Author: Teopista Birungi Mayanja, Vice Chair – Uganda National Institute of Teacher Education; LGI Champion

In May 2025, I had the privilege of joining stakeholders from across Tanzania’s education sector for a policy dialogue on Teacher Workforce Planning and Management. The dialogue brought together government agencies, development partners, teacher representatives, and experts to discuss a recent Rapid Mapping of Tanzania’s Teacher Life Cycle which sought to identify key enablers and barriers to effective policy implementation related to teacher workforce planning and management.

This policy dialogue catalysed a series of engagements over the last year that have aimed to unpack the mapping and develop concrete recommendations for decision makers, with the support of the Learning Generation Initiative and the broader What Works Hub for Global Education community.

To catalyse reflection and spark action, I shared Uganda’s experience with teacher workforce planning and management—an area where I have been deeply engaged for many years. The discussion in Tanzania underscored how central the education workforce is to education reform. Teachers sit at the heart of the system; without a well-supported, well-distributed, and well-managed teaching force, even the most ambitious policies struggle to take root.

Why Teacher Workforce Planning Matters 

Across countries, teacher salaries constitute the largest share of education budgets. This alone makes workforce planning a strategic priority. But beyond financing, teachers are the frontline actors who interpret, adapt, and ultimately implement reforms in classrooms. If they are insufficient in number, poorly deployed, inadequately supported, or left out of decision-making, reforms risk stalling before they reach learners.

Effective teacher workforce planning requires a full lifecycle perspective—from recruitment and training to deployment, retention, well-being, and career development. Each stage shapes the next; weaknesses in one area often cascade, reducing equity, quality, and system coherence.

What Effective Teacher Workforce Planning Involves 

The dialogue highlighted the many interconnected elements that must come together to build a strong education workforce. Effective systems consider:

  • Initial training and continuous professional development that is coherent, aligned with reforms, and practice-based ensuring teachers have the skills, competencies, and knowledge required.  
  • Equitable deployment, addressing rural-urban disparities, ensuring an inclusive workforce, and considering teachers’ personal and family circumstances and well-being. 
  • Retention and attrition management, including workforce forecasting and planning for natural exits. 
  • Working conditions such as facilities, safety, security, health, and workload. 
  • Remuneration, including the size of the wagebill. 
  • Career pathways and progression, which shape teacher morale and long-term professional growth.  

Enablers of Strong Workforce Systems 

The dialogue and learning amongst Tanzanian stakeholders has reinforced several enabling conditions that countries must strengthen to achieve coherent teacher workforce management:

  • Institutional coherence: Effective teacher workforce planning depends on alignment across functions—including training, deployment, pay, professional development, and regulations. When these are not coordinated, systems can experience gaps, delays, and inconsistencies between policy and practice.  
  • Culture of data use: Accurate, accessible data is essential, but equally critical is building the capacity, skills, mindset, and behaviors for regular analysis and interpretation for evidence-based decision making.  
  • Political will: Reforming teacher workforce systems often requires difficult trade-offs. Strong political leadership ensures prioritisation, resource allocation, building buy-in, accountability, and sustainability. 
  • Social dialogue: Institutionalized, meaningful engagement can reduce tensions, improve reform design, and strengthen collective ownership of change. 

These enablers echo lessons emerging across LGI’s work on the education workforce: systems change requires collaboration, coherence, and investment in people.

Lessons from Uganda’s Experience 

Uganda’s path to strengthen teacher workforce planning and management continues to evolve, but several lessons may be useful for Tanzania and others:

  • Robust planning and management for teachers is an important part of the journey to ensure teachers are ready and able to support education reforms. 
  • Systems must be responsive and flexible to adapt to shifting political, demographic, and socio-economic realities.  
  • Effective planning considers the entire teacher lifecycle—from training to retirement.  
  • Teachers’ voice is essential. Formal mechanisms for consultation with teacher unions and other stakeholders can help ensure reforms are credible and rooted in classroom realities. Yet the data shows that many systems still underutilize teacher expertise: in Education International’s Status of Teachers survey, 29% of unions responded that they were rarely or never consulted on policy; 33% were not consulted on the development and selection of teaching materials; and 25% were not consulted on curriculum development. 
  • Political commitment can accelerate change. A major milestone in Uganda has been the enactment of the National Teachers’ Bill (2024), which gives legal force to the National Teachers’ Policy. The bill aims to professionalise and standardize the teaching profession and improve teacher development and management overall. It embeds reform into law, with the goal of ensuring that change is systematic, consistent, and sustained over time. 
  • Even where responsibilities sit across multiple agencies, clear mandates, incentives and robust accountability mechanisms can prevent fragmentation and ensure reforms are well aligned. 

Strengthening Education Workforce Systems for Lasting Change 

The policy dialogue highlighted challenges and insights that resonate beyond one county. Issues such as institutional coherence, data use, teacher engagement, and sustained political will are shared across education systems worldwide. Strengthening the education workforce is always a long-term effort, requiring alignment across the entire teacher lifecycle and a commitment to creating conditions where teachers can succeed.

As countries continue to reflect and learn from one another, these conversations become a powerful catalyst for progress. Ultimately, robust education workforce planning is a driver of equity and quality, ensuring that every child gets the education they deserve.

Photo credit: A teacher transferring knowledge to her students by GPE/Nainkwa (Trans.Lieu). Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.