We carried out research with 150 academy trust leaders, school leaders, and academy staff, to understand more about making successful changes to trust operating models. We found that most school trusts are changing, most of the time. 82% of trusts have made significant changes to operations. 69% of trusts have been involved in major changes to their operations in the last 12 months including 52% where it is ongoing.
The most common rationales for change were creating better central services, improving processes and workflows, and removing duplication. In discussion, agility, building capacity, enhancing collaboration, enhancing governance and reorganising for success were emphasised.
Finance was most frequently involved service, followed by IT and HR and Education. Most trusts were changing more than 3 services at a time, leading to complex change.
The study incudes 4 case studies which provide important messages:
“Don't be put off by resistance - in almost all cases the change is a positive one for school staff”
“Make change exciting rather than scary”
“Culture is key”
“Onboarding processes need to be strong, informative but not overwhelming. ”
The advice provided by trust leaders underscores the delicate balancing act of managing change in academy trusts: conviction with humility, pace with patience, honouring views from within whilst learning from others outside.