If your school strategy is built on pursuing "A-grade" teachers, you might be solving the wrong problem.

That statement might make some leaders uncomfortable. After all, shouldn’t we want excellent teachers? Isn’t that the whole point?

Yes, but only partly. Because if excellence is framed as an individual pursuit, you end up with a culture built on competition, perfectionism, and fragility. Your outcomes become dependent on maintaining a narrow cohort of superheroes. And when one leaves? So does the magic.

The real long game isn't just about building high-performance teachers. It's about building high-performance teams.

The AITSL Mirage

Most educators operate at the Proficient level, which is the benchmark for full registration under the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers. It reflects consistent, competent, and ethical practice across the profession.

But here's where the trap sets in: many schools invest enormous time and energy trying to shift every Proficient teacher toward the Highly Accomplished or Lead standards. While aspirational, this creates a distortion. The system begins to behave as though only lead-level performance is acceptable, which is an impossible burden.

The truth? Not every teacher can, should, or needs to be a Lead. Nor do high-performance environments require that.

Instead, the question should be: How do we build teams that allow Proficient teachers to thrive, improve, and contribute at their best?

The Myth of the Unicorn

The cult of the superstar teacher is as persistent as it is problematic. Like the lone genius in a Silicon Valley garage, the myth is seductive: one extraordinary individual can change everything.

But in schools, this thinking is dangerous. It leads to:

• Over-reliance on individuals
• Burnout from carrying too much
• Undermined collaboration
• Isolation of less confident staff
• A narrow definition of success

As psychologist Ron Friedman writes in The Best Place to Work, "When we reward individual performance in team settings, we inadvertently discourage collaboration."

In schools, that looks like the teacher who hoards resources, avoids team meetings, and quietly believes no one else quite measures up. They're often praised, but they leave little behind.

What High-Performance Teams Look Like in Schools

High-performance teams in schools aren't abstract. They're real, and they come in many shapes. Each has the potential to transform good practice into exceptional outcomes:

• Faculty Teams (e.g. English, Maths): These teams are often the steady hum at the heart of a school. When they’re working well, planning is aligned, assessments are fair and consistent, and new teachers aren’t left to figure things out independently. Everyone chips in, sharing what they know, lifting each other’s practice, and making sure no one ends up carrying the whole load alone. They make decisions together, revisit those based on results, and create internal feedback loops that help refine their approaches over time. The best faculty teams are in a constant state of intelligent trial and error—reviewing, adjusting, and improving as a matter of rhythm, not rescue.
• Classroom Teams: When teachers and educational support staff operate as one unit, students benefit from differentiated instruction, coordinated interventions, and a seamless learning experience. The room becomes less about who’s in charge and more about what’s possible together. The work is distributed, and no one is left holding the entire behavioural plan or literacy load alone. A key part of this dynamic is the habit of daily debriefs—quick, focused check-ins where team members ask, "What went well today? Where could we improve tomorrow?" These moments build trust, sharpen insight, and create a rhythm of continual growth that isn’t dependent on formal reviews or top-down directives.
• Year-Level Teams: High-functioning year-level teams don’t just manage transitions; they shape a coherent, supported experience for students. Shared understanding of wellbeing, behaviour expectations, and academic pathways can dramatically reduce friction and amplify student engagement. Each team member takes ownership of their part, so challenges are met with collective capacity rather than individual exhaustion.
• Activity Teams: Think excursions, musicals, and student showcases. In high-performance mode, these aren’t just logistical nightmares; they’re cultural milestones. Teams here orchestrate events that build school spirit, showcase talent, and reinforce learning in authentic, memorable ways. Everyone has a role to play, from the teacher drafting risk assessments to the assistant coordinating bus schedules to the students leading rehearsals. When each person contributes their part, the workload is shared, burnout is avoided, and the final outcome is a shared triumph rather than a solo burden. Since most of these events occur annually, or at least semi-regularly, high-performing teams also make time to capture their learnings—what worked, what didn’t, and what to watch out for next time. This collective reflection is often recorded in guides or shared notes, so that next year’s team doesn’t start from scratch. It means the group's wisdom can outlast the event—and sometimes, even the people.
• Leadership Teams: Effective leadership groups go beyond decision-making; they model alignment, responsiveness, and cultural stewardship. They operate under greater scrutiny and higher expectations than other teams—parents, boards, staff, and students all look to them to set the tone and lead with integrity. When leadership teams are strong, strategy has traction, and communication flows with clarity. Distributing leadership ensures no one is buried under policy reviews or parent issues, and the team can hold itself to account. It’s not just about keeping the ship afloat—it’s about steering it wisely, together.
• Project Teams: These are your task forces and implementation crews. When composed and supported well, they deliver change faster and better, whether it’s rolling out a new LMS or trialling a new pedagogical approach. The work gets done because the right voices are in the room at the right time, and the effort doesn’t fall on just one willing volunteer.
• Sub-School Teams (e.g. Junior, Middle, Senior): These teams are the horizontal glue that holds vertical strategy together. They bring coherence to student experience, ensuring smooth transitions between school stages and that developmentally appropriate practices are embedded at every level. When all members carry a portion of the mission, no team leader is left to hold the identity of a whole sub-school alone.

The performance of these teams doesn't rely on each member being "excellent" in isolation. It depends on trust, clarity, shared purpose, and psychological safety.

Stop Upgrading Individuals. Start Lifting the System

Professional growth still matters. But it must be reframed as a team-enabled journey, not a solo sprint.

Improving a teacher from C to B isn't just about PD. It's about the environment around them:

• Do they have regular feedback?
• Are their strengths recognised and their gaps supported?
• Do they feel safe to admit what they don't know?
• Is there a clear sense of shared improvement?

A healthy team helps all boats rise. And perhaps most importantly, it prevents your A-players from jumping ship because they’re sick of rowing alone.

Lessons from Beyond Education

Friedman again: "What separates great teams from good ones isn’t talent. It’s how they manage energy, interact, and recover."

In elite sports, the team with the most expensive players rarely wins. It's the one with cohesion. In medicine, surgical teams reduce errors not by having the best individual doctors, but by debriefing together and trusting each other under pressure.

Schools need to apply the same logic. Strategy shouldn't just focus on what teachers know. It should focus on what teams do together.

Strategic Takeaways for School Leaders

1. Audit your teams: Where do teams exist? Where are they teams in name only?
2. Invest in team PD: Not just teacher PD. Focus on trust, collaboration, and protocols.
3. Rethink performance reviews: Recognise and reward team contributions, not just individual flair.
4. Build structures that support collaboration: Time, space, systems.
5. Talk about the team as a professional asset: The unit of improvement is the team, not the individual.

Final Thought

If your strategy depends on attracting more unicorns, you’ll spend your years chasing rainbows.

But if you build a school full of teams that function like Lead teachers, even when most individuals are Proficient, you won’t need unicorns. You’ll have something better.

You’ll have a strategy that works, even when people leave. Even when the plan changes. Even when the next "A" teacher hasn’t walked through the door.

And that’s a school worth building.