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Why do working conditions matter for retention?
Retention is shaped by the work teachers experience every week, not just by recruitment campaigns or a general message that staff wellbeing matters. A leader can support morale by making decisions fair, reducing unnecessary demands and giving teachers meaningful opportunities to improve their practice. Those same conditions may make it more attractive to stay, but evidence of better morale is not automatically evidence of lower turnover.
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A 2023 rapid evidence assessment by Dong Nguyen, Beng Huat See, Chris Brown and Dimitra Kokotsaki examined leadership, culture, climate and structure in relation to teacher retention. It screened 399 research outputs and synthesized 89 empirical studies that met its quality assessment, drawing on studies from more than 60 countries. Its findings point to connected themes: teacher development, relational trust, collegiality, positive approaches to discipline, intellectual stimulation, and fairness in how workload and support are distributed. The review also calls for stronger longitudinal and experimental research, so schools should treat these as evidence-informed approaches rather than guaranteed causal solutions.
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Before choosing an intervention, distinguish the outcome you want to change. Morale, wellbeing, job satisfaction, intention to leave, recruitment and actual retention are related, but they are not interchangeable. A policy may improve one without establishing an effect on another.
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How can schools reduce teacher workload?
Start with the tasks teachers say consume time without improving instruction or support for pupils. The aim is not simply to reduce the number of tasks on a checklist: it is to free time for teaching, planning, collaboration and the work that helps pupils learn.
Identify work that can be simplified or stopped
Ask staff to identify recurring demands and examine where the same work is being duplicated. Areas to review include marking and assessment expectations, repeated planning or data requests, administrative processes, behaviour-response procedures and pastoral duties. Look at what teachers actually do, not just what a policy says they should do.
The Education Endowment Foundation’s scoping summary identifies shared or adaptable schemes of work, collaborative planning and streamlined marking or feedback as possible workload actions. These are options to test against local needs, not a checklist to impose wholesale. A shared plan, for example, is useful only if teachers can adapt it to their pupils and are not required to complete a separate process alongside it.
Account for the transition cost
A new system can temporarily increase workload while staff learn it, move existing materials or change routines. Agree on a small number of changes, choose a sensible point in the school year to introduce them, and check both the initial effort and the sustained effect. If a workload initiative creates extra reporting or training that outweighs the time it saves, revise it rather than declaring success because the policy has launched.
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For context, the House of Commons Library’s 2026 briefing reports average weekly hours in 2025 of 53.2 for primary teachers and 51.2 for secondary teachers in England. These are England-specific survey estimates for that period; they are not a measure of every teacher’s hours or a target to apply elsewhere.
What can school leaders do to build trust and improve morale?
Teacher voice helps only when it can affect decisions. Involve teachers in choices that shape teaching, explain constraints and trade-offs, and respond consistently when staff raise concerns. Where a requested change is not possible, say why and identify what can be changed instead. These practices make decisions more legible and give staff a basis for judging whether leadership is fair.
The 2023 evidence assessment highlights relational trust and collegiality alongside positive school discipline, teacher development and fair working conditions. In practice, leaders can make those themes visible by creating time for colleagues to plan or discuss practice, applying behaviour expectations consistently, and checking whether support and extra duties fall disproportionately on particular roles, subjects or career stages.
Trust is weakened when consultation is performative or when a new wellbeing policy adds obligations without removing any existing work. Review the effect of decisions on teachers’ ordinary working day, and make it clear who owns follow-up. The aim is a climate in which staff can raise problems early and receive a credible response, not a promise that every concern can be resolved immediately.
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How should schools support new teachers and mentors?
Early-career teachers need support that connects professional frameworks to the classes, subjects and phases they teach. A useful induction can include regular conversations with a mentor, opportunities to observe and discuss practice, and help with applying ideas in the classroom. The Department for Education in England’s phase-two review of teachers’ professional development found that high-quality mentoring and investment by schools or trusts supported early-career development.
Protect the capacity to mentor well
Mentoring is not an extra duty that can be added indefinitely to an already full timetable. Protect time for mentors to meet, prepare and follow up. Train mentors for the role, and check that the pairing and support fit the early-career teacher’s subject, phase and context. The same DfE review records concerns about high mentor workload and about some training being repetitive, rigid or insufficiently contextualized. Those concerns are reasons to review how mentoring operates, not to assume that a formal programme is effective simply because it exists.
Ask early-career teachers and mentors whether meetings are regular and useful, whether advice can be applied to classroom practice, and whether the time allocated is realistic. If the programme is generic, adjust it to the teacher’s actual needs while retaining its core purpose: development through relevant, sustained support.
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Flexible working can support wellbeing, motivation and job satisfaction when it is implemented well, according to the EEF scoping summary. That summary also says direct evidence that flexible work improves retention is absent. Schools should therefore consider it as a possible way to improve the working experience, not promise that it will prevent staff departures.
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Work through practical questions before introducing an arrangement: how teaching continuity will be maintained, how responsibilities will be handed over, whether timetables can accommodate it, and whether access is fair across different roles and career stages. Consider cost and whether the arrangement creates additional coordination work for colleagues. Check outcomes after implementation, including staff experience and any effect on workload, rather than treating approval of a flexible arrangement as success in itself.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Which benefits and career paths should schools make concrete?
Specific commitments are easier for teachers to assess than broad statements about culture or wellbeing. The EEF summary notes that teachers value clearly defined benefits, such as a specified amount of planning, preparation and assessment time, more than vague promises. Schools can state what a commitment means in practice, who can access it and how it will be protected.
Where budgets allow, leaders can consider pay alongside tangible conditions such as guaranteed planning time, healthcare or childcare support, and workable flexibility. The EEF summary identifies financial incentives among the better-evidenced approaches for attracting teachers, while also noting that conditions and benefits can matter. It does not establish that any particular benefit can replace pay, or that the same package will suit every school.
Career development should also be visible. Explain how a teacher might grow as a classroom expert, mentor or leader, what development connects to each path, and whether the added responsibility comes with meaningful recognition and support. The 2023 evidence assessment identifies teacher development and professional learning as leadership levers. Australia’s National Teacher Workforce Action Plan also names career pathways as a retention priority; that is an Australian policy priority, not proof that a particular pathway has measured retention effects.
What do the available retention and pay figures show?
The figures below are from the House of Commons Library’s 2 February 2026 briefing on England. They describe different measures and periods; they should not be combined into a universal turnover rate or generalized to other countries.
| Measure | Reported figure | Scope and qualification |
|---|---|---|
| Teachers leaving the state sector | 9% in 2023/24 | England; includes retirees. |
| Newly qualified teachers leaving within their first year | 10%–15% | England; recent cohorts, as reported in the 2026 briefing. |
| Teachers leaving within five years | 30%–33% | England; recent cohorts, as reported in the 2026 briefing. |
| Average median classroom teacher pay | £48,892 in 2024/25 | England; reported by the 2026 briefing. |
| Real-terms pay change | 10.4% decrease from 2010/11 to 2022/23, followed by a 5% increase through 2024/25 | England; the briefing’s reported trend. It does not establish what pay change is sufficient to improve retention. |
The EEF scoping summary also reports that almost one in three teachers leave within five years, 43% within ten years, and around a third reported considering leaving in 2023. These are figures cited by that summary, which is undated in the captured material; the underlying studies should be checked before using them as standalone statistics. In particular, considering leaving is not the same as actually leaving.
How can a school choose and evaluate an intervention?
Start by finding the local problem rather than selecting a fashionable programme. The same turnover figure can conceal different causes: workload pressure, weak induction, lack of trust, limited development, or a mismatch between a benefit and what staff value. Use staff feedback and existing workforce information to decide what to examine, while protecting confidentiality and avoiding assumptions about why individuals leave.
- Define the intended outcome. Decide whether the immediate goal is better morale, improved wellbeing, stronger induction, reduced workload or fewer departures. Do not use one measure as a substitute for another.
- Choose a focused change. Select a manageable action tied to the identified issue, such as simplifying a recurring assessment process, protecting mentor time or specifying planning time.
- Check feasibility and fairness. Consider cost, timetabling, implementation effort and whether teachers in different roles, subjects and career stages can access the support equitably.
- Record a baseline and review the experience. Note the existing process and ask staff how the change affects their ordinary work. Check whether the change itself creates a transition burden.
- Assess the right result over time. Look separately at staff experience and actual workforce outcomes. A positive response about wellbeing is valuable, but it does not by itself demonstrate a retention effect.
- Adapt or stop what is not working. Keep changes that address the local issue without shifting costs onto other staff; adjust or end measures that add more burden than benefit.
For English schools seeking a wider diagnostic, the Department for Education’s 2025 “Working lives of teachers and leaders: wave 4” publication covers workload, wellbeing, flexible working, pay, professional development, pupil behaviour and career plans; its page was updated in April 2026. Its England context matters when interpreting the findings. In Australia, the National Teacher Workforce Action Plan identifies reducing unnecessary workload, enabling planning and collaboration, supporting early-career teachers and new school leaders through mentoring and induction, and developing career pathways as national policy actions. Those actions are priorities, not a guarantee of measured impact.
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