Education Leaders | Evidence Informed School Leadership
Shane Leaning | School Leadership & Organisational Development Coach
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The Science Behind Post-Decision Doubt
That sickly feeling after a tough leadership call isn't your intuition warning you that you got it wrong and this episode explains exactly why. Drawing on Leon Festinger's 1957 work on cognitive dissonance, a 2021 meta-analysis from Hebrew University, and Kahneman and Tversky's research on loss aversion, Shane reframes one of the most common experiences in school leadership: the quiet panic that shows up on the sofa after a hard decision. If you've ever drafted a softening email at 11pm or lain awake running alternate endings, this one is for you. You'll learn why that post-decision discomfort is a receipt, not a warning, proof that your brain is doing the work of committing, not evidence that you chose wrong. Shane also explains why the loudest complaints after a change are predictably loud (loss aversion means losses feel twice as heavy as gains), and why suppressing the discomfort actually makes you a worse leader in the room. The practical takeaway is a single written exercise you can do this week that won't make the feeling stop, but will change what it means to you. Resources & Links Mentioned: Leon Festinger's A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance (1957) Episode Partners International Leaders Conference Sisi Join Shane's Intensive Leadership Programme at educationleaders.co/intensive Shane Leaning, an organisational coach based in Shanghai, supports school leaders globally. Passionate about empowment, he is the author of the best-selling 'Change Starts Here.' Shane is a leading educational voice in the UK, Asia and around the world. You can find Shane on LinkedIn and Bluesky. or shaneleaning.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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