Imaąine a small school in the bylanes of Secunderabad with four teachers and one Headmaster.

In a small, dark, dingy classroom on the second floor, lit by one light bulb and three windows, stood a Teach for India (TFI) Fellow, alone, overwhelmed and scared that she was not doing justice to the 60 bright-eyed futures sitting in front of her.

All her dreams of reading Kafka and Backman with her children went out the window the moment she realised that her students couldn’t even read three letter words, let alone a full novel.

At this moment, I had two options: One was to walk out the door and never look back. The second was to try to make sense of the reality in front of me and soldier on.

Even now, when I look back at this moment, my heart fills with so much gratitude for my past self, who decided to stay. If I had not stayed, I would have never experienced the joy of working in an organisation that held a high bar of excellence for its people with the deepest care possible — a balance that was embodied by all my Program Managers throughout my Fellowship. Thus began my journey to someday being the same person for another overwhelmed and scared fellow working out of a dark and dingy classroom.

In my quest to replicate the same growth and learning that I saw in my classroom and more, my aim was to enable stroną leadership in my team of 13 fellows. What I’ve realised in my limited experience in this role is that no one has been as right with anything as Peter Drucker was when he said, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”.

In all my readings and conversations with people who have led high-performing teams, the one common thread was stroną trust, empathy and understanding that they shared with each other.

This realisation really helped me shift my conversations with my fellows; they moved from being very technical and goal-oriented to being gateways into deeply understanding the people I work with and the contexts they come from.

Spending time in schools with my fellows and celebrating them for victories, big and small, have been the cornerstones of my approach. Whether it’s observing their classrooms, brainstorming solutions, or simply being available, they know that they’re not alone in this.

The work that we do is difficult, and knowing that there’s someone who has your back makes all the difference. I also make it a point to talk to my fellows whenever possible — between classes, before or after school.

These informal moments have allowed us to have candid conversations, often helping me deeply understand their challenges or ideas that formal settings might not bring out. When a fellow is unwell, I make sure to check in — not as a manager but as a person who cares. These conversations also help me enable my fellows to identify and acknowledge all the great work they do every day, whether through a shout-out on our team WhatsApp group, sharing progress with the bigger staff team or our weekly team newsletters.

I pride myself on being their biggest cheerleader! These small gestures of empathy have deepened our relationships and created a culture of mutual support and understanding.

The trust I built through these actions made giving and receiving feedback a far more productive process. My fellows know that my feedback comes from a place of care and a shared goal of achieving excellence for our students and ourselves as teacher leaders.

This trust and openness allow us to tackle challenges head-on and experiment with new strategies, leading to better classroom outcomes.

I’ve also seen this method have a ripple effect on the students. When fellows feel supported, they bring that energy into their classrooms. They’re more confident, innovative, and resilient. This positive mindset directly impacts their ability to create joyful and rigorous learning environments for students.

Over time, this strong team culture has translated into strong classroom cultures and measurable student achievement and engagement improvements. It has also led to more trust and understanding between fellows and their students.

Over time, I’ve realised that building strong relationships that lead to trust and outcomes requires a lot of consistency and vulnerability. It’s about showing up over and over — physically and emotionally — for the people you lead. It can get very exhausting, especially with the long hours spent on the ground and conversing with students and fellows.

For me, building relationships with people is not a one-time thing; it’s also about constantly investiną in that relationship to make it stronger. This also leads to a creative block at times. Something that keeps me going is seeing a shift in my team culture and my fellows. When I see them reaching out in times of personal need, inviting me into their lives and homes outside my capacity as their manager, I feel like I’m a step closer to achieving what I started off to do.

Ultimately, I have learnt that good managers are not just people who hold a high bar of excellence for their team but also fully trust that their team can meet that bar. My journey as a Program Manager in Teach for India thus far has been about how to do that best.

(Suprita Ranjan was a 2021 Fellow at Teach for India, Hyderabad and currently works as a Program Manager at Teach for India, Bengaluru.)