This consultation followed the inaugural meeting of the Institute in January 2009. It was concerned with the proposed functions of the Institute and the draft competencies drawn up by the Learning and Skills Council following their research project and published in their report in December 2007.

12 responses were received.

3 responses were fully supportive of all the proposals.

1 response queried the need for a new institute and felt that there would be a lot of overlap with existing organisations.

8 responses were supportive in principle but made a number of comments and suggestions as summarised below:

• Definitions of membership should be more inclusive, recognise a diversity of roles and not be dependent on management experience in a large organisation.
• Levels of membership should not be dependent on management experience and should be kept simple.
• The balance between knowledge and practice should place more emphasis on practice.
• Draft competencies are too detailed, cumbersome and not user friendly; many are generic to good managers and not fully focussed on equality and diversity.
• Assessment will be difficult and concern was expressed about who would carry it out, how it would be done, whether there would be arrangements for appeals.
• The emphasis of the Institute should be on individual practitioners and support for them.

Response of the Board: The Board took serious note of these comments and suggestions; they were of particular value to the work of the Standards and Products Working Group, which worked on the next stage of the proposed arrangements and procedures.