Flexible Working for Teachers and Leaders (Alpha and Beta)

Tender description

Why the Work is Being Done The Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategy want more teachers in the profession to ensure careers in teaching are attractive, rewarding and sustainable. Many teachers would like flexible working patterns and career journeys, but these opportunities can be hard to access within teaching. The Discovery, explored the barriers, behaviours and attitudes around job sharing in schools. We would like to prototype, test and iteratively develop directly with schools and individual teachers/leaders a range of elements of a flexible working service so as to understand what would be most effective in helping them to adopt and support flexible working including job sharing. Problem to Be Solved Teachers leave, or choose not to return to teaching because they cannot access part-time or other flexible working opportunities. Who Are the Users As a teacher: - I need to see successful examples of flexible working works in other schools, so I know it can be done; to discover whether job sharing or another form of flexible working is right for my circumstances; to form shared vision and understanding of my responsibilities and accountabilities with my team including potentially a job share partner. As a school leader:- I need to know how to handle practical HR issues to see how flexible working works elsewhere; to understand who is accountable for what; to know how best to support and timetable multiple teachers working flexibly Early Market Engagement The key insights from the job share discovery are: • Job sharing is desirable to parents returning to work or those taking on extra responsibility. • Successful job shares require concerted effort at all levels of the system. • There are cultural, logistical and attitudinal barriers to some schools embracing jobsharing and other forms of flexible working. • Schools need to see the benefits of job sharing and flexible work more broadly and be ready to test new practices. • Schools are already trialling their own local solutions to the challenges they face. Work Already Done A discovery carried out, focused on job sharing in secondary schools, and the report of findings produced. The discovery report led towards content-based solutions, which should be researched, prototyped and iterated in Alpha. We will issue the discovery report to the shortlisted applicants in proceeding to the 2nd phase. Background information and research on flexible working for teachers can be accessed in the DfE teacher recruitment and retention strategy. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/teacher-recruitment-and-retention-strategy Existing Team Product manager and a small team of policy-focused civil servants. We are interested to receive provider proposals for team structure expect that the alpha team should include the following skill sets: Delivery Management; User Research; Design Content Design (between the designer and content designer we expect to have the capability to build and test wireframes of content-based services) Business Analyst Beta requirements will be subject to outcomes of the alpha. At the beta stage we would expect that the beta team would also comprise: Developer (front and back end); Tech Lead. Current Phase Alpha Work Location Department for Education 20 Great Smith St Westminster London SW1P 3BT Also it is expected that some travel may be required within England Working Arrangments Co-located working full time principally from the DfE's London office, maximising opportunity for engagement with the policy unit and stakeholders. We expect Alpha to be completed within 12 weeks with travel to meet users likely. Any expenses must be included in the contract sum as there is not a separate budget for expenses. Operate a standard agile methodology: daily stand-ups, sprint planning, sprints, retrospectives, show and tells. Supplier will lead by being a role model in agile working. Exact milestones will be determined post appointment and weekly updates detailing achievements and any issues that may impact timescales or cost. Security Clearance Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) as a minimum Additional T&Cs Standard Framework and Call Off Terms and Conditions. Expenses must be pre-agreed and comply with the DfE standard T&S policy. Primary work location stated in SoW will not attract expenses. Contract and Vendor Management will form a key part of governance and suppliers will be expected to co-operate in a manner that fosters healthy working relationships and quality delivery. Suppliers must provide sufficient guarantees to meet the requirements of GDPR in line with Procurement Policy Note 03/17 Changes to Data Protection Legislation & General Data Protection Regulation. CVs may be requested from shortlisted suppliers Skills & Experience Detail your most recent or relevant experience of delivering evidence-based service design, focused on user-needs, end-to-end journeys, motivations and goals, indicating how you went about this. Detail your most recent and relevant experience of prototyping, designing and developing digital and offline services through alpha and beta to meet identified user needs and business objectives? Detail your most recent and relevant experience of meeting all requirements to deliver successful outcomes in specified timescales, in a complex working environment? What will you do to ensure the project complies with the GDS design manual, service standard assessment, technical code of practice and wider industry standard? Detail how you will enable a tech-agnostic approach to delivery in Alpha which includes prototype online and offline solutions to support flexible working in schools? Detail the most recent or relevant experience you have of working in a front-line public service context? What will you do to ensure the project complies with the GDS design manual, service standard assessment, technical code of practice and wider industry standard? Nice to Haves Demonstrate in detail your most recent experience of working successfully with users in the school/education landscape in England Demonstrate in detail your most recent experience working in a complex policy landscape and of building good working relationships with policy teams. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 3 Proposal Criteria Demonstrate a plan of activities with clear deliverables, dates and the ability to complete the delivery of the alpha/beta within the required timescales (12wks alpha; 16wks beta). (15) Demonstrate a successful approach and methodology for alpha, to validate discovery findings, test assumptions, prototype solutions and lead to clear recommendations for beta phase to meet user needs. (15) Demonstrate how your teams skills and experience will deliver the required outcome including upskilling civil servants in agile/design based ways of working. (15) [Use DFE Template] Demonstrate the key assumptions, dependencies, risk and issues, with robust approaches to mitigating, testing and resolving them in a project-based environment. (10) Cultural Fit Criteria Demonstrate your approach to engaging with internal stakeholders undergoing cultural change and how this will support project success. (3) Demonstrate how you will work transparently and collaboratively with the DfE project team, external stakeholders and collaborators, and seek actionable feedback to resolve any issues quickly and efficiently. (3) Demonstrate approach to knowledge and skills transfer to permanent members of staff. Recent and demonstrable experience of up-skilling non-specialists and embedding agile ways of working in new teams. (7) 4. Describe your approach to a flexible co-location of the team with DfE. (2) Payment Approach Time and materials Assessment Method Written proposal Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 55% Cultural fit 15% Price 30% Questions from Suppliers Budget range proposed budgets: the alpha budget is available upto £215,000 incl vat beta budget upto 400,000 incl vat dfe require the supplier to provide a separate cost for alpha and beta dfe reserves the right not to progress from alpha to beta.