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How to support your employees: CPD and supervision

All our registrants are required to undertake continuing professional development (CPD)

As an employer, we encourage you to support your employees in meeting this important requirement.

FAQs for employers about CPD

  • This is how our registrants (your employees) learn and develop throughout their career, keeping their skills and knowledge up to date. This supports them to practise safely and effectively.

    To meet the CPD standards we set, your employee should:

    • carry out learning activities on a regular basis;
    • carry out different kinds of learning activities;
    • keep a record of their learning;
    • carry out activities that might improve their practice and benefit their service users; and
    • take part in an audit if asked.
  • We randomly select 2.5 per cent of each profession and ask them to complete and submit a CPD profile when they are renewing their registration.

    A CPD audit is our consideration of that CPD profile against our standards of continuing professional development and a decision about whether the standards have been met.

    If a member of your team is selected for audit, they need to complete a CPD profile and provide evidence of the learning activities they have carried out, which demonstrates they comply with the CPD standards. 

    If there is a gap of three or more consecutive months in their learning activities, they will need to explain it.

  • You can support your employee to meet their CPD requirements by:

    • making sure they are aware of their requirements;
    • regularly discussing and reviewing the learning activities they undertake;
    • helping them to find time and opportunities to undertake learning activities;
    • recommending learning activities; and
    • helping them to maintain records of their learning.

    If your employee is selected for audit, you can support them by:

    • making sure they have read the guidance on completing a CPD profile;
    • knowing the deadline they must provide this information to us by; and
    • providing support to help them complete their CPD profile.
  • We recognise that sometimes, due to unavoidable circumstances, your employee may need to defer (put off) their audit. For example, they may not be able to complete a CPD profile as a result of illness, family or personal circumstances or maternity leave.

    Deferral offers professionals the opportunity to stay registered if they cannot complete their CPD profiles due to circumstances beyond their control.

    If your employee would like to defer, we encourage you to explore the reasons for deferral with them and help them to overcome the difficulties, if they can.

    If the reasons relate to pressures of work, for example, it may be that you can help them manage their work alongside their CPD commitments. Pressures of work are unlikely to be accepted as a reason for deferral.

    If your employee decides they want to request a deferral, they must submit this to us as soon as possible, giving their reasons for deferring and providing evidence to support those reasons. You can provide a supporting statement as part of their application to defer.

In this video, some of our registrants discuss the types of CPD they find most rewarding.

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More information for employers or managers of health and care professionals is available on our Employer hub
Page updated on: 23/11/2021
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