A few weeks ago, my wife of twenty-something-odd years and I were running late and debating what to eat. I suggested what I often suggest in these moments:
Baked beans on toast.
She hesitated. Then said, almost apologetically, “You know what, I’ve never really liked baked beans.”
After twenty years together, I couldn’t count the number of times we’ve shared this staple meal — somewhere in the hundreds, for sure. So I was taken aback by this earth-shattering revelation. Not because I particularly wanted baked beans, but because of what this might mean about our relationship.
It didn’t take long, however, before we found ourselves laughing together, helped along by a legendary family story. In the early 1970s, my wife’s father spent several years politely eating his mother-in-law’s macaroni cheese because he thought it would be rude to say he didn’t like it the first time it was served up to him.
A macaroni cheese doom loop was created: the more thanks and appreciation he offered, the more likely it was to appear at the next visit. This continued until he finally plucked up the courage to ask his mother-in-law whether she had any other “equally lovely” dishes they might enjoy. Luckily for him, she did.
My wife and I had stumbled across our own macaroni cheese moment.
Later, what stayed with me wasn’t her dislike of baked beans, or the fact that I’d never noticed she never once suggested cooking them herself. It was how easily I had assumed she liked them. We’d eaten them for umpteen years. I’d cook them. She’d always thank me.
Even in relationships built on trust and shared power, people still go along with things. Not necessarily from fear, but from kindness, habit, or the wish not to make a fuss. If that can happen between two old partners who talk easily and laugh often enough, it struck me that it was worth noticing how often it happens elsewhere.
Remind Me of Your Name Again
Schools are full of macaroni cheese moments.
There’s a golden window at the start of the year (about a month, I reckon) when it’s still acceptable (in high school at least) for teachers to say, “Remind me of your name again.” After that, the window closes, and teachers develop all sorts of ingenious tactics to avoid asking again.
I still remember my own horrific early-career version. I was sitting with two parents in my first year of teaching, speaking with confidence and warmth about their child. They nodded politely.
It was only later that evening, when I met that child’s actual parents, that I realised the truth.
It was the wrong child.
Did they know? Almost certainly.
Did they correct me? No.
Did I go back to apologise once I realised? I didn’t.
Instead, we all colluded (very kindly and very politely) to pretend it had never happened. I still regret that.
The Confidence to Speak Up
Most macaroni cheese moments are harmless. Beans. Names. We bumble our way through.
But in schools (which are, by their nature, high-power environments) silence behaves differently. Power changes the cost of speaking. When someone with less power, whether a student or a member of staff, stays quiet, it’s rarely because they have nothing to say. It’s because the conditions don’t yet feel safe enough.
When we have power, we often assume speaking up is easy. We struggle to understand why someone wouldn’t have shared that thought, that observation, that concern. We reassure ourselves that our door is open, that we are approachable.
But that’s not how it works. And that’s not how it plays out.
Sometimes children, staff, and parents don’t speak up because they don’t want to. Sometimes they miss the golden window when it feels safe to do so.
I once spoke to a friend (another teacher at another school) who wasn’t sure whether to report an interaction he’d observed between two students a few months earlier. At the time, it didn’t feel like much. Later, it began to trouble him. The longer he left it, the more he felt the window to speak up had closed.
He felt comfortable talking to me because we were friends. He promised he would follow up on it at school. When I saw him again a few weeks later, he told me it was fortunate he had done so.
Noticing is Leadership
Oddly, the baked-beans confession didn’t weaken anything in our relationship. If anything, I hope it did the opposite. It reminded me that honesty isn’t the enemy of kindness. In fact, in many ways, it might be its deeper form.
In the same way, I believe the healthiest classrooms and staffrooms aren’t just polite, but open and candid. It’s good to hear things like, “I don’t understand,” or “That doesn’t sit right with me,” or even, “Actually, I’ve never really liked baked beans.”
This is why I often say that leadership is less about having the right answers and more about noticing. Not just listening when people speak, but paying attention to who doesn’t. I’ve also noticed that younger members of organisations (whether in workplaces or schools) may be especially cautious about raising concerns unless they genuinely feel safe and confident they will be heard.
Leaders have to create the conditions in which small truths can surface early, gently, and without penalty. And do that before politeness turns into regret.
Because if no one ever admits they don’t like the macaroni cheese, it’s probably worth asking what else is going unsaid.
Reflective Questions for Leaders
It’s been a while since I’ve added some questions to ponder at the end of one of my blogposts. I have three to throw out there:
- When was the last time someone safely disagreed with you in public?
- When was the last time someone corrected you and you thanked them for it?
- Who has stopped disagreeing with you, and when did that happen?
Serendipities 