Plenary Speakers

Conference Chair: Charles Lang

Programme Director of the Schools Productivity Unit

Department for Education

Charlie Lang is the Programme Director of the Schools Productivity Unit at the Department for Education. Charlie is an experienced senior civil servant who has led high profile Government reviews of the SEND system, child protection system and school exclusion; and has led several complex delivery reform programmes including the free schools programme, SEND reform and schools behaviour & attendance. He is a child-centred leader passionate about the role public servants – including school business professionals – can play in improving outcomes for children and young people. He lives in East London with his wife, two children and is also a local authority foster carer.

Susan Dawson

Commercial Director

Department for Education

Susan Dawson, Director for Commercial Sector and Commercial Operations joined the Civil Service 32 years ago as an Admin Assistant. Susan has delivered a number of commercial initiatives and has run a number of Government Major Programmes. She enjoys leading transformation and change. She has held a variety of roles in several departments climbing through the ranks to her current position. She has 17 years’ experience in the Department for Education. Susan is also proud to be Head of Place for the Yorkshire and Humber region, having lived and worked there throughout her career.

Nabil Ali

Deputy Director, Teaching Workforce Strategy

Department for Education

Nabil is the Senior Responsible Owner (SRO) for the Teaching Workforce at the Department for Education (DfE), overseeing the strategy on recruitment and retention of high-quality teachers for schools in England. Nabil has worked in DfE for over five years during which time he was the SRO/Programme Director for three government major projects – Teacher Training Reform to standardise initial teacher training across the country, the National Tutoring Programme, to introduce subsidised tutoring offers in schools during the pandemic, and STEM Strategy, overseeing the reform of the STEM curriculum and qualifications in England.

Previously, Nabil worked in the Cabinet Office and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport on cyber security, overseeing the development of the Cyber Security Skills Strategy and subsequent implementation of the key recommendations, including setup of the Cyber Training Academy.

Before joining the UK civil service, Nabil worked at the OECD and the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, primarily as an analyst on education and social welfare issues.

Gavin Davies

Deputy Director for Schools Financial Support and Oversight Directorate, Regions Group

Department for Education

Gavin Davies is a Deputy Director in Regions Group’s Schools Financial Support and Oversight Directorate. He has spent over 12 years working across both regional and national academy policy and delivery roles at both Education & Skills Agency and the Department for Education. Gavin is Chair of a Local Governing Board for a South-East Multi-Academy MAT, and is a CIMA member and part qualified Chartered Management Accountant.

Tom Goldman

 Director of Education Funding

Department for Education

Tom Goldman leads the Funding Policy Unit. We cover funding for the core day-to-day running costs of schools (5-16), early years providers (up to 4) and support for children and young people with high needs (0-25). This is known as “resource” or “revenue” funding. Prior to joining FPU, I have held a variety of posts dealing in particular with school curriculum, qualifications and standards.

Will Jordan

CEO & Co-founder

IMP Software

Will Jordan is Co-Founder and CEO at IMP Software, who are specialists in the provision of budgeting, forecasting, and reporting software for multi-academy trusts. As a qualified accountant who has been working with MATs and academies since 2010, Will has supported hundreds of Trusts nationally to help them develop a smarter approach to MAT Finance. Whilst most of this focus has been around the rationalisation and development of business systems and streamlining the reporting infrastructure, Will has also been deeply involved in operating model transitions and change management around budget management approaches, including Reserves and GAG Pooling, both from process design to stakeholder engagement and education.

Stephen Morales

Chief Executive

Institute of School Business Leadership (ISBL)

Stephen has a 20-year career history in operations and finance, working at a senior level in the public and private sectors, both in the UK and abroad.

Stephen presided over the development and implementation of nationally recognised school business leadership professional standards and led the transition from the National Association of School Business Management to the Institute of School Business Leadership.

Stephen works closely with the Department for Education in areas of policy reform, and his commitment to research to aid our self-improving system includes ongoing engagement with international jurisdictions including Australia, Europe, the Middle East and the US.

Work Session Speakers

Stuart Abrahams

Director

The Wisdom Partnership, Publishers of WhichMIS?

Steve Baines

Director

The Wisdom Partnership, Publishers of WhichMIS?

Andy Ball

Co-founder and Schools Mentor

IAM Compliant

Meet Andy Ball, the Schools Mentor and Co-Founder of iAM Compliant. He’s a School Superhero on a mission to vanquish compliance challenges and ensure every school is a safe haven for learning and teaching. With extensive experience in education sector facilities management, Andy is your go-to source for all things compliance and estates management. “Health and safety isn’t to stop you doing stuff, it’s there to allow you to do it…safely!”

Gary Benn

Director, Building and Projects Consultancy

Eddisons

Arti Bhanderi

Digital Services Strategy Team Lead , DfE Connect

Department for Education

Arti Bhanderi is the Digital Services Strategy Team Lead for the Department for Education’s DfE Connect service. She is currently a school governor and the safeguarding lead for a local authority school. Prior to this, she has worked in a number of policy and analysis roles for 15 years across the civil service.

Amy Bignell

Academy Operations Manager

The Priory Learning Trust

Amy is an Academy Operations Manager within the Priory Learning Trust based in the South West of England. Her focus is on strategic educational leadership, delivering effective resource management, staffing solutions, staff wellbeing and staff development. Amy began her career in education in 2020, and a degree in Education and Politics from the University of Stirling. Amy has a passion for staff wellbeing, sustainable school resource management and practise, and professional development. She is currently studying for the CIPFA Level 7 qualification.

Tim Brown

Stakeholder and Engagement Manager

Department for Education

Michael Conlon

Education Transformation Consultant

XMA

Michael has had an extensive career in education over the past 30 years in teaching, school leadership,  local authority quality improvement and a national role with Education Scotland. He has worked on some of the UK’s largest 1:1 iPad programs, including Glasgow’s innovative Connected Learning programme covering over 200 schools and he continues to support education institutions with their strategic ambitions across the UK, bringing XMA’s deep experience in delivering 1:1 projects to school leaders and communities.

Passionate about equity, accessibility, creativity and the importance of professional learning, Michael continues to pursue the opportunity to have an impact for young people in a digitally accelerating world.

Andrew Dutton

Education Sector Leader

Arcadis

Andrew is the Sector Leader for Education across the UK and Ireland. He has been supporting Education sector clients with developing and enhancing their estates for 20 years, with experience across Universities, Schools and Diocesan Portfolio Holder Clients as well as Multi Academy Trusts. His primary focus is around delivering large volumes of refurbishment and extension schemes, capital condition projects and strategic property related advice. Andrew has held key roles in supporting the Department for Education, particularly relating to condition strategy, leading the Technical mobilisation of the Condition Data Collection Programme and more recently in the Energy Pods Research and Innovation Project.

Jo Gilman

Director of Resources

Olive Academies Trust

Jo has over 30 years’ experience in finance and accounting, holding senior roles in both the public and private sector. Specialising in growth and change management, business partnering and company financial management, Jo enables our senior leaders to make well-informed decisions, contributing significantly to the stability and sustainability of the trust.

Jo is passionate about people. Through effective resource management, Jo ensures that pupils benefit from the most consistent and enriching experience, while providing colleagues with interesting and rewarding opportunities for development, building teams and connecting people through common aims.

“What gets me up in the morning is contributing to improving the lives of the children and young people in our care, ensuring we can provide the best opportunities. My part in that is managing resources to ensure that our work is fully focused on our pupils.”

Andrew Hamilton

School Resource Management Adviser

Andrew has worked in the education sector for 43 years: 36 as a teacher and School leader and latterly, 7.5 years as a school improvement consultant specialising in school improvement.

In his teaching career, he worked as a teacher in secondary schools for 36 years, 27 at senior leadership level and above, including 17 years as Head of 2 large secondary schools and 5.5 years as CEO of the 7 school MAT of 1 secondary and 6 primary schools that he designed and created. He has been an NLE for 13 years after being a LLE for 5 years and spent a decade working on the Oxon Schools’ Forum.

Lindsay Harris

Deputy Director, Education Estates Directorate

Department for Education

Lindsay has been with the Department for Education since 2016, having previously worked in other Government departments, including Defra and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office.  He is one of the Deputy Directors in Capital Directorate, responsible among other things for the Condition on Data Collection (CDC) Programme, the Capital Advisers Programme and the department’s Good Estate Management for Schools (GEMS) and Managing Asbestos guidance.

Lee Herridge

Head of Professional Development

Institute of School Business Leadership (ISBL)

Lee has been with the Institute for over a year and a half and has led the revision of the Professional Standards.

Prior to joining ISBL, Lee worked for 13 years in education, teaching and leading Business and Economics in the secondary and FE sectors.

Lee holds a level 4 Diploma in School Business Management and is currently studying a level 7 Apprenticeship in Senior People Professional Learning & Development

Georgie Langley

Policy Adviser, AI Alignment team

Department for Education

Georgie Langley is Policy Adviser on the DfE’s AI Alignment team, a team focusing on ensuring that AI tools are safe and effective for use in education. Prior to this role, Georgie work in the DfE Data Protection Office and in the central team of a small Multi-Academy Trust based in the Midlands.

Lara le Court de Billot

Policy Advisor, Schools Technology Services

Department for Education

Stephen has a 20-year career history in operations and finance, working at a senior level in the public and private sectors, both in the UK and abroad.

Stephen presided over the development and implementation of nationally recognised school business leadership professional standards and led the transition from the National Association of School Business Management to the Institute of School Business Leadership.

Stephen works closely with the Department for Education in areas of policy reform, and his commitment to research to aid our self-improving system includes ongoing engagement with international jurisdictions including Australia, Europe, the Middle East and the US.

Chris McGunnigle

Category Manager

Department for Education

James Murphy

Associate Director and Account Leader for Education

Arcadis

James Murphy, Associate Director and Account Leader for Education at Arcadis – James leads the education property, estates, and facilities management service at Arcadis. James is a strategic adviser to trusts and responsible bodies around estates management and has led the DfE capital advisers programme over the last 3 years.

Nathan Odom

Estates Director

Discovery Trust

Nathan is a school estate leader with over 15 years’ experience in the education sector. He began his journey in Local Government playing a key role in the academy programme and education sufficiency in Leicestershire. Now, as part of the Discovery Schools, Nathan oversees a diverse portfolio of responsibilities including strategic estates management, place planning and sustainability improvements.

Arati Patel-Mistry

Schools Engagement Manager

Department for Education

Bel Pennington

Associate Commercial Specialist

Department for Education

Tony Pickstock

Commercial Lead

Department for Education

Warren Porter

ex MAT CFO & Head of Education Strategy

IMP Software

Warren Porter is IMP Software’s Head of Education Strategy. Warren gained his chartered accountancy qualification whilst working at a 20+ school primary MAT, before moving on to become CFO at a Special/AP Trust in Derbyshire. In his role at IMP, he analyses sector developments and trends, and works closely with customers to ensure that IMP’s financial management tools continually evolve to support smarter MAT finance.

Paul Raine

Senior Product Manager, DfE Connect

Department for Education

Paul Raine is the senior product manager for DfE Connect. He has worked for the DfE and ESFA over the last 16 years, working on a number of digital products and services to support the education sector.

Andrew Shilton

Head of Solutions

 MLL Telecom

Andrew has over 19 years’ experience designing solutions for enterprise and public sector organisations.  He joined MLL in 2017 as a Senior Solution Architect and is now the Head of Pre Sales for UK Public Sector. Prior to MLL he spent four years designing network solutions some of O2 (Telefónica UK)’s largest enterprise customers.

Andrew has been instrumental in evolving MLL’s network solutions through MPLS to Software Defined Network technologies, always concentrating on the business benefits his solutions bring to his customers challenges. His latest innovation is in developing MLL’s very own Schools Content Filtering platform based on Fortinet technology.

He is looking forward to discussing the recent rapid developments in the market and the real-world challenges UK Schools are facing when dealing with changing demands and the choice of options available to meet those challenges

Anne Slade

Chief Operating Officer

 The Pioneer Academy MAT

Anne Slade is the Chief Operating Officer for The Pioneer Academy, a growing Multi-Academy Trust operating in the South East, currently with 19 primary schools.  She has over 17 years’ experience working in the education sector, having initially started as an Administration Assistant in a small 1FE school and progressing to the position she holds today.  In the role of COO, Anne is the senior executive responsible for all support, finance and business functions across the Trust.

Lawrence Tijjani

CEO

Happy2Host Education (Google for Education professional development partner)

Lawrence has been involved in Education for over 18 years, he began as a Computing teacher, progressed to Strategic IT Lead and later Head of Faculty. He introduced and developed a successful Computing curriculum at KS3 through to A-level, co-ordinated the implementation of IT within a new build.

Lawrence left classroom teaching to take up an exciting IT consultancy role supporting schools using and developing Google Workspace for Education, e-safety and general Edtech.

Lawrence founded Happy2Host Education and now supports Schools and Colleges around the UK and Ireland with all digital needs.

Peter Tomkins

School Resource Management Adviser

Peter is the SRMA Team Leader for North East London and the East Of England and one of the directors of TSO Education, a company providing schools, academies and local authorities with financial support and finance software, including the ICFP.school app. Peter has worked in education for thirty-five years, including six years as a secondary headteacher, and has been CFO in a number of trusts. Peter is a tutor and coach on the NPQEL course developing the next generation of system leaders.

Dan Tovey

Delivery Lead – Financial Benchmarking & Insights

Department for Education

Dan works primarily on the Financial Benchmarking & Insights Tool (FBIT). In a former life, Dan was a teacher of modern foreign languages. He also has experience working on Free Trade Agreements at DIT and on Local Authority SEND funding at DfE.

Mark Vickers MBE

Chief Executive Officer

Olive Academies Trust

Mark’s work in education is rooted in his belief that schools and other settings have the potential to break historic cycles of social disadvantage and to prevent the marginalisation of vulnerable young people. Mark has been a headteacher of a secondary school, an Ofsted inspector and a founding trustee of the PSHE Association before he established Olive Academies Trust in 2015.

Through the work of Olive Academies, Mark has been invited to join a small number of external advisory boards and forums, where insight, innovation, and best practices are shared to help form a collective voice that will impact more children and young people nationally. Mark is Chair of The National MAT CEO Network for Alternative Provision and SEND, a member of the DfE’s SEND and AP Improvement Board, Co-chair of Ofsted’s Inclusion Reference Group and Independent Chair of Norfolk County Council’s Executive Board. An advocate for partnership working, Mark regards collaboration as an effective and necessary route to improving the life chances of more of the most vulnerable children in the country.

In 2021 Mark was awarded an MBE in The Queen’s New Year Honours List for his services to children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities.

Speakers, agenda and times may be subject to change