The future of professional development: How the RCVS Academy can help to create collaborative and supportive practices

As you may be aware we launched the RCVS Academy on 20 June. When we decided that we wanted to launch a learning platform, we wanted to make sure it served a purpose and was in line with the College’s values. We wanted it to be beneficial for the veterinary professionals and support them in their day-to-day roles. In this blog, I would like to take you through what value the Academy can add to your practice.

Compassionate

As the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) we are a regulator that sets out standards that all veterinary professionals need to meet. When we decided to launch the Academy, we wanted it to reflect one of our aims of being viewed as a trusted and compassionate regulator. Therefore, we built the Academy in a way that would offer veterinary professionals tools and resources to support them in meeting the standards set by the RCVS.

How does it help build confidence?

The quickest way to build confidence is by becoming knowledgeable on a topic, refreshing what you previously learnt or by learning something new. By taking part in continuous professional development (CPD) through the Academy, you’ll have the opportunity to build your confidence in a variety of topics, which will help to make you feel more confident in practice. The Academy can not only offer you the opportunity to transform your skills and abilities, but it can also give you the confidence to be able to transfer your knowledge to other veterinary professionals such as students and newly-qualified team members.

High-quality content

On the Academy, we have up-to-date courses that have been created collaboratively across the College’s departments to ensure we have included the best expertise to create high-quality content. We also ensure that all our learning material is engaging by adding a variety of learning tools across all our courses, including videos, written exercises and how-to guides.

Recruitment

Building a positive culture of learning and development in the workplace can boost recruitment. This starts with attracting the right candidates. Have a look at the job description you use to recruit candidates. Does it talk about the importance of learning in your workplace? Does it talk about how your practice supports staff in gaining new skills? And lastly, does your job description show your practice has a forward-thinking approach to learning? Your practice needs to stand out from the rest and what better way to do this than by encouraging learning on the Academy.

Retention

The Academy can definitely help with retention! The first step to retention is hiring the right candidates. Once you have recruited a talented employee, you will want to nurture them and give them the opportunity to realise their potential and grow. Pay contributes to the retention of staff but there are also other factors that can contribute to a retention strategy such as providing learning and development opportunities. Creating a learning and development environment within your practice will help boost employee retention by creating more engaged employees, better collaboration, increased morale, and better employee satisfaction.

Forward-thinking

Whether you are a full-time or part-time veterinary professional, using the Academy can add value to your life. We have put together bite-sized modules where you are able to pick and choose what is relevant to your learning needs. We understand that in the veterinary profession, you are very limited in the amount of downtime that you can dedicate to learning and that is why we break up our content so you can navigate easily through the courses.

Content is free and easy to access

As a registered veterinary nurse or surgeon, you are already registered to access the Academy for free. Simply log in using your MyAccount details.