Meeting the challenge

 

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  I'm Terry Piggott, Executive Director from Rochdale Local Authority, and I'm here to talk to you briefly about some issues around the planning for succession of future generations of headteachers.
  
  So first of all, the demographics. Why is there a shortage, or potential shortage of headteachers in the future? For this, I need you to imagine a sphinx, in profile, facing right, and to convert that shape in your mind to a bar graph. That's the shape of the demographics of the teaching population. The scale along the bottom of the bar graph is the age of teachers, so you go from 21 at the tail end of the sphinx shape, to 65 at the front paws, and the vertical scale is the number of teachers in each age group. As you can see, there are very few teachers working beyond their 60th birthday, that's those thin paws. Then there's that big head - the preponderance of the teaching force in their late 40s and 50s; small at the back, that's the fewer number of teachers who are in their 30s or early 40s. Then you've got those large haunches, that represents the success we've had in recent years of bringing new recruits into the profession and the extra funding that we've enjoyed. Now the challenge of course is that that's on the move, so as that large proportion of the profession in their late 40s and 50s retire, where are the ones coming along to replace them? And of course with headteachers, their age profile is even more skewed and you can see the effect is already being felt.

  I can recall when we used to appoint headteachers, we'd have a huge pile of applications to read. Today you might have just single figures rather than scores of applications. As you know, some headships are really difficult to fill and we've got to the point where we might need to re-advertise, in some cases, more than once.

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  So how do you retain effective leaders? Well, there’s nothing mysterious about this. I think it’s about being a good employer – consistently. And that means being alive to the issues that impact on school leaders the most, and addressing them.

  All the research tells us that the least attractive aspect of headship is the impact on work-life balance. So a retention strategy that starts by making sure that the team feels well supported and that it’s able to maintain a healthy balance between home and work life is essential. There’s no single solution here. Different leaders will need different kinds of support – so your strategy must be responsive to their needs.

  Next, you can make sure that school leaders don’t feel that the only way to develop their careers is to move on. That means finding ways for them to develop their experience in their current job – investing in professional development of course, providing access to coaches or mentors if that’s relevant; or even opportunities for sabbaticals, secondments or exchanges with neighbouring schools.

  In fact, I think the secondment option can have a double benefit. As well as helping to retain a head, they also create opportunities for emerging leaders to ‘act up’ into more senior roles on a temporary basis. So you’ll be helping to grow the next generation of leaders, as well as retaining those currently in the system.

  If your current head is coming up to retirement, then retention has a different focus. Can you find ways to use their skills in different ways? Changes to the pension arrangements now include a ‘phased retirement’ option. That means heads can draw pension benefits whilst still working in a reduced capacity. You can keep their experience in the system while you bring on a new head. The benefit for you is that you have a smoother succession. The benefit for your departing head is that they get a smoother transition to retirement, instead of working flat out one moment and doing nothing the next.

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  But, however successful you are at holding on to good staff, sooner or later you will face the challenge of recruiting a headteacher. Now there’s no doubt that headteacher recruitment has become more difficult in recent years – but it is important to keep things in perspective. Last year, just over 70% of schools that advertised for a new head managed to make an appointment at the first attempt. The number of schools having to re-advertise has been growing – but it’s still a minority.

  Of course, some groups of schools are more likely to experience recruitment difficulties than others. When you look at the data, I think there are few surprises. The schools most likely to face recruitment difficulties are: faith schools (especially Roman Catholic ones), schools in London and the South East; and schools in areas of significant deprivation – particularly primary schools.

  I suspect few people will be surprised by that. What might surprise you, however, is that those groups of schools account for only a minority of the total number of schools which are struggling to recruit.

  In terms of overall numbers, most so-called ‘hard to recruit’ headships are in average schools. Amongst primaries struggling to recruit, for example, around three-quarters are neither faith schools nor in London or the South East. Now I suspect that’s because the recruitment market is a complicated place, and candidates choose to apply for one job over not another for all sorts of subtle and complex reasons which are difficult to analyse at a national level.

  But the message to schools – every school – is clear: no one can afford to be complacent. If you want to get the right recruitment result, then you need to start with a plan. For governing bodies, the NCSL’s guidance, ‘Seven Steps to Success’ offers a ready-made framework for recruitment planning.

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  But as they say, it not what you do – it’s the way that you do it, too. Of course we need recruitment processes which are robust. But successful recruitment I think is about more than just process. It’s about having the right mindset too.

  Now, traditionally, recruitment has been seen as a process of ‘buying’ talent from an available pool of candidates. I think not only is that idea outdated, it’s also irrelevant in the context of school leadership. Smart recruiters have long since turned that old proposition on its head. Recruitment is no longer about ‘buying’. Now it’s about ‘selling’.

  In school leadership, that means selling headship opportunities to the candidates that we’d like to see putting in applications – including those perhaps who would not normally put themselves forward. I call this a ‘marketing mindset’. It means we have to sharpen up the way we present information to candidates. NCSL research suggests that three-quarters of candidates for headship think that the information packs given out with job applications don’t provide adequate information, or even in many cases, reflect an accurate picture of the recruiting school.

  These days, we don’t even buy a ready meal without reading the label to see what’s in it. So why would someone make a key career choice without the right info?

  Most important of all, I think a marketing mindset means looking at our own behaviours during the recruitment process. If we want candidates to engage with us, we have to start by engaging with them. That means job information should be online so candidates have instant access; it means having a plan to ensure that candidates’ calls are returned promptly if they have questions; and it means respecting candidates and their times and sticking to your recruitment timetable. In short, I think it means a recruitment process which is focused on ‘candidate care’.

  Make no mistake – assessment is no less robust. Interviews are no less challenging. But every candidate goes away with a positive experience from the recruitment process – not with a vow never to apply for headship ever again.

• View Part 5 transcript

  And if you are approaching succession planning at a system level – from, for example, a local authority point of view or perhaps a diocese – then the candidate experience is key. A good experience for the candidates internal to your authority will mean that they’ll be encouraged to try to apply for the next headship, when that comes up. Or if candidates are from elsewhere, then you’ll be encouraging them to come back to you.

  A good recruitment experience means that your reputation as an employer is enhanced. Some organisations have taken this further and described that reputation as their ‘employer brand’. And they manage that brand very carefully indeed. They know that their reputation in the marketplace can affect their ability both to recruit – and crucially, to retain – good-quality staff in the future.

  There’s not enough time here to talk about the mechanics of how employer brands work, but you can find out more in the NCSL materials and booklets which look at both employer brands and recruitment marketing in more depth.

  To close, if I had to leave you with three messages, it would be these: First, this is everyone’s business. Leadership recruitment difficulties can hit any school at any time. So statistically, most hard-to-fill headships are in average schools. Second, remember that retention is easier than recruitment. What can you do now which will support your existing leaders and hold them in the system longer? Third, effective recruitment is about selling, not buying. What can you do to make sure that your recruitment process is genuinely focused on candidate care?

  I hope these few thoughts have been helpful. Thanks very much indeed for your time. And good luck with your next recruitment challenge!