Tom Rennie

School and College Trust Leader, Dixons Academies Trust

Tom’s career started in several private sector FTSE 100 organisations including British Aerospace, ICI and Lex Service. His career initially focused on IT and large-scale business change programmes but grew to include HR, finance, customer service and procurement moving through roles from business analyst to managing director. This grounding in corporate services led to Tom moving into the setup and delivery of large-scale shared services teams for Network Rail and five UK Police Forces as CEO. A common theme across Tom’s more recent career has been leading transformation initiatives in local and central government to improve the efficiency and service quality of each organisation. Since October 2023, Tom has moved into a career in education to implement a new business services function at Dixons.

1 Workshop series three

Transforming business services to improve support for schools

At our last Finance and Operations Conference, we heard how Dixons Academies Trust was radically reimagining its business services to schools, and the rigorous foundations it had established for service transformation. A year on, we are delighted to welcome the Dixons' Project and Service Leads back to share their experience of implementation. Tom Rennie, Amanda Bailey and Orrin Campbell will set out what has been achieved in phase one, its impact, and the feedback received. They will also outline how and what the second phase will deliver in spring 2025, and their new approach to the continuous improvement of business services to their schools.