Abstract:

Digital transformation in schools is often framed as a matter of access and infrastructure, yet the critical question is how teachers develop professional digital competence (PDC) as a sustained, collective capacity rather than an individual technical skill. Despite significant policy investment across many countries, a persistent gap exists between policy intentions and classroom practice. Research suggests this gap is partly explained by weak organizational integration of PDC and a lack of strategic leadership that supports long-term, school-wide competence development.

School leadership can bridge this gap, by establishing structures, cultures, and arenas that make professional learning collective, continuous, and grounded in teachers' everyday practice. Yet existing research on digital leadership in education remains conceptually fragmented. Studies tend to rely on narrow or inconsistent definitions of both leadership and digitalization, and few connect strategic leadership, organizational conditions, and sustainable PDC development in a coherent way. Individual-oriented frameworks dominate, while organizational infrastructures and leadership as a condition for collective learning remain underdeveloped as research area.

The novelty of this study lies in its shift of focus from individual technology adoption to viewing professional digital competence (PDC) as a collective, sustained organizational capacity. Unlike existing literature that often treats leadership as a mere driver of technology implementation, this review explores school leadership as a organizational condition mediating collective capacity building.

This paper presents a systematic literature review currently in progress, examining how empirical research published between January 2017 and January 2026 addresses school leadership as a condition for teachers' collective professional learning and PDC development in primary and secondary education. The review covers searches across three major databases and applies consistent inclusion and exclusion criteria to ensure methodological rigor. The review is guided by four analytical questions addressing leadership practices and organizational conditions that support professional learning, how studies conceptualize digital leadership, what methodological approaches dominate the field, and what knowledge gaps are identified. Preliminary results indicate that successful PDC development is reliant on distributed leadership and that principals impact teachers' digital competence primarily through indirect organizational factors, such as fostering collaborative learning communities, establishing peer-coaching structures, and shifting strategies from bulk technology acquisition to pedagogical transformation.

We conclude that to bridge the persistent gap between policy intentions and educational practice, school leadership must move beyond technology management to strategically orchestrating long-term, collective professional learning.

This presentation focuses on our methodology, analytical framework, and the conceptual landscape emerging from the literature. We invite dialogue on key tensions in the field, particularly around how leadership can be understood not as a driver of technology integration, but as an organizational condition for building collective digital competence in schools over time. Preliminary observations and directions for the full synthesis will be shared and discussed.

Keywords:

Professional digital competence, school leadership, professional learning, primary and secondary education, literature review.