The part of leading that nobody prepares you for

A few weeks ago I wrote a couple of posts on LinkedIn about my first year as a Principal, and everything that came with it. I wasn't expecting much from them, if I'm honest. But they clearly struck a nerve. The reach and the responses were completely different to my usual posts, which says something given how brutal the algorithms can be.

What struck me most wasn't the volume. It was how many people told me some version of the same story. Not always about their first year specifically, but about how little support they had the first time they stepped into a leadership role. Any leadership role.

The pressure looks different depending on where you sit

When you're at the top of an organisation, the pressure sits differently. If it's your own business, you know everything comes back to you, and that can be paralysing when you're trying to move forward. Even if you're a CEO reporting to a board, that board can hire you and fire you. So there's a real reluctance to admit when you're struggling, and in a lot of cases, that reluctance is entirely rational. Which is exactly why support that sits outside your organisation matters. Leading well is far more complicated than most people expect it to be before they get there.

Most people end up leading because they were good at what they did before. They get promoted, not because leadership was a path they chose, but because it was the next expected step after success. Nobody necessarily asks whether they've actually built the skills that step requires, because nobody planned for it in the first place.

What I did differently, and what it still didn't prepare me for

I did it differently, although not entirely by accident. I knew almost from day one of my first teaching post that I'd get to the top eventually, so I made sure I learned about leadership and management along the way. Two years into teaching, I self-funded a Masters in Leadership and Management, studying by distance learning while working full time. That gave me the theory. It also gave me the habit of reflecting honestly on my own practice as I went.

I thought that combination would prepare me for leadership. It prepared me brilliantly for the strategy and the systems. It didn't prepare me for what pressure would actually reveal about me.

What took me much longer to understand was that leadership isn't only about learning new skills. It's about understanding your own default patterns under pressure, and continuing to work on that. That's been true throughout my career in education, and it's still true now, running my own business.

The patterns that arrive before you've thought about them

We all have a pattern we return to under pressure. I certainly do. You will too. Much of it happens automatically, long before you've consciously thought about it. Your nervous system and old habits get there first. The work isn't getting rid of it. It's learning to recognise it early enough that it doesn't make your decisions for you.

None of these reactions mean you're a bad leader. They're patterns that usually developed for very good reasons, long before you were leading anyone. What matters is recognising when they're taking over without you noticing.

If self-doubt gets there first, you stay silent when you should speak up, or you let the next opportunity pass you by.

If anger gets there first, the difficult conversation comes from that place, rather than from genuine curiosity about what's actually going on.

If impatience is driving, you fire off the email before you've thought it through, or make the decision before you've weighed what it actually costs.

If proving yourself through sheer effort is the pattern, you'll work harder than everyone else and still feel it isn't enough.

If holding on tightly is the instinct, your team never gets the room they need to grow.

I see this constantly with the middle and senior leaders I work with. Whether you're trying to earn your next promotion, build trust with your team, or simply get through each day feeling you've led well, these patterns matter. Until you can manage what's happening in you, it doesn't matter how good you are at the job itself. Something stays just out of reach.

Where this fits into leadership development

This is the actual work inside Stay Strong. Lead Well., the group leadership programme I run for women in professional and senior leadership. Not just the leadership theory, though that's there too, but the space to see your own patterns clearly, and work out what to do about them, alongside other people carrying the same weight. If you're newer to this kind of work, Lead with Inner Calm is a shorter way in, built around the same five patterns.

Leadership isn't about reaching a point where the pressure disappears. It's about becoming someone who can meet it without losing yourself.

Reflection

Which patterns do you recognise in yourself when the pressure is really on?

If you were promoted because you were good at your job, when did anyone actually teach you how to lead it?

Where it shows up in the body

Isolation at the top isn't just emotional. It sits in the body too. Carrying something alone for long enough tends to show up as a kind of low-level bracing, shoulders slightly raised, jaw slightly tight, a sense of never quite putting the load down.

Try this: notice one moment where you're holding that brace without realising it. It might be before a meeting, or reading an email you're dreading. Just notice it. Then let your shoulders drop, properly, and take one slower breath out than in.

It won't remove what you're carrying. It just reminds your body that you're allowed to put a little of it down, even for thirty seconds.

Johanna Urquhart is a leadership coach and mentor for women in professional and senior leadership, and the founder of Resta Forte. She brings over 25 years of senior leadership experience, including 12 years as a school Principal, into a coaching and mentoring practice that holds leadership development and personal wellbeing together. She works with women through Stay Strong. Lead Well., Lead with Inner Calm, and 1:1 Executive Coaching. You can read more of her writing on the Resta Forte blog.