Interview - Iain Colledge, executive director of operations, Bright Horizons

WHAT DOES YOUR NEW JOB ENTAIL?

It is essentially overseeing the effective and efficient operations of the company, everything from setting the strategy to the daily actions we take in our nurseries. It covers the business side of things such as working towards budgets, as well as helping to embed the quality in each setting.

YOU PREVIOUSLY WORKED AS AN OFSTED INSPECTOR, HAVE YOU FOUND THE EXPERIENCE HELPFUL?

It was many years ago that I worked as an inspector. I became an Ofsted inspector at age 33, so was quite young.

The experience has been massively helpful and although it was inspecting schools, not early years settings, I am an educator, and we instinctively know what good learning and teaching looks like.

THE MAJORITY OF YOUR NURSERIES ARE RATED GOOD. HOW DO YOU PLAN TO GET THEM TO OUTSTANDING?

There is continual dialogue around achieving and maintaining an Outstanding or equivalent. We want all the settings to be at least Good. We recognise that the responsibility doesn’t just sit with the nursery team in the setting – our support teams are also involved, working on pedagogy and practice, billing and administration to ensure that we are able to deliver the highest quality for the children in the nursery. The wider teams support with actioning facilities improvement requests, staff recruitment and parent open days, as well as supporting our nurseries with inspections themselves.

Any Ofsted inspection is a challenge. We have had one or two settings where their grade has dropped, some remain as Outstanding and some have gone from ‘requires improvement’ to Good.

This highlights the impact that a great nursery team can have. If you have great leaders in place and they are well supported, they will produce outstanding results. The pride I feel in being part of a team that can create experiences that ignite the senses of young children is second to none.

ARE YOU FINDING RECRUITMENT DIFFICULT, AND HAS INCREASING SALARIES AND PAY SCALES MADE A DIFFERENCE?

It’s an industry-wide problem. We have nurseries across the world, and it is a challenge everywhere. We’ve done many things – developing our retention as well as recruitment approach. To support our retention, we are doing a huge amount of work around individual and team development planning and succession planning, multiple layers of leadership training, and are focused on professional development at every level. We are already seeing retention levels increase month upon month. There are a lot of green shoots starting to appear, but it is still regional to a point. There are pockets where we are having continual challenges with recruitment.

One action we can take is to work with other providers to paint a brilliant picture of the early years sector and make it an exciting job to be in. It is challenging, but it is also a rewarding job, one that helps you sleep well at night knowing you’ve made a positive difference in the lives of others.

The more challenging nurseries to recruit for are in the more affluent areas of London. As a sector we are innovative and always looking for solutions, and for us that means not just increasing pay and benefits but looking into other avenues such as recruiting internationally.

I am pleased that following our £10 million investment and as a result of various recruitment strategies, we are already seeing an improvement. A manager said to me the other day they’ve received more CVs in the past week than in the last couple of years. We’ve had people move to other providers who are now choosing to come back because our salaries are at the top end and appreciating that Bright Horizons is a really great place to work.

We’re currently in our second employee appreciation week this year and the fun and positivity that I’ve seen is amazing. Take a look at our TikTok account and you’ll get a really good sense of what working at Bright Horizons is all about.

HAS GOVERNMENT FUNDING BEEN AN ISSUE FOR THE NURSERY GROUP?

This is heavily influenced by the individual circumstances of each nursery – the local authority area and funding, the balance of age groups in the nursery and other costs such as rent and consumables. We are fortunate that we can counteract some of these pressures with our purchasing power and commitment to the long term for our business.

ARE YOUR NURSERIES BACK TO PRE-COVID LEVELS?

We are moving back, but we aren’t there yet. It’s a case of balancing the right level of staff with the wait lists in many nurseries. We are already seeing improvements here and I think in the next six to 18 months, our staffing levels will have increased significantly enough to reduce these wait lists significantly.

Since the pandemic, we have noticed less consistency in demand and more peaks and troughs throughout the week. Parents generally chose to work from home on Mondays and Fridays, for example. We have had to make sure we staff accordingly and be flexible with our approach. It is about matching staff flexibility with parent demand.

ARE THERE PLANS TO ACQUIRE MORE SETTINGS?

Bright Horizons is always looking to grow with a focus on quality, but we are not simply going to buy for the sake of it. If we get a good opportunity, which helps enhance our countrywide provision and complements our framework, we will absolutely look at it. It has to be the right quality and right fit for us.