Leadership as a profession in early childhood education and care

Abstract

Background Early childhood education and care (ECEC) centres have historically been overlooked and undervalued globally. However, recent economic investments and numerous changes have significantly impacted the role of ECEC centre leaders and their requirements. Moreover, recent research on educational leadership highlights its importance for both child development and employee well-being, as well as for maintaining pedagogical quality. Despite this recognition, ECEC centre leaders still lack systematic leadership education and adequate working structures.

Purpose This study aimed to review research evidence to understand how Finnish ECEC centre leaders position themselves within the realm of leadership as a profession. Specifically, the focus was on identifying the key components of leader competence.

Method We conducted a narrative structural analysis, following the framework developed by using data from 20 short writings by ECEC centre leaders. Four types of narrative were constructed to capture the essence of ECEC centre leaders’ competence. Subsequently, these narrative types were analysed using levels of narrative positioning to gain insights into how these different narratives relate to leadership as a profession.

Findings Through this two-step narrative analysis, we identified four types of narratives among ECEC centre leaders: professional leader, contextual leader, teacher leader, and leader persona. The findings underscore the importance of pedagogical understanding and competence as central themes in the narratives of ECEC centre leaders. However, a comprehensive understanding of general leadership competence as a learnable practice was not consistently evident across the narrative types.

Conclusion The reflection on these findings suggests that ECEC leadership as a profession is still an emerging phenomenon. Moving forward, there is a need for systematic leadership education and the development of functional leadership structures to clarify the concept of leadership as a shared practice and to ensure its effective implementation in ECEC centres.