Learning to Fail Well

Thomas Edison, one of the most famous inventors in history, was not an overnight success.

Born in Ohio in 1847, his journey was defined far more by failure than by breakthrough. Take the light bulb—often credited to Edison, but in reality, an idea that already existed. The problem was not invention, but application. Early versions were impractical: too expensive, too fragile, or simply unable to last. In 1878, Edison set out to solve this.

What followed was not a moment of genius, but a process of relentless trial and error. Edison and his team tested thousands of materials for the filament. They explored at least three thousand different theories. Each attempt failed to produce a viable solution. Until one didn’t.

By 1879, Edison had identified a workable design and filament, creating the first practical incandescent light bulb.

But here’s the important part. Edison did not succeed despite failure. He succeeded because of it. Each failed attempt wasn’t wasted effort, it was information. A narrowing of possibilities. A step closer to clarity. This has powerful implications for schools.

When it comes to culture, we often search for certainty. The “right” system. The “perfect” approach. The strategy that will just work. And when something doesn’t land as expected, there can be a temptation to abandon it quickly or move on to the next idea. But culture doesn’t work like that.

Building culture is far closer to Edison’s process than it is to a quick win. It is iterative. It is imperfect. And at times, it will feel like things aren’t working.

A behaviour system may need refining. A routine may not land first time. A new expectation may be inconsistently applied. These are not signs of failure. They are part of the process.

The key difference lies in how those moments are treated:

• In weaker cultures, mistakes lead to abandonment: “That didn’t work, let’s try something else.”
• In stronger cultures, mistakes lead to refinement: “What did we learn, and how do we improve it?”

This is where many school improvement efforts falter. Not because the idea was wrong, but because it wasn’t given the time, consistency, and reflection needed to embed. Too often, schools move from initiative to initiative, never staying long enough to learn what works in their context.

Edison didn’t change the goal. He refined the approach. For school leaders, this raises an important challenge:

1.  Are we building a culture that avoids failure?
2.  Or one that learns from it?

Because the latter is where real improvement lives. Your “ideal” school culture is not discovered fully formed. It is built, iteration by iteration, refinement by refinement.

And every mistake, if properly understood, is not a step backwards…It is a step closer.

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The Myth of Copying Success

Apple is now one of the most recognisable and financially successful companies in the world. But its journey to that position was far from inevitable.

Founded in 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne, Apple quickly became a pioneer in personal computing. Yet following Jobs’ departure in 1985, when he went on to establish NeXT, the company began to drift. Innovation slowed, direction became unclear, and by 1997 Apple was on the brink of bankruptcy. What is often overlooked, however, is what happened next.

Steve Jobs did not go on to immediate, runaway success at NeXT. Despite technical innovation and influence, the company struggled commercially. The same leader, with similar instincts and ideas, operating in a different context, produced very different outcomes.

This is where the lesson for schools becomes powerful. It is tempting to believe that success can be lifted and shifted, that if we take a strong leader, a successful strategy, or a high-performing school model, we can simply replicate it elsewhere. But Apple and NeXT remind us that success is rarely that transferable.

Because success is not just about leadership. It is about culture.

When Jobs returned to Apple in 1997, he did not simply reapply what he had done before. Instead, he worked within, and reshaped, the existing culture. He simplified product lines, sharpened focus, and aligned the organisation around a clear sense of purpose. Crucially, he rebuilt coherence. What followed was not just a turnaround, but a transformation. Leading to products like the iMac, iPod, and eventually the iPhone.

The difference was not just the leader. It was the alignment between leadership, strategy and culture. For schools, this matters deeply. Too often, we look outward for solutions: adopting another school’s behaviour system, curriculum model, or teaching approach. But without the cultural conditions that underpin those strategies, implementation can feel forced, inconsistent, or short-lived.

A behaviour system that thrives in one school may falter in another. A curriculum model that drives excellence elsewhere may feel ineffective when transplanted. Not because the strategy is flawed, but because the culture is different.

Culture shapes how things are interpreted, enacted and sustained. This is why surface-level alignment, such as shared values statements, is not enough. Two schools may both claim to value “high expectations” or “respect,” but how those values are lived day-to-day can vary dramatically. Culture is not what is written on the wall; it is what happens in the corridors, classrooms and conversations.

So what should leaders do?

Firstly, recognise that borrowing is not the problem: blind borrowing is. Looking outward for inspiration is valuable, but it must be followed by careful adaptation. Leaders must ask:

• Does this align with our current culture?
  
• If not, what needs to change first—our systems or our culture?
• What will this look like in practice, here, with our staff and students?

Secondly, focus on coherence. Successful schools are not defined by isolated strategies, but by how well those strategies align with each other and with the wider culture. Implementation is not just about introducing something new, it is about ensuring it fits.

Finally, understand that culture is built over time. It cannot be imported, accelerated overnight, or imposed through policy alone. It is shaped through consistent behaviours, shared expectations, and collective belief.

Apple’s story reminds us of something simple, but often overlooked: success is not portable.

In schools, as in business, what works is not just what you do, but where you do it, how you do it, and the culture in which it lives.

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Scaffold or Cage? Rethinking Routines

What if the “strictest school in Britain” was also one of the happiest?

A school in North London once earned that exact headline. To some, it conjures images of rigidity, silence and compliance. But step inside, and the reality is noted to feel very different. Visitors often describe something unexpected: students who are calm, focused, and content. There is a quiet confidence in the way they move through the day. Nothing feels chaotic. Nothing feels uncertain.

The difference? Routine. Not routines as a checklist, but routines as culture, deeply embedded, consistently applied, and understood by everyone in the building.

This is where cognitive load theory offers a powerful lens. Working memory is limited. When students are forced to think about what to do next, where to go, or how to behave, they are spending cognitive energy on things that should be automatic. Every small uncertainty is a drain.

Routines remove that friction. When students know exactly how to enter a classroom, how to begin their work, and what is expected of them, those processes become automatic and almost invisible. And when that happens, something important is unlocked: thinking capacity. Attention shifts away from managing the environment and towards engaging with learning.

And here’s where it becomes even more powerful. Success in learning, especially with more complex tasks triggers dopamine. That sense of achievement, however small, creates a feeling of reward. Over time, this builds a positive feedback loop: success increases motivation, motivation increases effort, and effort leads to further success.

Now imagine that happening every day. What looks like “strictness” from the outside is, in reality, clarity. What looks like control is, in practice, consistency. And what grows from that consistency is something far more valuable: a culture where students feel secure, capable and successful. That is why they look happy.

However, there is an important tension here: one that school leaders must navigate carefully. Routines are powerful, but they are not without risk. When over-designed or over-applied, they can begin to crowd out something equally important: creativity. If every moment is prescribed, every action scripted, and every response anticipated, students may become efficient, but not necessarily independent. They may comply, but not create.

The goal, therefore, is not maximum routine, but purposeful routine. Strong schools are deliberate about where routines matter most, transitions, behaviour, and foundational learning habits, because these are the areas where reducing cognitive load has the greatest impact. But they are equally deliberate about where to create space: for discussion, for exploration, for thinking differently. In this sense, routines should act as a scaffold, not a cage.

For school leaders, this sharpens the question. Not do we have routines, but do our routines create freedom or restrict it? Are they enabling deeper thinking, or quietly replacing it?

Because when routines are thoughtfully designed and carefully balanced, they do more than organise a school day. They create the conditions in which students can both succeed and think.

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