Unlocking your talent challenges

If you have struggled to appoint a headteacher, it’s most likely a reflection of the market and not your school or trust. The leadership landscape is tough and fiercely competitive. We work with the largest trusts in the country to develop their headteacher recruitment strategies – and in honesty, they even struggle from time to time. We bring a vast amount of knowledge and practical expertise around developing employer value propositions and working with organisations to become the employer of choice locally or regionally. There are some very simple (and low/no cost) changes that you can implement that can have a massive benefit to your campaigns. We love discussing how you can tweak or overhaul your existing strategies, so click here to get in touch if you’d like to learn more.

We’ve led senior level recruitment for MATs, LAs and schools for over two decades and have developed a deep understanding of the market and attraction strategies. ‘Headhunting’ is a term that has many connotations – not all positive. Within the education sector, we don’t have the luxury of limitless salaries to draw a leader from one organisation to another. Our campaigns focus on values alignment, articulating vision and mission and ensuring that we actively engage with brilliant leaders that are likely too busy in their own organisation to think about their own career pathway. Through this carefully curated approach, utilising our networks and credibility, we’re able to bring exceptional leaders together with brilliant organisations. It’s why we’re trusted by the largest organisations in the country to advise and partner them on their top talent agenda.

When a headteacher resigns it is important you are clear on how manage a smooth departure and appointment of your new headteacher. We’ve recruited hundreds of headteachers into schools of all phases and contexts. Every school is unique and therefore each campaign is different, but there are undoubtedly some hallmarks of a fantastic headship process. If you’d like a proposal and outline costs, please let us know by clicking here.

Using a recruiter to support your trust or school doesn’t need to be expensive. We work with organisations large and small to recruit at all leadership levels from CEO through to Deputy and Vice Principals. Any organisation you partner should be keen to understand what you’re trying to achieve and the budget you’ve got to work with. From there, we’d suggest a range of approaches and provide advice on how to secure best value. If you’d like a proposal and outline costs, please let us know by clicking here.

Whilst we can control the vast majority of variables in a headteacher recruitment campaign, people are people – and ultimately subject to acting in unexpected ways. That said, it’s fairly unusual. Last year, around 87% of the campaigns we supported appointed first time. If candidates are making us aware of barriers during a process, we’d work creatively with you to try to overcome them – and we’re brave enough to ask challenging questions if we don’t feel we’re quite hitting the mark around (for example) salary expectations and market expectations. We’ll be an honest partner throughout - and if things don’t go to plan, we’ll keep working with you to ensure you find the successful solution you need.