Lately, I’ve been thinking about how easily the focus can shift away from what really matters. This latest suggestion that schools could find savings by reducing the number of Assistant Headteachers feels like one of those moments, a convenient distraction, a misdirected focus.

Home Visits: Lessons from the Frontline You Can’t Learn in a Handbook

Connection is the superpower.

If you’ve ever stood on a school gate at 8:30 a.m. or 3:15 p.m., you know something no report can capture.The subtle shifts in energy. The unfamiliar faces. The conversations you overhear that would never happen in a meeting room. The tiny changes in relationships between children that whisper to you that something’s different today.Being on the gates isn’t just about supervision, it’s about presence. About noticing what others don’t. About connecting with parents in a way that isn’t “us and them,” when their vulnerabilities around education don’t feel under scrutiny because they’re being summoned to a meeting. About catching the pieces of the safeguarding puzzle that no paper trail could ever show.Ten minutes at the start and ten at the end of every day. It doesn’t sound like much but it changes everything. Safeguarding. Community building. Trust. Relationships. Impact that can’t be quantified.To my colleagues who get it, you are the real gatekeepers. Never underestimate the work that can’t be measured. It matters.

Imagine being known in your school not by your job title but as “The Lady in Pink.”That’s who I became.It wasn't by accident but because I realised something early on:As a non-teaching member of staff, if I wanted to make an impact, I had to build visibility.I had to create a profile.I had to be remembered.You can’t influence if you’re invisible.You can’t connect if people don’t know where to find you.So I carved out an identity.For me, that meant pink.It could have been anything but pink became my signal.Every morning and every afternoon on the gate.Every lesson changeover in the corridors.Every break and lunch, bouncing around like Tigger.Over time, pink became more than a colour.It became a character. An energy.A way for children, staff, and parents to know who I was and what I stood for, before I even spoke.When I stepped into safeguarding, this identity mattered more than ever.Safeguarding isn’t just CPOMS logs, reports, and meetings.It’s relationships.It’s trust.It’s being known, visible, approachable, so the hard conversations can happen.Pink is part of my personality but it’s also a mask.A mask that lets me show up with compassion, confidence, and consistency, even on the hardest days.It worked.Colleagues knew me as The Lady in Pink.Students noticed if I wasn’t wearing enough of it.Parents gifted me unicorns, Wonder Woman trinkets, starfish, you guessed it, pink.Even my Headteacher encouraged me to paint my office pink (shout out to the site team for making it happen!)Here’s my point:Your pink doesn’t have to be pink.If you’re not in a classroom, if your role is behind the scenes, your presence is still essential.Profile matters.Visibility matters.Connection matters.To make a difference, you first have to be seen and being seen, is the first step towards connection.And connection, well that makes life better for all of us.