CPD scheme continues to provide flexibility for bite-sized learning

With learning styles changing and an increase in bite-sized learning activities, we’d like to provide an update on your CPD requirements and outline some common examples of how grouped activities can count towards these.

This is particularly timely given the Financial Conduct Authority’s recent decision to remove the minimum 30-minute time requirement for structured CPD activities for regulated investment advisers. It recognises that learning styles are changing and greater flexibility is needed in response to the advent of bite-sized learning activities for insurance professionals, mortgage and financial advisers and their firms.

CPD scheme rules

Our existing CPD scheme rules already provide this flexibility for members. As a reminder, the scheme caters for all qualified members, irrespective of their specialism, discipline or geographical location. Your commitment is:

• Complete a minimum of 35 hours' compulsory CPD each year, of which at least 21 hours must be structured CPD.
• 35 hours is the minimum required. In practice the figure may exceed this as the actual requirement will be determined by an individual's development needs in any 12-month period.
• For an activity to be eligible it must be a minimum of 30 minutes in duration (a batch of different activities of less than 30 minutes each undertaken to meet a specific development need can be combined and recorded together).

Grouped activities – common examples

The activities you may choose to group together as part of your learning and development will vary from person to person, but some common examples include:

• Undertaking 20 minutes of preparation for a meeting with a client on a new product or regulation, and then taking ten minutes after the meeting to check your understanding and follow up on any specific questions that you were not able to answer fully in the meeting.
• Reading an article on management skills, which took five minutes but highlighted a need for further knowledge and development. Then, meeting the development need by watching a ten-minute video on the topic, and discussing the techniques you learned with your manager for 15 minutes, including how they could be applied on the job, before spending ten minutes reflecting on the outcome of what has been learned (perhaps including some commitments on implementing the knowledge in practice)
• Attending a conference where a topic was discussed as part of a 15-minute interview style presentation, and then going and testing your knowledge on the topic by taking a 20-minute online course with a multiple-choice test at the end
• Your company or network might ask you to complete a series of mandatory tests on an annual basis. Where these tests contribute to the same development need these small bitesize learning sessions can be grouped together to meet the minimum 30 minutes per CPD activity. An example is completing three x 10 mins online learning sessions on cyber security.

Evidencing group activities

In order for the grouped activities to be successfully claimed as structured CPD, your CPD record must clearly include:

• the development need
• details of the activity/activities undertaken to meet that development need
• the time taken on the activity/activities
• the date(s) the activity/activities were undertaken
• a reflective statement detailing the extent to which the activities contributed towards meeting the development need.

Find out more about the CPD rules and requirements here.