Our first #FinnemoreFireside of 2023 is with Catherine Tallis, Director of Business Services at HFL Education.

HFL Education (formerly Herts for Learning) is a national provider of school improvement and business support services, training and resources.  As long-standing providers of MIS support to their schools, this Q&A discussed in detail the ways in which support teams must adapt as the MIS market continues to evolve. Being a SIMS-only support team, as was usually once the case, is now a risky strategy for any team wanting to remain in business in the coming years.

 

It’s a fascinating chat and, amongst other things, Nick and Catherine discuss:

• The precarious state of school finances and the impact that has on decisions, and the huge amount of pressure on schools as they are taking on more as services around them are cut to the bone (e.g. CAMHS, social care, etc.)
• How academisation and changes to the way schools licence MIS have led to the sector completely changing, and how HFL Education have adapted into a multi-MIS support team to help their schools
• What will happen to teams who aren’t able to adapt quickly, and how the conversation needs to shift away from software support to whole school strategic support
• The challenges around understanding overheads as a business where teams are still part of an LA
• The democratisation of data, and how HFL Education supports meaningful school improvement through the effective use of data
• Schools are great at curriculum change but not always so great at change across other systems, and this is something support teams can help with
• HFL Education’s vision and plans for the next five years
• What Catherine would like to see from the market and from suppliers

 

We’d love to hear your feedback; what would you like to learn from support team leaders?

 

 

We’ve spoken to many schools, Trusts and LA support teams about the options regarding the 3-year ESS SIMS contracts, so it’s great to hear that there’s now some clarity as to what to do next.

 

Basically, if you’ve been thinking about exploring alternative MIS systems you can now take advantage of the new 12-month break clause following the recent Competition and Markets Authority judgement.

 

The CMA has published its decision to accept commitments from ESS that enable certain schools (meaning those which had considered switching providers but concluded they did not have sufficient time to do so) to apply to an independent adjudicator for a 12-month break clause. If granted, the clause will allow them to exit their current three-year contract with ESS and choose an alternative provider, should they so wish.

 

 

– This is good news for schools that wanted to go through a procurement exercise for their MIS but felt they didn’t have enough time as they can now apply for a 12-month break clause to give them time to test the market.

 

– What’s not so great is that there’s a limited timeframe to get your application in and you’ll need to provide a supporting statement. Schools have one month to apply, from 10^th January 2023 to 10 February 2023.

 

 

You’ll be told whether you are successful by 31st March 2023, you then have 12 months to choose a new supplier, giving you time to switch by March 2024.

 

There is no downside to applying. It’s worth doing to buy some time so you can take a proper look at the MIS solutions out there. You’re not under any obligation to actually move supplier and you can always change your mind and do nothing.

 

If you’re happy with your existing SIMS contract and terms, then of course this probably isn’t for you. However, if you would have liked to test the market but couldn’t do so at the time, here’s the link to the application form and the guidance

 

We’d also recommend looking at the support options available as many local school support teams are completely MIS agnostic; they support the process, not the product. They can often help you with your market-testing exercise and are able to support your MIS implementation as part of your overall IT strategy and School Development Plan too.

The MIS sector in England continues to be in a state of flux and there are currently no signs of it settling down. Schools and MATs continue to switch suppliers, businesses and support teams are changing the way they operate, and new partnerships and being formed to enhance the value suppliers offer.

 

Is this a good thing for schools and MIS users? We certainly hope so, with change comes innovation, but I can see why MIS can feel like a pain in the backside as opposed to an opportunity to improve things for some schools and MATs.

 

Here are some of the big talking points in 2022 and our predictions for 2023

 

 

The challenges around ESS’ move to direct licencing and 3-year contracts continue

When ESS announced to all its schools that they required them to licence with them directly (as opposed to via an LA licence deal) and that all contracts would be for 3-years now as opposed to one, there was a great deal of pushback from schools culminating in a challenge from them and a subsequent investigation by the CMA.

 

ESS, having offered various incremental ‘break clauses’, is now proposing a ‘New Break Clause Offer’ which will allow some schools to apply to break their contract if they can provide ‘objective evidence of a clear intention to switch’. The application will then be assessed by an independent adjudicator. Whether or not the CMA feel this is fair and workable remains to be seen. At the time of writing, the investigation is still open but the decision is likely to be soon as the last CMA consultation period closed in December 2022.

 

Our predictions: given just how many schools are affected by the ESS decision to change their terms, it’s likely the CMA would have received many responses during the last consultation period – both from schools and suppliers alike. Is it realistic to ask schools to provide written evidence of conversations – that would have likely happened verbally – in order to be able to apply to move? Is the application process itself so complicated that it puts schools off and they simply stick with what they’ve got? All questions the CMA will be considering, but we can see this rumbling on into 2023.

(**UPDATE** on 10th Jan 2023, the CMA published its decision to accept commitments from ESS that enable certain schools (meaning those which had considered switching providers but concluded they did not have sufficient time to do so) to apply to an independent adjudicator for a 12-month break clause. If granted, the clause will allow them to exit their current three-year contract with ESS and choose an alternative provider, should they so wish. More details on our blog here, schools have until 10th Feb 2023 to make their application.)

 

 

The rate of churn in the market continues at an even higher rate than expected

The most recent census figures are out and show that, over the past year, 2,734 schools have moved away from SIMS to alternate MIS suppliers. It means they’ve lost 18% of their market share in one year, probably higher than anyone expected. It also means that lots of challenger MIS are gaining ground with Arbor and Bromcom being the big winners, and lots of other new and existing MIS suppliers continue to gain ground (I’d recommend checking out Josh Perry’s blog for a detailed breakdown of market share by supplier).

 

Our predictions: Is this likely to continue into 2023? Everything indicates that it will. The school census figures are a good indicator of what’s going on but they always give a slightly delayed view on the market; they tell us which MIS the school used to submit the census, but they don’t reflect any recent procurements or new contracts schools may have entered into (e.g. the recent West Sussex procurement).  In the face of an enforced 3-year contract, many SIMS schools scrambled to move to an alternate MIS and there are still migrations in progress. We know that more schools, academies and MATs also intend to test the market there but felt that they couldn’t run a fair and thorough procurement within a limited timeframe (we talk about this below).

 

The acceleration in churn we’re seeing is not just due to contract issues though. There is a real desire for new solutions which offer schools something different, and which better meets the needs of MATs.  Bromcom and Arbor have made significant gains, and the primary-focused cloud MIS (Scholarpack, RM Integris and Horizons/Pupil Asset) have held fairly steady.  There are also new players out there which schools are happily choosing to switch to. IRIS Ed:Gen was the next fastest grower, and Compass Education is already busy getting schools live here in the UK.  ET-AIMS and Go4Schools have new MIS offerings which are sparking interest, and Satchel recently announced that they intend to build an MIS too. There’s lots of potential for growth and a very high likelihood that we’ll see more churn.

 

 

What’s next for Support Teams

The role and nature of school support teams continue to evolve. As an LA team, only offering support for one MIS option feels more and more precarious as the level of churn amongst schools, academies and trusts increases each year. However, by and large, MATs, schools and academies often still want to buy into local support – they still want to work with the colleagues with which they’ve built such great relationships.  As a result, the number of support teams forming partnerships with MIS providers other than SIMS has increased drastically, and many now offer multi-MIS support. The progressive teams understand that the priority is helping their schools achieve their goals, and it’s something they plan to continue to do in the future – irrespective of the systems they use. They “support the process, not the product”.

 

Our predictions: unfortunately, those LA teams that only offer SIMS support to their schools are going to find it harder and harder in the future. LAs no longer hold a SIMS licence in perpetuity as was once the case as ESS mandates that all schools licence with them directly so LAs are no longer a route to a preferential SIMS licence deal. ESS is offering its own support contracts directly to SIMS schools at a favourable price so these teams may find that some of their schools won’t buy into their MIS SLAs at all. In addition, we’ve heard anecdotally that ESS plans to discontinue the annual entitlement rebate that has traditionally been available to LA teams in return for them supporting SIMS. For many, it may mean there is no longer a viable business.

(N.B. we have a new #FinnemoreFireside coming up with Catherine Tallis, Director Of Business Services at Herts for Learning Ltd where we discuss the challenges above – watch this space)

 

 

An increased focus on procurements

As indicated by the amount of churn, it’s clear there are likely to be more procurements underway than ever. Depending on the size of the school or trust, this can be a complex process involving stakeholders from across all areas of operations, teaching and leadership.  At any one time, an MIS supplier will also be responding to multiple tenders so we’d definitely encourage the use of a framework such as  G-cloud or Everything ICT. It helps the process run smoothly and helps guard against any legal challenges.

 

Our predictions: We anticipate school and MAT requirements becoming more high-level and strategic as it becomes clear what brand-new cloud-based MIS can help them achieve. While lots of requirements have tended to focus on functionality in the past (e.g. can you take a register, can you submit the census) these are things that all MIS can do. A decision which is made purely on basics and price rarely gets schools and Trusts what they need.

 

We’re starting to see Trusts ask more of MIS suppliers in terms of how they will help them meet their own overall strategy. For example:

 

• How will the MIS help them meet Carbon net zero targets by 2030?
• How will the MIS provide the insight on students we need to successfully run a national academy chain?
• How does the MIS help us allocate budget to staff resources accordingly based on effective pedagogy?

 

Being a straight admin/office tool is not enough anymore, Trusts are looking for software partners with long-term benefits.

 

 

 

The desire for cloud solutions continues

There has always been a strong case for a school to move all its systems to the cloud, and this was brought into sharp focus by the pandemic.  Anytime, anywhere access became absolutely crucial as school staff were unable to gain physical access to buildings. Even when they could, many students were still attending school remotely so there had to be solutions in place to cope with remote learning – it caught a lot of people out and accelerated cloud strategy.

 

The argument around TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) is now more important than ever as, once again, schools find their budgets being shrunk so any way to save money has to be considered. Cloud solutions mean that schools don’t need to buy or house a server so there are all the associated power and air-con cost savings that go with it.

 

Carbon targets and a successful net zero strategy are also becoming a higher priority for schools as we head towards 2030, they want to waste as little energy as possible and the cloud helps them get there.

 

Our predictions: schools will of course want to move to the cloud where possible and all the MIS suppliers understand this. The fast-growing suppliers are cloud-based as you would expect, and ESS has a cloud strategy with its Next Gen solution planned for the future.

 

For schools and Trusts who find themselves with a client-based MIS for the foreseeable future, there are other options out there to help your cloud strategy. For example, suppliers can sometimes help with this directly, and school support teams such as Scomis offer SIMS hosting so you no longer need to buy and maintain servers.

 

 

 

 

Partnerships, mergers and acquisitions

There has been so much acquisition activity around MIS in recent years and this continued in 2022 with RM announcing the sale of the division that includes the Integris MIS to The Key Group. When the deal goes through, The Key will have around a 33% MIS market share in the English-maintained sector (across Arbor, Scholarpack and Integris) which makes them a huge player, second only to ESS SIMS which currently has around 56%.

Suppliers of MIS-adjacent solutions have also continued to form fruitful partnerships as it becomes clear that there’s not a ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution for schools and Trusts, and flexibility is everything.

 

Our predictions: We’re seeing increased merger, acquisition and partnership activity amongst support teams too. For example, it was recently announced that School ICT Services Ltd had been acquired by Oxfordshire-based provider of education ICT services, Turn IT On.

 

We’re also seeing more and more LA support teams working in partnership with each other in order to pool expertise and deliver valuable services to their schools. For the reasons outlined earlier in the blog, we see this sector in particular as one to watch as the nature of SIMS support teams changes.

 

 

 

So, all in all, an eventful year in the sector and we can see more change coming in the future. While it feels like a lot of battles are currently being fought around contracts and agreements, we’d really like to see what’s coming next in terms of innovation.  Who’s out there redefining the role MIS will play in schools in the face of changing requirements?

 

 

We’d love to hear what’s next and look forward to working with suppliers, schools, Trusts and support colleagues throughout 2023.

We’ve been privileged to speak with even more edtech and industry thought leaders throughout 2022 as part of our #FinnemoreFireside chats, and the insight they provide us and our community is invaluable.

 

So thank you Jonathan Coyles of EO Consulting for talking to us about how Trusts can become more energy-efficient, hit carbon targets, and save money at the same time.

 

Thanks to Mike Donoghue for giving us an insight into how MATs work and what is important to directors, leaders, governors, staff and learners.

 

It’s great to speak with entrepreneurs from across the edtech industry so thank you Lawrence Royston for getting involved and giving us your perspective.

 

Thank you to Stephen Bilboe for talking to us about changes across the international and independent education sector, and what the future might hold in terms of MIS.

 

Our chat with marketing and PR guru Cath Lane is essential listening for everyone who owns or leads an edtech business, thanks for the great advice.

 

Thank you to Andy Kent for talking to us about his focus on innovation and culture to help all levels of the education sector.

 

We welcomed Phil Neal back for a follow-up chat to discuss changes in the world of school management systems.

 

We spoke with Martin Baker of The Safeguarding Company about the lessons that can be learnt from the Child Q case.

 

And finally, we were delighted to speak with Matt Woodruff, Vice President of Analytics and AI at Community Brands UK, for an insightful conversation about data and machine learning.

 

We’ve thoroughly enjoyed making the series and already have some great sessions ready to go in the new year including a discussion on school support with Catherine Tallis, Director Of Business Services at Herts for Learning Ltd – watch this space!

 

 

Have a great Christmas break, looking forward to sharing more with you all in 2023! 🎄

 

Best wishes from Sarah & Nick

 

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Last month, Nick caught up with former Capita MD and creator of the SIMS MIS, Phil Neal, to discuss the various changes in the education sector. As the MIS market continues to evolve and Phil gives his view on:

• The ongoing tender in Northern Ireland and what might happen there in terms of MIS supplier, as well as Scotland and Wales
• The challenges of developing an MIS to meet specific, regional-based, statutory requirements: is this a distraction for MIS suppliers?
• The big changes in the England MIS market, with views on ET-AIMS, Compass Education, IRIS Ed:gen, Juniper Education, Bromcom, Scholarpack and Arbor
• The recent decision by ESS to move to three-year, direct contracts for all schools and potential ramifications
• How more MIS solutions within the UK market might actually lead to less innovation  in the long term
• How machine learning can be used within MIS to create something truly unique
• The importance of Support Units and the role they play alongside schools

 

As always it’s fascinating to get the views of someone who has worked in the MIS sector for so long and knows the various stakeholders so well.

Where do you think the MIS market is heading and who will be the long-term winners?

 

 

Just before Bett this year, Nick caught up with Lawrence Royston, Founder of teamSOS, to talk all things edtech.

Lawrence is one of the true entrepreneurs of the Edtech market. Along with his partner Joanne, he started with GroupCall messenger, the first SMS messaging system for schools in the UK, then built Xporter, supporting Third parties to have a generic way to integrate with MIS data, before looking at how they could provide deeper insights in the data they were already transferring through GroupCall XVault. He’s also supported GDPRis and has recently started a new business in teamSOS, an incident management and compliance tool for staff in Education and NHS establishments.

 

We’ve split the interview into two parts to make it easier to digest. In part one Nick and Lawrence discuss:

• What it means to have an entrepreneurial mindset
• Working with partners (and family!), their symbiotic skills, and how this is a great asset in business
• The thinking behind teamSOS, where the idea came from, and the problem it solves
• The importance of listening and learning from users
• ‘Successive approximation’ and continually iterating solutions to help better meet the needs of your customers

 

In part two they talk about:

• What advice would Lawrence give budding edtech entrepreneurs based on his own experience?
• Getting work/life balance right
• The effect of recent market changes: how consolidation makes space for speedboats!
• The innovation bubbling away in the background within smaller businesses that lead on vision and integration
• Modernising technology (case in point: walkie talkies)
• Their approach to pricing and delivering value
• How making school staff feel cared for attracts and retains the best candidates

Enjoy!

Our first fireside chat of 2022 is with business thought leader Jonathan Coyles, Director at EO Consulting.

Recorded towards the end of last year, we’ve been keen to speak with Jonathan as his company helps schools, academies and Trusts deal with something that is becoming more and more pressing each year: how do they become more energy-efficient, hit carbon targets, and save money at the same time?

EO Consulting has created a standard for collecting condition, energy and compliance data so that user-friendly business intelligence dashboards can be created that enable reporting and benchmarking to be done within and across MATs and allow data to be analysed by asset, element and priority to aid strategic estate investment planning. They count several of the larger Multi-Academy Trusts among their clients.

It’s a great fireside chat, and Jonathan provides insight into:

• His journey through the world of education services from working with PFI contracts to being involved in one of the earliest academies (Grace Academy), project managing IT and ultimately becoming the Operations Director.
• The creation of EO Consultancy and their goal of helping organisations become more efficient and more effective through the clever use of dashboards and analysis
• Why spending lots of time understanding the needs of MATs was crucial to them developing the service they offer today: what they do makes a difference.
• How dashboards and data are not the answer to everything but should provide the insight to help schools, academies and MATs save money.
• Hitting carbon targets early, and how this is completely possible if you’re armed with the right information.
• The project management and additional help Barker Associates provide once a plan has been identified.
• What drives EO Consulting as a business?
• Where energy is wasted: 40% of energy is spent when there is no one in the school building!
• The importance of the learning environment, and how being aware of how and when energy and resources are being used plays a part in that.
• Getting the whole education estate into a condition that’s conducive to learning, reduces the carbon footprint, and makes it more efficient and effective as a result.
• What Jonathan would like to see from the government in the coming years to support schools, academies and MATs, and the effect of the Public Sector Decarbonisation Scheme (PSDS)
• The top five quick wins schools can put in place right now to become more energy-efficient and save money.

 

We’ve split the interview into three shorter parts for you to watch and listen to – enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

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P.S. We’re aware that some of the audio is a bit rough in places so we’re working on getting a transcript created to accompany this Q&A – we’ll add once completed 

 

 

 

Is signing into a multi-year contract for your MIS a good thing?

If it’s something you’ve actively chosen to do as a school, academy or trust then, yes, it’s a great idea. It means you’ve had the chance to look at the options out there, and you’ve asked your suppliers for three-, four- or five-year pricing to guarantee a bit of budget certainty for the future.

If a multi-year contract is something you’ve had sprung on you in the small print – leaving you a very short window to either agree or cancel – well, it’s unlikely to be very popular. No one appreciates feeling like they’re being backed into a corner ☹

An unforeseen change in contract terms like this poses all sorts of questions for everyone involved in MIS:

❓ How does this affect the relationships schools have with the local support teams out there whom they’ve worked with and accessed their MIS licence through for years? It leaves Support Teams having to manage a difficult message from the MIS provider.

❓ How does this affect how Support Teams work with suppliers? More and more Support Teams have moved to be a multi-MIS support team, choosing to support their schools irrespective of the systems they use as opposed to only offering one option. All of the ‘big 5’ MIS have established Support Partner programmes (some useful links are below), as well as many of the newer entrants to the sector.

❓ How does this affect everyone (both schools and LAs) in terms of meeting procurement rules? Does everyone now need to get quotes and go through a tender process to even just stay with the MIS they already use?

❓ As academisation continues, what happens when a Local Authority maintained school is tied into a multi-year contract that converts to an academy?

Lots to think about which will hopefully become clearer soon.

 

If you’re a school, academy or trust and you’re affected by this and are wondering what to do, I’ve seen lots of posts on this already but it seems like the best advice is:

• Remember, YOU are the customer, so don’t be afraid of looking at alternatives and moving as it can all happen a lot quicker and easier than you think. Everyone is well-versed in migrating data from your system and it’s possible to be up and running very quickly.

 

• If there’s too much time pressure to look into things right now, don’t feel you have to lock in for a further three years, but do definitely contact your supplier to negotiate an alternative term length. They may be open to shorter contracts in the face of schools cancelling altogether, and this will give you time to plan for 2022.

 

• Talk to people! Get in touch with your local MIS support team if you use one, or with any of the MIS companies directly. They are all friendly and knowledgeable and will walk you through everything you need to know (or send a message to me or Nick as we’re more than happy to introduce you).

 

‘Big 5’ Support Partner programme links:

RM Integris https://www.rm.com/products/rm-integris/partner

Bromcom https://www.bromcom.com/LA-partners

Arbor https://arbor-education.com/become-a-partner/

Scholarpack https://scholarpack.com/who-we-help/support-partners/

ESS SIMS https://www.ess-sims.co.uk/products-and-services/sims-support-units

 

 

 

Following on from our first fireside with the Senior Product Director at IRIS Software in November 2020, we’re delighted to welcome Winston Poyton back for a follow-up conversation – especially given so much has changed in the world of school management systems in the last 12 months alone.

 

In this fireside chat, Nick and Winston discuss:

• Developments across the IRIS business since our last Q&A session when iSAMS had only just been added to the portfolio
• How IRIS is busy reinforcing its education credentials through building relationships and listening
• Their thought leadership work including this webinar with Lord Jim Knight, and their recently published whitepaper “Are Education Management Systems Future-Fit?”
• The wellbeing challenges faced by schools – especially in the light of Covid – and how technology can help
• The ways in which the MAT landscape continues to evolve and why academies are demanding more
• Innovation and what this means: it’s not just about new tech, but new ways of doing things
• How IRIS is working hard to make sure their customer experience is as intuitive and friction-free as possible

 

We’ve split the interview into 3 parts to make it easier to digest. Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

Continuing our series of edtech thought leader interviews, I recently caught up with independent consultant and former colleague of mine, Tony Lockwood.  Tony describes himself as having had a career of two halves: one in Education as Head of Science in a Nottinghamshire Secondary School, and one as Head of Product Management at Capita Education Software Solutions (now part of ParentPay Group).

Nowadays, Tony advises MATs and schools on getting more out of their Management Information and other Admin software systems, as well as subscribing to additional systems or changing suppliers. As an independent product consultant, he also provides help for EdTech companies to improve the performance of their products and develop new solutions.

 

In part 1 we discuss:

• the key changes Tony has noticed in the last 3 years
• the consolidation of businesses with Private Equity to provide a larger value proposition
• how, even though MATs came into the market some time ago, solutions are very much still fixed on schools
• MIS as a platform, and the future of MIS

 

In part 2 we cover:

• What’s next for the MIS market, and the challenges that SIMS has and that even though they have a loyal customer base
• The challenger MIS and which suppliers Tony expects to do well.
• What makes a good tech company and what we can learn from Spotify, where a lot of companies see themselves as tech companies but they should see themselves as service providers.
• The fact that educators and suppliers need to be more curious to deliver better value