On 13th May, MAT finance leaders attended our first national Customer Connect conference. After a series of regional events last year, we took the plunge and went one step further to bring everyone together in King’s Place, London for a day of practical workshops, customer stories, and hands-on product sessions.
Interest and engagement in the conference was frankly mind-blowing, and an incredible 236 delegates joined us to hear about the exciting things we have in development, learn from fellow sector finance leaders on ‘all things’ budgeting, and make time to attend masterclasses to understand how to get more out of IMP.
So, what did we discover? Here are our six key takeaways from IMP Software: Customer Connect 2025.
1. Supporting more MATs, investing in a first-class team
During his conference opener, CEO and Co-founder Will Jordan shared that we now work with 525 MATs, including over 100 new trusts in the past 12 months. Most (54%) of schools in MATs now use IMP Planner. Will also outlined how, with the addition of IMP ICFP and IMP Finance (the first IMP Finance customer, an 11-school MAT, went live in May), we have “transitioned from a single provider to a solutions provider”. Will paid tribute to who he described as “97 legends” at the beating heart of the company across product and engineering, support, implementations, sales and marketing, and the central team who support over 7,000 users of IMP. He said that “attracting, developing and retaining colleagues” was IMP’s strategic pillar one for building a great place to work.
2. The first all-in-one MAT platform: delivering on our 2024 customer commitments
“Growth means better products and services, not worse”, Will said. Revisiting ‘our commitments to you…’ made at Customer Connect 2024, he delivered updates on progress, improvements made, and headlines from our recent customer survey. Among these, 49.8% of IMP customers have reported that “development pace is improving with growth”, and therefore the “investment in our 40-strong product and engineering team is being felt”. Planner support is now rated 8.9/10, and in fact over 50% of respondents scored 10/10 for support. IMP ICFP is used by 155 MATs and 1,600 schools now – with ‘value add’ being found in the variability of ICFP in primary and addressing issues around the deployment of leadership and education support e.g. EHCPs/teaching assistants. “We are starting to make a real difference in primaries, and how they are using it,” Will concluded.
3. Getting ready for Benchmarking 2.0
“Our ambition is now for benchmarking to influence government policy and thinking,” said Head of Education Warren Porter. Having launched the MAT Finance Sector Insights Report 2024, informed by the findings of personalised benchmarking reports tailored to individual MATs, Warren gave an overview of progress, overcoming issues around timing, and submitting benchmarking data through IMP and plans for 2025. A new Benchmarking Wizard Delivery will allow MATs to share data “at any point that they feel is right in the submission window” (1st July-31st July). Individual reports will be released in September, and the MAT Finance Sector Insights Report 2025 in October. New expanding insights to look out for are around MAT finance teams, school-level benchmarking, higher-paid staff, FTE analysis, investment income, and degrees of centralisation.
4. Funding pressures and an impassioned debate on the pay award gap
With increasing financial pressure across the sector – including NI grants not covering the full increase in costs, limited headroom for pay awards, and failing pupil rolls putting further strain on budgets – several trusts shared their perspectives. Chief Finance Officer Sarah Howells set out how Oasis Community Learning is navigating these challenges across their 54 academies – but it was the discussion on pay awards that sparked debate. Whilst the majority of trusts in attendance said (when asked) that they were planning for a 2.8% increase in teacher pay, “government would be under pressure to fund anything above that” (including the reported 4%). One trust even reported that they would run out of reserves in three years’ time if the pay award was 4%, given their falling pupil numbers.
5. Other inspirational customer insights and “stories from the trenches”
Michelle Plumtree, Chief Financial Officer at Learning Without Limits Academy Trust, discussed how the Trust has managed to get ALL stakeholders onboard with ICFP to create alignment and a culture of everyone pulling in the same direction so they can truly embed ICFP into their way of working and planning principles. This has supported understanding of non-contact activities, underpinned recruitment strategy, and led to reconsideration of curriculum changes. Meanwhile, Greenshaw Learning Trust’s Simon Hunter shared insights on his work across 37 schools and how the role of Finance Business Partner can lead to strong relationships with schools and inform decision-making. Gary Mizler (Chief Finance Officer) presented on ‘How LEARNERS’ Trust and their 18 schools are facing 25/26 financial pressures head on’. You can read a case study on our work with LEARNERS’ Trust here.
6. Making the next step: what’s next for IMP?
Throughout the day, delegates learned of the range of developments that IMP is working on to further improve customer experience, including ASK AI (name to be confirmed!): an AI-friendly virtual assistant, which has been trained with 6,301 questions over the past year, will launch in September. This will be located as an extra option in the Help Centre, and will complement (not replace) existing in-person and online customer support. Training for ASK AI is available now. Beta programmes to shape new features like Visual Reporting and Salary Reconciliation are also open for interested MATs.
Thanks to everyone who was part of our 2025 user group conference. Planning is already underway for Customer Connect 2026, and if you would like to present next year, or be part of our other events, please do drop us a line.
Our MAT CFO Insights Survey 2025, which seeks to further drive awareness of MAT finance issues ahead of the next academic year, is now open. This survey is open to MAT CFOs in both IMP customers and non-IMP customers. The deadline for responses is Friday 13th June. Thank you for your input.
