Are you an online tutoring agency or education provider struggling to recruit and retain the best teachers for your students? Or maybe you’re in the process of setting your teaching business up?
Let’s explore insights from successful tutoring agency owners and their teachers to help you find and keep the best talent for your online education business.
With over 10 years experience teaching with various companies and independently, Katie co-founded an online ESL tutoring agency back in 2020.
What NOT to do – the five biggest complaints
First, it’s important to get the basics right. In our poll of almost 50 online teachers, the top five reasons they selected for leaving their last online tutoring company were:
- Low pay, pay cuts, or changes to pay structures (42%)
- Lack of progression opportunities (18%)
- Micromanagement / unreasonable requests from admin (15%)
- Lack of flexibility – class cancellation / rescheduling, vacation periods, etc (7%)
- Unreasonable penalties and fines (7%)
Ok, now we know what NOT to do, let’s jump in to what you can do to attract and retain the best teachers for your online teaching business.
#1 Pay a fair rate and support pay progression
This was clearly highlighted as the top reason for teachers leaving a company, and is therefore critical for recruiting and retaining the best teachers.
Research the pay expectations for your target market – not just the legal minimum wage, but the average salaries for teachers with the specific qualifications and experience you require. If you want to attract the best talent, you need to be paying higher than that.
⚠️ Yes, some people will accept lower, but they’ll do the bare minimum work for the job and be constantly looking for better opportunities elsewhere. The result? High teacher turnover and constant stress recruiting and training new hires. In our survey, 42% of online teachers stated pay as a reason for leaving.
And then to actually keep those amazing teachers, offer clear pay progression opportunities. Many companies do this based on the number of hours taught.
A good example of this for an entry-level company is MyTutor. While their base pay starts rather low, at £13.69 per hour (approx. $18 USD), as teachers teach more classes they collect coins and work up to £26.50 ($35 USD) per hour.
Consider also offering bonuses for trial class conversions, student exam scores, or other key targets. These reward teachers who get the best results for their students and your business.
And while we’re talking about money – have fair policies paying teachers (usually 50% of the usual class fee is standard) if a student cancels last minute too.
#2 Support, don’t penalise, teachers
Everyone falls sick occasionally, so be an understanding employer. DON’T impose fines on teachers for things like emergency cancellations or tech issues. These are not only legally dubious, but also a major cause of teacher turnover.
Instead, consider how you can support them and smooth things over with students during these situations.
We write emails that our tutors can choose to send to their clients when they are unwell and need to cancel, or when their clients cancels without notice and they need to charge them. It is really simple but takes the stress away from the tutor. For us it works well as we know that it is professional and in our brand language. Tutors don’t have to use it, but it is there if they wish.
#3 Reduce workload and make teaching easy
One of the main reasons online teachers apply to work for a company or agency is that it’s a lot less work outside of class time compared to teaching their own students independently. Teachers just want to turn up and teach!
To reduce teachers’ workload:
- Provide high quality, pre-made teaching materials, such as the Abridge Academy curriculum.
- Create self-marking homework and assessments, using tools such as WordWall.
- Reduce class feedback expectations – a few bullet points and check-box ratings is sufficient.
- Don’t expect teachers to answer students’ / parents’ questions outside of hours.
- Use a calendar booking system so teachers can easily update their availability.
#4 Offer career growth opportunities and training
Even with fair pay progression, teachers can feel stuck when they reach that highest tier of your pay scale. And all teachers need to be supported in developing their teaching skills and longer term career.
Having structured training and options for teachers to take on new roles (e.g. teacher mentor, teaching groups, pay raise, etc.) really helps them stay motivated and feel like they are making personal/professional progress.
Consider offering:
- Additional (paid) roles alongside teaching, such as resources development, new tutor training, and marketing.
- Opportunities for top teachers to be featured as “teacher of the month“.
- Certificates and awards for teachers upon reaching key milestones.
- Training for teachers, from entry-level to specialist courses.
These not only help teachers feel valued and supported, but also improve student feedback and help you grow your business too.
Looking for structured, high-quality, ready-to-teach lesson materials?
The Abridge Academy curriculum offers structured, high-quality, ready-to-teach lesson materials for online ESL teachers, virtual schools, and tutoring agencies.
✅ Structured, interactive, ready-to-teach ESL lesson materials.
✅ Placement test, trial classes, and onboarding materials to support your teachers converting new students.
✅ Teacher training, including free face-to-face workshops and self-paced courses.
#5 Trust your teachers to teach
It can be difficult to find a good balance between providing training, support, and consistent policies; without micromanaging, criticising, or removing teachers’ autonomy. But get it right and your teachers will love teaching with you.
This might be the opposite of an answer, but if the company leaves you alone and lets you do your job that’s how they can support me.
| Do | Don’t |
|---|---|
| ✅ Provide training and mentoring, including lesson feedback. | ❌ Watch teachers live in class and interrupt to provide feedback. |
| ✅ Have consistent policies and class expectations. | ❌ Change policies or allow parents to dictate everything. |
| ✅ Offer high quality, flexible, pre-made teaching materials. | ❌ Script lessons or force teachers to change their entire teaching style. |
One teacher surveyed, Laura, had a particular issue with an agency micromanaging and being inconsistent with class feedback expectations. She felt that companies should have clearer policies and protect teachers from parents, so they can focus on teaching the way they know works best:
A company I worked for wanted me to do mock Cambridge English exams and give corrections and advice. I did so according to Cambridge guidelines, but the parents complained because I wasn’t correcting every single mistake. Then when I corrected every single mistake as she asked me to, she then told me a different parent complained about me correcting too much. Changing on the whim of a parents a few times a month is confusing and doesn’t get the best out of your teachers.
#6 Build a community and provide real support
Set up a community group for your teachers and support staff – a place to ask questions, share teaching tips, and discuss ideas. Run regular events or activities for teachers to keep them engaged. This community will quickly become a hub of support and helps teachers feel part of a bigger movement.
Additionally, make sure you provide actual support to teachers. This could be via a dedicated line manager, a teacher success coach, or an admin assistant to answer important questions and resolve issues quickly.
I used to work for a large online school with thousands of teachers and we were all given a personal manager that we could contact anytime and they would get back to us quickly to deal with any problems. We also had a monthly video meeting with them. It was great.
After some time they decided to fire all of the managers and replace them with an AI chatbot. To actually speak to a human when the chatbot obviously failed at its task that you had to wait up to 48 hours to get a reply and it was useless. That was the beginning of the end for me and I didn’t stay long after that!
#7 Recruit the right teachers in the first place
It’s all very well and good having all this support and strategies to retain teachers. But how can you make sure you’re hiring the very best talent in the first place?
Firstly, have a clear idea of exactly who you need. Consider the specific qualifications and experience you require, check your requirements align with your budget for tutor salaries, and identify where these ideal teachers actually look for jobs.
Hiring entry-level online teachers
If you’re offering more entry-level positions (with training provided), you might want to focus on more generic job boards such as Indeed. These reach a wide audience, including many people looking for a flexible, work-from-home income.
You could also partner with teacher training companies such as TEFL course providers or university career services, which often have job boards for recent graduates.
Hiring experienced online teachers
If you want to attract more qualified and experienced teachers, you may wish to advertise on specialist jobs boards such as TES, eTeach, or Teach Away.
Additionally, consider partnering with professional teaching bodies such as IATEFL or The Tutors’ Association. These organisations often have their own jobs boards, as well as offering opportunities to present at conferences, sponsor events, or contribute to professional publications. Building your brand awareness among the professional teaching community helps attract the very best teachers to work for you.
In summary…
Recruiting and retaining the best teachers for your online teaching business can be a challenge, but these strategies can really help:
- Pay a fair rate and provide clear pay progression.
- Reduce workload with pre-made teaching materials, tech tools, and reduced out-of-class responsibilities.
- Offer career progression opportunities and training.
- Trust your teachers to teach.
- Build a community with collaboration, events, and live support.
- Recruit teachers through the best teacher recruitment channels for your specific needs.
And honestly, your teacher recruitment and retention strategy will require continual evaluation and improvement. Above all, listen to your teachers and provide them with a positive, supportive, and rewarding teaching experience.
Looking for structured, high-quality, ready-to-teach lesson materials?
The Abridge Academy curriculum offers structured, high-quality, ready-to-teach lesson materials for online ESL teachers, virtual schools, and tutoring agencies.
✅ Structured, interactive, ready-to-teach ESL lesson materials.
✅ Placement test, trial classes, and onboarding materials to support your teachers converting new students.
✅ Teacher training, including free face-to-face workshops and self-paced courses.