'We're not fat cats': INOVA trust CEO's frustration after back-of-office restructure leads to teachers' strike
“Our people aren’t happy about the way we’ve gone about this, and I’m happy to own that”
A CEO of a Sheffield academy trust admits he is frustrated that a rearrangement of back-office HR and IT services has now led to a teachers’ strike.
Classroom staff at seven schools operated by INOVA MAT staged a walk out this week over a union’s claims ‘support staff’ are at risk of job cuts.
The chance of looming redundancies and criticisms over the formation of two well-paid executive teams in a new head office led to industrial action by the National Education Union, which primarily represents teachers.
However, in an interview with The Star, INOVA’s CEO Lee Barber has appealed to staff on strike and hopes to explain the restructure by saying; “We’re not fat cats.”
“Our people aren’t happy about the way we’ve gone about this,” said Mr Barber. “And I’m happy to own that.
“It could have been done differently. We could have gone to schools in person to explain and gather opinions.
“But we’re not fat cat CEOs. I’m here for children getting the best possible start.
“We’re aware of the optics, but the blanket argument is no one has lost their job.”
What is happening to ‘support staff’ at INOVA?
The NEU called the strike at INOVA after accusing the trust of “placing support staff at risk of compulsory redundancies or being forced into reduced or downgraded positions.”
Namely, criticism was aimed at the formation of a team of highly-paid senior-level staff at the trust named Project Pioneer, which it claims has led to increased costs and a risk of cut jobs.
The Star reported on June 10 how there is no information about Project Pioneer on INOVA’s website except the paragraph: “The Pioneer Team are partners in operational effectiveness and resourcing. The team supports schools by removing operational barriers so that the educational experience of young people can be brilliant.”
Speaking to The Star, more critical teaching staff derided Project Pioneer as “wasteful” and “designed to drive cuts and fund executive salaries.”
Anecdotally, it would appear this opinion is not uncommon.
What is Project Pioneer?
When asked, Mr Barber said Project Pioneer is a plan to reorganise and centralise the trust’s HR, IT, finance, estates and marketing staff, describing the current state of play as “nine schools all working differently on the same thing.”
An example is payroll, where each of the trust’s nine schools handle their pay individually. Pioneer would centralise this to a single office for all.
“Initially, that involved the prospect of compulsory redundancies,” said the CEO.
“We launched a consultation, but cost cutting was not our outset as much as efficiencies.
“I want to be clear - the reorganisation is not costing us anything.
“There are no compulsory redundancies. We are retaining the same number of colleagues across the trust.
“Initially it needed savings, but now we think not.”
Executives
It also led to the formation of Pioneer’s team of executives. Mr Barber said these were not new hires, but seniors already in the trust, and required hiring only one new person.
FOI requests reveal the salaries for Pioneer’s senior staff range from £54,662 to £76,772.
The wages of other senior INOVA teams, known ‘Pinnacle’ and ‘C-Suite’, range from £93,000 to £193,000.
Amidst this, INOVA recently took out a £64,000 a year lease for a head office at the Pennine Five Campus building on Silver Street Head.
Mr Barber said: “Whilst we’re aware of the optics of creating manager leadership roles during a reorganisation and taking a lease on an office, none of this has involved cutting costs and is a reorganisation of existing roles.”
Consultation
This month, a consultation was sent to staff over Project Pioneer, at which point staff engaged their unions.
But it was the NEU - which primarily represents teachers - that balloted for strike action.
The number of industrial action ballots by the NEU has reportedly tripled in recent years, from 76 in 2022-23 to 229 in 2024-25.
The NEU says the increase in ballots this year is a “consequence of sustained and chronic underfunding of our schools”.
However, the NEU was scolded in a statement by UNISON in March 2026 for breaching agreements by representing school support staff - normally the exclusive domain of the National Joint Council union (NJC).
The scathing statement reads in part: “... the NJC unions are the recognised unions for school support staff and are the ONLY Unions that can negotiate on Support Staff Pay and Terms and Conditions.”
‘We are not making staff redundant’
Mr Barber says the ballot for teachers to strike at the INOVA schools was held before the consultation ended.
He said: “So we already knew a strike was already on the table.
“I think we were very generous and positive in respect of the consultation.
“The NEU asked for an extension, so we extended it.
“They asked for no compulsory redundancies, so we took it off the table.
“They asked for pay protection, so we agreed.
“We’re trying to resolve what their remaining issues are, which they say is to do with workloads.
“If I’m honest, the NEU is a teaching union and I’m struggling to see a line of sight from the reorganisation of support services like HR and finance to teachers’ workloads - we have meetings with the NEU lined up and I am willing to be corrected.
“But the process has never at any point referenced or impacted any teachers. Never.
“None of this expenditure is from loss of teachers, or from losing support staff.
“That is my frustration.
“We just want staff to come back to work.”
“We are not making staff redundant.
“Education wise, the trust’s schools are exceptional. Nearly every metric for academic achievement and attendance is up, we’ve turned Bradfield around, and Chaucer is flying and off to join Mercia trust.”
New head office
In 2025, the Tapton School Academy Trust rebranded into INOVA, at a cost of £800 to design the logo and £5,200 for IT services, and leased the new office in the city centre for executive staff.
In emails to The Star, INOVA teachers criticised their executive board for seemingly creating well-paid roles for themselves and taking an office lease while at the same time “cutting services.”
Mr Barber said: “It isn’t what it seems.
“When I first arrived [2024] we did not have a trust head office, where the CEO and CFO are based. Seniors were either working form home or in a spare space around schools.
“This was while we had three oversubscribed schools and the council were asking us to take more.
“Taking these people out schools to a single office was necessary and created space.
“The revenue from taking more pupils after creating space more than covers the cost of the lease for the head office.”
What have teachers said?
The Star has received numerous emails from INOVA staff in the last week.
One reads: “I don’t want to get sacked but I am so outraged by what is happening to our school under the new name of INOVA Trust.
“The trust are restructure so they say, finance, HR, IT etc but at Tapton they are cutting the mental health and behaviour support roles.
“The number of directors and chiefs who are based in an office block in town and don’t even work in a school has increased significantly, that’s where the public money for education is going.
“We have INOVA HQ in town draining our finances full of executives and they just bought a £4K coffee machine for their important visitors in town while they are cutting mental health support in school!”
The Star put this to Mr Barber, who said: “We are not cutting any mental health roles, and there is no additional spend on executives.
“The Trust employs a thousand staff. The [coffee] machine is in a central office used for meetings with school leaders, staff, governors, trustees, contractors, and visitors. It is a capital item with an expected lifespan of many years, rather than an ongoing luxury expense.
It is entirely reasonable for people to ask questions about how Trust funds are spent. We welcome that scrutiny and are satisfied that this purchase represents good value and was made in accordance with our financial procedures.”
Another email reads: “The contrast on the ground is stark. In the same period that the Trust has been spending on rebranding, centralised events and technology, teachers at Tapton have been buying basic classroom supplies out of their own pockets including glue sticks etc. due to shortages.”
However, one teacher on INOVA’s side wrote: “Whether one agrees with the final structure or not, it is difficult to argue that the Trust has not engaged in a substantial process of consultation.
“What many colleagues find puzzling is that much of the industrial action appears to be being taken by teachers, despite the fact that teachers themselves are not affected by the changes
“To be clear, I am not anti-union [...]. My own view is that this dispute appears to have become part of a wider ideological argument about academies and trusts rather than a dispute about the specific proposals within Inova.”
Some teaching staff criticised the trust for the workload on teachers with large classrooms.
The Star has received numerous emails from INOVA staff in the last week, who continue to criticise spending, pointing to the at-times six figure salaries of executives, the rollout of iPads & tablet computers to staff across its school, and an annual meeting in June 2025 thrown at The Crucible which cost £25,000.
All told, the strikes at INOVA came about because of outrage that compulsory redundancies were ever considered, and staff felt further insulted by the appearance of grandiose executive spending.
In contrast, the trust seeks to assure staff Project Pioneer comes at no cost, neither financially or to anyone’s jobs.
The next NEU strike days at INOVA are set to go ahead on June 16 and 17.