Repositioning Professional Development
Repositioning Professional Development
Professional Development is rarely questioned in principle – but it is routinely abandoned in practice. When time is tight and pressure mounts, PD is often the first commitment to go. That’s the irony: it’s usually the very thing that would make the pressure more manageable – sharper thinking, stronger skills, clearer boundaries, greater confidence, more choice in how you respond…
Whether you’re a coach, mentor, supervisor, HR or L+D professional – the question is not, ‘Is PD important?’
It should be: ‘How can I protect and value time for PD in a way that survives real life?’
So, how do we make PD consistent, sustainable, and genuinely useful – without needing to ‘find time’ because, let’s face it, spare time is unlikely to just appear by magic in your diary.
Reframe PD as part of the work, not extra work
A common roadblock is the belief that PD is something you do after you’ve completed the ‘real work’ of the day. If your role involves people, complexity, decision-making, or performance, PD isn’t optional – it is, in fact, part of your professional responsibility.
Try this mindset shift:
- Admin time keeps you organised.
- PD time keeps you effective.
What do the professional bodies say?
In ICF’s Core Coaching Competencies (2025) it states in Competency 2: Embodies a Coaching Mindset, that coaches need to:
- Engage in ongoing learning and development to enhance coaching skills.
- Develop and maintain reflective practices to improve effectiveness.
- Demonstrate self-awareness, recognising their personal impact, strengths, and limitations.
Reflection and PD are essential to demonstrating this competency — they are not optional but core to showing competency in the coaching role.
Similarly, the ICF Code of Ethics mandates that coaches:
- Maintain professional competence through continuous development.
- Engage in regular reflection, mentoring, and supervision to uphold ethical standards.
Reflection and PD are tied directly to ethical practice and competence.
A similar message appears across the EMCC Supervision Competencies (2025):
- Reflective practice is a core supervisory function.
- Professional development is an explicit outcome of supervision.
- Reflection is required for ethical practice, learning, and sustainability.
- Time for reflection and PD must be intentionally created and protected.
In the ICF Supervision Competencies (2025), Competency 1: Establishes and Maintains Supervision Agreements states that supervisors are expected to:
- Contract clearly for reflection, learning, and development.
- Clarify supervision as a space for ongoing professional growth.
In the EMCC Coaching and Mentoring Framework (2018), there is also explicit reference, in Competency 7: Commitment to Ongoing Development, that practitioners:
- Take responsibility for continuous professional development.
- Engage in reflective practice to enhance effectiveness.
- Use supervision, feedback, and learning activities to develop practice.
- Integrate learning into ongoing work.
It’s about the Individual: Decide what ‘useful PD’ means for you, and what you need right now
Not all PD is created equal so, before allocating time, decide what you’re allocating it for. A simple way is to choose one primary PD intention for the next 8–12 weeks:
1) Skill-building (capability)
Examples: deepening competency markers, strengthening presence, improving contracting, sharpening supervision skills.
2) Quality and standards (professionalism)
Examples: mentor coaching feedback, exam preparation, alignment to core competency frameworks, benchmarking.
3) Sustainability (capacity)
Examples: reflective practice, supervision, restorative learning, boundary work, preventing burnout.
When your PD has a clear ‘why’ it becomes easier to defend in the diary – and easier to notice the return on investment.
Put PD where it actually fits: your energy, not your ideals
Many people schedule PD in the ‘leftover zone’ (late evening, end of the week, between meetings) but we really – instead – need to be focused on how we spend our energy most effectively. Instead of just slotting in occasional PD, consider the energy it needs:
- High-focus learning (new concepts, assessments, deliberate practice) → mornings or your best cognitive window.
- Reflective PD (journaling, integration, reviewing sessions) → late afternoon or end-of-day transitions.
- Light-touch PD (short videos, reading, listening) → commute time, lunch break, walking.
If you’re using self-paced PD, you can shape learning around your reality rather than forcing your life around a course timetable. This is one of the biggest advantages of asynchronous learning design – the fundamental principles of the Jigsaw Learning Hub.
Protect PD time and treat it like a client commitment
If PD is always movable, it will always be moved therefore we need to schedule it – and give it the same level of importance – as client work. Consider some of the following:
1) Time-block and name it properly: Avoid vague calendar labels like ‘Learning’ that feel optional.
2) Create a boundary script: When requests come in, stick by your plans and have a default response: “I’m not available then, but I can do X or Y.”
3) Use ‘bookends’: Start and end your week with PD anchors such as
-
- Monday: 20 minutes intention + one skill focus.
- Friday: 40 minutes review + one improvement commitment.
4) Reduce resistance and distractions: Make starting easy – open the module, bookmark the resource, keep your notes template ready. The goal is: less deciding and more doing.
Choose PD formats that produce real behaviour change
Many professionals consume a lot and apply little. If you want PD to translate into better practice, prioritise formats that involve feedback and reflection:
- Mentor coaching for structured, competency-based feedback and clarity on what mastery looks like. You might consider one-to-one or group mentor coaching with Caroline.
- SUPERvision for resourcing, exploration, ethical reflection, pattern-spotting, and sustainability in your work. Maybe you could try one-to-one or group supervision with Caroline.
- Self-paced modules for flexible, high-quality learning you can do “little and often,” especially when mapped to recognised frameworks. Maybe you could try the Jigsaw Learning Hub self-paced CCE courses?
- Learning Communities and live sessions might work better for you if you like to make a clear commitment to some PD each month or on a regular basis. You might consider the Jigsaw Puzzle Series 2026 for 2.5 hour live workshops with Caroline each month.
A powerful approach is blending different options – learning, feedback, and integration – so PD becomes a cycle rather than a one-off event.
The ‘PD that counts’ checklist
Before you commit your valuable time to PD activities, ask some of the following questions:
- Is this aligned to my current goal?
- In what ways will it challenge or sharpen my practice?
- What is included? Reflection? Support? Advice? Application? Knowledge-share?
- What is realistic with my current workload?
- Will I be glad I did it in 3 months?
PD is how you ‘future-proof’ your professional self
When you consistently invest in your development, you don’t just gain skills – you strengthen your professional competency, confidence and identity. You make better choices, you notice more, you recover faster, and you serve others at a higher level. And, crucially, you stop relying on willpower alone. Build a system – one that makes PD part of who you are and what you do.
