Continuing Professional Development (CPD)
To retain accreditation, Continuing Professional Development, CPD (previously known as Continuing Professional Education, or CPE) was introduced to ensure that accredited members maintained and enhanced their knowledge, skills and competencies throughout their research management journey. The aim of CPD was to ensure that Accredited members:
- Maintained relevant knowledge;
- Developed and implemented research management practices in their workplaces;
- Developed their careers; and
- Would be an example or mentor to other research management professionals in their workplace.
Accredited members were required to accumulate 60 hours of CPD over each 3-year block of time, commencing upon graduation.
In 2024, a sub-committee of the Accreditation Council undertook a comprehensive review of it's CPD policy to ensure that it was current, obtainable and responded to member concerns. This combined with feedback received via the 2024 ARMS Member Survey, showed that Accredited members questioned the rationale for the CPD policy noting that it was difficult to maintain.
It was observed that:
- Members found that it was becoming more difficult to accumulate CPD in light of increased work loads, part-time employment and working from home.
- Some professional development activities are costly and institutions are often decreasing available funding for professional development or not providing time for staff to undergo professional development.
- Often members felt that their institutions did not support their ongoing professional development.
- CPD could be seen as disadvantaging those who were working less than 1.0 FTE or experienced long periods between jobs due to institutional cut-backs.
- Members felt stressed having to find professional development opportunities while balancing work life and personal priorities.
- In general, the majority of Accredited members have not been lodging CPD applications since pre-COVID.
CPD is no longer a requirement for retaining accreditation status.
As such, and effective immediately, the requirement to maintain accreditation by accruing CPD has been removed from the ARMS Accreditation Policy. Accredited members are no longer required to accrue (lodge) CPD to maintain their accreditation status. Any applications lodged via CPD diaries will be converted to zero (0) hours. Additionally, CPD will no longer be automatically approved for participation in PD Sessions @ Zoom, Chapter events, Special Interest Group (SIG) events, conferences and any other events where ARMS traditionally granted CPD to registered attendees.
Where to from here?
ARMS firmly believes that it is important for Research Management Professionals to take ownership of their own personal professional development journey by continuing to seek out opportunities that enable Accredited members to:
- stay updated with industry trends;
- maintain any professional competencies directly associated with job classifications;
- network with others at professional events to share ideas;
- mentor others or ask to be mentored;
- expand personal competencies through workshops, seminars and conferences; and
- learn new approaches, technology or techniques to promote innovation and creativity.
Sources of Professional Development
The Society offers a variety of education, training and professional development opportunities:
- participation in PD Sessions @ Zoom as an attendee or presenter;
- joining and contributing to ARMS Special Interest Groups (SIGs);
- joining and contributing to an ARMS Chapter Committee or attending a local event;
- joining and contributing to the Australian Ethics Network (AEN) or the Australasian Research Training Network (ARTN);
- enhancing your research integrity knowledge via the Promoting Research Integrity: A Practical Guide for Research Integrity Advisors;
- examining open research policy, strategy and practice via the Open Research Toolkit;
- investigating opportunities to connect with others and seek mentoring opportunities via the ARMS Skills network;
- attending the ARMS 2025 Conference in Melbourne (10-12 September 2025) or the AEN Conference in Newcastle (6-7 November 2025); and
- finally, consider taking up additional module, master class or elective offerings to learn new skills and meet like minded colleagues.
Should you need assistance with identifying future Professional Development opportunities, we encourage you to contact your supervisor or direct line manager.
