Latest / Teachers Talk Radio / Consultants, Edugurus & Influencers: Help or Hindrance?: The Late Show with Beejesh Deva and Claire Bills

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Consultants, Edugurus & Influencers: Help or Hindrance?: The Late Show with Beejesh Deva and Claire Bills · Teachers Talk Radio

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Welcome to TKO Talk Radio! Thank you for listening!
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With BJ Shdiva and our guest host today, Nathan Ginn.
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So today what we're going to look at is we're going to be looking at this idea
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of consultants, edugurus and influencers.
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So we're going to get kind of into that subject today and have a little think
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about whether these people are helping schools or whether they're hindrance
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or as per usual, it's probably a nuanced picture,
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and we're going to just delve a little bit deeper and kind of do a bit of digging
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into that, kind of the idea.
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These people are a growing group of people who are surrounding schools and who
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are involved in the education of our young people,
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and we just need to think about what good are they bringing to the system and
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like how they are interacting with schools and to what extent they're having an impact.
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So that's what we're going to be exploring today. Yeah.
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I'm just going to do a disclaimer here. You may be an edgy guru,
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consultant or influencer listening to this podcast.
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This is no way pointed. I want to really just explore the idea in a way that
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is fair and balanced and I'm not getting at anyone when it comes to this kind of topic.
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It would just be really interesting to explore the kind of the way that this
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is kind of developing and the way this has become a more mainstream thing.
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I know this is in recent times, it's become a more usual thing to get in a consultant.
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Or maybe not. Maybe actually, you know, we had local authority consultants and
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we had people attached from Ofsted and things like that come in and doing consulting
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in schools beforehand. But I think it's an emerging and growing field.
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And there's more and more kind of call for it, I think, and more and more kind
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of, more and more maybe money to be made from it as well. That's the other side of it.
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So it's just quite an interesting thing to explore, especially with the advent
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of social media and the kind of the development in social media as well,
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which then pushes the angle of it coming from influencers and edugurus as well.
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So hopefully we've got Nathan joining us, and maybe Claire. We don't know.
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You should be able to hear me now.
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I can hear you, Nathan. How are you doing? I'm okay. It'll be a little confusing
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because I'm on two counts here, but I'll talk from one and maybe comment from
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another, just so you can hear me.
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And you're right, I've been reading a little bit into this topic,
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like sort of once you suggested it.
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And I'm myself torn because I have strong opinions, but then they're conflicting
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opinions, if that makes sense as well.
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So I'm hoping to gain some clarity for myself, I think, by the end of this as well.
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It's an interesting one, isn't it? Because like, I know, just being like working
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in schools over the last few years, it's become more of a thing.
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Do you know what I mean? Especially educators and influencers.
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I think consultants have always been around, you know,
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you had people like consulting in schools for decades, almost,
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you know, coming in and being that guy who knew everything and kind of coming
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in and delivering and working with your school.
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We've always had that, I think, from what we've had, like, ex-Ofsted consultants,
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we've had local area, like, LEA consultants, and we've had, like, you know,
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other people attached to various governments and council consultants and things like that.
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I think they've always been around, but the eduguru and influencer angle is quite interesting.
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And then the mushrooming of the idea of the consultant coming out of that eduguru
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and influencer circle is quite an interesting thing, I think,
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in the last few years as well.
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So have you had any experience with any of these people coming into your schools, Nathan?
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So, you know, I often talk about one who, you know, I would say consultant.
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I went on a training course with him, but, you know, Mr.
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PICT was fantastic. I went on a training course with him, fantastic.
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And, you know, he is on social media. He does have a platform.
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I see him talking education secretary or promoting teaching in ways one of those people,
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He's also someone who really directly impacted on my teaching and improved it.
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And so I felt that I got something from that.
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So as far as celebrity sort of influencer type person going,
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there's people like that who I see.
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Then there's some other people who I see who I like less, I should say,
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probably, which is, you know, I don't like, you know, I've seen some people
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on TikTok maybe who are filming in their classes and hear kids' voices in the background.
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And they're kind of maybe doing it
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more for likes than than to
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help people so there's that that kind of bit and then
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there's the traditional kind of consultants who i've had in
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you know to school before and i've always normally been
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in a local authority school so often they're attached to the local authority
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then who you'll have a maths advisor or someone who'll come in and do some work
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and i found them at sometimes useful but i'll tell you what i have seen and
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maybe this is something that maybe we'll see across the board from all consultants is I have been there.
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When someone has come to my school, seen something that's worked well, gone to another school,
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and suggested to them to do it, but it was my work that had been suggested.
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Someone from that school came to my school to have a look around and suggested
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I try the thing that had been suggested to them,
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which was my thing that I'd given to a consultant to share around,
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you know, in that kind of let's all share and good.
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So I do think like, you know, as far as someone who sees lots of different schools,
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I love that aspect of it. I think there's always a role for someone going around
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sharing good practice, maybe in a more open and honest way than I saw it happen. So I like that bit.
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I like having people sharing good practice and advice like that you can select
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yourself maybe, you know, so like the Mr.
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P example that I gave, that's someone who I saw out because,
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you know, they're outside of my school or my trust or my local authority.
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And I sort them out to seek advice from, if you want a better word.
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Then there's also another group who maybe are, I don't want to say pushing people,
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Or maybe kind of, you know, giving a view on teaching.
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I don't know, you know, like, and bits where I'm kind of a little less sure.
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Maybe I'm old-fashioned.
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I'm not TikTok enough for it. I don't know.
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Yeah. I mean, like, let's stick with the idea of these consultants who come
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into school. Because we need to really separate the categories.
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Because they're all influencing what happens in schools in different ways.
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And to different extents as well. I mean, I've read about kind of,
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I did a little bit reading on.
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It's really difficult to find any sort of research on how much these people
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are being used by schools, how much consultancy schools are getting.
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There's no fast or hard figures.
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It's really, really difficult to find out what the average price they are charging to schools is.
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It just seems there's quite a lot of opaqueness around this.
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Probably because i i don't i'm not saying it's malicious i
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think it's just it's just the fact that we we haven't
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collected the data do you know i mean i don't think people have
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really been looking at it per se but i mean i i
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did see a range of prices just advertised by some
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online consultants and for like 10 kids plus some
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agencies some consultancy firms are charging like 700
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quid it can go all the way up to 1500 quid
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a day it can be as low as 400 pound a
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day to do this sort of consultancy work and
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what is offered is a variety of stuff so
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you can have someone coming in looking at lessons and giving advice you can
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have someone working with the leadership team you can have someone coming and
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delivering inset for a day you know and come in and doing that side of things
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you can have people working long term with schools so if you think about it,
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there's quite a lot of discrepancy, but if you think about schools utilising these people.
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For one, two, three, four, five, six, seven days plus, or even many schools
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utilising these people.
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It's a significant outgoing for the education sector.
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And I just find it flabbergasting that there's no...
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You can't actually find a lot of detail on... No, you know, I agree.
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At AQA, we work with a lot of.
10:23
The only thing that I could find around spending was something from sort of 2018.
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So old now, you know, this is eight years ago and the world has changed.
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We've had COVID since then, you know, and online learning, lots of technology stuff has changed.
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But this was Mary Belstead talking at an NEU conference, I think,
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about consultancies, you know, and she was talking about snake oil in a way
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that, you know, very often people can be, you know,
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rude about these kind of things.
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But they were saying that spending on consultancy from 2002 to 2017 had gone up by 196%.
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So I can't find what the actual numbers are anywhere apart from the fact that it's.
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Blossomed it's bloomed it's boomed in
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those 20 years from from the 2000s to
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you know like pre-2020 and and
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it had it quadrupled so like it you
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know it's massively gone up and you know
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the similar numbers per day to what you were suggesting you
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know this 400 pound upwards and and
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the the thing that they were saying at
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the time and the world has moved on you know
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for better or for worse you know we have academies we have
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things like that you know before this
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time when before their figures started you
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would have been going to your local authority for advice yes you
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know yeah and there wasn't that freedom of
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choice that wasn't that sort of freedom of
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outlook of go you know going to different places looking for
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this thing looking for that thing you were maybe funneled
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in and certainly you know i i have been
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in schools where where that's the case where i
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have as a leader in the school said hey you know we want to focus on this thing
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and the local authority have said no well you need to use our maths advisor
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and they're gonna do some work on you on this because this is what we see as
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the priority we've had to sort of turn around and go hang on.
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We, you know, that's not what we want. We, this is a service and we want,
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you know, to behave more, I guess, more like academies could then at that point
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and say, look, this is a service that we're paying for.
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We want the thing that we want, that we as a school leadership think will help the school.
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And so we kind of opened that and academies have opened that up, haven't they?
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And that freedom of choice is there now. And so like,
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I think a lot of that change has been a change in the education sector,
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you know and i think possibly if you went through other
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things that happened you know that we've moved
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away from the local authority model so of course we've moved away from you know
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it being centralized and there being one person who's employed at the local
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authority to advise on science and if you want advice on science or you want
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someone to come in and lead a science inset you had to go through that person
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or it was always that you did go through that person,
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because they were probably the people coming in to inspect you as well yeah
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you know in your interim inspections so it's kind of that kind of like whereas
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now you could say oh i want to improve science i'm going to look out there who's
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doing it well who can we get you know who would be great to come in the bit
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that i disagree with in some of it that's happened with that.
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Is i don't like one-off insets
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i don't like one-off trainings i like
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something that's more embedded and i don't like that
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idea and i don't see how i would get the benefit unless it
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was some inspirational guest speaker you know i like the benefit of someone
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coming in and maybe working with us four or five times over a year you know
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that that that kind of support and so you know i i'm torn on that and i think
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the local authority model maybe did that better.
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You know but i'm sure there are probably consultants who are offering that
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kind of support as well the problem there is it's costly isn't
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it it's really costly to to then engage with like for
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400 pound a day and then you multiply that
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to you know like five and five days
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or something along that lines or it's a release yeah
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on top of that you've got to release your teachers or your senior
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leaders to go and do that you've got to get some cover in there yeah
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and and if they're not local and there's the transport costs
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and things like that that come with that there is the
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organization along with it so there's there's quite
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a lot of if you're doing the SWOT analysis there's quite a lot of opportunity costs
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that then and cost cost that then we need
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to factor into the into the mix for it
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to be a valuable experience it's quite yeah it's
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an interesting one like I like I liked your point about kind
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of the idea that there's more choice do you know and that widens
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the field but then and that's that's
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what tears me do you know what I mean like there's there's more choice you.
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Can go and get consultancy on in
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a way that you would want consultancy you can get someone to
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look at what you particularly want to look at look
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at as a school and obviously context is just
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huge isn't it with schools it's massive in
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terms of school improvement and and
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I think you've named it really where a consultant goes
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from one school to another suggests an improvement
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model which they've seen from another school but doesn't
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quite fit that context and then it becomes legally mutated it comes back to
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you and then all of a sudden we're doing something which is really really odd
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for all the school's context and not particularly improving or it's not necessarily
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improving to school leading to school improvement whereas we can throw out a little bit.
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However, what's really interesting is then it brings a level of incoherence
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so to speak, to what schools are doing.
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So, you know, like essentially we get a system where things are, what is working here,
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Or what is said to be working here isn't necessarily the model a school over
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there is following, which means that the two aren't compatible.
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And then essentially, if you're trained in one location, you go to another and
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they're not doing that thing.
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We end up with incoherence between the two systems. And sometimes we end up
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going down weird rabbit holes in those areas.
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Do you know what I mean? Oh, well, a consultant told us to do this.
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Ah, well, your results still aren't improvements. So why aren't you doing this?
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You know, we end up with this and everyone's scratching their heads going,
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well, what is the right thing to do? We get a bit of incoherence there.
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So it's an interesting one. That's the trade-off, isn't it? Well,
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I would put you on something that you've said there, which is this kind of framing of, you know.
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A consultant told us we should do this or, you know, someone told us we should
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do this or, you know, I've seen it before, like, you know, as I say,
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most of my experiences in local authorities, the local authority have said we have to do this.
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You know the maths advisor has said i should be doing this yeah and and i think
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you can expand that across any of the groups that we're you're kind of talking
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about tonight you know whether they be consultants or people you see on tiktok
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or maybe even someone's book that you've read you know and there are some there's
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some great stuff in books but if you're taking it blindly,
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and if you're holding them up as a kind of you know you
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know putting them on a pedestal saying but you
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know this person said i should do this you
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know if you're blindly following that i think that's there's
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something really dangerous in that and then it
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gets into this question of you know who are you letting into your school and
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actually what how are we gatekeeping that and you know and how much and how
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much of it is they're putting in because there's some great advice from people
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but some of those people are not very nice people sometimes and you know like
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All of these things are mixed in.
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And so I think there's a real danger of holding consultants or anyone up on a pedestal.
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For their advice if you're not you know
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interrogating the advice on its own separately does that
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make sense yes yeah it did like that that's the
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issue isn't it the the consultant said do this but
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then when you've you paid for something like that uh there is a commitment bias
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i guess you know like and and obviously i'm not saying that i i said that you
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know we're not tracking the spending as a system.
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We're not tracking the spending, but obviously you are held accountable to what
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you spend on the consultants as a school as well.
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So it's okay to pay, I mean, is it okay to pay four, 500, 700,
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1000 pound plus for a consultant to come in and ignore the advice?
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It's a really difficult thing. And I can see exactly how we end up down the
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rabbit hole or, or on the other side of it, let's say it's a LEA consultant,
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you know, like you said, there's, if consultant said this and consultant is
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going to come and see whether we're doing this, well, we are, we are going to do this.
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Do you know what I mean? We're doing it because he told us to, or they told us to.
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It's quite an interesting kind
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of cycle of, of how it works because realistically, I think you're right.
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I think all schools should take consultancy and advice and, and objectively
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and explore what parts are useful and what parts aren't, you know,
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like, because they don't know the school context.
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They're not doing it on a day-to-day basis by the very nature of what consultants do.
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There's very few consultants who know the ins and outs of your organization.
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And that's quite an interesting thing to entertain. However,
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it's the way in which that consultancy is done, isn't it?
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It's quite an interesting kind of thing to explore. I don't know how you'd get
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around that commitment bias in another model.
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Can I jump in? I'm very late to the party. Oh, hello Claire.
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Hello. Hello, welcome back, Claire. How are we doing? Yeah, I'm all good.
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I literally joined and the baby cried and I was like, ah, this is awful timing.
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So I've just been sitting on mute, listening intently and it's fascinating. What a wonderful topic.
20:41
So yeah, can I pose a question to you?
20:44
Pose a question, Claire. Go for it. So we are in this post-academy local authority
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world. I obviously sit as a local authority head.
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In some ways, I feel like academisation definitely started this ball rolling
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of consultants beyond the local authority and therefore reducing local authority's offer.
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But as we stand now, does it make a difference?
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Because I can still choose as a local authority school leader where I go to
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to get my support as long as I'm in a good place, right?
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So if my data is strong, I'm looking like all should be good or expected,
21:25
whatever language you want to use, I can kind of stand by those decisions.
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But in some ways, the same is true in a trust school.
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As long as you are in a good situation, the mat will often allow you to take
21:39
control of what that CPD consultation process looks like.
21:44
They step in when there's concerns. But actually, whether that's,
21:48
you know, quality assurance advisor within a trust or a local authority.
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That's the point when they want to centralize that support more.
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In the world we're in now, is there any difference for local authority schools
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or trusts and academies?
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It's an interesting one, isn't it? But like I said, so I think Nathan said it
22:07
when he talked about kind of, if you've got a consultant from the LEA and they
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are going to do interim inspections, etc. it.
22:16
Whether you choose to take it it's a brave person who takes that into their
22:21
hands and kind of like it doesn't choose to take that advice and justifies it
22:26
really really well so I guess if things are going well and you've got that in
22:29
your back pocket then then you can take,
22:33
say thank you for the advice but we're doing this and I'll
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give you a ridiculous example and I'm this is very primary
22:40
so apologies like there's a certain people in
22:43
our local authority who have gone around to many schools
22:46
and I heard you say this kind of concept and be like
22:49
floor books are the answer and it feels like
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you're going back in time about 20 years all of a sudden
22:55
and it but like it's hilarious when you
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meet as local authority heads you're like oh have you met with your quality
23:00
person yes did they mention floor books and you're like yes now half the schools
23:05
are going to go do you know what I think that might work for our context I think
23:08
it might provide us with a good source of evidence and I'm going to go for that
23:11
because I can see how that would work with what I'm trying to do.
23:14
And half the school was going,
23:15
Absolutely not. No way on earth am I asking my staff to do that because it just doesn't work for us.
23:23
And I am pleased that there is that balance, if I'm honest.
23:28
I'm pleased that there's people who go, no, there aren't magic wands.
23:34
Like the answer to all schools' phonic situations isn't one scheme.
23:40
It's the right scheme for that school. The answer to how you get protected characteristics
23:45
or British values right in a school isn't a one-size-fits-all model.
23:50
And that's the danger, I think, of over-reliance on one consultant.
23:56
And, you know, we're lucky. Our local authority's got some fantastic people.
24:00
Emma Turner does some amazing work on curriculum with our local authority schools.
24:05
And, you know, you get local academies buying in to come and be part of those
24:10
things. But I think that's probably rarer than other vehicle authorities, perhaps.
24:16
Can I say, Claire, on that point as well, is I have been in this situation,
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and this is primary, and it was sort of six, seven years ago now,
24:25
when I was back in England, and...
24:29
As a school leader, I did not like the advice that the local authority maths
24:34
advisor was giving to our teachers.
24:37
And now this will blow your mind, but like as a school, and I was a parachute
24:43
deputy at the time with a new head, and we'd gone into a school that had not
24:48
been successful in Ofsted,
24:50
and we were put in and told that we had to pay for the local authority support
24:55
package because of our Ofsted grading.
24:58
And so we had to pay what i would
25:00
say is equivalent to an nqt full-time we had to pay to local authority to have
25:06
advisors come in so we had no choice in that we had to we were told and then
25:11
we had no choice and i had to really fight and put my foot down to say i want a different advisor,
25:19
because the approach they are taking and the approach we want to take are not compatible,
25:26
and we managed to do that but it is
25:29
a a brave and bolshy person to
25:33
turn to the local authority who are going to be the people who
25:35
come in and judge us in in that way they they would then come in and look up
25:40
books and say how ready we were for offstead to turn around to them and say
25:44
we actually don't want your support we think someone else would give us better
25:48
support that you know you're really biting at hands that can do some damage to you when you do that.
25:55
I think having some,
25:58
space i think people forget you know that when things
26:02
are going well things are going well and everyone's happy to stick along when
26:05
things are going badly actually there are disagreements and
26:08
i imagine maybe in academies this happens as well where
26:11
there i was just going to say that i think it'd be no different in
26:14
an academy situation you're going to have someone who in that trust is their
26:18
maths lead or is their kind of maths overarching person who would come and then
26:23
you then you're really stuck though right because you've not got a local authority
26:28
you have bought into that trust. The trust have put their kind of.
26:32
Focus on that maths hub or that maths individual and
26:35
that perhaps is even harder yeah it
26:38
can be a tricky climate to work in it can be you know
26:41
disagreements within the organization it's it's
26:45
it's it's as problematic as probably an lea i
26:48
reckon so so you're right actually claire maybe the two systems
26:51
aren't aren't drastically different i guess
26:54
the lea have got a little bit i don't know
26:57
actually okay academy can have that in terms
27:00
of the clout of of what can possibly happen as
27:03
a result of not following the advice they give but i mean this is i
27:06
i think you i want to pick out something you said claire which is
27:09
the idea that some consultants are really added value to
27:12
to us do you mean like in we
27:16
we can end up on a group think train and and
27:19
going down that weird rabbit hole of well we're doing this and we're doing this
27:22
and we're doing this and and not getting the results and then having an external
27:26
pair of eyes to come and look at that and some of them are you know worth their
27:30
weight and salt you know they come and come and they literally like can see
27:35
they're so in tune they can see what's going on in your school they've been to.
27:40
Hundreds of schools and they can see exactly what
27:42
the patterns are in your organization and maybe they can
27:45
um they can pull you out of something that you've got
27:48
yourself into or even just add value to if
27:51
you do it really really well if you've not got a you know we've got a new
27:54
maths lead in our school this year actually someone really experienced
27:57
he's not new sort of leader but actually he's new to maths and actually having
28:02
someone who's got that wealth of maths knowledge and experience just walk around
28:06
and look at things just gave him totally different perspective oh yeah that's
28:10
a really good point why is that like that why are they doing it like that and
28:14
actually that was really valuable and helpful so you're absolutely right.
28:17
Yeah, you know, you're swimming in the water, but you can't see what ocean you're in.
28:22
Whereas these people, because they kind of end up across a number of schools,
28:27
they can see exactly what's happening.
28:29
And it's quite interesting to get that perspective.
28:32
I guess what we've now done is subdivided, haven't we? Like both of you,
28:37
Nathan, you were kind of talking about this.
28:38
We've kind of gone, there are great consultants and there's a spectrum.
28:44
There's a spectrum of consultants who there are consultants
28:47
who say do it like this and there's consultants who can offer a
28:50
different perspective it depends what you're getting into i
28:52
guess however i mean once again there's no consistent i don't see a consistency
28:57
in that process maybe it's my my neurotic need for consistency in process yeah
29:05
well that doesn't surprise me let me let me Right, onto a cost thing now,
29:10
which leads into this kind of need for things to work and be consistent within
29:16
your school and your approach and things.
29:18
One of the things, so we, a group of local authority schools,
29:21
have gone, right, one of the things we don't get as a kind of non-academy schools is.
29:27
Say, like high quality CPD from someone external coming in and delivering because
29:33
the cost of it would be too great.
29:34
So we've gone right okay well look let's do
29:37
this let's put on a joint insert let's get a guest speaker you know i think
29:42
uh nathan was saying about someone kind of inspirational you know that can just
29:46
come and talk to us about something that is of value to all of us so we're all
29:51
doing around like what does metacognition really look like and mean like let's get beyond the kind of,
29:57
sound bites that you hear and and dig a little bit deeper into what that what
30:03
that means what that looks like, how it's in play, and how it fits in with one
30:07
of the other key buzzwords in primaries, which is always C at the moment. Mm-hmm.
30:11
And actually, it was a fab day, like a genuinely really, really encouraging, interesting day.
30:18
And people still worked in their school teams, but alongside,
30:21
you know, 10, 11 other schools to get something really valuable out of it.
30:26
And, you know, cost wise, that's amazing because none of us would have been
30:30
able to afford that expertise, that level of consultant by ourselves.
30:36
But splits across the 11 schools you know all of a sudden it looks a very different kettle of fish.
30:42
And and it's just about doing that
30:45
but doing it when it works and when it's right like
30:48
not just saying we're going to do this every year forever more
30:51
now without actually stopping and thinking going is
30:54
there something that would be a value and use for us moving forward
30:57
next year or actually do we not do it for a
31:00
year because actually there isn't that same kind of
31:03
demand and need my worry is that and I don't know
31:06
but I've been in academy trusts where they've had
31:08
joint inset and then it gets to like a month before and they
31:11
go oh what we're going to do with it and so it doesn't become
31:14
the best use of of people's time and that's
31:17
when people get frustrated but that actually there's actual thought and planning
31:21
and how it fits into big picture planning for each of those schools involved
31:26
with that kind of opt in opt out as required to to make sure whatever we're
31:31
doing is is meaningful and whatever that you know guru or consultant or influencer whoever they are,
31:37
is the right person to take that school on the right next step of their journey.
31:42
Yeah, this is a really interesting idea. I'm just going to go for a quick ad
31:46
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32:45
What are you saying, Claire? Kind of triggered an idea in my head,
32:49
which is maybe we need some sort of platform that shows us, a bit like the EEF,
32:57
that shows us, gives us a quality indicator and shows us the sort of impact
33:02
that some of these people are having.
33:03
Do you know what I mean? Like, I think it's really difficult because it seems potluck.
33:08
As to who you get or potluck if you get someone do you know i mean and and and
33:13
someone who who is useful to you for that that experience it seems like um a
33:18
little bit of a wild west out there at the moment where you got consultants
33:22
for this that and the other varying degrees of impact,
33:27
and they're able to quote varying degrees of
33:29
impact i don't know whether it'd be nice maybe to
33:32
have have some sort of level of like
33:36
organization for these structures whereby you know there isn't
33:39
a directory you can dip in an hour into quite often it's who's
33:42
found what who knows what and and you never know you
33:45
know like there's the situations where nepotism creeps in
33:48
where you know throw a friend a bone oh well
33:51
we've got like this trust that needs this consultancy okay
33:54
well you come in and do this consultancy and then people are
33:57
kind of thinking well what's happened here there's this
34:01
you know there's this consultants out there who can
34:04
really bring value to schools who just don't get any any
34:07
take up because because of the fact
34:10
that there there's no no one knows they're out there so it's an interesting
34:13
one to like there it'd be interesting if it was a directory or some sort of
34:18
kind of resource but like checker trade baby i'm not affiliated to checker trade
34:25
we don't endorse trick trading anyway on ttr check a consultant i think it's.
34:31
Do you know what the problem is i think it gets down that that route of you
34:36
know i'm very much like that the onus is on the school to know what it wants
34:44
and what it needs right and so you know all of these things we talk about you
34:49
know i really like this idea particularly for schools
34:51
aren't part of a trust of collaborating together.
34:53
And I've been in schools where we've done that and we've gotten someone to do,
34:56
you know, an insert day on, you know, Singapore maps or something like that,
35:02
you know, something that we couldn't afford on our own, but certainly was big
35:06
enough that everyone would want them.
35:08
But the big thing is we then had plans as what we were going to do.
35:13
You know, we'd spoken to the, you know, the leaders who we were working with.
35:17
But when we go away from this, what's your next staff meeting?
35:21
What's your staff meeting in a term's time?
35:23
You know, how are you embedding this rather than it being a one-off?
35:27
And I think there's power in that. Almost, you know, subdividing like the different things.
35:34
Because also I really like what Claire said about this.
35:38
Having a consultant who's almost
35:41
an experienced person who maybe isn't telling you what you
35:44
should know they're almost it's almost more of a coaching thing or showing
35:47
you what to look for and giving you that kind of support and experience as opposed
35:53
to and there's two different things there i think of one you're buying the thing
35:57
if you're getting someone into single maps it's because you want everyone to
36:00
use bar models or you want everyone to be doing you know that that's you saying, I want this thing,
36:06
you need to provide this thing for me.
36:09
Whereas the other way of that consultant is, you know, I need a different pair of eyes.
36:15
I need someone with experience. I need support in that way to bring your experience to ask questions.
36:23
And those two are almost like the complete opposites of staff development in a way for me.
36:30
Yeah, I think that's an interesting way having someone in to coach and guide
36:35
and kind of, but it needs that expertise really.
36:39
What's really interesting is i've heard of a couple
36:42
of consultants who they get the school to sign up a contract to
36:45
to do certain things after they leave and and
36:49
they won't enter into an agreement with the school unless they do x y and z
36:54
towards school development so it actually becomes ingrained in what they do
36:58
and that's a high level i think of consultancy that which is well worth it there
37:02
and if it's actually going to have an impact but i'm not sure that is widespread practice.
37:08
No, I've not heard of that. That's fascinating.
37:11
I mean, you'd get people who pay lip service to that though,
37:14
right? They'd say, yeah, yeah, yeah, of course I'll do that.
37:16
And then it doesn't. But that is absolutely, it's like Nathan's saying in terms
37:21
of you plan in your staffing. And I've done exactly that.
37:24
You know, you plan in what you're going to do as a result of that,
37:27
to make it value for money, to make it meaningful, to make it impactful.
37:31
Because if you just expect teachers to listen to one thing, take it in,
37:36
walk away and implement it.
37:38
It's just, people have got too much on to be able to juggle all of those balls,
37:43
unless you give them the time and space to think it through and go,
37:46
right, here's what we're dropping, here's what we're picking up to do this.
37:49
How's that working? What does that look like? Same with everything,
37:52
though, right? Whether it's teaching and learning, whether it's subject knowledge...
37:57
We've lost her so let's segue
38:00
into this idea of i've got a nice little segue here
38:03
maybe so what is a current thing going around in my head is are we losing people
38:11
from our workforce to consultancy it's become quite a trendy thing to do to
38:17
you know like teaching's hard and maybe at the.
38:23
At the kind of midpoint of your career you
38:25
decide to pivot towards consultancy because you've done
38:29
a really good job in classrooms you've got a really nice impact
38:32
kind of track record and now
38:35
we pivot towards consultancy it i don't know
38:38
whether it's a worry or where it's concerned i don't know whether it's
38:41
become an enticing thing are you are you tempted bgs
38:44
is that what me no i i love the
38:47
classroom i see it i'm going
38:50
to tell you something about midwifery which i
38:53
will get to why it relates to this in a
38:56
minute but my mother-in-law was
38:59
a like university lecturing midwifery my
39:02
wife was midwife as well but one of the
39:05
things that she had to do regularly was
39:08
update her practice and she had
39:11
to go back in and be a practicing midwife
39:15
to maintain her license for one
39:17
of her head qualifications you had
39:20
to get a number of hours and so she couldn't maintain being that you know lecturer
39:26
of midwifery training new midwives unless she had been delivering babies and
39:32
supporting mums for a certain number of hours every year you had to keep up your.
39:38
Thing and so that brings me to my current situation where i am in wales i've
39:43
been in wales for about five years now and before i was in wales i was in england
39:48
and i was you know applying for headship jobs in england that's the level i was at in primary.
39:54
I just talked to my wife about what I wanted to do over the next couple of years.
39:58
And we talked about it. And I said, I've been out of the game in that for five
40:04
years. A lot has moved on.
40:07
And I can't just, without having thought about the English curriculum or leading
40:12
a school in England, I couldn't just, I don't feel I could just step back into it.
40:17
And I worry about that. Same with the midwifery is this.
40:21
You know if you went to be a consultant for five years for 10 years how far
40:26
away from practice do you get that you can still i don't want to say have valid
40:33
opinions but you know do we lose something by not being at the cold face.
40:37
Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, it's, you do though. Like, you know, you, you see it.
40:42
I mean, you see it when you step into, when you see leaders, do you know what I mean?
40:46
Who clearly haven't, have forgotten what it's like to do five lessons in a day
40:51
or maybe a whole day's worth of kind of teaching year one,
40:55
uh, and then like kind of come up with initiatives and stuff,
40:59
which, which just don't, what aren't practical.
41:02
We see that at a smaller level.
41:04
So then what does it look like in terms of a consultant i mean
41:07
it's difficult because like no one's got the capacity to do both that's
41:10
the other side of it isn't it i'm i we're saying this like
41:13
oh these consultants they haven't got a clue what's going
41:16
on in classrooms but you can't have a classroom practitioner who's
41:19
teaching that much i would disagree the one that
41:22
i mentioned earlier who i said i you know i really liked
41:25
and yeah it is no surprise that i'm a big fan
41:27
of this edu celebrity type person part-time
41:31
teacher part-time consultant so is part-time
41:35
in a classroom doing it and is part-time speaking and you know doing training
41:41
for other people and sharing good practice and so i think there is like there
41:46
is an opportunity there there are people who are finding a way but it's a bit
41:51
of a brave new world particularly post-covid of people finding.
41:55
You know work-life balances and what works and you know
41:59
are we ready for part-time teachers part-time head
42:02
teachers you know are we ready for this kind of
42:05
joint role I don't know well so I'll
42:08
speak to you as a previous part-time head teacher in primary to be fair but
42:15
I I find it found it really hard like I was working four days a week I had an
42:21
amazing deputy who absolutely stepped up and into that role on the fifth day.
42:26
But I am really, really pro-flexible working. And you don't get that many people like me out there.
42:33
Like I'm pro it because it absolutely helped me at a time step into headship
42:37
when I wouldn't have done otherwise.
42:39
My children were two and four when I went into my first headship, not advisable.
42:43
But actually, it allowed me to do something that I was desperately passionate
42:48
about, and also just have a little bit of headspace. But it was full on.
42:53
And maybe I caveat that with, but I, about in the summer term,
42:58
so next week, I just start doing some SIAMS training.
43:02
So I'm going to become a kind of church school inspector.
43:05
And that won't be a every week commitment, but it will be an every half term
43:09
commitment to go out and to do inspections and things.
43:13
And I guess there is a part of me that goes, that is partly because I am fascinated
43:18
by it and I think it's brilliant and I will get to go out and see what's going
43:22
on in lots of other schools and see what's going on and help people.
43:26
Develop that. But it also gives me something as well as just being in my school every day.
43:32
And there are lots of people who are Ofsted inspectors, for example, and school leaders.
43:38
And that balance between doing those two roles is never perhaps questioned.
43:43
Actually, the really strong inspectors are people who are still in school,
43:48
and that's what they're really pushing for, kind of current school leaders.
43:52
And it's the same with SIAMs.
43:53
You know, there are lots of people who were only a year or so outside of headship
43:56
and actually they got rejected from doing the training because that's not what they're after.
44:00
They don't want people who have stopped being a school leader and then want to go into inspection.
44:05
They want people who are still doing that role to pick that up.
44:09
So I think there is that balance. And I think you're absolutely right,
44:14
Nathan, that some of the most effective consultants are those who still have
44:19
kind of on the ground, you know, are still in front of children regularly.
44:23
But it does need school leaders to open their mindset to more flexible ways
44:28
of working and allowing people to have that freedom to do different parts of
44:33
the roles and share their kind of expertise beyond their school,
44:37
dare I say, beyond their trust in that way.
44:39
Because I haven't really thought of it before until you started saying those things, Claire,
44:44
that actually I, you know, I, I have myself and I have for people who I have
44:49
seen the opportunity to develop them, either sort them to, you know,
44:55
they've gone to other schools to help other people, other schools.
44:58
You know if we've had an excellent early
45:01
years teacher they've gone to support another school in
45:04
the local authority or myself i've gone to support another
45:07
school in the local authority and i imagine in trusts you know that that's probably
45:12
similar and very expected you know or a teacher from another you know whether
45:18
within your trust within your local authority might come and you know have a
45:22
critical eye or be a critical friend or one of those things you know come around
45:25
and we're very accepting of it.
45:27
I think where we haven't taken that full leap is when you're doing that,
45:31
but it's not within your local authority or it's a private financial game,
45:37
for want of a better word.
45:38
We're happy when it's, as you say, an Ofsted inspector or SIAMS or something that's within.
45:44
But if I went to my school and said, hey, I want to have a day off next week
45:48
because I'm going to go and be paid £800 to support another school,
45:54
suddenly you know everyone starts feeling a bit more queasy maybe I don't know
45:58
if I went to them and said hey you know I'm going with AQA to do some training
46:02
to develop myself they would be fine with it but when it becomes consultancy I think there's still a.
46:09
Maybe a mental barrier with it? Well, so my deputy, who is still there and working,
46:15
I believe she's working four days, it might be three and a half,
46:18
set up her own kind of external coaching company.
46:21
So that's her kind of own private entity, kind of that she does self-employed
46:25
on that basis for the separate day.
46:28
And I think if you've got someone who's saying, actually, I want to work for
46:31
your school three days, four days, whatever it is, you cannot then control what
46:35
they do on those other days.
46:36
If they choose to go into that business model.
46:38
What we need is leaders who go, actually, that benefits us too.
46:42
Like me having a really experienced life coach who'd done all of that training
46:47
qualification offering back brought huge amounts of value to my school community.
46:52
And actually, I didn't ever begrudge her to actually kind of swap my day because
46:56
I've got this client or something else that needs to happen.
46:58
If I can make it work, I always would. And she knew that because actually the
47:02
benefit I get is someone who is highly motivated, doing something they're really passionate about,
47:07
developing their own CPD and and got
47:09
a real commitment to the school and no matter what that consultancy
47:13
was be it you know math subject
47:16
specialism or an area of teaching and learning kind of that they're passionate
47:19
about if they're going to continue to provide those skills on a wider basis
47:24
and and do that independently that's great or the school takes the risk but
47:31
gets the income you know that's That's the balance.
47:33
So I do the science inspection, knowing full well the cost, they'll pay for
47:37
my training, but actually any funds that I get back will go back to the school
47:41
because that's a day when I'm employed by the school still.
47:43
You know, and I think there's probably more and more school leaders going,
47:46
how do we make this budget balance?
47:47
Is there a way that I can be a way of bringing in funding as well,
47:51
which, you know, rightly or wrongly, it feels like a direction of travel.
47:55
It might be something that we get more proliferation of given the demographic
48:00
change and the numbers changes in schools and the kind of the need for staffing.
48:05
I'm just going to go for a quick ad read.
48:07
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48:10
publishers of professional development, books and resources that support great
48:13
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48:15
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48:21
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48:24
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48:55
more yeah so it's an interesting thing
48:58
given the demographic demographic change it reminds
49:02
me actually when when both of you were talking it reminds me of the ast role
49:05
that used to exist yeah no longer and how fantastic that was do you know what
49:10
i mean and gave people like you didn't have to go and take the leap yourself
49:13
and set up your own consultancy organization no game a local authority consult
49:17
like yeah you know you were fielded out,
49:21
you know, your three days would be in the classroom or it wouldn't even be three
49:24
days. You could have afternoons and stuff like that.
49:26
And I think it's a real shame that that mechanism doesn't exist and that area
49:31
of like kind of development for people doesn't exist.
49:34
That area of sharing practice doesn't exist. I think in trusts,
49:39
it's been filled with kind of like leaders teaching learning within departments.
49:44
But I don't know whether we threw out a baby with the bathwater there.
49:48
You're right. That was exactly what it was. And that is a real shame.
49:51
And it was a career progression path for those people who wanted to stay in
49:56
teaching, but develop their skills, not in a leadership kind of traditional
50:03
way of moving up into senior leadership.
50:05
I think we probably have lost something there and I wonder if it is too late
50:11
I mean what that could look like within.
50:15
Yeah I guess some trusts do it every trust does it differently as a thing can't
50:18
they so there's not really enough to generalise so in Wales Nathan what's the
50:23
academisation model and things look like there or is it the same totally different zero.
50:28
No academies in Wales no academies in
50:31
Wales at all they just
50:34
were not a thing but you know developed education means
50:38
that it was not Michael Goe
50:41
who was in charge and so the door
50:45
was never opened and for better or worse
50:48
you know we maintain now the local
50:52
authority model and you know that can
50:55
be frustrating in all the ways it
50:57
was frustrating in England but
51:01
you know it does mean that there
51:04
are there are the benefits of you
51:08
know some of the negative consequences of academization that
51:12
didn't happen here so yeah no academies we still have you know people coming
51:17
in we have you know local authority challenge advisors you know people who come
51:23
in who are head teachers or experienced heads heads who will come in and do
51:28
those you know challenging,
51:30
conversations, walks, mini inspections, whatever you want to call them, critical friend.
51:34
We have local authority people who will come in and deliver training.
51:38
But also, there still are externals and there still are advisors.
51:43
Who you can book to come in if you want something special.
51:47
So I think we kind of, on this area, have a little bit of the best of both worlds,
51:53
maybe don't always have the funding for it.
51:55
And I think that, you know, that's where the crux comes is, you know, is it.
52:04
Are you getting the bang for your buck? And schools, I'm a governor of my son's
52:08
primary school, and they're very creative.
52:10
The headteacher does work for the headteachers union and that pulls in some cover funding,
52:18
and they will do things where they have a teacher go somewhere else if there's cover provided.
52:26
And I think that's one of those things that people always forget about is cover costs.
52:30
And as you say, Claire, you know, having to be a bit cleverer with your finances
52:35
around how we book these things, because, you know,
52:40
I guess long gone in the days where we could just pull people out of class to
52:45
go and do something and be able to cover them.
52:48
You know, the money just isn't there for that. So I don't know,
52:52
I guess maybe consultants are moving to work in more evenings or as they see
52:57
that, or maybe insert days of the thing.
53:01
We've got we've got a few minutes left we haven't covered
53:04
influencers yet it's got quite an interesting thing you
53:06
know we've talked about these high-level consultants who work with schools but we
53:10
haven't really talked about the impact influence have had influencers have had
53:13
on schools you know like we're talking twitter edgy twitter we're talking about
53:18
sorry x apologies we're talking like linkedin we're talking those guys who write
53:22
the blogs who then do the kind of who then can change a tide within schools.
53:27
I mean, I know as a teacher, like just as a classroom practitioner,
53:33
how much influence kind of reading some of these pieces of work have had on my practice.
53:40
I mean, I'm able to just basically take.
53:44
I've been able to take bits and bobs and it's pushed my thinking on,
53:48
you know, it's pushed my thinking towards other bits that influence those influences,
53:52
which are grounded in research rather than in like conjecture or in personal experience.
53:59
It's been a really, really interesting thing getting involved and wrapped into
54:04
that area of kind of education.
54:07
And it's burgeoning. It's kind of growing.
54:10
Do you know what I mean? Obviously, it's burgeoned. It might have had a crest.
54:12
It might be on its way out. But I think it's, I don't think we can understate
54:17
the impact that influencers have had on education in the last kind of five to 10 years.
54:22
You know, we've got very key people who probably reel off, probably have been
54:26
guests on this show as well on TTR and they've had massive impact.
54:31
But then is it all good? I think that's the question that we need to ask.
54:37
Well and it's about discernment right like it's
54:40
about being able to read beyond the headlines not getting someone
54:43
in just because of their name or because of their kind of
54:46
you see thousands of people like them it's
54:49
about going what are they standing for does that align with me my principles
54:54
how I want to lead and and I'm so I'm I have to be I have to build a team around
55:01
me that make sure they sense check me because I get excited when I see new stuff
55:05
and I love change and I'm fully aware that that is not normal.
55:10
People don't like change. They like to know where they stand and they like things.
55:14
And so whenever I go on holiday and I take three or four different books with
55:18
me and it's maybe not influencer in the same way, but I do love a good book
55:22
and I love a good leadership book, good educational book.
55:25
You know, I get really stuck in and I come back and go, oh this was amazing
55:30
and I've heard about this and I wonder about doing this and maybe if we change
55:33
this format and they're like.
55:35
Hmm, okay, let's just bring it down a little bit.
55:39
But it's about that discernment and deciding what is at the heart of what they're
55:44
saying and is that aligned with what you are currently doing and where you're
55:48
currently trying to get to and how you bring that all together. Because if it is, great.
55:53
It could just be another tool, another thing that people have got alongside
55:59
them that helps them to have what they need to do their job well.
56:03
And that's what we're all about, right? providing teachers with what
56:05
they need to be able to be effective teachers but if
56:09
it's not and if it's just a kind of you know
56:12
flash in the water i saw something on x today which first
56:15
glance it was about a kind of snapshot observation thing
56:18
and at first glance you go i can kind of see the point
56:21
of that and then you read the dialogue and go oh no
56:24
you're right is that this this does this become just a
56:26
tick box thing by just doing this set thing
56:29
that actually loses a lot of the kind of value of
56:33
the conversational dialogue you might have following
56:36
that kind of learning walk and actually what matters is
56:39
that you don't just look at something go oh yes right that solves
56:42
my problem of people saying they need more clear
56:45
feedback on learning walks whatever or more
56:48
focus they actually people have stopped and
56:51
engaged and thought and had a conversation with other leaders in their school
56:54
before they jump in and say right this influencer says that this way is the
56:59
only way we're doing this you know it's that process and thought of who are
57:04
we listening to why are we listening to them and what would that look like here.
57:09
Yeah, it's interesting. These people have had massive impact.
57:13
They've written books and people bring those books into schools and some people
57:18
only have those books on their shelves and then kind of that informs the way
57:23
the school works. But I don't know.
57:26
At the moment, it feels like there's more good than harm.
57:30
But sometimes I think some things happen. Like, for example, a polemic.
57:34
Because obviously, to gain traction as an influencer, you've got to get the views, right?
57:40
And you've got to make sure. And sometimes I see influencers needlessly feeding
57:46
into the false dichotomy debates on the internet and it kind of snowballs.
57:53
But then every now and then you'll see one of those influencers write something
57:56
of real value that can then be utilized in a school.
58:00
It's a really, really tricky area because if it wasn't for the swarm that comes
58:07
as a result of bringing this to the social media platform,
58:12
I'd have never heard about some of these ideas that happen.
58:15
So it's a tricky one, isn't it? It's a difficult one to tread.
58:18
And these influence obviously then become consultants as well and take that work into schools.
58:26
There is possibly some problem for us that we haven't been for.
58:33
We're talking about us. We're talking about people who influenced us.
58:36
Maybe we're talking about... Oh, have we lost Nathan?
58:40
Yeah, I think so. We kind of cut out a little bit. I know, he's got a robot on us.
58:45
Oh, there you go. We're talking about books. We're talking about books.
58:48
We're talking about long-form.
58:50
Yeah, I'm picking up, go on, Nathan. You know, I think there's that TikTok element.
58:56
What are people getting from that? They're not meters on TikTok.
59:01
Yeah, it depends. I think it's about the wisdom of the person who picks up the material, isn't it?
59:07
And how they engage with the material. Like, it would be mad for a school leader
59:12
to be informed by the TikTok guy who says, wear different colour hats because
59:18
your class will definitely learn better.
59:22
Oh, PJs, did you not have thinking hats? I feel like you're missing out.
59:27
You were probably at school when it came into BFF.
59:29
No, no, no. I just started teaching. Okay. It was horrific.
59:34
It was horrific. I had a yellow box with hats and walls and beanbags. Brilliant.
59:39
Yeah, it was... Good times, right? Yeah.
59:48
But there's, do you know what I mean? It's about the wisdom of the person who
59:52
encounters the material, I think.
59:54
There are school leaders who, but then also, like you're saying,
59:58
Claire, it's very easy to fall into the novelty trap, isn't it?
1:00:02
You know, as a department head, I've often fallen into the novelty trap and
1:00:06
then suddenly had to kind of go, oh, hold on a second.
1:00:09
Does this change really need to happen? Luckily, I'm surrounded by a team of people who go,
1:00:13
mate, have you read something this week?
1:00:17
You've got the same people as me, clearly, right? Yeah. Just don't ever let
1:00:21
us work together. It would be a nightmare.
1:00:23
Yeah, or they look at me with that look in their eye and I go,
1:00:26
all right, yeah. I've got to go away with this, haven't I?
1:00:29
Do you know what I mean? But it all depends.
1:00:33
But once again, I think without some of these people, we'd have been stuck in group things. Yeah.
1:00:39
We'd have been stuck in kind of like being a head of department is lonely,
1:00:43
probably. It is a lonely role, and you are the head of your department in that location.
1:00:49
And without some of these people writing what they've written,
1:00:52
it would be really difficult to figure out exactly the course to take.
1:00:57
Do you know what I mean? Because you read a little bit here,
1:01:00
you read a little bit there.
1:01:00
And I think actually, this is probably where I'll come down on a side of the fence.
1:01:06
I think they've been more good than harm. like
1:01:10
you know like we're not doing learning styles
1:01:14
I haven't I'm not doing we don't do learning styles anymore because of some of
1:01:16
the work of these people we don't do some of
1:01:19
the practice that was really sapping away opportunity in our schools and we're
1:01:23
more focused on some of the things that are really really having impact because
1:01:29
of this little circle of people who have well big circle of people who who were
1:01:35
giving up their time as well that's the other side well Yeah,
1:01:39
I think the answer is it's better because we are more discerning as a result.
1:01:43
Because we've got more ideas and thoughts to question and to query.
1:01:48
We are more empowered to be able to make the right decisions and to think about things.
1:01:53
Whereas before it was perhaps you didn't really think about it so much because
1:01:58
that's just the way it had always been or was or kind of you knew the one way
1:02:02
of what that looked like.
1:02:04
Yeah, I think you're right. It's better because actually knowledge is power
1:02:09
and knowing more and seeing different approaches allows you to make the right
1:02:13
decisions for your school, which you maybe otherwise wouldn't have had that knowledge.
1:02:18
Yeah, if you read that blog that sends you down the rabbit hole,
1:02:21
there's all the better for it. Do you know what I mean?