Leadership: a key to innovation and educational change

This article constitutes a review under an experiential approach of the leadership impact in education, and especially in the processes of innovation and educational change. It is provided data from studies and experiences with different models of leadership, carried out during these last four decades that allow us to draw some considerations and conclusions. A perspective of leadership that is strongly emerging and that updates the so-called pedagogical leadership highlighted by the movement for effective schools and improvement. Empirical studies are collected in which various leadership models have been applied. Firstly, Fiedler's situational leadership model, which was widely used in the 1970s and which we have applied in the context of the secondary education reform. A second model examined is Bernard Bass' Transformational Leadership carried out in two different contexts: in business and in education. A third approach was the one proposed by Kenneth Leithwood and collaborators of what has been called Effective Leadership Practices in Education, a model that has been validated in several countries. Finally, an exploration of emotional leadership is presented, an issue that has been emphasizing the importance of emotional intelligence as one of the variables that best explain the effectiveness and satisfaction of educational leadership.