Written by our assessment team: what the criteria mean in practice, the evidence that works, and where learners get caught out.
What this unit is really about
Unit 525 is the Level 5 stakeholder unit, and unlike the Level 3 equivalent (317, which is external stakeholders only) it covers stakeholders generally — internal and external — and adds conflict, influencing and negotiation as substantive outcomes in their own right.
LO4 is where the evidence lives: a stakeholder management plan, engagement records, applied influencing and negotiation, applied conflict management, and a review of the impact of your approaches. All five criteria need real situations.
The evidence that works
| Learning outcome | Evidence that works well |
|---|
| LO1 — stakeholder management | What a stakeholder is, the importance of communication, how relationships are managed, and the strengths and limitations of stakeholder management models |
| LO2 — conflict | Types of conflict, and an evaluation of approaches to managing it |
| LO3 — influencing and negotiation | The difference between the two, influencing techniques, and the negotiation process |
| LO4 — manage relationships | Your stakeholder plan, engagement evidence, influencing and negotiation applied, conflict management applied, and a review of impact |
The models, with their limitations
Criterion 1.4 explicitly asks for strengths and limitations of stakeholder management models, so do not just draw the grid:
| Model | Strength | Limitation |
|---|
| Power–interest grid (Mendelow) | Simple, actionable, widely understood | A snapshot; positions shift, and it flattens "power" into one dimension |
| Salience model (Mitchell, Agle and Wood) — power, legitimacy, urgency | Explains why some stakeholders get attention they should not | Harder to apply quickly; judgement-heavy |
| Stakeholder circle / influence mapping | Captures relationships between stakeholders | Time-consuming to build and maintain |
| RACI | Precise on decision rights for a piece of work | Says nothing about relationship or influence |
The observation that lifts this criterion: these models tell you how to categorise stakeholders, not how to change a relationship — and the informal influence network usually matters more than the formal grid.
Influencing versus negotiation
Criterion 3.1 asks for the difference, and it is worth being crisp. Influencing changes what someone wants or believes — it works on preferences and is often one-directional, with no explicit trade. Negotiation starts from acknowledged differing interests and trades to reach an agreement; there is something on the table.
For techniques (3.2), Cialdini's principles — reciprocity, commitment and consistency, social proof, authority, liking, scarcity, unity — are the standard reference, and using them means naming which you actually used and why it fitted. For the negotiation process (3.3): preparation, opening, exploring interests, proposing and trading, agreement and implementation. Preparation is where negotiations are won, and knowing your BATNA — your best alternative if no deal is reached — is the concept most worth applying to a real case.
Conflict, properly framed
For LO2, distinguish task conflict (about what to do — often productive), process conflict (about how and who), and relationship conflict (personal, and generally destructive). The evaluative point is that task conflict left unmanaged usually converts into relationship conflict, which is why early handling matters more than the technique chosen.
The Thomas–Kilmann modes — competing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding, accommodating — are the standard frame for criterion 2.2, and the evaluation is that no mode is best: avoiding is right for a trivial issue that will resolve itself, competing is right where safety or compliance is at stake, and collaborating is expensive in time. Show a real situation where you deliberately chose a mode you would not usually use.
Useful reading
