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  • CPD. Any Chartered Surveyors in?
  • Stoner
    Free Member

    The tedious outfit that us my “professional” organisation want me to do 20hrs of Compulsory Professional Development. Im a semi-retired freelancer, I dont want to develop any more and frankly the RICS is an irrelevant load of crap to my work. BUT Mrs Stoner insists my letters are for my client’s benefit not mine, so I should maintain my membership. Even if it is a usurious £500 quid a year – and I have no idea WTF they do for me with that money anyway. 😛

    I dont want to have to pay £1,000 for a 10hr “formal” CPD course. I can blag the 10hrs of informal CPD based on watching You tube videos of things falling down, reading “Property Week” neatly tucked into a copy of Razzle and making stuff up as usual.

    But how do I blag the “Formal CPD” bit?

    Any other self-employed/freelancers found an easy way round it?

    tim41
    Free Member

    Not sure you can ‘blag it’ but proper building industry CPD can be had for free or pretty cheap. Some of it might even be quite interesting!

    I’m IStructE and try to attend all manner of CPD seminars to rack up my formal hours. The IStructE and ICE regional groups often have evening seminars open to the public about high profile local projects. I’m fairly sure you can attend most other seminars as a guest if you check in advance for free or a modest charge. The CIOB charge non-members a sensible £10 for their seminars and they have loads to choose from. I know the RICS charge non-members a stupid amount for their seminars so I’ve never attended one.

    Another source of free CPD is from specialist contractors such as piling companies who offer ‘breakfast seminars’ at hotels. They get exposure to construction professionals (i.e. anyone interested) and you get an hours free CPD and a fry up! Roger Bullivants seem to do one in my area once a year and must tour around the country.

    MoreCashThanDash
    Full Member

    I used to have to do CPD for my insurance qualifications, and I’m just starting on an RICS route.

    MrsMC has to do CPD to keep her professional social work registration as well.

    Local groups usually offer meetings/talks/site visits that count for CPD hours. Yes, they are a ballsache and interfere with family and social life, but they can be more interesting than you expect, and a useful chance to make contacts.

    Ultimately, would you lose clients/income if you are not still RICS? Would it prevent you from practising? Only you can make that call.

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    jp-t853
    Full Member

    I am a Chartered Accountant but I work more closely with sales and management streams so it can feel like a struggle at times.

    I usually have a scan back through my calendar to the start of the year and it jogs my mind on new activities that I have been involved in. These often involve some tuition or subject understanding sessions that I can tag as CPD. This may be more difficult as you are self employed.

    Does your chartered body not send a monthly magazine with CPD self learning in? It may also be on the website. These are usually 1 hour chunks of video with a multiple choice question at the end.

    jamesy01
    Free Member

    I got an email recently “News: 2 hours of free formal CPD in a couple of clicks”

    Check back on your RICS emails, mine was dated 15th September.

    Other than that they do a range of online courses that are either free or cheap(ish).

    jamesy01
    Free Member

    YGM…I’ll save you the 5 minutes search!

    camster
    Free Member

    Stoner,

    I’m in much the same predicament. I can get the 10hrs from reading the Estates Gazette but am really struggling this yr on the formal bit. I’ve rather belatedly joined the local WMids CPD Foundation (c £200) and have a few late afternoon gigs to go to but, I don’t even think these count as ‘structured learning’! I made the cut last yr mainly through a company management course.

    Having been outsourced into a company where I seem to be the only GP RICS person, I’m not able to attend any relevant in-house training nor will the company pay for any external courses. I’m in the rather surreal world of Telecoms too so fewer free brekkie seminars with the big firms.

    I recall there’s a professional ethics web based course and one on service charges which might get me a few hours. I think it’s a shame we cannot seem to log reading professional articles as structured learning (accepting it cannot be monitored).

    Squirrel
    Full Member

    Don’t know if you’re anywhere around south Oxfordshire (and you might be given your username) but I use 3cpd (www.3cpd.co.uk) who provide some good cheap CPD events. I went to their “Oxford Briefing” last Friday: 6 hours formal CPD (including the Ethics bit) for £99 including lunch & VAT. Building Magazine does free on-line CPD: take about 10 mins each and count for 1 hour 😉 probably counts as informal though

    40mpg
    Full Member

    Go CIOB? I dropped RICS right after doing the exams (20+ years ago) as I couldn’t complete the APC in the discipline I was – and they wouldn’t be flexible at all.

    CIOB do free bacon rolls at their morning CPD’s, and I sit next to the local Chairman so get first nod on whats coming up 😀

    BlindMelon
    Free Member

    Do RIBA approved CPD presentations count? If so I can send you 2 hrs worth and a cert if needed. It’s on external render btw

    camster
    Free Member

    Perhaps I should change to a Building Surveyor, I’ve never had Bacon butties at a CPD event and most half day seminars are still too expensive if self funded!

    Building Surveying CPD’s often have bacon butties or a decent sandwich spread 😀

    Stoner / Camster – do you do any form of mentoring, APC assessing or mock panel interviews etc? If so, you can put that down as formal CPD. I managed to get my hours this year by attending the Wessex Briefing (8 hours of tedium) and the APC Assessor training.

    There is also the free ethics module available on the RICS website.

    Just after I graduated, a colleague received a formal reply from the RICS answering his question, along the lines of “we agree that watching Grand Designs can provide some limited useful elements of CPD, although we don’t feel that Changing Rooms and DIY SOS offer any tangible learning opportunities”. 😆

    beicmynydd
    Free Member
    camster
    Free Member

    Ah yes, good point MMTM I have indeed done some mentoring and perhaps can claim I’ve now learnt VLookups.. I rather fancy doing a bike maintenance course but am struggling to see how I can claim it’s furthered my knowledge of L&T law!

    hh45
    Free Member

    Amazing! I never thought there might be another RICS person on STW as I got the impression everyone was a northern ITist or engineer.

    I should just blag it and I’m sure most of us do. RICS really is so pants its untrue.

    Maybe we could form a group and go for a ride and self certify it as a big CPD gig.

    honeybadgerx
    Full Member

    CPD needn’t be something that you get a certificate at the the end though? Most of mine this year has just been self learning due to doing some slightly different things at work, so a a few hours here and there for say reading some CIRIA guides and then implementing what I’ve learned.

    garage-dweller
    Full Member

    Stoner have you got a local professionals network or association. These sometimes do a bit of free or cut price cpd for a modest entry fee to the “club”.

    Also try scouring linked in for relevant groups that way you may get notified of upcoming stuff.

    Marmoset
    Free Member

    TBH I view it as a money making scheme. A lot of the formal CPD sessions I see on around where I work don’t add anything to my knowledge, the topics lack the depth in their detail that I’d want to see. At times that you have to wonder who does get anything out of them.

    It’s probably harder being semi retired as I seem to learn something new “on the job” most months. The definition of formal can be somewhat foggy IMHO, some formal sessions from companies don’t offer you a certificate, so it would be hard to prove if the RICS required proof.

    I usually read a book or two to get the hours up as well.

    Stoner
    Free Member

    thanks everyone for the pointers and ideas.

    I Guess Id better muddle through some kind of online tutorials/reading etc to make an effort, but I doubt I shall complete the formal 10hrs. I agree it’s most often a money making swizz with really poor lack of detail in any of the courses. And TBH Im a specialist in my field. Ive lectured in it, but I am a nichey specialist and dont particularly want to go and “develop” other areas in which I shall never work or have an interest.

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