The number of schools switching MIS is at an all-time high and this trend looks set to continue (check out this previous blog for the reasons why and the movement we can expect to see in the future).

 

As schools are taking on new MIS all the time, it’s important for all suppliers of all school management software – be that the MIS itself or any one of the hundreds of products which sit alongside it – to understand what’s most important to schools when looking at alternatives.

 

 

In Spring 2021, The Key sent a survey to all primary, secondary, special schools and pupil referral units in England on the subject of MIS which produced some fascinating insights, including (amongst other things):

 

• What’s most important to schools when looking for an MIS, and how likely are they to move supplier
• How effective are MIS at saving schools time, and how well are schools supported
• How intuitive are MIS solutions for new users, and do they give schools the right tools for the job in terms of collaboration and data?

 

The Key sent out a similar survey in Spring 2022 so, using these results, we’ve been able to compare how opinions on MIS have changed and gain some insight into what schools might do in the future.

 

 

 

What it is that schools look for in a new MIS: what’s most important to them?

 

The surveys asked schools across England to prioritise what they felt was the most important factor in terms of price, support, functionality, integration, partnership and reputation when looking for a new supplier. The results are outlined below:

 

 

As you can see, the trend of what’s most important to schools is broadly unchanged but there are a couple of notable things here:

 

• Even in a world of huge budgetary pressure on schools, price has not scored as highly as last year. It’s still the second most important factor, but it’s interesting to see that functionality has not only remained the most important factor by far, but the percentage has increased too.

 

• Being a trusted procurement partner has become more important and has (only just!) overtaken reputation in terms of importance. This could well be a reflection of the way in which MATs prefer to work, as they often use trusted procurement partners to help select their school management software and technology. There are also a number of frameworks in place to help schools and MATs through the procurement process e.g. G-cloud, Everything ICT

 

 

 

How satisfied are schools with their MIS compared to last year?

 

In both 2021 and 2022, the survey asked respondents to rate how satisfied they were with their MIS, on a scale of 1-10 with 1 being extremely dissatisfied and 10 being extremely satisfied. This graph shows that there are actually fewer schools towards the ‘Extremely satisfied’ end of the chart, and more are rating their satisfaction at 5 or lower (You can find the full results plus analysis by supplier on The Key’s blog here).

 

 

What could be causing schools to report that they are less satisfied than last year? There are a few possible explanations:

 

• Given so many schools have moved or are on the move at the moment, it’s likely that a number of respondents are in the MIS transition period which is always the most nerve-wracking time where the least satisfaction is felt.

 

• It’s possible that schools are feeling unhappy with their existing supplier if the contract and support terms have changed as this often puts them under pressure.

 

But it may be that this is an accurate reflection of how schools are feeling about MIS in the current environment, in which case it’s all suppliers should take note!

 

Ultimately, if schools are citing functionality as the main thing they look for in a new MIS, how confident are MIS suppliers that their functionality is truly meeting the needs of schools? Aside from the basics, what makes one stand out from the other?

 

What do you think users are looking for in their MIS?

 

 

 

According to DfE census data, the past three and a half years have seen an increased trend towards switching MIS amongst schools in England.

The headline story is that SIMS market share has dropped the most, from a huge 77% to a still healthy 60%, and three main challenger MIS have emerged, between them winning 27% of the market: Bromcom and Arbor across all phases, and Scholarpack in primary schools. There are also plenty of other challengers – each of them gaining ground in their own way (I’d recommend checking out Joshua Perry’s Bring More Data blog for details and analysis).

 

 

What’s behind this trend and is it set to continue?

 

The reasons schools choose to move in the first place are varied.

 

• Many convert to academies and sometimes they join a trust where a different MIS is in use, so they switch as part of the joining process. Other times, they’ll use their change of status to academy as an opportunity to look at the MIS options available to them now that they are no longer under LA control.

 

 

• Maintained schools are switching MIS too. For many, the traditional model of them being able to buy into an LA-purchased and supported MIS has disappeared. Councils in England are rarely able to retain budget or mandate solutions, and the largest MIS supplier (ESS SIMS) has taken the decision to ask all their schools to contract with them directly instead of via an LA licence, for a three-year period¹. For many, this change in terms prompted a market-testing exercise which led to a new MIS being selected.

 

 

• Schools, academies and MATs are increasingly aware of the cost and efficiency gains they can make by switching MIS. Schools are looking to save money on multiple systems and save time on back-office processes, and MATs are looking to centralise more data and operational workflows. This is a huge driver and one that is likely to increase over the next few years.

 

All these factors are ongoing. Academy conversion continues to happen, and single academies are increasingly joining larger, more established MATs.

SIMS schools who wanted to go to tender for their MIS but felt they didn’t have time to complete a proper procurement exercise resulted in a large group of them seeking legal advice on the matter which is now being investigated by the Competition & Markets Authority (CMA).¹

There are countless case studies of schools and academies who will tell you about the huge improvements moving MIS supplier has brought about, almost always accompanied by big cost-savings.

It looks like change is set to continue. The question is: how fast?

 

 

How likely are schools to switch MIS supplier in the next 12 months?

 

In Spring 2021, The Key sent a survey to all primary, secondary, special schools and pupil referral units in England on the subject of MIS which produced some fascinating insights, including (amongst other things):

 

• What’s most important to schools when looking for an MIS, and how likely are they to move supplier
• How effective MIS are at saving schools time, and how well schools supported
• How intuitive are MIS solutions for new users, and do they give schools the right tools for the job in terms of collaboration and data?

 

The Key sent out a similar survey in Spring 2022 so, using these results, we’ve been able to compare how opinions on MIS have changed and gain some insight into what schools might do in the future.

 

 

The survey asked schools how likely they were to consider changing supplier in the next 12-months. The results indicate that almost 16% said they were either ‘likely’ or ‘very likely’ to move in the next 12 months which is around the same as last year – if this is a reflection across the whole market then we can expect the trend of switching MIS to continue in the next year or so (you can find the full results plus analysis by supplier in The Key’s blog post “What do schools feel about their MIS?”)

 

 

 

 

While the distribution of results was broadly similar to 2021, the trend compared to the previous year showed some polarisation towards either end of the scale. More respondents said they were ‘very likely’ to move than last year, but an increased number of respondents said they were ‘very unlikely’ to move too. There could be a few reasons for this:

 

• A sizeable group of schools have switched MIS recently so the appetite amongst this group for them to switch again will be very low; it usually makes sense to embed a new MIS fully and explore everything it can do before deciding to change again.

 

• A lot of schools will be in a multi-year contract with their MIS so moving MIS may not be an option they could consider in the short term. (However, some suppliers do give schools the option to switch to them mid-contract without double-paying, e.g. Bromcom and Arbor )

 

• At the other end of the scale, the increase in appetite amongst schools for moving MIS will likely be for the reasons outlined at the very beginning of this blog: when a new contract is required (be that through the school’s academisation, or an existing contract coming to an end with an LA or supplier) it prompts the need for a fair and rigorous tender process – even if that school, academy or trust is pretty happy with the incumbent supplier. There are a number of frameworks in place to help schools and MATs through this process e.g. G-cloud, Everything ICT, etc.

 

• Finally, the increase in schools saying that they are very likely to move MIS in the next 12 months could purely be down to the fact that they are not happy with their existing supplier. This could be down to the way it works (or doesn’t work) for them, the support they receive, cost, customer service, or any number of other reasons.

 

We’ll be exploring what’s important to schools, academies and trusts in future blogs – subscribe to stay up to date.

 

 

 

 

¹At the time of publishing this blog, the CMA has stated that they need further time to investigate and has not yet announced the action they intend to take.

 

What does it mean when we talk about MIS solutions being intuitive? The concept of something being ‘intuitive’ often gets mistaken for ‘basic’; there’s a belief that something is intuitive to use because it’s not rich functionally, but this is simply not the case. The smartphones we use today are some of the most sophisticated tech consumers have ever carried around – and they don’t come with instructions. We know how to use them because we’ve grown up with the more basic mobiles; one of the reasons we find them intuitive to use is because we learnt the old stuff the hard way!

Also, companies (in particular gaming companies) have identified ways to make it easy for us to use their systems using clever software such as WalkMe; the goal is to reduce friction and allow users to play games or use systems starting with the most basic flows, then introducing you to the more complicated features later.

 

It’s a similar story with MIS, but the idea that something will be hard to learn still holds people back when it comes to looking at alternatives – especially if their recollection of learning the existing system was painful.

It’s rarely the case though, and a good analogy here is that of learning to drive. You don’t have to re-take your driving test every time you get a new car.  You know how to drive already; you just need to find out what’s different in the new car and get used to using it.  It’s easy, and the new stuff is usually the best stuff (hello sat nav and park assist!)

It’s the same when you change your Management Information System.  You don’t need to go on lengthy training courses or re-learn from scratch. You know how to use an MIS already; you just need to find out what’s different in the new system and get used to using it.

 

A recent survey¹ of 2,146 schools asked, amongst other things, how intuitive their MIS is for new users.  The pie chart below summarises the responses:

 

The vast majority of respondents (38.15%) fell into the satisfied category which is good to see, with a further 25.34% taking the middle ground saying they were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied. However, what’s surprising here is that over a quarter of respondents (25.39%) said they were either dissatisfied or extremely dissatisfied when asked how intuitive their MIS is for new users. It’s a worrying stat as no MIS supplier sets out to make a solution that’s prohibitively difficult to use.

 

According to the Interaction Design Foundation, members of the interdisciplinary research group Intuitive Use of User Interface offer the following definition of intuitive use:

 

“A technical system is—in a specific context of a user goal—intuitively usable to the degree the user is able to interact with it effectively by applying knowledge unconsciously.”

 

Based on this definition, there are a few reasons why respondents might not feel like their MIS is intuitive for new users:

• If the MIS you use now is the MIS you’ve always used, it’s likely that you may not consider it to be intuitive as you remember your first learning curve.
• Newer, SaaS MIS may be perceived as more intuitive as their users have used something previously so ‘know how to drive’ and won’t find it a challenge.
• Equally, solutions based on more recent technology will likely be easier to work with as they don’t have the old legacy-system hang-ups of having to navigate out of one module and into another. It will undoubtedly be an easier and more seamless experience.
• For brand new users, solutions built on more recent technology tend to require minimal training and are easier to learn. Older systems involved attending courses – which often made them all the more difficult to roll out to teaching staff given the time required.

 

The graph below shows a breakdown of the survey results for the ‘Big 5’ who, between them, they make up 96% of school market share² (namely Arbor, Bromcom, RM Integris, ScholarPack and SIMS):

Ultimately, how intuitive an MIS solution is perceived to be is down to a combination of things:

• How easy the solution is to access, and how quick it is to navigate
• How confident the user is with technology as a whole?
• How experienced the user is with MIS and the concepts of records, data dependencies and analysis
• How the user was introduced to the solution in the first place. For example:
  • Did they start the role when it was already in place, so they ‘had’ to use it? If so, what sort of intro did they have to the system?
  • Were they part of a team where the school started using a system for the first time? If so, what was their introduction to the MIS like?
• How well supported they are throughout, and the source of the support (local team, colleagues, provider, someone else?)

 

But most importantly of all, the concept of a solution being intuitive or not comes down to how well the product managers, designers and developers know their users, and how much time they spend listening and understanding.

The point is MIS users already know how to use intuitive software.  If they don’t have a basic understanding of how to use the MIS software by playing around with it for a few minutes then, as an MIS supplier, you’ve sadly missed the mark.  But if you work alongside your users on what’s important to them (and avoid the pitfall of developing something clever and technical just because you can), you can deliver a solution that users can take to without having to hesitate and wonder how they can execute an action.

 

 

 

¹The data was collected by The Key from a survey that went out to all primary, secondary, special schools and pupil referral units in England, by email. It was not sent to independent schools. The survey was completed by Headteachers, Deputy and Assistant Heads, and School Business Managers / Leaders between 29 March and 27 April 2021.

As part of the survey, respondents were asked which MIS they use. The results are outlined below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

²Market share statistics are sourced from two excellent blogs: Graham Reed’s Omega Pegasus https://www.omegapegasus.com/mischallenge and Josh Perry’s Bring More Data https://bringmoredata.blogspot.com/

 

 

 

When asked, the majority of schools say that functionality is most important to them when looking for an MIS. But what does ‘functionality’ actually mean?

 

The idea of functionality means different things to different users. If you’re an experienced MIS/data manager who users the MIS to undertake detailed daily/weekly/termly routines, then complex functionality might be your cup of tea. If you are an occasional MIS user who looks to the solution more for reports and analysis, your idea of perfect functionality is simplicity and intuitiveness.

How you rate the functionality of your MIS is personal to you and will be based on, amongst other things:

• Experience with systems
• Role within school
• Proximity to the system (e.g. a daily super-user v arms-length, occasional use)
• Previous use of alternate MIS to draw comparisons
• Understanding of what might be possible in the future within MIS
• Level of training received

 

Ultimately, different users require their MIS and data to do different things. To understand how effective an MIS is, it’s worth looking at it from the perspective of the user (not the system) and asking:

• Does the MIS give them the tools to do their job well on an individual level?
• Does the MIS help them work as part of a team of many people?

 

A recent survey¹ of 2,146 schools asked, amongst other things, how effective they felt their MIS was at providing the data they needed to do their job well.  The pie chart below summarises the responses:

 

To examine the findings in more detail, the graph below shows a breakdown of the survey results for the ‘Big 5’ who, between them, they make up 96% of school market share² (namely Arbor, Bromcom, RM Integris, ScholarPack and SIMS):

 

Over half of respondents scored their MIS positively, saying it was either Very effective or Extremely effective.  This is good to hear, and exactly what MIS solutions are striving to achieve in their functionality and user experience. In addition, only a relatively small percentage, 15.69% in total, scored their MIS negatively, saying it was Not so effective or Not at all effective (it would be interesting to understand what data they need to do their job which their MIS is not providing, it could be a great opportunity to develop something new!)

The survey¹ also asked how effective they felt their MIS was at helping them to collaborate with colleagues. The responses to this question tell a different story. As you can see from the pie chart and graph below, a much lower number of respondents scored their MIS positively (Extremely or Very effective) at only 35.51%, and a much higher number scored it negatively (Not so or Not at all effective) 29.76%.  The majority, however, scored their MIS neutrally, as Somewhat effective.

 

• The cloud-based MIS solutions scored highest across the board for both questions.
• Where MIS scored highly for collaborative working, cloud-related features such as ease of access are likely to have played a part.
• Where MIS scored highly for providing the data required to do their job well, a contributing factor is likely to be how well supported and trained the users are on the solution.

 

So what do these findings tell us?

Overall, respondents seem to be fairly happy with the data the MIS gives them to do their job, but less happy with how it helps them work with colleagues. As we move more and more towards using technology to work collaboratively (the pandemic-related lockdowns brought this sharply into focus!), it’s important for MIS to keep pace with its learning counterparts.

Collaboration is a key part of the success of any organisation and schools are no exception. Operational teams, senior leaders and teaching staff all need to be able to collaborate with each other, and also with other establishments. It will be interesting to see how MIS solutions help schools handle this tricky task in the future.

 

 

 

 

¹The data was collected by The Key from a survey that went out to all primary, secondary, special schools and pupil referral units in England, by email. It was not sent to independent schools. The survey was completed by Headteachers, Deputy and Assistant Heads, and School Business Managers / Leaders between 29 March and 27 April 2021.

As part of the survey, respondents were asked which MIS they use. The results are outlined below:

 

²Market share statistics are sourced from two excellent blogs: Graham Reed’s Omega Pegasus https://www.omegapegasus.com/mischallenge and Josh Perry’s Bring More Data https://bringmoredata.blogspot.com/

“It saves you time.”

This is something that is often said about MIS, but what does it mean? More importantly, how effective do schools feel their MIS actually is at saving them time?

 

A recent survey¹ of 2,146 schools asked, amongst other things, how effective they felt their MIS is at saving them time. The overall results are outlined in the pie chart below:

As you can see, the majority of respondents (just over a third at 38.85%) went for the middle ground and said it was ‘Somewhat effective’. That said, a combined total of 43% did say they felt it was either Very or Extremely effective which is good news for suppliers as it indicates users must be feeling some time-saving benefits from their solutions.

 

We can also break this down further by MIS; the chart below shows survey results for the ‘Big 5’ (who, between them, they make up 96% of school market share²):

 

But what does the idea of ‘saving time’ actually mean when it comes to systems and users? There are a number of ways of defining it, here are just a few:

 

1. The MIS literally takes a basic, manual process and uses software to make it easier. A good example of this would be the school census; it has to be done in a certain timeframe, it’s very data-heavy, and the role of MIS in this is to make it as automated as possible, therefore saving time.

 

2. The MIS brings an automated element to improve a process and create a more complete view. A good example of this is the ability to record and manage behaviour within MIS; it’s something that all schools have (and use things such as paper report cards in secondary) but, once they start to utilise their MIS for this, the increased shared knowledge means teachers have the info at their fingertips and don’t need to waste time searching for it.

 

3. The MIS completely replaces the way something has always been done to make it easier and slicker. For example, communicating with parents used to be via letters and reports. MIS’ offer the ability to email, text and direct message via apps, plus parent portals. Another good example is the handling of money; everything from school dinner management to online trip payments can now be done online, completely replacing the original processes and saving time.

 

4. The MIS provides insight that would otherwise have been time-consuming to find out. A good example of this is analytics and dashboards which draw on data from a number of sources to help leaders ask questions, and also provide answers.

 

5. The MIS suggests courses of action based on data. This is something we have yet to see in use in a big way, but the idea is that your MIS can make some suggestions to you using machine learning based on a combination of what it has seen work in the past, plus your usual actions. Think about when you shop online at Amazon, the site makes suggestions for other products based on your purchases and what other customers go on to buy. A school-based example could be that various intervention suggestions are made when behaviour incidents are recorded, and these could be based on past actions combined with, say, the MATs own intervention policy. The time savings here could be enormous – as well as getting a strategy in place sooner to help the child.

 

So there are definitely ways MIS solutions can save time, it’s really a matter of understanding how.

As an MIS supplier, saying you “save schools time” isn’t a meaningful statement anymore that sets you apart from the competition. It’s a given that a solution will do that; your unique value proposition should focus on how it will do it, why it’s important, and what benefits the school will get as a result.

 

 

 

 

¹The data was collected by The Key from a survey that went out to all primary, secondary, special schools and pupil referral units in England, by email. It was not sent to independent schools. The survey was completed by Headteachers, Deputy and Assistant Heads, and School Business Managers / Leaders between 29 March and 27 April 2021.

As part of the survey, respondents were asked which MIS they use. The results are outlined below:

 

²Market share statistics are sourced from two excellent, independent blogs: Graham Reed’s Omega Pegasus and Josh Perry’s Bring More Data