Comments on: What does CPD look like?

By: pauldrasmussen

pauldrasmussen — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 05:31:34 +0000

The idea that it all counts is a great one. One of the things we do for all of that informal kind of learning is allow individual staff members to capture anything they think might count as professional development in their own personal section of our student management system, they can then print that out at anytime as well as a ‘transcript’ of all of the official training activities they have undertaken as evidence of CPD

By: Sukh Pabial

Sukh Pabial — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 20:29:19 +0000

Appreciate the comment, thanks Ade.

By: Sukh Pabial

Sukh Pabial — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 20:27:59 +0000

The whole certificates thing is really interesting with CPD. I guess they’re a necessity for ROI purposes, but they prove very little. So how do we get these learners to prove they’re engaging in CPD?

By: Sukh Pabial

Sukh Pabial — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 20:25:13 +0000

“All content is equal, but its impact isn’t.” This is spot on, Kev.

By: Ade

Ade — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 17:55:58 +0000

You are so right. CPD is very important. Even more important is CPD built on solid “Self Awareness” foundation.

By: David Goddin

David Goddin — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 10:57:28 +0000

Can events & workshops stop churning out CPD certificates now then?

If you (the learner) need to be reminded of what you did then the learning didn’t stick and the CPD certificate is misleading. If the organisation or body needs to see evidence of learning, then CPD certificates just show attendance not learning.

Makes you wonder what has been going in the minds of folk who’ve valued CPD certs…

By: Kev Wyke (@kevwyke)

Kev Wyke (@kevwyke) — Thu, 04 Oct 2012 21:42:31 +0000

They all count, but they count more if they have an impact on what you do back at the ranch. And they count even more than that if you can figure out what the impact was, what changed and why it happened. That’s why CPD should be owned by the individual, in fact has to be owned by the individual. It is up to them to understand the value of a piece of learning, to know if it has changed their practice, to understand if it has made a difference.

So not all learning is created equal, or perhaps its better to say that all content is equal, but its impact isn’t. That impact isn’t to do with the content or the content provider, it is to do with the learner. A 2 hour lecture with the worlds leading authority on left toe nail surgery may have little in it to change the practice of the worlds leading right toe nail surgeon, but it may make a hell of a difference to the left foot rehab nurse. ( No I don’t think those jobs really exist, and yes it’s a rubbish example) At the end of the day only the learners will be able to judge.

And that’s my point, CPD can be almost anything and we should be encouraging our collegues to use as wide a range of learning opportunities as possible, but L&D mustn’t try to define CPD, we should just help learners to understand which bits make a difference to what they do and to figure out as best they can why so they can make good choices in the future.