All practising patent and trade mark attorneys have a professional obligation to ensure that they maintain their skills and knowledge at the necessary level to be able to provide a competent service to existing and potential clients. The principle of Continuing Professional Development (CPD) or continuing competence is well established and its value is self-evident.
Attorneys should approach continuing competence in three stages:
- Reflect on their practice and identify areas for learning and development
- Plan activities to address their development needs
- Record and evaluate the activities undertaken, and properly consider whether those activities met the development needs identified.
We have published some guidance here and also provide additional information in the tabs to the left. This guidance has been updated following the 2024 Continuing Competence Thematic Review. You can read IPReg's response to its findings, here.
When attorneys come to complete their annual return in order to renew their registration for the following year, they will be asked to make a Continuing Competence Declaration. They will need to confirm that they have:
- reflected on their practice over the course of the year
- identified learning or development needs or opportunities to embed their understanding of a particular area
- put in place steps to meet those needs or opportunities
- recorded what they have done.
IPReg will not require attorneys to upload evidence that they have reflected on their practice, but as part of our assurance processes we will ask some attorneys to provide their records to us from time to time. The purpose of this is to understand how well attorneys are undertaking the process, identify whether there are any obstacles in place preventing attorneys from complying with the requirements and sharing best practice across the professions more widely.
IPReg, CITMA and CIPA presented a 1 hour webinar on 21 September. A recording of this webinar can be accessed via CITMA's website.