What are the benefits of CPD for employees and employers?

In this article, we outline some of the key reasons why CPD is beneficial to both the employees and employers within a healthcare organisation.

Benefits for employees

• CPD increases your confidence in your abilities. It’s not just about learning new skills, but confirming that what you already know is current and correct.
• CPD allows you to fill in gaps in your competencies and knowledge. You may want to move into a new area of specialism or seek promotion: CPD can help you to get there.
• Carrying out regular CPD throughout your career means your skills and knowledge are up to date to practise safely and effectively.
• Any CPD you carry out should result in you being able to provide a better service to your service users, thereby making yourself a more effective member of your workplace.
• Regular CPD activities enable you to stay interested and engaged with your profession, by learning new skills, interacting more with your colleagues, and keeping afresh of new research and methods.
• CPD can actually be quite rewarding in itself - learning new things can give you such a buzz and you may discover something new about yourself, not just your specialism.
• CPD gives you something to talk about in your performance development review. You can share your experiences and your colleagues may be able to offer you additional support in completing your personal objectives.
• CPD can be great for bonding with colleagues and team members. Of course, you can get to know others by attending formal courses in person, but a shared discussion on a popular podcast or TV programme can hit the nail on the head in multiple ways.

Benefits for employers

Did you know it’s actually written into the NHS Constitution that trusts must invest in the skills and development of their staff? Although only individual AHPs are regulated by HCPC, it can definitely pay for employers to be fully on board with their employees’ CPD practice.

Aside from ticking the boxes, some benefits of CPD for healthcare employers include:

• Making sure your employees remain on the HCPC Register by fulfilling their obligations and maintaining the required standard of practice.
• Gaining visibility on hidden skills and knowledge. By reviewing what your AHP employees are learning about, you may find you have more to offer your service users.
• Increasing the value of developmental conversations. Having regular appraisal conversations with CPD talking points can help you to identify any potential barriers to your employees completing their CPD - and give you useful insights for succession planning.
• Finding out more about what makes your employees tick; if there is a vacancy or promotion opportunity that comes up, you’ll know who is especially keen and well-placed through CPD to take that next step.
• Ensuring standards are high and consistent across your organisation, thereby ensuring a good experience for your service users.
• Having a more engaged and happier team that feels recognised for their work.
• Having an up-to-date and effective workforce with the appropriate skills.
• Maintaining better employee retention, as staff feel invested in - and offering CPD is cheaper than hiring a new staff member.
• Saving on training costs, as allowing your employees time off for personal CPD is often a lower cost than providing the training itself.
• Easier management of training - allowing individuals to choose how to spend their CPD time is easier than pushing employees into a particular direction.
• Gaining a reputation as an organisation that will support career progression, which in turn will aid recruitment.

Ultimately, CPD should be seen as a win-win for employees and employers; both sides gain a huge amount from this learning and advancement of skills.

If you’re an employer looking to support your AHP staff with their CPD, get in touch with us to discuss our Teams packages which can help your employees record, reflect and report on their CPD practices and give you valuable insights into your workforce.