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Competence

High on the government's current agenda is a competent healthcare workforce. And as a CSP member, you have a duty to maintain and develop your ability to work safely and competently within your scope of practice. How do you do this?

Competence

Working safely and competently within your scope of practice means that you:

  • ensure you have the skills, knowledge and abilities required to carry out your work role
  • identify areas in which you need to further develop in order to maintain your competence.

We expect that you will maintain your competence through continuing professional development (CPD) activities and have a number of key resources available to support you in doing this.

This CSP model of competence is one that focuses on broad attributes and individual responsibility. It promotes the notion that learning is inherent in practice and is inclusive of ethical and emotional dimensions of practice (competencies). The Skills for Health model focuses on specific skills and knowledge that can be easily observed in practice (competences) and has ensuring safety as its centre.

Skills for Health

The competence of the healthcare workforce is currently very high on the government agenda across the sector. Skills for Health (SfH) (see www.skillsforhealth.org), the sector skills council for the health sector, is currently engaged in a large number of projects to develop competence frameworks for many areas of healthcare practice. These tend to be around specific patient groups, eg children, older people, or care pathways, eg diabetes, long term conditions, chronic heart disease.

Information on Skills for Health competence frameworks projects can be found on their website - see www.skillsforhealth.org.uk/page/competences.

Skills for Health has also produced a Competence-based Career Framework for AHPs (please see the Competence-based Career Framework for AHPs content on the Career Planning page) that aims to provide a resource for AHPs to support:

  • role and service development
  • career development
  • education planning, commissioning and delivery.

There are CSP information papers available if you are interested in knowing more about Skills for Health and the competences agenda and how to use SfH competences and competence frameworks:

  • Competences and Competence Frameworks: Skills for Health and the Competence Agenda and Using Competences and Competence Frameworks
  • Getting to grips with using competences and Modernising Allied Health Professions (AHP) Careers: A competence-based career framework: Briefing for managers

    Competence and Capability

    The CSP has adopted a holistic/professional approach to competence as described in the Competence & Capability resource pack which:

    • explores the terms competence and capability
    • examines why the development and maintenance of competence is important
    • identifies systems and structures that underpin this process
    • provides advice and good practice where capability concerns may arise.

    Cultural competence

    Cultural competence is a facet of overall professional competence. Understanding and reflecting on your own culture, and the underpinning values and beliefs that contribute to this, is the starting point for the process of acquiring cultural competence. As a culturally competent physiotherapist you will recognize, respect and respond to individual needs, and adapt practice accordingly, whichever country you work in.

    Culturally appropriate, client centred services are: negotiated with community leaders, accessible, sensitive to different perceptions of health and wellbeing, adaptable, sensitive to power differentials and non-discriminatory.

    Discrimination on the basis of gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion and belief, or disability against service users or work colleagues breaches the Society’s Rules of Professional Conduct, Core Standards of Physiotherapy Practice and UK law.

    NHS Knowledge and Skills Framework

    In the NHS the competences-based approach is currently being driven by the introduction of the NHS Knowledge and Skills Framework (KSF). The KSF is a broad, generic UK-wide framework that sets out to describe and recognise the types of knowledge and skills that a post-holder needs to be effective in their NHS job.

    All competences developed by Skills for Health have indicative links to the relevant KSF dimensions and levels to help NHS staff and managers identify the SfH competences that might link to specific work roles. More information on the tools available for identifying relevant SfH competences is available on the tools skills for health website: http://tools.skillsforhealth.org.uk/.

    Charting the Future

    We are currently working on a project, called Charting the Future, to prepare the physiotherapy profession for the future. As part of this we are developing a physiotherapy framework that will set out the knowledge, skills, attributes and values associated with physiotherapy practice at all levels and in all types of roles. The framework will help you to identify learning and development opportunities that match your learning needs and professional development goals. For example, when planning a career move or returning to practice.

    Get involved yourself: see more information about Charting the Future on this website.

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