Continuing Professional Development (CPD) is a regulatory requirement for retail investment advisers and an essential part of maintaining your competence throughout your career as a financial adviser. But completing the learning is only half the job. You also need a clear record showing what you completed, what you learned and why it was relevant to your role.
A certificate can confirm that you attended a webinar or completed a course. On its own, however, it doesn’t show how the activity developed your knowledge or affected the way you work.
This guide explains how to create CPD records that are accurate, useful and easy to review – without turning every entry into an essay.
CPD is only one part of your wider regulatory responsibilities. Use our Independent Financial Adviser Compliance Checklist to review the other areas you need to keep on top of as an adviser, including suitability, record keeping, Consumer Duty, complaints and financial promotions.
Before you begin: Check which CPD requirements apply to you
Retail investment advisers must complete at least 35 hours of relevant CPD each year, including at least 21 hours of structured learning. Structured CPD is an activity designed to achieve a defined learning outcome.
Additional requirements may apply depending on your role and the products you advise on. For example:
- Pension Transfer Specialists must complete at least 15 hours of pension transfer-specific CPD in each 12-month period, in addition to their wider CPD requirements.
- People advising on certain long-term insurance products must complete at least 15 hours of relevant professional training or development in each 12-month period. For retail investment advisers, these 15 hours can count towards the wider 35-hour annual CPD requirement, rather than being additional hours.
- Your firm, Principal or accredited professional body may set additional expectations for how CPD is completed and evidenced.
Before planning your learning, confirm:
- When your CPD cycle begins and ends
- How many hours you need to complete
- How many must be structured
- Whether any specialist requirements apply
- Which records and evidence your firm or professional body expects
1. Start with the reason for the learning
A strong CPD record begins with a clear learning objective.
Rather than recording only what you attended, explain why the activity was relevant to you. For example:
- A regulatory change affected your advice process
- A file review identified a development need
- You wanted to strengthen your knowledge in a specialist area
- A client conversation exposed a gap in your understanding
- You needed to improve a technical or communication skill
- The activity related to your permissions or the clients you serve
Keep the objective specific.
Too vague: Learn more about Consumer Duty.
Better: Improve my understanding of how to identify and evidence foreseeable harm during ongoing client reviews.
The second version makes it much easier to show whether the activity achieved its purpose.
2. Record the essential details every time
Use the same core fields for each CPD activity.
Your record should normally include:
- Date
- Activity title
- Training provider or source
- Duration
- Structured or unstructured
- Subject area
- Learning objective
- What you learned
- How the learning applies to your role
- Supporting evidence retained
Using a consistent format makes your record easier to maintain and helps you identify missing information before it becomes a problem.
It also means that your firm, Principal or professional body can understand the activity without having to interpret a collection of certificates, emails and notes.
3. Update your record while the learning is fresh
Don’t wait until your Statement of Professional Standing renewal is approaching to reconstruct a year’s CPD from your inbox and calendar.
Record each activity shortly after completing it. At that point, you’ll be better able to explain:
- What was new to you
- What clarified or changed your understanding
- Which points were most relevant to your work
- What you intend to do differently
- Whether you need any further learning
A five-minute reflection completed immediately is usually more useful than a longer entry written from memory six months later.
Setting aside a regular time each week or month to update your log can stop CPD administration from becoming a year-end exercise.
4. Classify structured and unstructured CPD correctly
Structured CPD is planned learning designed to achieve a defined outcome. It can include:
- Training courses
- Professional qualification modules
- Regulatory update webinars
- Workshops
- Conferences and seminars
- Online learning with testing or verification
Relevant sessions at industry events and as part of ValidPath’s Member community can also count towards your CPD where they meet the applicable criteria.
For example, ValidPath’s regional events and annual Member event include sessions that support Members’ professional development. Record each relevant session separately, including its duration, learning objective, outcome and any evidence of attendance, rather than recording the entire event as a single CPD activity.
Unstructured CPD is generally more informal. It can include:
- Reading FCA publications
- Reviewing technical updates
- Reading professional journals
- Researching legislation
- Technical discussions with colleagues
- Reflecting on previous work
Don’t classify an activity as structured simply because it took place online or came with a certificate. The important question is whether it was a planned activity designed to achieve a defined learning outcome.
Research undertaken solely to recommend a product or service to an individual client shouldn’t simply be recorded as CPD.
Where you’re unsure, check the definitions used by your firm, Principal and accredited professional body.
5. Retain evidence of the activity
Keep evidence that supports each entry, particularly for structured learning.
Depending on the activity, this could include:
- A completion certificate
- An attendance record
- Assessment or test results
- A course agenda
- Event confirmation
- Training slides or materials
- A record from your learning platform
- Notes showing what you reviewed
- A link or copy of the publication you read
Store the evidence with the corresponding CPD entry wherever possible. Don’t rely on the training provider retaining it indefinitely or assume that you’ll be able to find the original email later.
Accredited professional bodies can sample advisers’ CPD records, and they may impose evidence requirements above the FCA’s minimum standards.
6. Explain what you actually learned
Avoid reflections that simply repeat the title of the activity.
Too vague: Attended a webinar on pension changes. It was useful and informative.
Better: The webinar clarified how the pension changes affect the information clients need before making retirement-income decisions. I also learned which assumptions should be documented when comparing the available options.
Focus on what was added to your knowledge. Useful questions to answer include:
- What do I understand now that I didn’t understand before?
- Did anything challenge my previous assumptions?
- Which part was most relevant to my role?
- Did the activity confirm that my existing approach remains appropriate?
- Is there anything I still need to investigate?
Your reflection doesn’t need to be long. Two or three precise sentences are usually more valuable than a generic paragraph.
7. Connect the learning to your work
The strongest CPD records explain how the learning will be used.
This could mean:
- Updating a client document
- Changing a fact-find question
- Improving how you explain a risk
- Reviewing a process with your team
- Applying new regulatory guidance to future cases
- Discussing an issue with compliance
- Completing further training
- Monitoring a future regulatory development
Be specific about the action.
Too vague: I’ll use this in my role.
Better: I’ll update my annual review checklist to make sure changes in vulnerability and support needs are considered and recorded consistently.
Not every activity will require a major change. Where the learning confirmed that your current process remains appropriate, record that conclusion and why.
8. Keep your CPD relevant and balanced
Completing enough hours isn’t the only consideration. Your learning should remain relevant to your responsibilities, permissions and development needs.
Review whether your CPD includes an appropriate balance of:
- Technical knowledge
- Regulatory and compliance updates
- Consumer Duty
- Vulnerability
- Suitability and advice quality
- Fact-finding
- Client communication
- Ethics and professional judgement
- Any specialist advice areas relevant to your role
ValidPath’s training framework groups CPD across regulatory and compliance learning, role-specific technical knowledge, and soft skills and client engagement. This helps advisers demonstrate competence beyond product knowledge alone.
Avoid choosing activities purely because they’re easy to access or offer a large number of hours. Your log should reflect the work you actually perform and the clients you advise.
9. Review your progress throughout the CPD cycle
Check your CPD record periodically rather than leaving everything until the final weeks of your cycle.
During each review, check:
- Your total completed hours
- Your structured hours
- Any specialist requirements
- Whether each activity is relevant to your role
- Whether evidence has been saved
- Whether learning outcomes and applications are complete
- Whether you’ve covered a suitable range of subjects
- Whether you’re relying too heavily on one type of learning
This gives you time to address gaps properly rather than completing unsuitable activities simply to reach the required total.
ValidPath recommends that CPD is distributed across the cycle rather than concentrated at the end. Our Advance CPD platform can also help Members track hours, monitor structured learning and identify gaps or overdue activity.
10. Use AI to organise your reflection – not invent it
AI can help you turn genuine notes into a clearer CPD entry.
For example, you could use it to:
- Organise notes under consistent headings
- Separate the objective from the learning outcome
- Tighten an overly long reflection
- Turn brief notes into complete sentences
- Identify fields you haven’t completed
- Improve clarity and remove repetition
AI shouldn’t be used to:
- Invent what you learned
- Guess how long the activity took
- Claim that you attended or completed something
- Create a reflection that you haven’t reviewed
- Replace your own professional judgement
- Process confidential client information unnecessarily
The FCA applies its existing principles and outcome-focused regulatory framework to firms’ use of AI, while the ICO confirms that data protection law applies where AI systems process personal data.
Follow your firm’s AI policy and use only approved tools. Don’t include client names, identifiable case details, or other confidential information in your prompt. Where you’re using an AI chatbot for business purposes, use the business or enterprise account approved by your firm rather than a personal or free account, so the appropriate organisational data controls and protections are in place.
An AI prompt to help you draft your CPD record
If you like, you can use the following prompt to help organise your own notes:
Using only the notes I provide below, draft a concise CPD record in plain English. Don’t invent, assume or add any facts.
Use these headings:
Activity
Date
Duration
CPD type
Learning objective
What I learned
How I’ll apply the learning
Evidence retained
If any information is missing, list it under “Information to add” rather than completing the gap yourself.
Don’t include or request client names, identifying details or other confidential information.
My notes:
[Paste your non-confidential notes here.]
Treat the result as a first draft. Check that every statement is accurate, reflects your own experience and sounds like something you would genuinely record.
What does a good CPD record look like?
A basic entry might say:
Consumer Duty webinar – two hours.
This records the activity and duration, but it doesn’t explain why it was relevant or what changed as a result.
A stronger entry would look like this:
- Activity: FCA Consumer Duty webinar
- Date: 15 March 2026
- Type: Structured
- Duration: Two hours
- Learning objective: Improve my understanding of foreseeable harm and customer-outcome monitoring.
- What I learned: The session clarified how complaints, review completion, client-support data and service delays can help identify differences in customer outcomes.
- Application: I’ll review how these areas are recorded during annual client reviews and raise any gaps with our compliance team.
- Evidence retained: Attendance certificate and webinar slides.
The aim isn’t to produce the longest possible entry. It’s to create a record that clearly connects the activity, the learning and its relevance to your work.
ValidPath’s 2026 Training, Competence and CPD Guide uses the same core structure: activity, type, duration, learning objective, learning outcome and practical application.
How ValidPath helps Members manage CPD
ValidPath Members have access to role-specific training, regulatory learning and practical guidance from our compliance team.
Our Advance CPD solution also provides structured and mandatory learning, knowledge testing, CPD tracking and training records, helping Members keep their evidence organised and monitor their progress throughout the year. The platform makes managing CPD simpler, but it doesn’t replace your own reflection. You should still make sure each record accurately explains what you learned and how it relates to your role.
Speak to ValidPath about the training and compliance support available to Members, including 120+ training sessions delivered last year.
