Beyond Instructional Leadership: Why Sustainable School Improvement Depends on Ethical and Relational Capacity, Not Heroic Principals

By Dr. Hector Navedo

January 11, 2026

Abstract

Instructional leadership remains a foundational expectation for school principals and a central lever in district improvement strategies. However, a growing body of empirical evidence suggests that instructional leadership alone is insufficient to produce and sustain school improvement at scale—particularly in systems experiencing chronic disruption, leadership turnover, teacher shortages, and intensified accountability demands. This article synthesizes recent peer-reviewed research on leadership for learning, ethical leadership, principal socialization, and relational–emotional leadership to argue for a shift in the unit of analysis: from the individual “heroic principal” to the organizational capacities that enable instructional improvement to take root and endure. Drawing on meta-analytic findings, qualitative evidence on newly appointed principals, and systematic reviews of ethical leadership, this paper advances an integrated framework linking instructional improvement to two enabling conditions—ethical coherence and relational capacity—operationalized through a learning architecture that develops teacher expertise and efficacy. Implications are presented for principals, superintendents, and central office leaders responsible for building durable leadership pipelines and coherent systems of support.

Keywords: instructional leadership, ethical leadership, relational trust, principal induction, teacher self-efficacy, school improvement

Introduction

Across many districts, the image of the “ideal principal” remains remarkably consistent: a decisive instructional expert who is highly visible in classrooms, fluent in data, and relentless in the pursuit of improved teaching and learning. This narrative is appealing because it offers a seemingly linear theory of action—strong principal practices lead to stronger instruction, which leads to better student outcomes.

Yet this model obscures a persistent organizational reality. Instructional improvement is rarely sustained when the adults in a school do not experience leadership as legitimate, coherent, and relationally safe. When schools struggle, principals seldom struggle because they lack knowledge of instruction. More commonly, they struggle because they enter complex systems where culture, trust, informal power, workload, and competing stakeholder expectations constrain what leadership can accomplish (Medford & Brown, 2022).

This article advances a postdoctoral-level synthesis: analytically rigorous, grounded in empirical evidence, and oriented toward action. The central claim is precise: instructional leadership produces durable gains when—and only when—it is embedded within ethical coherence and relational capacity, and when districts intentionally design the organizational conditions that allow those capacities to develop and endure.

What the Research Shows
Instructional leadership matters, but it operates through organizational mechanisms.  A substantial empirical literature confirms that leadership for learning is associated with student outcomes. A recent meta-analytic structural equation modeling (MASEM) study synthesizing 90 studies found that leadership behaviors oriented toward learning—particularly instructional, transformational, and distributed leadership—were consistently associated with student outcomes, both directly and indirectly through teacher self-efficacy (Ozdogru et al., 2025).

Importantly, teacher self-efficacy demonstrated a meaningful relationship with student outcomes, supporting the plausibility of leadership influence through adult capacity rather than through compliance alone. At the same time, the authors reported substantial heterogeneity across studies, indicating that leadership effects vary considerably by context (Ozdogru et al., 2025).

Because this evidence base is primarily correlational and meta-analytic, it supports modeled pathways and consistent associations rather than definitive causal claims. Nonetheless, the convergence of findings across methods strengthens the inference that leadership operates through organizational and psychological mechanisms that are sensitive to context.

Complementary empirical work reinforces this interpretation. Instructional leadership demonstrates its strongest practical effects when enacted through structures that organize adult learning. In a recent study, principals’ instructional leadership predicted teachers’ professional development, suggesting that leadership influences instruction most reliably when it establishes learning architectures—such as coaching cycles, collaborative inquiry, and protected time—rather than relying on episodic supervision (He et al., 2024).

Ethical leadership is contextual, not merely a personal attribute

Ethical leadership is often framed as individual integrity or adherence to formal codes. Contemporary scholarship challenges this reductionist view. A systematic review of ethical leadership in educational settings concludes that ethical leadership is fundamentally contextual and relational, shaped by organizational norms, structural constraints, and leaders’ capacity to navigate competing values under pressure (Argyropoulou & Lintzerakou, 2025).

For principals and superintendents, ethical leadership becomes operational in routine decisions concerning: equity in discipline and access, transparency in decision-making, allocation of scarce resources, professional accountability and support, responses to conflict among stakeholders.

In practice, ethical leadership functions as infrastructure for legitimacy. When educators perceive misalignment between stated values and enacted decisions—for example, rhetoric about well-being coupled with relentless workload escalation—trust erodes, and instructional initiatives become performative rather than developmental.

Principal transitions reveal the limits of technical competence

The challenges of leadership are often most visible during transitions. Qualitative research on newly appointed principals demonstrates that early leadership difficulties are rarely instructional in nature. Instead, new principals struggle to interpret school culture, negotiate informal power structures, manage expectations, and initiate change in the absence of structured socialization supports (Medford & Brown, 2022).

When leaders attempt rapid instructional change without deep cultural understanding, resistance and division often intensify, undermining the relational conditions required for improvement. These findings underscore a critical insight for districts: leadership outcomes are partially produced by the quality of induction, mentoring, and system supports—not solely by individual competence or effort (Medford & Brown, 2022).

Under chronic disruption, leadership is an emotional and relational practice.  Leadership models that emphasize only technical expertise and instructional supervision underestimate the emotional and relational labor required in contemporary schools. Research on leadership during disruptive change conceptualizes leadership as a relational and emotional practice—one that sustains adult functioning, maintains coherence under uncertainty, and preserves professional community amid instability (Vanlommel et al., 2025).  Although this research emphasizes disruption, the broader implication is structural rather than situational. Many schools now operate under conditions of chronic disruption, including staff shortages, leadership turnover, and heightened public scrutiny. In such contexts, relational leadership is not optional; it is foundational.

A Synthesis Framework for Leadership at Scale

Drawing on this evidence, an integrated framework for sustainable school improvement emerges—one that shifts attention from the “heroic principal” to the organizational capacities that enable instructional leadership to function.

Proposition 1: Instructional improvement depends on a learning architecture

Instructional leadership translates into sustained improvement when schools establish repeatable learning architectures—time, routines, and roles that enable adult learning. Professional development must be treated as a system for building instructional expertise, not as a sequence of disconnected initiatives (He et al., 2024).

Proposition 2: Ethical coherence is the legitimacy engine of improvement

Ethical leadership provides the moral logic that renders instructional expectations credible. Because ethical leadership is contextual and relational, it operates through consistency between values and decisions, transparency in reasoning, and equity in implementation (Argyropoulou & Lintzerakou, 2025). Without ethical coherence, improvement efforts default to compliance.

Proposition 3: Relational capacity is the transmission system of leadership influence

Teacher self-efficacy functions as a mediating pathway linking leadership and student outcomes (Ozdogru et al., 2025). Relational capacity—trust, psychological safety, clarity of communication, and reciprocal accountability—supports adult learning and efficacy. When relational capacity is weak, instructional leadership is interpreted as surveillance rather than support.

Proposition 4: Leadership effectiveness is partly a product of socialization systems

Principal success is shaped not only by individual competence but by how leaders are inducted into culture, expectations, and operational realities. Districts that neglect this reality effectively outsource leadership development to trial and error (Medford & Brown, 2022).

For leadership frameworks to be usable, core constructs must be observable and measurable.

Indicators of ethical coherence may include: documented rationale for high-stakes decisions aligned to mission and equity commitments, consistency between stated priorities and resource allocation, transparency in disciplinary and staffing decisions, stakeholder perceptions of fairness and voice.

Indicators of relational capacity may include: staff trust and psychological safety survey data, patterns of teacher retention and internal mobility,

participation in collaborative learning routines, frequency and resolution of conflicts and grievances. These indicators provide leaders and districts with practical tools for diagnosing and strengthening the conditions that enable instructional improvement.

A 90-Day Leadership Sequence 

Days 1–30:

1. Cultural diagnosis and trust building

2. Structured listening with staff and families

3. Mapping informal influence networks

4. Establishing communication norms

Days 31–60: Instructional focus and learning architecture

1. Selecting a limited number of instructional priorities

2. Launching coaching and collaborative inquiry routines

3. Protecting time for adult learning

Days 61–90: Evidence of progress and recalibration

1. Reviewing short-cycle indicators of teacher learning and efficacy

2. Adjusting supports and expectations

3. Making ethical reasoning visible in decisions

This sequence operationalizes the research-informed principle that coherence precedes speed.

Implications for Practice
For principals and aspiring principals:

1. Lead with cultural understanding before launching change.

2. Make ethical reasoning explicit and visible.

3. Treat professional learning as the core work of leadership.

4. Invest deliberately in teacher self-efficacy.

5. Develop relational leadership as a professional competency.

For superintendents and central office leaders:

1. Design leadership pipelines that include robust induction and mentoring.

2. Align evaluation with ethical and relational capacities, not only technical metrics.

3. Redesign workloads to protect time for leadership.

4. Monitor teacher self-efficacy as a system-level indicator of improvement.

Conclusion

The empirical evidence supports a clear conclusion. Instructional leadership matters, but it becomes durable only when embedded within ethical coherence, relational capacity, and a learning architecture that develops teacher expertise and efficacy. Schools do not improve sustainably because principals work harder or implement more initiatives. They improve when leadership builds organizational conditions under which adults can learn, trust, and act with shared purpose.

For aspiring principals and superintendents, the distinguishing leadership signal is not technical mastery alone, but the demonstrated capacity to lead ethically under constraint, build relational coherence, and design systems that translate adult learning into student success.

References 

Argyropoulou, E., & Lintzerakou, E. E. (2025). Contextual factors and their impact on ethical leadership in educational settings. Administrative Sciences, 15(1), Article 23. https://doi.org/10.3390/admsci15010023

He, P., Guo, F., & Abazie, G. A. (2024). School principals’ instructional leadership as a predictor of teachers’ professional development. Asian-Pacific Journal of Second and Foreign Language Education, 9, Article 63. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40862-024-00290-0

Medford, J. A., & Brown, T. (2022). Newly appointed principals’ challenges in learning and adjusting to school culture. Heliyon, 8(8), e10542. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e10542

Ozdogru, M., Tulubas, T., Karakose, T., Kanadlı, S., Kardas, A., & Papadakis, S. (2025). How does teacher self-efficacy mediate the relationship between student outcomes and principal leadership for learning? Results from meta-analytic structural equation modelling (MASEM). Acta Psychologica, 258, 105144. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2025.105144

Vanlommel, K., van den Boom-Muilenburg, S. N., & Kikken, E. (2025). School leadership during disruptive change: An emotional and relational practice. School Leadership & Management, 45(1), 125–147. https://doi.org/10.1080/13632434.2024.2421526