Fostering collaboration through inclusive leadership: Exploring the behaviour of childcare and school leaders in Dutch child centres

More collaboration between primary schools and childcare providers is increasingly considered a crucial factor to optimally support children's development. However, due to disparities between these two sectors, fostering collaboration proves problematic in practice. Inclusive leadership is seen as a promising approach in contexts with strong fault lines, but whether school leaders and childcare leaders apply this leadership approach is not clear. To fill this gap, our qualitative study aimed to explore whether a recent theoretical model for inclusive leadership can be used to identify inclusive leadership behaviours of school and childcare leaders who work together in child centres. Data was collected through in-depth interviews with 12 school leaders and 12 childcare leaders. Our results showed that the theoretical model of inclusive leadership used is suitable for interpreting inclusive leadership behaviours in interprofessional educational settings. Based on the data, adding non-positive behaviours to the model was appropriate, to account for behaviours that may discourage experiences of belongingness and valuing uniqueness. The theoretical contribution of this study lies in refinement of this model and its application in the education sector. We also make practical recommendations based on our findings, and advocate professional development for school and childcare leaders in child centres, not only because of the non-positive behaviours taking place in practice but also because inclusive leadership behaviours valuing uniqueness appeared to be less common.