When Your Head of IT Hands in Their Notice

It happens every January.

Someone on your team decides the new year is their moment for a fresh start. And if you're running a Multi-Academy Trust, there's a decent chance that someone is your Head of IT—right when you're getting stuck into the spring term.

If you're dealing with this right now, you're not alone. We see it every year. But here's the thing: while it feels like a crisis when it lands on your desk, it's actually a chance to step back and ask yourself what your trust really needs going forward.

The Problem

Your Head of IT is moving on. Maybe they've already gone; perhaps you can see it coming. Either way, you've suddenly got strategic technology decisions to make, compliance boxes to tick, governance frameworks to maintain, and policies that need someone senior looking after them.

And technology doesn't pause while you figure this out. Projects are running, systems need managing, and staff need support. Your students are in lessons that depend on everything working.

So the question isn't just "how do we fill this gap?" It's "what's the smartest way to get the IT leadership we need?"

Two Options Worth Considering

Look, you've got choices here. Understanding both of them well will help you make the right call for your situation.

Option One: Hire Another Head of IT

This is what most trusts do. Advertise, interview, and employ. It's familiar territory.

Here's what you get:

• Someone who's fully embedded in your organisation and gets to know your schools inside out

• Daily presence—they're there for staff meetings, walking the corridors, building relationships

• Complete focus on your trust's specific priorities

• Direct management of your technical team

• A proper member of your extended leadership group

  
  

But consider this:

• You're looking at a £50k to £75k salary, plus pension, NI, and all the other employment costs

• Recruitment takes months. That's a long leadership gap.

• You get whatever expertise that one person brings—and that's it

• Holiday cover, sickness, and eventually doing this all over again when they move on

• Keeping their skills current costs time and money

  
  

Option Two: Outsource the Strategic Leadership

This is the one most Multi-Academy Trusts haven't really thought through properly. Instead of replacing like-for-like, you bring in an external partner to handle the strategic IT leadership piece.

What this looks like:

• You get access to senior-level strategic thinking across multiple areas—not just what one person knows

• Expertise from working with loads of education settings. They've seen what works and what doesn't.

• Proper coverage of strategy, compliance, governance, cyber security, data protection, policy frameworks—the whole picture

• Flexible. Scales up and down with what you actually need, rather than paying for 40 hours a week regardless

• No recruitment delays. No handover gaps.

• Cover built in. They're on holiday? Someone else steps in. They leave the company? Not your problem.

  
  

Things to think about:

• It's a service relationship, not an employment one. Communication needs to be clear.

• They need time to get to know how your trust works

• Day-to-day technical delivery still needs sorting—either with your existing team or additional support

• Some trusts just prefer having someone on the payroll. It feels more secure, even if it isn't necessarily.

  
  

What Else You're Actually Getting

When you bring in external strategic IT leadership, you're not just plugging a gap. You're getting a capability that's really difficult to hire for in a single person.

Think about it. Governance frameworks that actually work. Compliance with regulations that keep changing. Policies that protect your trust without strangling innovation. Strategic planning that connects technology spending to what you're trying to achieve educationally. Cyber security oversight based on what's happening across the whole sector, not just in your trust.

The admin burden shifts, too. Instead of managing employment contracts, appraisals, CPD, and worrying about what happens when they eventually leave, you're managing a service agreement. Your finance team will probably thank you for predictable monthly costs rather than the variables that come with employment.

And flexibility. Your needs in January might look completely different from your needs in July. An external partner can shift focus as your priorities change.

So, What Should You Do?

There's no single right answer here. What works depends on your trust's size, how complex your setup is, your budget, who you've already got on your team, and where you're trying to go.

Some trusts absolutely thrive with dedicated internal leadership. Others find that external strategic expertise gives them better results for less money. Plenty discover that a hybrid model works best—external strategic oversight combined with internal technical delivery.

The essential bit is making an active choice rather than just defaulting to "well, we've always employed someone."

Let's Talk

If you're working through this decision right now, you don't need to figure it all out on your own. We've helped quite a few Multi-Academy Trusts through exactly this situation. We know the education sector, we understand the compliance landscape, and we've seen what good strategic IT leadership actually looks like in practice.

Whether you end up going with traditional recruitment, strategic outsourcing, or some combination of both, we're here to help you think it through and work out what makes sense for your trust.

No pressure. No sales pitch. Just a conversation with someone who's done this before.

Want to explore what might work for you? Get in touch with Tech Shepherd.