How to recruit school governors and trustees
Work through this step-by-step process to recruit new governors or trustees. It covers identifying your needs, advertising the role, screening candidates and making the appointment.
Contents
- Conduct a skills audit to identify your board's needs
- Clarify who does what in the recruitment process
- Use a free recruitment organisation like Governors for Schools
- Create a tailored advert
- Explain how rewarding the job is
- Attract the right people
- Create an application pack
- Screen candidates
- Appoint/elect and induct your new governor
We used the Governance Handbook, academy trust governance guidance and advice from governor recruitment charity Governors for Schools, and our governance expert Matt Miller, to write this article.
Conduct a skills audit to identify your board's needs
The first step when recruiting new governors or trustees is to identify what skills and experience your board needs from a new member to be effective.
Use our skills audit to do this. It's based on the Department for Education's competency framework.
If any third party organisations are helping you recruit new governors or trustees, share your skills audit with them.
Clarify who does what in the recruitment process
The whole board might be involved
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