Continual Professional Development
Earlier this week, Premium Credit released findings from research they’d commissioned which delved into broker attitudes towards development and learning.
The results suggested that the average insurance professional is spending more than twice the FCA required minimum of 15 hours on CPD (Continuing Professional Development).
These are really positive findings, as we know the importance of learning and upskilling in such an ever-changing profession.
Premium Credit also found that 65% of companies expect a rise in staff training this year.
CPD at Romero
On the back of this report, we thought it’d be a good idea to take you, our readers, through some of the ways that we ensure that staff are always learning and developing.
We’re determined to create certainty in an uncertain world, and to do that, we know we have to stay on top of all the latest developments and changes in our industry.
But before we get into that, we’d better explain what CPD is in insurance and financial services, and the rules we have to stick to.
What is CPD?
Continuing Professional Development is learning on the job, basically. It can take many forms, including courses, seminars, lectures, conferences, workshops etc, as long as it has the defined goal of making the staff member better or more knowledgeable in a defined area.
That all sounds complicated, but it’s just a way of insurance staff making sure they’re offering the correct advice to clients.
The level of CPD you have to undertake differs depending on a few different factors and from role to role. For instance, ‘business support’ staff (IT, accounts, digital marketing etc) have to do less than half the hours that ‘advising’ staff (claims, brokers, account executives) do.
CII qualified staff are held to even higher standards, and are asked to complete even more CPD hours.
Romero going above and beyond
As a Chartered Institute of Insurers broker, we don’t see CPD as a box ticking exercise. We don’t look at the minimum hours and decide what can be done to get there. We consider learning and developing a big part of our culture.
From the social media manager to the broking director, everyone shows commitment to being better.
This includes attending courses run by insurers, legal firms and risk management governing bodies. We have near constant visits from training professionals in all different departments.
But we also utilise the expertise within the business. We have leading experts throughout the company, so we may as well use them!
For example, we have set up a Study Support Group for anyone working towards various insurance related qualifications. The group is made up of directors and key personnel from around the business. Anyone who needs help simply emails the group and the most relevant member will arrange a time to have a one-to-one conversation.
We also run a series of Lunchtime Learning sessions, where different heads of department run a seminar on their expert field.
The sessions are all optional, but very well attended.
Really importantly, we stay on top of gap analysis – the system where we record gaps in our skillsets. A big part of effective CPD is understanding where you can improve your knowledge to get the best bang for the customers buck, so to speak.
Get in touch today
If you’d like more information on the Romero CPD operation and how that affects your insurance account, contact us today for a really friendly conversation.
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