Partners in funding
Working with others across your school can generate additional income and project buy in. Two school business professionals explain how
School business coach Laura Williams
Being an SBM can be lonely on a good day, let alone when you’re feeling the full weight of the financial pressures on your school. So it’s vital to remember that although you live and breathe those figures, financial management is a whole school responsibility. You can analyse, report and research
but the power of the staff body to be more efficient, make savings and achieve financial objectives is something that cannot be underestimated. Everyone can and should be contributing to this process. It’s just a matter of teaching them how. Think about sharing financial
information with your staff in a way that not only educates them on the headline school position but also helps them understand the impact of their financial requests and decisions beyond their own team or department. This can inspire and motivate them to contribute to improving the financial health of the school.
Every decision made in a school will
‘Make finance a topic of
conversation by weaving financial
management into regular meetings’
have a financial implication. We know this as SBMs but we need to evidence it to staff. Here are my tips: n Make finance a topic of conversation by weaving financial management into regular meetings and discussions n Reference costings on key documents, such as your school development plan n Add finance updates to key meeting agendas every half-term n Do presentations to staff on inset days, share budget reports with team leaders and chat with them about what they mean, what’s been going on and what they might need n When staff come up with ideas, ask them if they have investigated the cost of implementation and set them the task of doing some basic research. The more finance is spoken about, the more familiar the topic will become and the more your staff will learn how to connect the numbers to the narrative of school improvement n Once a good level of financial understanding has been established as part of the culture in your school, you can work with staff on their ideas for how to improve value for money, create profitable partnerships with other stakeholders and plan ahead collaboratively to help fund bigger projects. Having other staff contributing to the
financial discussions will not only improve the financial picture, it will improve the quality of education provision. Meaningful conversations about finance will result in better decisions being made, which will have a direct impact on student outcomes and student lives.
22 SPRING 2024 FundEd
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