Lessons from the International Successful School Principalship Project.

Studies on school leadership are one of the most successful research lines in recent decades. In particular, there is an interesting area of research on how successful school leaders are (Day, 2016b, 2017, Day, Gu, and Sammons, 2016; Moos, Johansson and Day, 2011). The Interna-tional Successful School Principalship Project (ISSPP) focuses on learning about successful school leadership in the different countries that make up the network. Within this project with an international scope, the present study seeks to know the characteristics both personal and professional of successful school leaders. For this, a qualitative research out of four case studies placed in Madrid (Spain) has been carried out. Semi-structured interviews, discussion groups, questionnaires and observations were also carried out for this purpose. The main results indicate that successful principals are those who a) have a clear direction of the school, b) show human leadership, c) open their schools to the community d) adapt the school to the context and e) exercise a pedagogical leadership.