Early years practitioners are well aware of the sector’s recruitment and retention challenges. Wages remain low and higher-qualified applicants are becoming rarer. Some early years experts warn that forthcoming changes to qualifications will worsen the situation, but others say there is light at the end of a dark tunnel. Could apprenticeships, childminder agencies and improved recruitment strategies help boost workforce numbers?
According to the National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) 2019 Workforce Survey, the number of Level 3 qualified staff in the sector fell from 83 per cent in 2015/16 to just 53 per cent in 2018/19. As much as 81 per cent of employers are finding it harder to recruit Level 3 trained staff as a result. Higher salaries attracted 41 per cent of leavers away from childcare, with 48 per cent citing retail as their new destination.
In February, nursery chain Busy Bees (below) announced a target to hire 700 apprentices as an antidote to workforce challenges. By September, it had filled 500 places. ‘The candidates we’ve got coming through are really good,’ says Busy Bees customer service director Sandy Silvester.
Busy Bees targeted school-leavers, as well as people wanting career changes, or those trained to Level 2 who want to progress. The company offered higher rates than the apprentice national minimum wage, as well as a £1,000 bonus for people joining before April. Silvester says this helped recruitment. However, it has been harder to fill vacancies in the South of England, where the cost of living is higher.
The company chose apprenticeships because they enable settings to grow their own talent and retain hires, Silvester says. She believes apprentices are less likely to drop out compared to students completing college-based early years qualifications, because training in-house gives them ‘clear expectations’ of what roles require.
Training provider Realise has seen the number of early years apprenticeship starters on its books rise by 17 per cent this year, up from 13,955 in 2020/21 to 16,365 in 2021/22. The company’s head of sector, Karen Derbyshire, says college-leavers are moving on to different sectors after finishing early years qualifications, but apprenticeships keep trainees loyal to the sector. ‘People start work, they get a feel for the ethos, they understand the workings of the setting and have that progression right the way through,’ she says.
WEIGHING UP T-LEVELS
Derbyshire says T-Level qualifications will not help keep newly qualified students in the sector. Introduced in September 2020, T-Levels may gradually replace full-time, college-based versions of the Early Years Educator qualification. They only require students to complete 45 days on placements over two years.
‘Apprentices, if they do a Level 2 and Level 3, are going to have two and a half years’ experience on the floor, which massively helps the employer,’ says Ms Derbyshire.
Education consultant, author and trainer Penny Tassoni also fears the content in the T-Level is too broad and may put off students from completing courses. ‘There are 12 core units which are generic units about education, but they’re not specific to early education,’ she says.
‘If you started off wanting to learn about early years, and you have to plough through a lot of content that does not feel directly relevant, that might actually not feel like a positive experience.’
CHILDMINDER AGENCIES
At the time of writing, Prime Minister Liz Truss had announced plans to grow the early years workforce by increasing the number of childminder agencies. Early Years Alliance CEO Neil Leitch criticised the plans, saying that since the agencies were first introduced eight years ago, the number of childminders in England had fallen by 40 per cent – from just under 52,000 to just over 31,000. Government statistics from March this year show there are 1,100 childminders on roll with agencies.
Childminder agency Tiney CEO Brett Wigdortz argues that childminding agencies are the only part of the early years sector that is growing. ‘We tripled in size last year,’ he says. Childminders like agencies because they receive more support than simply by registering with Ofsted, Wigdortz adds. He estimates that about 90 per cent of people joining Tiney are new to childminding, although about half do have previous early years experience.
Wigdortz emphasises that childminding is a better-paid role within early years. He says Tiney-registered childminders earn an average £30,000 annual salary.
According to NDNA’s survey, the average advertised early years salary was £18,000. The agency also supports childminders’ training, which is partly completed online and takes about three months. ‘I think this is the future,’ Wigdortz says. ‘It’s the only part of the early years profession where workers can earn a professional salary.’
MAKING VIDEOS
Settings are still looking to recruit staff through the traditional route of advertising vacancies. HR consultancy Redwing Solutions founder Imogen Edmunds says employers can only expect to be successful if they revolutionise their approach. ‘What you’ve always done won’t work now,’ she says. ‘You have to work a lot harder at recruitment in 2022.’
Edmunds says settings must be upfront about their offer for potential recruits. In particular they should include salary details in adverts. There are fewer jobseekers in the market so recruiters need to be competitive. ‘One thing some people are doing really well is little videos – real people who work in a setting doing a piece-to-camera about what it’s like to work there,’ she recommends. ‘If people find that on the internet, they may think – she or he looks a bit like me.’
Employers also need to be more flexible about when they have job interviews. Edmunds recommends telephone calls first. ‘If any candidate is any good, they’re already working somewhere else,’ she says. ‘Your best bet is to give them an option to self-select an appointment time. We have to be doing interviews at six o’clock on a Tuesday now, when previously we would have been going home.’ She also advises nursery managers stay in touch with leavers in case they decide to return.
This strategy has proved fruitful for the London Early Years Foundation (LEYF). ‘We always try and keep positive with people,’ says LEYF director of operations Mike Abbott. The organisation has changed its exit interview format to learn as much as possible about why someone has quit, so it can make changes in response. ‘We’ve had quite a few returners, up to eight years after they’ve left,’ adds Abbott.
In April, the chain announced it was increasing salaries by an average of 5 per cent to retain existing workers and recruit new talent. It also introduced an extra day off for staff on their birthday, and financial rewards for workers who serve five-year periods. LEYF also paid out ‘thank you’ staff bonuses of up to £275 at the end of the last financial year. ‘We’d done better than we anticipated,’ says Abbott.
Abbott cannot pinpoint which of these measures is working. But he says LEYF has seen a ‘slight reduction’ in vacancies since April, and a ‘reasonably significant reduction in staff turnover’. However, he says apprenticeships are a key part of the solution. LEYF aims take on two apprentices at each nursery every year. ‘That’s really the way we’ve got to grow our workforce,’ he explains.
Case study: childminder Michelle Livingstone, Bolton-le-Sands, Lancashire
‘My little girl was born in July last year. Before going on maternity leave I was on a fixed-term contract as a secondary school English teacher. I had no job to go back to, and the role would have been inflexible.
‘I saw something about childminding online and came across a local childminding group. I met them and they shared their wisdom and guidance. One of the women, now retired, said registering through Ofsted was straightforward. I didn’t go down the agency route because that would have meant looking at different agencies and working out fees.
‘I registered in June this year and all my places are already filled. I’ve turned people away, partly because I’m just finding my feet and keeping things simple. I have my daughter and two other children four days a week, so I have one day a week just with her.
‘Childminding is more lucrative than I imagined. But I also take into account what I’m saving by not having to pay someone else to look after my daughter.
‘The autonomy of being a childminder and being able to shape my own curriculum, rather than swathing through red tape, is a massive blessing. I can’t say yet if I’ll be doing it forever, but I have found a passion in early years.’