Jonny Uttley, Forum Strategy Lead Associate for ‘Being an Employer of Choice’; and former trust CEO. From Compliance to Collective Responsibility in the Next Decade of Trust Leadership
There is a quiet but profound shift underway in how we think about accountability in education. For a generation, accountability has been too often equated with inspection, regulation, and narrow and – too often ‘high stakes’ – (though important) metrics of success through national performance tables. It is something that has been done to schools and trusts. Helping to secure a certain level of standards and improvement over the last three decades or so — but also, at times, narrowing focus, driving some negative leadership behaviour and exacerbating the fragmentation of responsibility for the things that matter most.
The next decade demands something very different. Not less accountability, but better accountability. Not a weakening of standards, but a strengthening of a more rounded sense of responsibility —shared, owned, and reflective of a mature trust system.
This is where the concept of Pure Accountability becomes so important – as both a culture definer and as a practical lever.
What is Pure Accountability—and why does it matter now?
At this month’s National #TrustLeaders Symposium, Michael Pain defined pure accountability as being:
is formative accountability forged and sustained by those who are part of a collective endeavour – often at a local level. It generates a shared understanding of thriving trusts, schools and communities; public promises that ensure we progress towards and achieve this; and a shared sense of responsibility in our efforts to make this a reality.
For those of us who lead it, it is about empowering those we serve and work alongside to provide feedback and insights that contribute to the strategic direction, ongoing improvement and responsiveness of our organisations over time. It also helps clarify what our organisations are responsible for, and where others – including communities- are best placed and expected to contribute and take ownership themselves in this shared endeavour.”
He goes on to ask
“What defines pure accountability?
It is formative – it feeds our ongoing learning and growth. It is not judgmental – it encourages openness and vulnerability for that learning. It is real time – it keeps up with progress and need. It reflects a shared vision – connecting accountability with common purpose and ambition
And it is inclusive, encouraging shared endeavour and collective responsibility – because we can’t take on all the responsibility or realise success as single institutions alone.”
Pure Accountability reframes the key question at the heart of public accountability. It asks not, “How are we judged?” but “Who do we (all of us) feel responsible to—and how deeply?”
Pain, M.; Pure Accountability, latest iteration, 3rd June 2026
Pure Accountability reframes the key question at the heart of public accountability. It asks not, “How are we judged?” but “Who do we (all of us) feel responsible to—and how deeply?”
At its heart, Pure Accountability is about intrinsic responsibility: a culture where trustees, leaders, teachers and support staff act in the best interests of children, not because they are compelled by external pressure, but because they are committed to a shared moral endeavour. It is about the responsibility of institutions to their communities – and, crucially, communities’ responsibility to themselves and their institutions; including families and children’s responsibility to participate, give their best, and help inform improvement for the benefit of all. It is accountability that is owned and welcomed, not imposed.
This matters now because the limits of our current model are clearly visible and impossible to ignore any longer. We are still operating within a system architecture created by the Education Reform Act 1988 and subsequent legislation —a landmark set of reforms that introduced market dynamics into the school system: parental choice (and an emphasis on being a ‘customer’, arguably to the detriment of being a sufficiently active ‘partner’) and competition between schools (and later trusts), with performance tables and inspection grades as the currency of quality.
That model has had benefits. It professionalised schools, sharpened focus, drove transparency and, in many cases, accelerated improvement. But it has also embedded a set of assumptions that now constrain us.
- It assumes that competition predominately drives improvement.
- It assumes that most solutions (and therefore corresponding accountability) lie predominantly with public service leaders and institutions
- It assumes that the public is – first and foremost – a customer of the state, not the main agent of changeIt assumes that accountability is best exercised through external and ‘moment in time’ judgement
- It assumes that institutions succeed or fail largely on their own.
