About Us
background
We provide back office services to schools.
Our aim is to provide a number of high-quality value for money services thereby taking much of this burden from the Headteacher and local governing bodies and gaining cost advantages. This allows school leaders to concentrate on educating children, teaching and learning and working with the local community.
Established in September 2019, our education support services company is jointly owned by the Diocesan MATs (DMAT) but its board of directors includes three independent directors to give balance and bring appropriate expertise. It is a ‘not for profit company’. The company’s objective is to provide high quality, value for money services for all the Diocesan academies and any VC or VA schools who wish to procure their services from it.
Robust governance and risk management ensures any potential conflicts of interest are managed well. There are clear, formal contracts for all services provided across DMATs and with VA / VC schools to ensure transparency and the ability to monitor value for money (VFM). Each year a VFM report is produced, an independent reviewer will check the costs of the services provided by the company against those available in the market. This will ensure that the DMATs and schools are still obtaining value for money for these services. This approach will give consistency of financial probity, policy implementation and risk management.
By developing this work within one company there are efficiencies and savings that can be made. The objectives set for the company are to:
- ensure high quality, VFM services are provided for academies and schools.
- ensure systems and performance meet legal and funding body requirements.
- maximise opportunities for driving through cost savings to allow greater investment in front line services.
- actively encourage and positively respond to customer feedback; and to ensure a risk-based approach is taken supported by robust risk management.
Values and Aims
Our Vision is to “be recognised as the partner of choice for our schools and deliver a trusted value for money service which sets the benchmark for the sector”.
Our Mission is to be “consistently delivering a quality and reliable service for schools, which has a positive impact on the education and development of learners”.
Our values are based on those of the joint Diocese of Norwich Education Team. They are:
- Teamwork and Service, imbued with kindness, lie at the heart of what we do to support schools and academies across the Diocese. This shapes our interactions and dealings with everyone, recognising that in life as in education, we are always ‘stronger together’.
- We are Centred in Community and strive to live well together. We model dignity and respect, hope and aspiration going the ‘extra mile’ to enable the flourishing of all.
Our Vision for the next 3 years
We will:
- Enable our customers to thrive by:
- Being financially strong and secure so that we can pass back any surplus to our shareholders.
- Helping them to become employers of choice.
- Working in Partnership and providing excellent customer service to our customers.
- Growing our business and services by increasing our customer base to include additional MATs and associate schools.
- Providing demonstrable best value services with year on year improvements in efficiency and effectiveness measured through an annual value for money report and net promotor score.
- Provide high quality, VFM and effective services are provided for academies and schools in the following service areas:
- Management accounting and financial control including Transaction processing and financial management.
- Operational, contract and estate management
- Procurement services
- HR services
- Governance services
- Risk Management.
- Maximise opportunities for driving value through cost savings and efficiencies to allow greater investment in front line services.
- As a service provider we take on the responsibility for research and innovation in our services and will build capacity in this area.
- Our Cross Cutting Themes
At the same time as developing our strategic pillars we will also pursue three cross cutting themes:
- We will be an employer of choice by:
- Recruiting, training and developing great people
- Support our customers to be an employer of choice.
- We will think digitally in all we do and reimagine how digital processes can improve our ways of working.
- We will work to continually improve our offer and provide better value for money for our customers. We will use benchmarking, process review and value engineering as we strive to improve value.