Training for iProfessionals by iProfessionals
Continuing Professional Development: Interactive Companies
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Companies, skills and CPD
How does this relate to CPD? There are 2 parts to CPD to achieve the best value.
- The company needs to define what will serve its needs best, and provide guidance/incentives to its employees to help them achieve their professional development in line with these needs.
- The individual takes part in activities that lead towards professional development in line with what he/she agrees and with what the company wishes.
Either the company or the individual should keep a record of the development that can be verified, so that external appraisal and agreement of the development can take place if and when necessary. There are several parties that are interested in an individual's learning record. For example, recruitment agencies find them valuable for defining the skills to a potential new employer. Increasingly academics need these records to accredit prior learning for post-graduate or professional short courses. The records may save money by reducing the number of modules to take to achieve a formal qualification.
CPD (Continuing Professional Development) applies to each individual in your company, including yourself. It represents your professional self-development. The interactive sector changes so quickly that a person has to learn on the run. This is the nature of self-development in this volatile sector. People in the interactive industries do a lot of development but it does not fall into previously accepted categories such as formal training courses, university short courses, or employee appraisals. Increasingly in this jobbing rather than job-for-life information society, it falls to the individual to strive to keep abreast with developments in the specialist field. People learn on-the-job with various means - by tapping into colleagues – both real and virtual, for example. They solve problems as they come across a dilemma. They spend some of their own time getting to grips with a new piece of software etc.
Other initiatives in other sectors have moved to people keeping a learning record each year to show how they have met professional expectations. Doctors, dentists and lawyers, for example, have to demonstrate that they have taken part in a certain number of self-development hours over a year to keep their credentials current. (Note: we offer a free individual CPD interactive template resource to allow individuals to keep track of their CPD activities. See www.atsf.co.uk/cpdi.html.)
The interactive sector has not had a strong record in training its people. Many companies are very small so that they do not require a dedicated human resources manager. If the company does have an HR resource, training and development is often one of the responsibilities and may kick-start initiatives for self-development. Slowly, companies in the interactive sector are taking initiatives to up-skill its people.
CPD has more value to a company if the individual up-skills in a way that serves both the individual and their company. A company has an obligation to meet the needs of its clients whether it is providing services or products. To do this, the right mix of people with the right set of skills need to operate together to achieve a brief. It is this balance between the skill needs of the company and the needs of the individual that forms the basis of a company CPD scheme. If the individual is operating alone for self-development, the company may or may not benefit to the best that is achievable.