Continuing professional development

The case, par excellence of the box-ticking culture than modern risk management has become.

Once upon a time, somewhere, someone in a self-regulating professional trade body confected a worry that the daily practice of one’s professional calling might render an attorney stale, out-of-touch or dangerously unlearned in the ways of her calling. A counter-intuitive idea, to be sure, but there you have it.

So was born “continuing professional development”, a stipulation whereby solicitors must periodically re-educate themselves on germane issues. It has caught on amongst other professional bodies: teachers, soldiers, healthcare professionals, accountants, architects and engineers have similarly misconceived programmes. To be sure, keeping up with your CPDs is not all that onerous — a dozen or so hours, spread over a year, is all you need — though across an entire profession that is no small demand on total capability. Law firms beheld a great marketing opportunity: a jaunty breakfast seminar for their in-house clients, followed by networking: a chance to renew acquaintances over a bagel. Simmons & Simmons took it a step further, organizing a whole day of crushing tedium wherein their clients could see off half their yearly quota in one biscuit-saturated setting.

Make no mistake: free bacon sandwiches are great. Most jobbing solicitors need no more incentive to show up than that. If the room is large and dark enough there is scope for a few winks. (Freshfields London has an excellently dingy auditorium, by the way, with premium snooze opportunities at the back). In brighter forums, it is a chance to catch up on Twitter, LinkedIn or follow the cricket.

But as to whether a CPD hour is well-spent, who can say? Is it vocational? Is it relevant? Is the content even accurate? Can one know whether, having signed in, young sir spent any part of it in the room, let alone paying attention? (The Americans had a crack at this by interposing a random number, to be read out at a random moment, which candidates had to quote in their attestation to prove they were conscious. But even then only one brave attorney must sit through the ordeal for the greater good of the whole.

Now let’s pretend for a moment you do show up, you do pay attention, and the talk is topical talk for area of practice. Will it be the thing that staves off a claim sounding in professional negligence? No-one who has spent an hour before a wizened solicitor mumbling through a dense PowerPoint deck about the transaction reporting regime under MiFID 2 would be on it.

But hurry along - the bran muffins are going fast.