Standard 6 is about social workers being provided with the opportunity to learn, keep their knowledge and skills up to date, and critically reflect on the impact this has on their practice.
Providing opportunities for regular and effective CPD
Employers should:
- understand that CPD is an important part of a social worker’s professional standards and a regulatory requirement to be registered with Social Work England (SWE)
- recognise that CPD can be both formal (e.g. specialist training) and informal (e.g. allocation of complex cases accompanied by adequate training, supervision and support)
- provide social workers with dedicated time and resources to carry out regular and effective CPD which benefits them and their practice
- offer coaching and action learning as core components of CPD
- encourage social workers to record their CPD in their SWE online account. Recording learning throughout the year promotes a culture of continuing reflection and reduces administrative burden for both the social worker and the employer during the registration renewal process.
Promoting additional training
Employers should:
- where relevant, support social workers to progress through post-qualifying specialist training and access national funded development and support programmes. This additional training may allow them in some cases to annotate their registration to reflect a specialism.
Providing feedback to inform development
Employers should:
- have an appraisal or performance review system which assesses how well professional practice is delivered and includes the feedback of people with lived experience of the social worker’s practice. This review should inform a learning and development plan with objectives to work towards, developed in discussion with the social worker
- encourage social workers to consider their ethics and values in relation to their practice and emphasise the importance of reflecting on the impact of their learning.
Supporting new social workers in ASYE
Employers should:
- have effective induction systems for all social workers
- put in place tailored support for newly qualified social workers (NQSW) by including protected development time, a managed workload, tailored supervision and personal development plans
- ensure that CPD is capability focussed to support new social workers in meeting the expectations of an NQSW as set out in the Post Qualifying Standards and the Professional Capabilities Framework
Supporting digital literacy
Employers should:
- ensure that social workers are supported to develop the level of digital literacy required to use technology ethically and safely for their social work practice.