To have pretty much automated 90% of my job and pretend I'm very busy?

Can you ask them to pay for you to upskill in related areas, particularly data science/ machine learning/ AI. From what you've said it sounds like what you're doing now is data analysis, is that right? But would it be useful for your employer if you could extend it to predict future student outcomes (such as drops in attainment or school refusal, or whatever is relevant - I'm not a domain expert here) using DS/ ML tools?

If so, would they pay for you to upskill in these areas? Then when you're ready you can jump ship to a much better paid job in DS/ML?

I just wanted to say how impressed I am with your skills!

Why not introduce them to using AI for lesson plans?

Do you know enough about how other departments and tasks work to have a view of other pain points? Could you create your own job description? If so, you could sit down with your manager/someone you think will listen, explain the situation and point out other things you could be fixing/focusing on. Then you’d have more to do, but would have control over what you’re doing and by when.

Any company worth their salt would recognise the talent they have in front of them and give you the chance to solve more of their problems. You could also talk about what a reward/compensation package could look like, if you’re able to meet some additional targets.

You may find you get the occasional surge of work when new government guidance comes out, provided of course that your employers read it.

I don't completely understand though - you refer to Phil as a piss taker when at worst he sounds incompetent, whereas you actually are taking the mick a bit?

You are still needed to manage the system, deal with bespoke requests and be generally helpful on the IT side, so you are very much doing a fulltime job, even if you are effectively on-call most of the time.

Maybe you could share this with our Data Manager, she seems clueless and there’s constant issues with the MIS and other systems. She’s part time, so if she’s not there, I end up picking up and stumbling through it, I’m not even IT trained.

Op, can you see other places within the working environment where you can make changes? Preferably without getting anyone made redundant!

Dear god no, don't say anything. Just keep your head down and enjoy it.

I'd look to gain competence in the fast growing sector of Machine Learning / AI. You've got to think ahead for your future career once your own kid is less dependent and this is an obvious area for you. Take a look at what professional certifications might be suitable for you and get learning - there are loads of good options out there.

Wfh 2 days a week. Stay up a business in your free time.

Sounds like you are in sixth form or FE sector. Depends on your Principal ... you could always offer a service to other colleges if wanted.

You are blowing my little mind right now and I’m going to have to go play with some of this reporting stuff…

Id say wfh but use the time to start your next move - once your daughter is out of primary school etc - maybe start your own business/ consulting in the future as there is a LOT of businesses that would love this type of data. Well done

This is the dream. Get your life admin done, and yes try to WFH 2 days! I feel sorry for Phil a bit. I hope he is non the wiser. It wouldn't do him much good to find out how inefficient he was at this point.

Can you answer this OP?

Maybe when you move on someone will notice and it will ruin your reference or maybe someone will join the team who will be aware of the potential to automate and will offer to do it or something?

I mean, if you're confident there will be no negative consequences I would just sit back and enjoy it!

Can you do some Consultancy work? Share your systems and efficiencies?

Im an Assistant Head who only gets the basics of Excel so this sounds amazing to me!

Can you do some extra consulting on the side from home?

Can you not bundle all this up under your name/school name/whatever and roll this out to other schools?

Our LA did that years ago with some other software they created. Nice little earner plus training opportunities for more money

Hmm, there is an endpoint to this though, isn't there - at some point you'll leave, and someone will say, Er, what exactly was Bob doing all day?

And even if it is in the private sector, we're all probably paying for this one way or another, so I couldn't do this.

I did something similar years ago in my then new job. I'm saving the company double my salary annually as a conservative estimate, so the way i see it is that ive covered the cost of emploing me. Like you, there is no proportional prospects.

I always offer to assist colleagues, and routinely offer to take on any duties that my line manager might need, and always willing to help out. In my down time I do some udemy courses, go online, and do things like meal plan and online orders, pay my bills and sort out life admin stuff.

Some weeks I've extra tasks like last week and was busy but otherwise I'm far from overworked.

Be careful. If you 'confess', your employers might decide to fire you and hire someone else to cover the couple of hours of work you do. They would be taking advantage of your hard work automating so much. You have pretty much made yourself redundant. If I were you I would build in some sort of kill switch so that sure, they can fire you, but if you go then your systems go with you.

This got me thinking of how I would advise someone in a computer science/IT role where I work who’s good at automating and streamlining tasks, and is now actively looking for more work. I would be very appreciative if they came to talk to me and the other frontline workers (rather than managers) to see what other data handling tasks could be improved for us, you might have already been doing this though