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What defines a “professional?”
Across regulated professions—from accountants, social workers, doctors, lawyers, pharmacists, and pharmacy technicians—one defining component of a professional is the unique knowledge they have. They then use that knowledge and their experience to carry out their work. A professional is someone who can use their judgement and critical thinking to make decisions when information is imperfect, problems are complex, and answers are ambiguous.
It is essential for every professional to keep their knowledge current through professional learning and development. They need to stay connected with colleagues and the profession and ensure they know how to navigate challenging and complex situations.
As regulated health professionals, pharmacists and pharmacy technicians must continuously learn and grow to be prepared to meet the needs of patients and their communities. Healthcare colleagues expect that those with whom they collaborate have the knowledge and skills they need. Patients have a right to expect up-to-date and evolving professional competence.
Maintaining competence is a professional responsibility and a hallmark of self-regulated professionals. As such, the Health Professions Act requires that ACP deliver a Continuing Competence Program (CCP) to ensure pharmacists and pharmacy technicians fulfill their professional responsibility of maintaining competence.
Part of ACP’s commitment in delivering the CCP is to enable ongoing growth and development. That is why the CCP underwent a major review in 2025 and has been revamped to better serve regulated members’ professional development. The review of the program was informed by a comprehensive literature review and an analysis of other continuing competence programs from across the country. Detailed feedback was also collected from regulated members through a review of annual survey data and guided focus groups with practising pharmacists and pharmacy technicians. This feedback helped to identify what regulated members found valuable, effective, and relevant about the CCP. From there, the feedback was considered in relation to the literature and the environmental scanning and revisions to the CCP were developed.
ACP’s deputy registrar, Kaye Moran, said that one of the key takeaways from the feedback was that regulated members value periodically reflecting on their practice.
“We heard from regulated members that the program facilitates reflection on their practice, and supports ongoing improvement,” said Kaye. “Respondents felt that the program creates a helpful structure to set their own learning and development goals and guide them in considering all the ways they’ve improved over the last year.”
While the program was valued by regulated members, this comprehensive consultation process also elicited some helpful feedback about areas for improvement.
“We heard feedback that aspects of the process were repetitive and didn’t always easily fit with how they think about their practice,” said Kaye. “There were also calls to make the program more user friendly and it became obvious that the program needed to change to better recognize the differences between the pharmacy professions.”
This feedback was used to inform some major changes to the CCP to better align with the needs of regulated members. Overall, the evolved CCP was designed to be more user friendly, better recognize the differences between different practice settings and the pharmacy professions, modernize the documentation process, and better support those who require practice improvement.
At the heart of this shift was to move the program away from a continuous professional development (CPD) approach. A CPD-based program is limited in its structure as it focuses only on learning and the application of learning. It does not encourage or support professionals to think about other aspects of their professional work or what makes them who they are as professionals.
To better encompass a more holistic appreciation of a pharmacy professional’s identity and development, the evolved program was designed with the tenets of professionalism at the core of the CCP to ensure every regulated member, regardless of practice setting, could use the CCP to meaningfully reflect on their learning, development, and experiences.
Professionalism in action
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“With the evolved program, the focus has shifted to a holistic reflection on all aspects of professional practice,” said Kaye. “The six tenets of professionalism effectively set the framework for this reflection because they guide regulated members to really consider the many different aspects of a pharmacy professional. Whether it’s using good judgement, being a leader, or collaborating, having the opportunity to reflect on growth in these different aspects of one’s professional practice and thinking more holistically will help regulated members continually improve.”
Pharmacy technicians and pharmacists also shared through surveys and focus groups that they wanted to get feedback from peers about their submissions and professional practice through the CCP.
“We heard that people wanted to know how they were doing to make sure they were doing things correctly and to hear meaningful feedback from their peers about their submissions and their overall practice,” said Kaye. “We have taken that feedback and plan to incorporate more opportunities for peer feedback in the CCP.”
One thing that hasn’t changed? The opportunity to keep track of continuing education units.
“We consistently heard that regulated members find value in documenting their learning,” said Kaye. “We heard that keeping track offers a sense of accomplishment and a valuable opportunity to reflect.”
Pharmacy technicians and pharmacists are proud to be regulated healthcare providers and participating in the CCP is a valued program to support this essential aspect of being a pharmacy professional. The evolved CCP better facilitates the process of ongoing professional growth with a shift away from a CPD approach to a more holistic approach that will foster ongoing personal and professional growth.
“Pharmacy practice is demanding, but pharmacy professionals continue to prioritize fulfilling their professional responsibilities of always learning and developing and evolving with the latest information,” said Kaye. “The evolved CCP empowers pharmacists and pharmacy technicians and creates the structure that fosters their continued professional learning and development.”
