had the best room in the hotel, picked them up in a car, got them to their speaking engagement, had the yellow room all set up, all that sort of stuff. Then the next year he was no longer in government and he was still speaking at the same conference. And he had to book his own flights, find his own taxi to the airport, find his own way to the conference. And it's like, yeah, you know, as heads of school, we might be like that too. What if we weren't heads anymore? Would we still have that influence and that impact? And that could be humbling. And I think it helps ground us in being the right people instead of worrying about being in the right position.

SPEAKER_00 21:48

Before we finish, just for a leader sitting in the loneliest seat right now and hearing this and resonating with what's being said, what do you want them to hear from this conversation?

SPEAKER_01 21:56

I know what it's like, and you carry a lot of responsibility. There is a lot of Heaviness and things that you did not expect when you accepted this job. But you don't have to carry it alone. You can find other people who can support you. And the best thing that you can do as a leader is build other leaders. Don't do the work for them. Don't do the work by yourself. Give them the freedom and the responsibility to become stronger leaders themselves. Then that's ultimately going to help you as well and help them, right? So it's such a win-win thing. But so often we become leaders because we're highly capable. We get stuff done. And a lot of times we'll just hang on to something and do it instead of taking the time to coach the kindergarten principal on how to handle that parent's situation or how to better improve their teachers' uh instructional practices or whatever. So building other leaders is a big thing. Find a group of people where you don't need to perform leadership anymore. Where you can stop performing and you can just be. And that might be people with a similar role. It might be people who aren't even related to education. It might be connections in your family, in your church, in your community, but where you can just stop wearing that mantle of head of school or principal or director. And be yourself. And I think making sure that your title, your role, doesn't overtake your identity, that who you are as a person is way more important than what your job is on the org truck.

SPEAKER_00 23:36

Final point for me. Have you ever experienced a time where a member of staff is a leader in the school is not the right fit for the school or things aren't working? Or perhaps yourself you reflect and thought, you know what, I don't fit here. My personality is not right. And if so, how do you deal with that as an owner, as a board member, or perhaps even yourself as a leader in the school?

SPEAKER_01 23:55

Yeah, I it's so important. Sometimes we get stuck in deficiency models, right? Oh, this staff member is driving me crazy. They can't handle their class, they they have conflicts with the other grade team members or something like that. But that person ultimately still wants to be a good teacher. I don't think anyone goes into education to just collect the check or just for the summer holidays. There's an intrinsic part inside it. And it's our job as leaders to tap into that and to help coach it and to recognize when it's not going to be a good fit in our school. So, for example, you might have um, you know, a high school physics teacher who's so stuck on the exams and the results, and it doesn't fit your school because your school is more about well-roundedness and wellness and stuff. Well, helping that person to find another school that's a better fit for them, they're gonna thrive in a different type of school than what yours is. And then your students are gonna do better with a different type of teacher as well. So success is big enough for all of us to achieve it. Uh, it just doesn't have to happen at every individual school. So sometimes letting go, letting them find their own better fit is better for them and better for thank you very much for your time, Howard.

SPEAKER_00 25:09

I really do appreciate it. And uh my book, Loneliness, is on its way, but uh I think living in Malaysia takes a bit of time to arrive. But um, I'm very much looking forward to it and I encourage others to go out and buy it, and it's definitely worth a read out.

SPEAKER_01 25:19

So great. I appreciate that, Joshua. And no, thanks for doing this. I know you're stepping out of your comfort zone to put this podcast out there, and good on you for starting these conversations and then sharing it with the world. Um, that's how we're going to help connect better with people, and it helps us avoid some of the pitfalls that some of us uh older dinosaurs have fallen into in the past. So thanks for having me on. Brilliant. Thank you very much.