Bench-marking my practice – professional, ethical and inclusive

In my early years as a trainer and assessor I was encouraged to benchmark everything I developed against others in the industry – hopefully those who were better at it than me! I quickly joined the local Trainers and Assessors Network, but was disappointed to find that most weren’t actually interested in bench-marking, but rather protecting their own intellectual property. That attitude makes it very difficult to benchmark ones’ own professional practice.  To counter that I started to take every opportunity to observe other trainers and learn from them, not only what TO do, but also what NOT to do. In those early days I had the Assessor Code of Practice front and centre, but I find now that many Assessors don’t even know it exists. It’s been a while since I looked at it, so on a recent review, I was surprised to see how much of it has now become something we do for compliance rather than because we believe it’s what is best. Surely protecting the rights of candidates, avoiding harassment and maintaining confidentiality (to name a few points) should be expected of all Assessors because that’s what we WANT to do, not because we’re told we have to.

I’m particularly interested in the way a couple of the last points are worded: “Professional development opportunities are identified and sought” and “Opportunities for networking amongst assessors are created and maintained.”  Both are active, not passive, statements. It’s not “Professional development will be attended (reluctantly) when it’s handed to me on a plate”, but rather implies an active working out what I need and then seeking it out for myself. I think I’ve done this reasonably well in identifying and attending webinars, Twitter chats, live streamed conferences and MOOCs. I still need to work out how I can better engage my colleagues and encourage them to seek out their own PD.

Achieving a qualification can be seen as a means of bench-marking, but there is no specific qualification for my job role, and sadly, many Diploma qualified Assessors can’t navigate their way through a unit of competency, meaning this isn’t a satisfactory benchmark.

I can also benchmark against our organisational Code of Conduct which highlights the values of fairness, respect, integrity, professionalism, accountability and equality of opportunity. A few key points applicable to my role are the need to use current and accurate information and evidence: maintain up-to-date knowledge in our areas of work or scholarship, and in the professional, legal and ethical standards relevant to our areas of expertise: and to practice inclusiveness and respect for differences between people.

How do I do this? I subscribe to a barrage of industry newsletters by email, I participate in LinkedIn group discussions, and follow industry organisations on Twitter. In our team I’m recognised as the “information seeker” and I’m tasked with keeping the rest of the team informed – one of the benefits of our Myers-Briggs analysis a couple of years ago was identifying what tasks each of us enjoys.

Practicing inclusivity on our campus is a must: our staff include tradespeople who have spent years on the tools and come to us having never used a computer, admin staff fresh out of school, highly (and multi) qualified HE Lecturers and everything in between. We may not be multi-racial, but we are certainly multi-cultural. And I get to work with all of them! They know that if my door is open they are welcome to drop in with a query or a chat. They know that if they need assistance, there is nothing I enjoy more than getting out of my office, sitting beside them and helping to work out whatever is the issue. I love working with small groups in a training environment where I can make sure I give everyone opportunities to be involved.

I’d love to hear from other Instructional Designers or Learning Technologists – what are your professional benchmarks and where do you look to for professional development?