3 Responses

1. Management accreditation
   We have used OCR as our awarding body and have been very pleased with the sharing of ‘best practice’ and support we have received at both levels 4 and 5 NVQ across both operational and strategic management. Also ILM have loads of experience with management qualifications and are easy to deal with.

   We wanted to use new technology present in workplaces to gather evidence and OCR are extremely supportive and open minded in the sorts of evidence available. We also are registered with EDEXCEL but have only ever used OCR for the reasons above. The standards are UK wide and it is really, as with most things, down to the supplier of the service rather than the awarding body when dealing with qualifications at this level.

   As for the best supplier to provide that depends on the sort of business you are in. Occupational competancy in your business area is very important and should be the fundamental question you ask of any provider of the NVQ assessment/training process. Class room based training for NVQ process is dwindling (a good move) as the process of a truly useful NVQ as a management qualification needs to be supported as the manager does the work. For example we teach strategy models, business planning and decision making processes away from the workplace with new managers but with more experienced managers they need to see the practical alongside the theory.

   We hope this is useful to you.

   Best of luck
   Training By Design Global Ltd
   0870 241 3998

2. Advise not doing it yourself
   I concur with Susan’s comments: we also use OCR (Edexecel also but clearly not flavour of the month at the moment). They all sell the same product (as well to remember they do just sell!) and you make a choice based of customer service levels.

   But do you need to register as a Centre if you only have 5 candidates? Whilst, in theory, the paperwork to support an assessment centre is not onerous, it is expensive and time consumming for very small numbers. I’d seriously try to find a partnership with a local centre (either an independent training provider, college or maybe another firm). It would be cheaper and allow you to focus on supporting the candidates rather than admin.

   If you want courses to support the knowledge elements of S/NVQs again look at a college for managers the DMS or similar diploma is ideal for Management levels 3/4. For level 5 you should be looking at postgraduate level qualifications to give the depth of underpinning knowledge.

   Peter Cox
   TMPL Consultants/Training

3. Arian Associates Ltd
   Sorry to disagree with the previous replies but the best accredited Management courses are those from the specialists:- The Chartered Management Institute (Formerly the Institute of Management) and The Institute of Leadership & Management (Formerly the ISM & NEBS Management) All of the others are hybrid awards and do not have much credibility in the ‘Real World’. Any college/uni will be able to help.