Our research on how school trust leadership priorities have changed since 2018 reveals urgent priorities for action including workforce, social justice, ‘truly civic’ duties and SEND. How are trust leaders adapting their operating models to address these, and how will you – if you are a trust leader reading this – respond personally?
Much has happened since the first Building Trusts report in 2018…in no particular order!…the creation of the Confederation of School Trusts, Covid, Trump, Brexit, Ukraine, TikTok, T Levels, #MeToo, 5G, ChatGpt, NFTs, Trump v.2 (‘Make Academies Great Again’? J), six Education Secretaries and of course Baby Shark.
The journey has seen more than a few bumps along the road, but the sector’s resilience has resulted in a clearer view of what it takes to build strong, sustainable, and effective trusts.
Here’s a breakdown of the 6 key themes from CJK research. This will be of interest to both front-line educators and the operations staff who work tirelessly behind the scenes to make schools tick.
1. Developing people moves to the top of trust priorities
As Loic Menzies, author of the original 2018 report has noted “the omission of workforce development from the priorities framework in 2018 seems naive now, but this does show starkly how workforce has shot to the top of the agenda.” The people challenge in education is very real; the stats are on this are alarming – here’s just one example of the deep water that schools are facing: one in ten new teachers leave teaching after a year, and a third within five years (SchoolsWeek Jun 24).
Tom Campbell, CEO of E-ACT, said that “developing their people strategy is of the utmost importance as it is the greatest threat on the trust’s risk register to being able to provide high quality education”.
As trusts grow larger, they are tending to be more business-focused and to look outside the sector for skills and experience. E-ACT has recently recruited three executive roles outside of education including their CFO, Chief People Officer and Chief Digital Officer. By blending together business and education, this will give trusts new perspectives on ‘doing more with less’.
Trusts are therefore increasingly focused on recruiting, retaining, developing staff and promoting wellbeing. Expect more robust CPD programs, collaborative networks, and staff retention strategies to support both new and experienced teachers.
A greater focus on people is also underpinned by potential government policy changes such as the introduction of the ‘Teacher Training Entitlement’. (TES Sep 24).
Does your trust have a ‘People Strategy’ that convincingly sets out how you become an employer of choice and a great place to work? Are you attracting people from outside the education gene-pool?
2. Shift towards inclusion and social justice
More trusts are prioritising inclusion and social justice, which is likely to have been influenced by the pandemic's impact but also the ongoing pressures on public services. One of the systemic (and political) questions this raises is whether the education sector is being asked to step into the gap where other parts of central and local government have cut back on services.
Rowena Hackwood, CEO of Astrea Academy Trust, references social justice in relation to GAG pooling; for example, by combining together all of a trust’s resources and then focusing spending where need is greatest, regional inequities can be eliminated such as differences in local funding for SEND.
Derek Trimmer, Acting CEO of Academy Transformation Trust, notes that the variability of local provision is challenging for a national trust working across a number of local authorities. Derek also remarks that the RISE approach is again geographically driven and would cut across trust structures and already established partnerships.
One of the new criteria of the Ofsted inspection framework (and potentially one of the ratings on the new school report card) will be inclusion. This new priority for trusts also reflects the increase of SEND in schools. Pupils with SEND currently represent 18.4% of the school population, up from 17.3% from 2023 (Nasen Jul 24).
Trusts are thus navigating a future shaped by technology and SEND demands. Many leaders see technology—especially AI—as a way to drive efficiency, improve data insights, and enhance learning. Expect a tech overhaul in your schools, with everything from unified data systems to AI-driven insights becoming more common.
On the SEND front, government is stepping up with more funding and more provision on the way, but resources are still stretched thin.
These shifts will manifest in the form of increased specialist staffing and a commitment to mainstreaming inclusion.
Where does civic duty start and end in your trust’s mission, what can you directly deliver, influence through partnership, or see as ‘context’ outside your control?
3. Working more closely with local authorities
The report hints at a more collaborative relationship emerging between trusts and local authorities, it’s no longer a zero-sum game. Trusts can only do part of what is needed to run education – for example, local authorities have a key role to play in: commissioning and planning school places, improving the quality of local education, SEND provision/funding.
Loic Menzies suggests that although there is currently government agnosticism to school structures, trusts should demonstrate a willingness to evolve. For example, trusts can be the engine to building a ‘National Workforce’, and they can also be the key participants of the new RISE teams through offering their skills and expertise to help other schools beyond their trust.
Some trusts have become anchor institutions within their communities, working with schools beyond their network. Examples include Community Hubs, and United Learning has taken this to scale by setting up its own charity to manage them. Rowena Hackwood suggests that, even if the ‘Community Hub’ policy is putting a name against something schools already do, it is important that we all continue to highlight nationally the key role which schools and trusts play in our local communities.
Community collaboration with other trusts is also on the rise. There are many ways for trusts to engage including through institutions such as CST. Linking with trusts in the same local area will drive efficiencies at the local level and avoid having to reinvent the wheel. This will allow all schools in a local area to jointly tackle the problems and challenges in their communities.
How are you using local partnerships to deliver on a broader civic duty, and what are the barriers and enablers to this?
4. What really matters is local agency, not local autonomy
While some trusts prioritise teaching and pedagogy, others emphasise autonomy and community engagement. Interestingly, even trusts with similar operating models may have arrived at those models for very different reasons. For instance, centralising back-office functions might be driven by a desire for efficiency in one trust, while in another, it might be a strategic move to free up teachers from administrative tasks.
Many trusts resonate with statements about preserving ‘school autonomy’ and the need to balance this with central back-office efficiency (this is certainly not a new concept in the world of MATs).
However, have we been asking the wrong question about local vs central? We think we need to reframe this balancing act - what really matters is local agency, not local autonomy.
Agency is the ability and will of local leaders to make decisions and actions which shape the outcomes for their school. There is, however, scope for standardisation alongside local agency. As an example, recruitment should follow a set of rigorous processes (e.g employment checks), however local leaders will know the best channels to attract candidates in their local area.
How are you ensuring local leadership agency, whilst also securing efficiencies by working together across schools?
5. The continued rise of collaborative standardisation
In that light, which functions within MATs have become more centralised over the last 6 years?
The majority of trusts now manage finance, HR and IT centrally.
Estates management and safeguarding remain locally managed in the majority of trusts.
Procurement is becoming more centralised – there are clear savings through buying as a group and benefits to building central procurement expertise.
Central back-office efficiency becomes more important as trusts get older.
People at the centre of trusts are more likely to believe that they are achieving efficiency. Conversely, school leaders are less likely to believe that central staff that the trust is offering value.
What’s next for operating model improvement?
Simplify, standardise, share. Particularly for the transactional aspects of IT, HR and Finance, the next focus should be looking at transactions that are repeated across all schools and how they can be automated (supported by AI) in order to gain greater efficiencies. Examples of processes that could be automated include employee onboarding, complaints, CapEx requests and the management of exclusions.
Collaborative standardisation: you will hear this more and more as it becomes a key ‘buzzword’ in the world of MATs. With many trusts expanding, the shift towards standardised practices has become inevitable. Larger trusts, in particular, see centralisation as a route to consistency and economies of scale. Yet, this can create headaches: while uniform systems help operationally, they can sometimes feel restrictive, particularly at a local level. Chris Kirk suggests that, as your trust grows, you may need to adapt your culture to encourage collaborative engagement in an industrialised way. This is to ensure that things get done and that collaborative working groups don’t end up as just ‘talking shops’.
How are you building the culture and process to support ‘collaborative standardisation’ across you trust?
6. Final thoughts…adapting to a new political environment, confirmation bias and the relentless focus on outcomes
We are experiencing the first change of government in 14 years. Voters appear apathetic towards education: Tom Campbell noted that education languished in 12th place amongst voter priorities in the 2024 general election, with only 1% of voters believing that education was the most important single issue to them (YouGov Jun24).
The emerging view from Labour is an agnosticism towards school structures and that trusts may no longer be the main driver for school improvement (SchoolsWeek, Nov24).
Garret Fay, CEO of Insignis Trust, wonders if trust leaders are in danger of believing their own confirmation bias that trusts are the most important voices in the room when it comes to education. Political leaders hint that local authorities have a larger role to play in education, and the recent decision to remove the academy conversion grant and Trust Capacity fund may slow trust growth. Mergers will become ever more important in order to achieve economies of scale.
Rowena Hackwood’s view of the future is pragmatic: “our core business as education leaders is running schools and this won’t change; it’s evolution, not revolution. Everyone needs to use their best brains to make the most of the funding that they have, to make better use of technology and to collaborate better”.
As Loic Menzies says, this second Building Trusts report perhaps reveals ‘a sea-scape of captains tacking and jibing as they navigate a bumpy ocean’. It is trust’s flexibility and adaptability that remains their greatest strength. In doing so, Rowena Hackwood has reminded us that the purpose of trusts is, and will always be, about keeping our eyes on the horizon of better outcomes for students.
If one thing’s clear from the past six years, trust leaders are embracing the unpredictability of education (including a new government) with a mix of resilience, optimism, and a touch of good humour. After all, if trusts can get through a pandemic, embrace AI, tackle a mental health crisis and a recruitment crisis, do more with less, be central and local at the same time...what can’t they do?
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