• What is the Continuous Learning Framework
• Who is it for?
• How is it being developed and when will it be completed?
• How can the Continuous Learning Framework be used?
  • To support learning and development
  • To facilitate career pathways and progression
  • Standards

What is the Continuous Learning Framework?

The Continuous Learning Framework descxribes what people need in order to be able to do their job now and into the future. It also outlines what employers need to do to support their staff to do well.

1. Knowledge, Skills, Values and Understanding

The knowledge, skills, values and understanding required for social services roles varies depending upon the requirements of that particular role, the organisation's needs and the needs of those who use the service. The National Occupational Standards, the standards for the achievement of specific awards and the Codes of Practice for social service workers and employees are already well developed and provide organisations with a way of describing these requirements. These are often enriched with organisations' context-specific requirements.

2. Qualifications and Training

The qualifications and training required are largely determined by the SSSC's registration requirements. However, many organisations have additional requirements in place such as context- specific programs e.g. induction.

3. Personal capabilities

The personal capabilities (sometimes called 'soft skills' or social and emotional intelligence) describe the way in which people manage themselves and their relationships with others.

There is evidence to suggest that it is the personal capabilities that add value to the qualifications, knowledge and skills that people have gained, and therefore add quality to the social services provided. We believe that it is by recognising, valuing, and supporting employees to build upon their personal capabilities that we can have the most positive impact on those people who use social services.

The personal capabilities have been described across four progressive stages; engaged, established, accomplished and exemplary and currently include

Managing Self

• Self confidence
• Accurate self-assessment
• Lifelong learning
• Awareness of impact on others
• Flexibility
• Judgement
• Initiative
• Managing workloads
• Resilience

Managing relationships

• A focus on service users and carers
• Empathy
• Developing others
• Motivating and leading others
• Working with others across organisational boundaries
• Organisational awareness
• Teamwork
• Managing conflict

Do you want to know more? Please read "Personal capabilities", p16 of the Consultation Paper

4. Organisational Capabilities

An individual can be committed to doing a good job but unless they are part of an organisation that supports them to learn it can be very difficult to make the most of their capabilities. The organisational capabilities aim to highlight the shared commitment required by both the individual and the organisation to really support people to learn and develop.

The organisational capabilities currently include a set of principles and five capabilities which have also been described across four progressive stages; engaged, established, accomplished and exemplary. The five capabilities currently include

• Belief that the organisation has a learning and performance culture
• Planning for learning, development and improved practice
• Access to learning and development opportunities
• Access to feedback
• A workplace that focuses on health and well-being.

Do you want to know more? Please read "Organisational capabilities", p35 of the Consultation Paper

Who is it for?

It is being developed for the whole social services workforce. So regardless of whether people are involved in a local authority, voluntary or private organisation or whether they work in social care, early years or social work, the framework will be relevant to them.

How is it being developed and when will it be completed?

• Initial development
  We are currently working with a reference pool of people to finalise the consultation draft. Reference pool members are representative of people who use services and their carers, front line staff, leaders and managers, learning and development staff and people in higher and further education as well as those in voluntary, private and public sector organisations.
• Consultation
  The consultation phase of the project includes
  • Five consultation events across Scotland
  • Eight trials across Scotland
  • An outsourced online consultation process
  • Ongoing consultation with practitioners, people who use services and their carers.

• Completion
  Information from the consultation processes will be used to develop the final draft of the Continuous Learning Framework. The Framework will be launched in Autumn, 2008.

How can the Continuous Learning Framework be used?

1. To support learning and development

It is a given that people need to engage in learning and development to be effective. People have told us that it us currently difficult to make decisions about learning. There are so many initiatives and yet sometimes they seem fragmented and unconnected. The Continuous Learning Framework provides a mechanism to make these decisions more strategic and transparent. A number of the trials will be exploring its use for Post Registration Teaching and Learning, induction, supervision and performance appraisal processes.

2. To facilitate career pathways and progression

Employers will be encouraged to describe job roles in their organisations in terms of the

• qualifications and training
• knowledge, skills, values and understanding
• and the personal capabilities required.

Employees will then be able to compare what they 'can do' in their current roles with what they need to be able to do in a new role. This will enable them to be much clearer about targeting their learning as well identifying transferable skills.

3. Standards

The use of standards is well established in social services in Scotland and acts as an important mechanism to assure the community of the quality of social services they can expect. For example, the Care Commission use the National Care standards to ensure that service users receive the same standards of care wherever they live and the National Occupational Standards describe what an individual needs to do, know and understand in order to carry out a particular job role or function in the sector. The role of the Continuous Learning Framework is not to replace these standards but to find a way to build on and enrich them.

We are proposing two standards based approaches.

1. Employees can use the Continuous Learning Framework to track their progress and achievement over time using
   
   1. the qualifications and training
   2. knowledge, skills, values and understanding and
   3. stages of progression for the personal capabilities

   This would allow employees to keep a record of the Post-registration training and learning, their CPD and the impacts this has in practice. This would also support processes of recognised prior learning.

2. Organisations can use the Framework to identify the standards of practice they require and the standard of support they will provide to employees. To do this organisations would need to describe
   
   1. the qualifications and training
   2. knowledge, skills, values and understanding and
   3. stage of progression for the personal capabilities for each job role and
   4. determine the stage of progression for each organisational capability

   Employees can then be clear about what is expected of them as well as the levels of support that will be provided. This will assist organisations to make strategic decisions about where to invest in learning and development as well as contributing to evaluation and accountability processes.

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