Developing Professional Practice

This document discusses the importance of continuous professional development (CPD) and provides a development plan for a leisure manager. It covers the benefits of CPD, the steps involved in creating a development plan, and the reflection on personal development and continuous professional plan.

Developing Professional
Practice

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
INTRODUCTION TO CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT PLAN ...............................................1
My CPD (continuous professional development plan)................................................................3
REFLECTION.................................................................................................................................6
PDP PLAN.......................................................................................................................................8
CONCLUSION .............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................15

INTRODUCTION
Professional development is a process of earning high profile and maintaining
professional career by performing roles, responsibilities, attending conference and find new
opportunities to grow in professional career (Grant, 2017). To develop one's own career an
individual need to make professional development plan to list out the attributes which an
individual wants to achieve, analyse and monitor. Development plan will be beneficial for an
individual to measure growth in their profession and identify the skills which have been
enhanced. There are various steps in framing development plan in order to achieve success in
professional career. Present report will include a development plan for the profile of Leisure
manager, a continuous professional development plan use to determine how an individual will
continuously learn new skills and knowledge to succeed in the their career. Further report will
also include personal development plan to identify the learnings and various skills developed
throughout the overall process. Lastly report will also include reflection of personal development
and continuous professional plan.
INTRODUCTION TO CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT PLAN
Continuous development plan consist of various learning activities in which professional
engage in order to enhance and develop their skills, knowledge and abilities (Walker, 2017).
CPD consist of different methodologies where learning is done through training programs,
events, conferences, workshops and seminars, digital learning programmes and other techniques
used to share ideas to improve and enhance professional development. As the name states an
individual need to learn new skills, knowledge constantly to remain competitive in professional
world. Continuous learning will benefit an individual to grow and develop its professional
career.
CPD includes both structured and unstructured learnings. Structure learnings is provided
through various coaching classes, institutes and professionals on the other hand unstructured
learnings are provided by gaining practical knowledge using digitalization etc. Unstructured
learning is more effective in gaining knowledge because people are more interested towards
practical knowledge rather then learning through modern ways (Drude, Maheu and Hilty, 2019).
People are engaging in continuous professional development because they want to reach their
desired job for example, if a persona want to become leisure manager than CPD plan will be
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helpful for them to identify various roles and responsibilities of leisure manager. Further
individual will then identify whether these skills are posses by them or not and if not then they
will take actions to achieve those skills. Thus, continuous professional development helps an
individual career.
CPD is beneficial for professional people to boost their skills and enhance their career.
There are various benefits of CPS plan which are as follows:
 It helps an individual to bridge the gap between the knowledge and skills to become
efficient and productive.
 CPS builds confident to be able to stand out of crowd.
 CPS is beneficial in achieving success in professional career (Burke, Redfern and Marks-
Maran, 2016).
 Helps an individual to demonstrate professional status.
There are various steps to plan a continuous professional development plan which are as follows:
 Plan: This steps include the planning of personal professional development by assessing
current situation and deciding development goals for next 2 to 3 years. As the need of an
individual changes, development plan also changes thus it is names as continuous
professional development. This plan helps an individual to recognise various
opportunities and needs required in a workplace to perform specific job role (Biswas,
2018). The planning stage answers the following questions i.e. what to achieve?, how to
learn and what are the needs to be learned?
 Do: As soon as the plan is ready, an individual need to make an action plan to convert
their plan into action and achieve desired goal. This stage involves the development of
plan where an individual steps out and attend different activities, undergo training
sessions, attend seminars and conferences to learn and adapt new skills, knowledge and
ideas to enhance their career. This stage is time consuming as all these activities take time
but an individual need to give proper time to each activity to see improvement in career
(Biswas, 2018).
 Record: Under this stage monitoring and evaluation of progress is determined. An
individual monitors its progress towards the plan, in simple word a person records the
outcomes generated by all those activities which was used to increase the learning and
experience of an individual. CPD plan need to reflect result, output or benefits that a
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learner has gained. Monitoring the professional development plan will be beneficial in
evaluating the performance and learnings of an individual. Through monitoring a person
is able to find out its strengths beneficial for their career development and weakness
which need to be overcome (Drude, Maheu and Hilty, 2019).
 Reflect: It is the most important step, without reflection there is no use of CPD plan.
Reflection helps an individual to reflect their value and skills with clients and colleagues
in wider context (Biswas, 2018). Continuous professional development plan is beneficial
for an individual in answering questions like what have you learn?, how you have learn?
What have you achieved? How will you use this in professional career? Does the plan has
changed your performance?
My CPD (continuous professional development plan)
What roles
have I had?
What were my strengths
in the role?
What were my
weaknesses / restrictions
in the role?
What were my key
learnings in this role?
Supervising
staff
My strengths in
supervising team is my
leadership skills which has
helped me in directing and
leading my team. Conflict
resolution is also one of my
strength that helps me in
resolving conflict. These
skills helps me in
coordinating with the team
members and lead them to
achieve business activities.
Sometimes I found
difficulty in
communicating with my
team members as they
belong to different culture.
I face difficulty while
explaining and transferring
information with them as
there are different
perceptions and attitude in
different cultures.
I have learned coordinating
team members having
different opinions, mind
set and make them stuck on
one decision. It have also
identified that I lack in
communicating for which I
need to communicate with
team continuously and try
to learn their behaviours,
natures and belief so that it
is easy to understand their
point of view.
Recruitment and
training
As leisure manager, my
accountability is to recruit
and trained workers as well
I have identified my
weakness that I lack
practical knowledge which
While playing a role of
training and recruiting
candidates HR manager has
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as new applicants in
business in order to
increased their knowledge
and skills. I am capable to
make recruitment plan
which helps me to get the
most talented people in
pool of expert. One of my
strength in recruitment is I
am capable of judging
candidates whether they
are suitable for the
organisation or not. In
providing training I am
able to use theoretical
knowledge and make my
team learn new skills and
knowledge by providing on
the job training.
would be beneficial for
training and I also lack
time management skills
while recruiting candidates.
I can hire people, but
cannot been able to provide
training which is essential
for overall business. It is
one of the weakness that I
need to improve for
developing strong team
who can contribute to
achieve organizational
goals and objectives.
guide me and make me
learn about various
strategies of time
management. I have also
learned that while
providing training I also
need to posses practical
knowledge along with
theory. This role has helped
me in keeping focus on
time management as well
as off the job training
which will be helpful in my
professional career. I have
learned training skills
which makes me able to
trained employees and
helps to increased their
skills better than before.
Ensure health
and safety of
employees
I am responsible for
providing employees full
security of their health and
make sure that they do not
face any issue. I also
possess accountability in
case anything went wrong.
I also follow all the
policies formulated by
companies for the safety of
employees.
I face various issues such
as I lack knowledge of new
policies which are
formulated by government.
Due to this I am not able to
achieve my goal in
providing employees health
and safety.
While providing employees
their rights I have learned
health and safety
legislations and new
policies which government
has formulated to protect
the rights of employees.
During the period I have
done my work ethically
and took responsibility to
implement safety culture in
the organisation.
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Developing new
facilities
My strengths in developing
new facilities was that I
was capable to do market
research and identify
different opportunities to
expand business and
implement change,
innovation and creativity in
the firm.
One of my major weakness
was that in order to
implement change in the
organisation there was a
need of new technologies. I
was unable to use
technologies and train
employees. I faced many
challenges in using new
technologies.
I have learned to identify
different opportunities for
business and my seniors
has also taught me to use
and implement new
technology in business to
bring creativity and
innovation to increase
profits. It was beneficial for
me as I am capable of
training my team members
to use different techniques.
Maintain
standards of
customer service
It was easy for me to
motivate employees so that
they are able to provide
good quality service to
customers and I have also
provided training to my
team members in treating
customers well in order to
increase their satisfaction.
On the other side I have
found some weakness like I
lack organisation skills and
tracking performance.
These skills will be more
beneficial in maintaining
the standards of customers
but I face challenges in it.
I have learned to motivate
employees towards
achieving the desired goals
by providing incentives and
bonuses. I have learned
organisation skills and now
I am able to track
performance of employees
and provide training to
them having poorer
performance.
Managing
budgets and
financial record
While working as leisure
manager in organization I
can be able to manage
overall budgets of business
effectively and also
maintain financial records
(Murat and et.al., 2015). It
But on the other hand, due
to lack of knowledge in
Excel I cannot been able to
use it which affect on my
daily activities. I face
difficulty to enter data in
spreadsheet. I cannot been
I have learned excel skills
in which I have learn how
to work on spreadsheet
effectively and make
appropriate formatting of
number.
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is one of the my another
strength that support me in
managing budgets. I am
able to allocate budget to
various departments within
company to complete their
activities as well as
functions. I can analyse
budgets proposal from all
departments and make
estimate of future needs.
able to format number and
general data.
REFLECTION
Working as a leisure manager I came across various skills, knowledges that is required in
career development. Through continuous professional development plan I have identified that
there are various skills I lack as a leisure manager and I am not able to perform my role
effectively. CPD plan was very beneficial for me in determining my strengths and weakness, I
will work on my weakness to overcome it and build my career as a leisure manager and develop
myself in this profession.
CPD plans has helped me in various ways such as in supervising team members I have
strong leadership skills through which I influence and lead my team members towards achieving
business goals. I have also share specific information to my members which a leader should do. I
have also strong conflict resolution skills, I was capable in analysing the problem among the
employees and providing solution to solve it. Both the skills are beneficial for an individual in
developing their career. On the other side I also lack communication skills which is one of the
most important skills required in every profession. I face communication problems while
understanding the views of some employees as they belong to different culture. I have learned
team coordination and improved my communication skills by communicating with them on
regular basis and understand their culture. It is essential for every individual to learn these skills
as it enhance the professional career and open various opportunities for them.
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However while recruiting and training employees I have faced various challenges
because I lack time management skills and training skills. With the help of CPD plan I came to
know that along with theoretical knowledge practical knowledge is also important to train
employees and make them learn easily by providing practical examples. On the other side I
possess some strengths such as I am capable to judge people and determine whether an
individual will work efficiently in the organisation to achieve business objectives. This can be
beneficial for company in hiring and retaining employees for long period by increasing the
productivity and profitability of company. CPD plan is used to review the performance and
identify the gap between the desired skills and existing skills. Reflecting your own CPD plan will
be beneficial for an individual to succeed in their career and gain higher opportunities to grow in
their professional world.
Further performing the role of development of various facilities as a leisure manager I came
across various skills that I need to have such as able to perform market research and change
implementation techniques. Market research is used to analyse the current market trends, new
technologies available and competitors position in order to frame new policies. I have analysed
that I have the ability to do market research and identify various opportunities which are required
in business to bring creativity and innovation in the business operations. But implementing this
change was a challenge foe me as I was not able to use these technologies and train employees.
Throughout the role I have learned to use new technology, train employees and implement
change successfully. It is important to implement change in the company and gain competitive
advantage. Now I am able to innovate and create new products and motivate employees to accept
change and increase their productivity to earn more profits.
Moreover I have also leaned to manage and maintain the standard of customer service by
training and motivating employees by providing bonus, incentives so that they give their best in
attaining customer satisfaction. On the other hand I lack organisation skills and I am not able to
track the performance of employees which creates difficulty in maintaining standards of
customer service. I have also learned some health and safety legislation used to protect the rights
of employees. I have analysed that I am able to provide employees with health and safety
benefits and I also take responsibility of any misconduct or mistake that occur. I have also
learned different policies that are formulated by government and I have make sure that all these
policies are implemented in the organisation ethically.
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I working as leisure manager in organization, I have different types of skills and great
knowledge in many areas which helps me to grow my professional career. But on the other side,
due to lack of some knowledge and abilities I cannot be capable to provide better services and
manage my work. But with the help of continuous development plan I can work on my weakness
and improved it better than before. When I improve my excel skill I can work on it and manager
budgets effectively like my own money. While working on excel I can save time, and make
appropriate calculation. I can increase productivity when I work on excel by saving a lot of time.
Through developing my excel skills I can become proficient in spreadsheet and develop tables as
well as charts efficiently. Furthermore, training skills is one of the most important part of my like
and also considered as one of my weakness. Due to lack of this ability I cannot been able to
increased workers productivity. But with the help of continuous developing plan I can improve
my skill and also provide the best training practices to new candidates in workplace. When I
trained employees appropriately I can reduces turnover which has been raised in past few month.
Moreover, training reduce stress of people and give job satisfaction within business working
under positive environment.
PDP PLAN
SWOT ANALYSIS
It is a tool that will help to analyse personal strengths, weaknesses and existing
opportunities and threats. It will help to achieve various goals.
Strengths -
 My major strength is high level of commercial awareness.
 Another strength is excellent interpersonal skills. My another strength is excellent problem solving skills.
Weakness -
 One of my major weakness is that I am lacking leadership skills. My another weakness is customer service skills.
Opportunities -
 Opportunity to improve existing skills and ability. Opportunity to get employment in commercial organization, educational institutions.
Threats -
 One of the major threat is high level of skills and abilities of other people.
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Skills audit :
Key I really have to work
on this
I have to improve this. I am confident that I
can perform this.
INTERPERSONAL SKILLS
Ability to effectively interact with others.
Ability to listen carefully other's views and opinion.
PROBLEM SOLVING SKILLS
I am able to use various methods for solving problems.
Ability to find out how to work productively with others
for solving complex problems (Gee, Schulte and
Matsumoto, 2019).
CUSTOMER SERVICE SKILLS
I have to improve my ability to analyse needs of clients.
Skill of patiently listening to the views of customers.
LEADERSHIP SKILLS
Ability to effectively motivate team members.
Ability to use creativity in performing different types of
tasks.
Personal development plan
It refers to the process of developing an action plan on the basis of reflection, awareness,
goal-setting and conducting planning for personal development in respect of relationship, career,
education or for self development. It includes recognizing threats and opportunities, developing
skills or improving knowledge, measuring the progress etc (Lejeune, Beausaert and Raemdonck,
2018).
Short term goal : To improve all the skills that are lacking or require improvement.
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Log term goal :
 To get employment as a Leisure Manager.
What do I
need to
learn and
why?
What I will do to
achieve this?
What has been
achieved ?
What
resources
or support
I will
require?
What will
my success
criteria be?
Target
dates for
review and
completion.
Interperson
al skills : To
develop
ability to
influence
others.
I will practice
active listening to
others. This will
help to improve
and develop
interpersonal skills.
I have improved
my ability to listen
the views and
opinions of other
people.
I will
require
support
from top
management
for
receiving
feedback
regarding
skills.
Communica
ting
effectively
with
subordinates
and clients
of the
organization
.
01/02/19
Problem
solving
skills : For
solving
complex
problems
that may
occur during
employment
.
I will attend classes
for developing
skills and ability to
solve complex
problems that may
occur during my
profession as
Leisure Manager.
I have gain the
ability to resolve
complex problems
under different
situations.
I will read
newspapers
and
magazines
that will
help me to
develop
skill for
solving
complex
problems.
To be able
to solve
complex
and difficult
problems in
small parts.
Having
confident
knowledge
of problems
that may
happen in
the field of
01/04/19
10

leisure
activities.
Customer
service
skills : To
improve
skill of
listening the
views of
clients.
I will attend
seminars and
workshops that will
help me to develop
my customer
service skills. This
will also help in
promoting
business.
I have achieved an
improvement in my
ability to listen
different views and
opinions of the
customers.
I will ask
my
supervisor
for
providing
Tvaluable
guidance
that will
assist me in
developing
good
customer
service
skills.
Developmen
t of great
sense of
empathy
towards
clients.
Being able
to
understand
need of
customers.
01/07/19
Leadership
skills : For
effectively
influencing
team
members
while
working on
a project.
I will read books
Such as Awaken
the leader in you,
better decisions
etc. that will help
me to develop
leadership skills.
This will help me
to influence other
people to perform
tasks.
It has improved my
ability to lead other
people.
I will join
practical
course for
improving
current level
of
leadership
skills.
Further, I
will also
attend
various
training
programmes
Ability to
provide
directions to
subordinates
.
01/09/19
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Physical
fitness :
Skill of
being
physically
fit will help
me to
perform
various
tasks related
with leisure
activities.
I will join gym and
attend classes for
improving my
physical fitness.
I have achieve an
improvement
physically.
I will read
books,
magazine
etc. such as
bigger
learner
stronger,
The four-
hour body
etc. and I
will also
watch
English
channels
that helps to
develop
physical
fitness.
Being able
to perform
different
tasks.
Ability to
perform
physical
activities.
On - going
Reflection :
Personal reflection is described as an opportunity to reconsider feelings, events and
thoughts from a new perspective. It helps individual to offer own opinion and views. It is very
important because it helps to gain better understanding of personal strengths, weaknesses and
other driving factors (Reynolds, Shah and van Ameijde, 2018).
SWOT analysis, skills audit and personal development plan helps to to achieve short term
and long term goals in personal as well as in professional life. It helps me to think regarding own
performance, learning, career and social development. For Example - Personal development
plan has provided me an opportunity to acquire those skills that are lacking in me or skills and
abilities that require improvement. SWOT analysis has assisted me to analyse opportunities that
are prevailing in the field of leisure for the post of leisure manager. As, I also face various
difficulties but, I have overcome those challenges with strong determination and commitment. It
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has also helped me to overcome threats. Further, I am able to analyse my strengths such as my
good leadership skills that will help me in my future career.
From these considerations, I recognized some of my major strengths and I also analyse some of
my weaknesses that can impact my performance in specific areas. For Example - I am able to
analyse that I should attend classes for improving physical fitness, leadership skills etc. that are
lacking in me but these are required to effectively perform the duties as Leisure Manager. Before
developing personal development plan I am involved in those activities that are not helpful in
building my future career. But after developing personal development plan, I am able to involved
in those activities that will support me to develop leadership skills, interpersonal skills, problem
solving skills etc. Moreover, it has developed my habit of reading books and magazines. Further,
support from supervisor also help me a lot to improve my current abilities (Deloitte Access
Economics, 2017).
By preparing professional development plan I have come to know about the skills that are
lacking in me and the ways in which I can improve those lacking skills. So that, this will help me
in getting employment in near future. On first February I have gain an improvement in my
interpersonal skills. On first September I have achieved an improvement in physical fitness etc.
CONCLUSION
Carrying out the above research conclusions can be drawn about the continuous
professional development plan. The plan deals with activities that are engaged by professionals
for developing and enhancing the abilities of the professionals. It enables professionals to be
more conscious & proactive instead of being reactive and passive. It includes various
methodologies for learning training, conferences and events, best techniques & ideas for sharing
all theses methods and techniques are focuses on individual for improving and to having
effective development of professional. The academic qualifications are required for offering
vocational & skills that are based on practical learning of the candidate.
The role of leisure manager includes staff recruitment and training that will help the company to
grow and achieve it objectives. Manager is also required to ensure that the workplace provide
health and safety measures that they do not have to compromise with the health and safety.
Manager should also develop facilities for the employees that will help them in providing
effective services. It has to play the role of effective leader and to ensure that the customers are
satisfied with the services and the standards of customer services should be continuously
13

enhanced. Also with all these responsibilities he is also required to ensure that the cost of
carrying out all theses activities do not go high for the company. Cost are to be controlled by
preparing budgets of the company.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Biswas, P.K., 2018. Unit 2: Continuing Professional Development: Some Issues. IGNOU.
Murat and et.al., 2015. The Role of Sports in Recreational Activities. The Online Journal
of Recreation and Sport. 4(1). p.40.
Burke, L., Redfern, M. and Marks-Maran, D., 2016. Continuing professional development for
non-medical health care professionals: History, issues and challenges. International
Journal of Continuing Education and Lifelong Learning. 8(2). p.85.
Deloitte Access Economics, 2017. Soft skills for business success.
Drude, K.P., Maheu, M. and Hilty, D.M., 2019. Continuing Professional Development:
Reflections on a Lifelong Learning Process. Psychiatric Clinics. 42(3). pp.447-461.
Gee, D., Schulte, M. and Matsumoto, R.R., 2019. An Individual Development Plan for
Pharmacy Students for Career Planning and Tracking Accreditation Standards. American
Journal of Pharmaceutical Education. 83(6). p.6825.
Grant, J., 2017. The good CPD guide: A practical guide to managed continuing professional
development in medicine. CRC Press.
Lejeune, C., Beausaert, S. and Raemdonck, I., 2018. The impact on employees’ job performance
of exercising self-directed learning within personal development plan practice. The
International Journal of Human Resource Management. pp.1-27.
Reynolds, M., Shah, R. and van Ameijde, J., 2018. Framing professional competencies for
systems thinking in practice: final report of an action research eSTEeM inquiry.
Walker, K., 2017. Why continuing professional development is so important. IQ: The RIM
Quarterly. 33(2). p.4.
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