CPD guidance for members

Completing the CPD log

You should set your objectives at the start of each year, review them regularly and record your CPD as and when you undertake it.

In the CPD section of the Members’ Area, you can complete your CPD log.

The log is structured around the Plan – Do – Check – Act cycle.

Your development plan (Plan phase)

What do you need to do?

• You should identify a minimum of three specific professional development objectives related to your work in quality.
• For each objective write a short statement about why you want to achieve that objective and how you will measure success.
• For each objective you must set a start date and a target end date.
• For each objective you should list the activities that you will undertake to meet the objectives.

What can be an Objective?

Anything that either helps you improve as a quality professional or ensures that your skills and knowledge are up to date.

Objectives could relate to:

• Changes in standards, regulations and legislation, industry, your profession
• Your strengths and weakness
• Any feedback you have received from colleagues, employer and clients
• Organisation and client plans and requirements

Activities you have undertaken (Do phase)

In the Plan phase you listed your objectives and the activities that you planned to undertake. Sometimes these activities will meet your needs. Sometimes they won’t and you will need other activities.

In this section you list all relevant activities you have undertaken to meet this objective, whether or not they were listed in the Plan phase. As long as they helped you in meeting the objective you should list them here.

Reflection (Check phase)

In this phase you should think about your objective and the activities you have undertaken.

Thinking about following questions could help you:

What have you learned from these activities?
What difference has this made to you?
What will you change as a result of this?
Has the objective been met (fully or partially)?
If it has been partially met, what gaps remain?

What next? (Act phase)

In this phase you think about what happens next.

If your objective has been fully met then you record it as such and create a new objective to replace it.

If you need to change or extend the objective based on what you have learned, write it here and then go back to the plan stage to make sure you know how you will attempt to meet the revised objective.

Most importantly, you need to put into practice what you learned through achieving this objective.

Recording your CPD

Recording your CPD is recommended for all CQI | IRCA membership grades and is mandatory for:

If you keep CPD records for other professional memberships and certifications, we can accept records submitted on forms from other bodies, provided that you can demonstrate you are identifying your own development needs related to your work in quality, and have a plan for completing appropriate development activities.

Please contact us to check that your method of recording CPD is appropriate.

CPD activities

CPD can encompass a wide variety of learning activities. It is not limited to classroom-based courses, and it does not have to be specific to the scheme against which you audit. Any learning activity that supports your professional development is encouraged.

Examples of CPD activities:

• Training courses, either classroom-based or online
• Seminars and lectures, including webinars
• Conferences and events
• Active engagement in relevant professional networks and forums, such as our LinkedIn groups
• Reading reports, journals, magazines, or online articles relevant to your industry or profession eg CQI | IRCA Knowledge emails, Quality World
• Self-study

In our Members' Area you can access online resources such as ISO reports, Knowledge articles and webinars. You can also access thousands of journals and industry publications in our eLibrary. All these resources can contribute to continuing your professional development.

Additional CPD guidance

We do not prescribe a minimum number of hours or activities, and we will consider all activities that are relevant to your profession and aimed at achieving your identified development objectives.

We recommend that you use the CQI Competency Framework as a prompt for identifying your development needs.

For guidance purposes you should consider devoting a minimum of 10-15 hours of activity to your professional development each year.

We recommend that you spend review your CPD objectives every three months in order to ensure that they are still appropriate and to review your progress.