Taking the load off

Managing workload is an essential skill but one we were never taught in school. As a former nursery manager, I know what it is like to feel like you are on the hamster wheel that never stops.

In my job as an early years consultant, it is all too clear that the management team feel like they are drowning, and burying their heads in the sand is often the position taken. But the key to getting off that hamster wheel is working smarter, not harder. So where to start?

Priorities

The first thing to do is think about what needs achieving immediately, what can wait and what is a luxury. I call these ABC lists. A is ‘Absolutely needs achieving’, B is ‘this would be Beneficial’, and C is ‘Can wait’.

For example, anything connected with regulatory compliance or statutory responsibility goes straight on the A list, such as staffing, not to mention key business processes such as cash collection. Meanwhile, reviewing non-priority risk assessments are B-list, and redoing your parent partnerships board is probably going on the C list.

Lists are a way of feeling in control and seeing the bigger picture, but they can spiral out of control. I encourage a shared list in the office to which managers, deputies and seniors can all contribute. Managers should try and instil a sense of team purpose so that when things do get tough there is always someone to share anxieties with.

One good way of using the lists is to highlight what you are going to achieve in the next hour. If you don’t achieve them, don’t beat yourself up – just add them back to the list and go again in the next session. One nursery I work with has an ingenious wall-mounted card index showing daily, weekly, monthly, termly and annual tasks that need to be completed. It is always visible, and if there is a card in the slot then both management and staff know it needs to be done.

Blocking out time

In a hectic nursery, it may feel like there is always someone wanting your attention. Although this is very much part of the job, there should be time when you put a ‘do not disturb’ sign on the door. In some settings, managers will have an unwritten rule – for example, ‘between 2pm and 3pm I am not to be disturbed unless it is urgent’. Some even take themselves to a local coffee shop – and it is amazing how staff answer their own questions and manage their workload when the manager is not present.

Time must also be spent on the business side. Several of the settings I work with have a monthly or termly day to focus on business issues – reviewing overdue bills and costs, or planning the next few months’ marketing and advertising, for example. Most managers went into an early years role to be with children and not to run a business – so having this structure helps managers keep their eyes on the prize.

EYFS audit

If there is one thing guaranteed to increase stress and workload, it is the word ‘Ofsted’. When working with new settings, I often hear the same sentence – ‘I have to do this for Ofsted.’ Once we sit and talk about what they believe they have to ‘do for Ofsted’, it is amazing how much paperwork and stress we strip away (see Case study).

I always advise management teams to go back to the EYFS. If it says it in the statutory framework, then it must be done. But if it doesn’t, make a calculated decision on whether that task is actually benefiting the children, families or staff.

It’s amazing how many pieces of paperwork or daily tasks staff churn through which turn out to be meaningless but have become custom and practice. A good review of what you do will almost certainly highlight tasks that are not relevant or beneficial any more.

case study

Last year I worked with a setting that had built layers of admin into their processes because they were terrified of not being able to evidence something Ofsted asked for.

The management team lacked confidence in their staff and so had designed a top-down process that was extremely onerous but felt like a ‘safe’ way to operate. In fact, the paperwork took staff away from meaningful interactions with children, and in many cases didn’t evidence anything appearing in the statutory framework.

By going back to first principles and stepping through the process from end to end, we could:

a. ask ourselves what we were trying to achieve with this step and why?

b. refer to the EYFS to understand if this step was necessary

c. conclude whether the step should remain, be altered to reflect the framework or be removed entirely.

Following this process allowed the team to remove the majority of the audits – which in turn freed staff to deepen their knowledge of their key children and empowered them to demonstrate that knowledge in line with the inspection framework. These changes were embedded in staff training and reinforced through supervisions – it was vital that staff understood what the process was designed to do, how they could use it in the context of demonstrating their practice and, crucially, be comfortable they had the answers to everything Ofsted could ask at their fingertips.

Staff report that the new system has reduced their workload. Morale is so much higher and the staff are all spending more time playing with and teaching children.