Abstract
M.Ed. (Educational Management)
Research shows a perception of South African female principals as “extremely challenged”,
which implies that female principals experience problems in certain areas of leadership and
management. For this study, four novice female principals were selected from a school
district in the Free State Province, South Africa. The study explores their leadership and
management experiences. The objectives were to investigate their leadership- and
management successes; describe their leadership- and management challenges; and elicit
what support they received to navigate their initiation into principalship. A generic qualitative
research methodology and instrumental case study design was applied. Purposive sampling
was used to select the four participants. Four main themes emerged in the study: The first
theme was the participants’ experiences of their socialisation to principalship. Secondly, was
the participants’ self-description, which revealed their self-efficacy, personality- and multiple
intelligences traits. The third theme to emerge was accounts of the participants’ leadership
that resulted in changes in their respective schools. The fourth and final theme was specific
issues that related to the participants being female. The novice female principals displayed: a
high level of self-efficacy with perseverance and optimistic thoughts; leadership skills that
include empathy, effective communication and cooperativeness skills; personality traits that
include openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and resilience. The study
further showed that for effective leadership not only IQ is needed but also emotional- and
social intelligence. The study found that support and initiation into principalship should take
place through coaching and establishing communities of practice to ensure effective
leadership in a school.