In this episode of my What a DSL Can Learn From podcast, we explore how the puppeteer's craft of hidden influence, movement that looks voluntary but is carefully directed, and control that the audience never sees offers one of the most powerful and uncomfortable lessons for safeguarding leadership.

On stage, the puppet appears to move freely. In safeguarding, a student can appear to be making their own choices, defending harmful relationships, engaging in risky behaviour, and withdrawing from trusted adults, while every action is being shaped by someone else.

Grooming and coercive control operate exactly this way: gradual, normalised, and invisible until you know what to look for. The safeguarding question is never just what did they do it is who is influencing this, and how do we help this student regain control of their own decisions.

The question to carry forward: when you see concerning behaviour, are you responding to the action, or are you trying to understand the influence behind it?

🎙️ Available now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

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