ABSTRACT

The systematic maintenance, improvement and broadening of knowledge and skill and the development of personal qualities necessary for the execution of professional and technical duties throughout the practitioner’s working life. Various suggestions have been put forward about the purposes which continuing professional development programs might serve, in addition to the general one of keeping up professional standards of competence and capability. The specifications themselves vary in terms of whether they involve the whole professional population or only sectors of it; whether they refer to hours or working days spent or whether they base themselves on points earned. The professional bodies are in a difficult position, in that the courses they put on are seen by participants as in some sense officially approved. Training consortia of this kind can also serve other useful functions, such as negotiating lower insurance costs to members, generating inter-firm specialist groups, and opening up wider social and professional contacts.