There is so much to think about at the moment for a school business manager or school leader. In addition to the normal tasks of daily administration, managing absence and balancing budgets, school leaders now have to consider how they are keeping staff safe, protecting children, ensuring safety measures are adhered to and no doubt responding to the increased levels of absence due to both illness and isolation measures.
You may have to consider how to respond to a loss of income to the school due to lettings or fundraising activity. You may have had to install extra software for distance working or potentially adjust roles for staff who were shielding.
So, now we have to also accept that even more changes are upon us. You have to consider ensuring you have a contingency plan for local lockdown and that your policies reflect any changes for staff activity, the new NHS app and home working. You can find out more about the NHS app here on our blog and further government guidance is available on local lockdown advice for schools on this link.
You also need to ensure that the new changes from Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) from September are in place and that your policies reflect this. You can find out more about these changes on this link.
Finally, employees have had a lot to deal with now and you may start to see increased levels of anxiety as news of bubbles closing circulates and positive Covid-19 cases increase. Have you considered how you can support your staff further? Are you offering any wellbeing support? Are there staff that would benefit from access to counselling or group wellbeing sessions to talk through their concerns. If you need help with these services contact FusionHR on 01924 827869.
You may also see increased absence both due to isolation, illness and stress related absence. Every member returning to work should have a return to work carried out. If you are struggling to keep track of who is off and when these should be carried out, you may benefit from our next session on managing staff absence which also shows a demonstration of our SAM software. SAM has a COVID dashboard as well as our absence homepage which can instantly show you where you need to take action. You can also complete all return to work meetings within the system and get the employee to approve using our employee portal. To find out more take a look at staffabsencemanagement.co.uk or register for our next event by clicking here.
Make sure you take care of yourself and don’t feel like you’re alone. Consider joining an SBM group if you are not already a member. You can find a full list here. We host the Leeds School Managers Forum and there are useful templates to share with colleagues, discussion platforms where you can ask colleagues questions or for recommendations and free events. You can find out more here www.lsmf.org.uk.
Take care and if we can help in any way with policy changes, employee support, absence management, virtual Headteacher recruitment please call one of the team on 01924 827869.
