How the classroom shapes leaders for life

Oliver was part of the second Teach First Training Programme cohort in 2004. After teaching science in Bexley, a work placement at Deloitte sparked a career journey that has come full circle. Now leading Deloitte’s education practice, Oliver reflects on how his time in the classroom continues to shape his leadership, perspective and commitment to tackling educational inequality.

I graduated from the Training Programme in 2004 and completed my teaching qualification at Canterbury Christ Church that summer. I then spent two years in the classroom as a science teacher at the Business Academy, Bexley.

As part of the Teach First programme, I had the opportunity to do two work placements – one at the Department for Education and one at Deloitte. I applied to Deloitte and here I am.

Today, I lead Deloitte’s education practice, which spans the full breadth of the sector – from working with the Department for Education, schools, further and higher educational institutions, private providers including EdTech and outsourced services.

It’s a large, diverse portfolio, and one I’ve recently taken on – which makes it a particularly poetic moment to be celebrating 20 years of this partnership.

Lessons from the classroom

Even though it was some time ago, I think back to those days in the classroom regularly.

Teaching shaped me in ways that go far beyond the professional.

One of the most important things teaching gave me is genuine empathy for the people I’m working with. As a science teacher, I had to get up to speed quickly with content I wasn’t always familiar with – but more importantly, I had to get to know the students. You have to understand what’s going on in children’s daily lives, tailor your message, and treat each person as an individual. That lesson has stayed with me.

In my line of work now, relationships are everything – and I’ve learned that too often in business, people focus on the content and forget the people.

Teaching taught me how to hold the emotional and the professional at the same time.

I remember a pupil coming to me at the start of the day and sharing something deeply disturbing that had happened at home. I was 22 years old. I had to listen, console him, report it, and then walk into a classroom and teach a lesson as if nothing had happened – knowing I’d never find out what happened next. That was sobering. Maturing. And it’s something I draw on now when I’m managing a team through a difficult period – whether that’s a bereavement, an illness, or a difficult life moment – while still needing to deliver for clients.

Some of the techniques I was taught while teaching I genuinely still use: how to facilitate workshops, keep a room’s attention and structure ideas clearly.

And I’ve carried those lessons beyond work too – into coaching under-11s cricket and into parenting. The lessons from Teach First are pervasive across my whole life, when I think about it.

20 years of partnership

What makes the Deloitte and Teach First partnership unique is that I’m a product of it. I can speak to that partnership not as an observer but as someone whose career – and arguably whose life – was shaped by it. That’s not a small thing.

The fact that I now lead Deloitte’s education practice means I can speak with genuine authority about the sector – not just because I’ve advised on it, but because I’ve been a frontline public servant in it. That credibility matters enormously when you’re sitting across the table from a headteacher or a civil servant. And it comes directly from Teach First.

More broadly, the Teach First and Deloitte partnership has infused the wider workforce with people who truly understand how hard teaching is.

There are many Teach First alumni who haven’t gone back into the classroom, but who hold teachers in the highest possible esteem because of what they went through. I include myself in that. What I witnessed from the colleagues around me – some naturally gifted, some who worked incredibly hard to become so – was inspiring. That perspective is something you don’t lose.

Rewriting the future for children facing disadvantage

The impact is both direct and systemic.

Directly, Deloitte colleagues are on the ground – volunteering, mentoring, bringing professional expertise into schools and programmes that serve young people who might not otherwise encounter those kinds of opportunities.

Systemically, the partnership is doing something subtle and powerful: it’s producing leaders – in business, in policy, in education – who understand disadvantage from the inside.

People like me, who went into schools in communities that needed support and came out with a perspective that we carry into every room we walk into. When I’m advising my clients, or when I’m thinking about how Deloitte’s work can better serve the education sector, I bring that lens with me.

I look forward to finding the right ways – intelligently and without conflict – to think about how Deloitte’s commercial work for the education sector can dovetail with our social value work and our support for Teach First as a partner. There’s more we can do there, and it’s something I’m genuinely excited about.

Driving change in education

Year 8 was the hardest group I ever had to teach. And I say that genuinely – every stakeholder challenge I’ve faced since has felt more manageable by comparison. That’s both a joke and a serious point.

Teaching builds resilience, adaptability and a kind of human understanding that is genuinely rare in the corporate world.

The more of that we can bring into business, the better.

But the bigger point is this: educational inequality doesn’t solve itself. It requires sustained, committed, long–term partnerships between organisations that are willing to put real resource behind a shared purpose.

Twenty years is significant. The fact that this one has lasted so long – and that it’s produced people who are now leading education practices at major professional services firms – is a testament to what’s possible when you stay the course.

I hope future Teach First stakeholders realise how vital that is. And I hope this anniversary is not just a celebration but a recommitment, because the work is far from done.

Helping every child fulfil their potential

For 20 years, Deloitte and Teach First have helped young people believe in what’s possible. Read more stories involving colleagues, pupils and volunteers whose lives have been changed through the power of opportunity.

Read more about the partnership