Qualification Options

  • NEW Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care 3096-51 (England)

The NEW Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care is a competence-based qualification which has been designed to meet the Skills for Care qualification criteria. City & Guilds conducted additional consultation with employers and assessment centres during the development of the qualification.

The qualification covers the knowledge and skills required to work as a leader and manager of an adult care service, such as domiciliary/home care or residential care for adults with a range of care and support needs. The main purpose of the role supported by this qualification is to lead and manage a service, including having responsibilities for staff or staff teams who deliver the service.

This Level 5 Diploma enables learners to demonstrate and develop the skills and knowledge required within a role which has autonomy, responsibility for supervision of others, decision making, safeguarding, leading and managing services, service improvement, managing end of life care, governance and regulatory requirements.

Consisting of mandatory units, which cover core knowledge and skills competencies, plus a number of optional specialism units, this qualification can be adapted in flexible ways to reflect the real working context of each learner and their work setting.

Age Group – 19 or older

The City & Guilds Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care (England) is an occupational qualification for learners who lead adult care settings in England. Learners must be in a leadership role which provides the opportunities to apply the knowledge, skills and behaviours required in this qualification. The outcome of the qualification is to confirm occupational competence at level 5.

This qualification is applicable to variety of roles such as:

• Registered managers
• Managers
• Assistant managers
• Deputy managers

In settings such as:

• Residential services for older people/work age adults
• Domiciliary care services
• Day services
• Respite services
• Community based services

This Level 5 Diploma covers a range of skills and knowledge relating to leadership and management of adult care services in England, such as: Decision-making, safeguarding, leading and managing services, service improvement, leading person-centred care and governance and regulatory requirements.

The qualification is structured in a way which means that all learners will have to complete a group of 21 mandatory units, the content of which is appropriate across many leadership roles in adult care .

In addition there is a range of optional units to support areas of specialism, including:

  • Learning disabilities
  • Advocacy
  • Mental health and wellbeing
  • End of life Care
  • Clinical Skills
  • Domiciliary Care
  • Management skills
  • Study Skills

To achieve the City & Guilds Level 5 Diploma in Leading and Managing an Adult Care Service (England) learners must achieve a minimum of 90 credits: 79 credits from the mandatory units and a minimum of 11 credits from the optional units

Full qualification guidance (England) – Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care 3096-51 (England) QHB V2-0 March 23

90 credits / 900 TQT

All learners vary on the timescale to complete their qualification.
When you register, you will be given a specified target date in which to achieve your qualification, you can complete your qualification sooner than the target date if you are able to submit work regularly and at a good pace. Specific target dates can be discussed and agreed with your Assessor.

Total Qualification Time (TQT) is set at 900 hrs, this is based on the average amount of time taken to achieve these qualifications, over an average completion period of 24-36 months.

Complete qualification (including Registration, Learner Pack, Assessment and Certification) prices start from:

• Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care - £3834.00.

These prices are reduced significantly for learners and organisations with their own in-house assessor support.
Registration only from:

• Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care - £923.00.

*ARC members benefit from reduced costs

*WDF funding has not yet been announced for this qualification, please contact us for more information*

WDF information

To register for any of these qualifications, you need to complete the necessary registration forms. This will prompt support for you to consider all the aspects involved in undertaking the qualification and ensure the right one is selected for you. You will also need to seek permission from your organisation to collect evidence in the workplace.

To find out more about registering please click here ‘How to Register’.

All ARC learner documentation is included in our learner portfolios, these can also be accessed via our ‘’Documentation, Guidance & Policies’ section in word and .pdf format.

Awarding Organisation guidance is available via the same page.