A new approach to employee engagement at Stamford Endowed Schools

The Stamford Endowed Schools (SES) are based in Stamford, Lincolnshire named by the Sunday Times as the ‘Best Place to live in the Midlands’. The independent schools group is made up of the Stamford Nursery School, Stamford Junior School, Stamford High School (girls) and Stamford School (boys) with a co-educational sixth form. Dating back to the 16th century, to this day it provides an environment where learning is regarded as key to unlocking all of life’s possibilities.

The Schools are a close community. Their 550 staff enjoy a supportive team environment with great colleagues amongst the teaching support, operations and professional services teams. Kay Rainsby, HR Director, has led the HR team at the Schools since 2013.

Kay believes in the principles of good employee engagement and all of the positive benefits that brings to everyone. She feels very fortunate to be working in HR in the independent sector with a forward thinking management team who like her view their people as their biggest asset “It’s a great time to be in HR in a school like Stamford,” said Kay. “We’ve seen a real leap forward in the professionalism of HR in the independent school sector in recent years. Our people are our biggest investment, and we all benefit when they are engaged in their working life.

“Staff engagement is more than just doing a survey and ticking a box. You need to work with your leadership team, have an embedded strategy, and the process has to be engaging with great communications and clear actions. You need to listen, act, then listen again. It’s an ongoing cycle. Finally, you need the right partner that fits with your organisation and brings you the data and insight you need.”

A key strategic objective set by the Schools Executive Team (SET) is for the Schools to be a ‘Great Place to Be’ for staff (considering recruitment, engagement and talent retention objectives,) and for pupils.

As part of this objective, there are a range of initiatives designed to encourage a ‘One Team’ approach, uniting staff in very different roles across schools and functions. This includes events and projects including teaching staff across the schools, operational and professional services employees (including professions such as finance, IT, Marketing and HR.)

In order to measure progress against the objective, Kay knew it was critical to be able to get honest feedback across all employees.

Kay set some important aims for employee feedback:

• Staff feel they are listened to without setting unrealistic expectations that can’t be met.
• Staff know we are committed to making changes where these are achievable.
• Ultimately, staff feel positive and engaged with the School and its aims. Meeting employees’ personal aspirations providing quality education to our pupils.

Whilst working with People Insight’s expert consultants to design the survey questionnaire, Kay set about preparing the Schools for the survey. Kay said, “I approached it like we’d never done a survey before. We communicate extensively beforehand, explaining the rationale for the survey and why this was different. We had newsletters, posters and desktop screen adverts all designed to encourage participation and reassure about anonymity.”

Creating belief and trust in the employee survey process

The survey ran smoothly. “It was a really positive experience,” said Kay. “We got the results so quickly that we were able to communicate the results and next steps with actions whilst we had good momentum.” Actions were developed at the Schools Executive Team (SET) level, and Kay supports each Head to action plan on the basis of their own results.

Each member of the SET shared the results, actions and plans with their teams at INSET days or team meetings. Each term, “You Said, We Did” earns an update so staff knew the actions were a priority, and what progress had been made.

The commitment had been made to staff to survey in 2020. When the time came, the UK was under Covid-19 lockdown, teaching was remote and the majority of staff were working from home. As for schools all over the country, It was a stretching, exhausting time. There was initially a desire to postpone the survey.

Kay had a strong rationale:

• There is never a ‘best time’ to launch an employee survey.
• More than ever, it’s during times of upheaval that people must be listened to and supported. If things didn’t change, we wouldn’t need to ask.
• The act of listening shows we care. Let’s not be afraid of the feedback.
• It’s essential to honour previous commitments to carry out a survey, after building up good trust in the process. Not following through could be seen as disingenuous.
• Consolidated feedback was necessary on the Covid support measures undertaken.
• We need a baseline equality, diversity and inclusion (ED&I) assessment in advance of developing the Schools’ ED&I strategy.

Equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) were high on the agenda, as well as full lockdown support, as Covid-19 set in.

People Insight’s experts help Kay develop an up-to-date question set to reflect new priorities. Kay realises that Stamford needs to respond to the immediate situation, and EDI has grown in importance at the schools.

“PI have been brilliant,” said Kay. “Our consultant was so helpful. The employee survey programme really supports what we’re trying to achieve.”

Will Phelan, Principal of Stamford Endowed Schools says:

“The anonymous, easy to access and detailed analysis that we have been able to obtain for a second time has also helped to confirm that the work we have been doing in areas such as staff wellbeing and communication is having a positive impact. Equally important, we have been able to critically focus on those areas that need further work and it is pleasing and reassuring to know our levels of staff engagement are improving as a result.”