The Datum Report

Occupation 2324 · Professional occupations

Early education and childcare services managers

Half of full-time early education and childcare services managers in the UK earn more than £30,140 a year, and half earn less.

Early education and childcare services managers plan, organise, direct and co-ordinate the administration, support systems and activities that facilitate the effective running of nurseries and early education centres.

How people enter it

Entrants will usually have a degree or level 3 qualification in childcare and significant relevant experience. Early years teacher status may be required. An additional management qualification may also be required by some employers. Entry is possible with a variety of academic qualifications, professional qualifications and/or relevant experience. A DBS check is mandatory.

What the work involves

• directs and co-ordinates the day-to-day activities of nurseries and early years education centres
• helps create a friendly, secure atmosphere to encourage the development of social and language skills and other learning
• determines staffing, financial, material and other short- and long-term requirements and ensures facility meets health, safety, Ofsted and other standards
• writes reports on children’s development and maintains awareness of health and safety issues
• communicates with parents and colleagues on children’s development and well-being

Also called

After school club manager · Childcare manager (day nursery) · Nursery manager (day nursery) · Pre-school manager

What it pays

How pay has changed

Median gross annual pay for early education and childcare services managers, full-time employees, 2023 to 2025. Each point is that year's ASHE April snapshot as published — revisions are not backfilled into earlier years, and a year ONS withheld is a gap rather than a joined line.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Year-on-year change

The change from each year to the next, in per cent, computed from the figures in the chart above — so the two cannot disagree.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Pay by region

Median gross annual pay for full-time employees, ranked, against the UK figure. 8 of 11 regions are published: ONS withholds a cell where the survey sample cannot support it, and those are shown as gaps rather than dropped — an absent region is not a region without the work in it.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Period 2025. Table

Every regional figure

ONS does not publish occupational pay below region. Cells the survey could not support are shown as withheld, with its reason — adding a region split to a specific occupation leaves roughly a tenth of cells publishable.

Common questions

Classified alongside this

Education advisers and school inspectors · Education managers · Head teachers and principals · Other educational professionals n.e.c