Why the Blueprint is needed
Being a professionally qualified career development professional involves guiding people of all ages to:
- gain relevant information about themselves (e.g. their interests, talents and abilities), the labour market, and educational or vocational options – depending on their individual information needs;
- develop their career management skills; make sense of the situations they are experiencing, work through issues towards solutions, make career decisions, and realise personal change.
In addition they also:
- work with people and organisations in designing and developing career development programmes;
- manage and assure the quality of their own work;
- adopt professional values and ethical standards in all practice roles, develop and regulate relationships appropriately, engage in continuous learning and critical thinking and advocate for the profession
This role demands professional level qualifications at graduate level or above.
In order to ensure that all professional level qualifications for the career development sector reflect the skills and knowledge required, the CDI
- looked at the National Occupational Standards: Career Development and the full range of professional level career development qualifications currently in use across the UK,
- consulted with employers across the sector and course providers
The Blueprint was first produced in 2016 and updated in 2021 to reflect changes in the sector and the increased use of technology.