Recruitment: everything schools need to consider
Recruiting and retaining staff is arguably the most challenging job for any school leader, particularly in the current climate.
So it makes sense that before you start the recruitment process, you take the time to sit and plan it all through, making sure you haven’t missed any potential opportunities to make the job easier for yourself.
To help you achieve your recruitment and retention goals, we’ve pulled together some of our top Tes tips from recent articles.
Get ahead of the game
As with so many problems, prevention is better than cure. One piece of advice we hear from teachers time and time again is that you need to have honest conversations with your staff about their career goals. Jo Facer, principal of Ark Soane school, explains why she thinks it is so important for the future planning of your school staffing in our Career Clinic video blog.
In international schools, where two-year contracts are common, these conversations have to come at regular intervals. Read our guide on how to make the two-year contract work.
Can you recruit from within?
Before you send that email asking for the vacancy to be advertised, first take stock of the staff you already have. We’ve got some ideas on restructuring, where schools share what they did when there were last-minute resignations.
Then we have some great suggestions on how you can look to develop your existing teaching support staff to ensure you are making the most of the talent you have.
And how about thinking long term? Are you considering the possibility of recruiting from your pool of former students?
What type of teacher are you looking for?
If you have a clear understanding of your school ethos, you’ll find it much easier to know what kind of teacher will make for a good fit.
Once you know who you’re looking for, then attracting those teachers becomes easier. Read our tips on how to market your school to candidates.
Some roles are harder to fill than others. Here are some tips on recruiting for those shortage subject posts. And we’ve also pulled together the data on the shortage subjects.
How do you make sure they’re the right fit?
It’s not just about finding the best teacher, you need to find the best teacher for your school. If you don’t find someone who will share the vision of your school, you’ll soon find yourself advertising the same position all over again. So how do you make sure your recruitment process targets the right teacher first time round?
Here are some suggestions on shortlisting, where we get some insights into how choose from the applications you receive. For overseas leaders, we also have some suggestions about attracting the right international teacher.
What else is there to think of?
Looking at the data for the teacher shortage, it doesn’t look like it is going to go away anytime soon. We know student numbers are rising, and more teachers are leaving, and less people applying for teacher training. For school leaders, there is only so much you can do within your control.
However, all schools are working within similar conditions, and if you can keep abreast of the latest news and developments, you can at least have a good idea of what you’re up against. Subscribe to the Tes podcast, and Career Clinic video blog to keep up to date with the latest teacher recruitment news and advice.
