CPD at HarrisonStevens

Choosing CPDs

Continuing Professional Development is not only a requirement by the landscape professional body but also a great learning opportunity to develop skills throughout our professional career. Here at HarrisonStevens we regularly invite, host and join online, a range of CPDs from all sectors of design, products, and learning opportunities.

With all team members taking part it is vital that the choosing and selection of relevant topics is appropriate for learning. Such CPDs may be linked to certain project we have in development at the studio such as understanding roof terrace landscapes and the possibilities of what is achievable, understanding the need for better urban tree planting as well as Biodiversity Net Gain and updates to planning law.  In addition we align the general topics of CPDs with the learning outcomes of our annual team study trip.

We are never short of CPDs and encourage all team members to suggest or reach out to companies or agencies with the opportunity to teach or present.

Curiosity is what drives learning and we encourage members to actively engage with CPDs and offer feedback both internally and externally.

Why is it valuable?
At HarrisonStevens we aim to maximise the learning opportunities and make sure that CPDs are both valuable and knowledgeable for all. We actively encourage an inquisitive nature and offer all team members the chance to question what we are learning about. Following CPD presentations we offer the chance for the studio to reflect back on the learning with feedback forms. This helps the CPD co-ordinator gain an inside look into how useful and knowledgeable each CPD has been. Not only does it help keep track of feedback but also allows us to document and store that learning opportunity to be used in practice later.

CPDs prove valuable as it keeps us knowledgeable about current trends, laws, advice and design enhancements. The world is continually changing and so is the landscape! It is important to not only be good at your job but also to actively learn and grow both professionally and as a practitioner, to ensure that our clients get the best and most appropriate advice in our projects. CPDs offer different insight into other topics not typically used in our day to day, which leads to an overall better understanding of a wide variety of learning objectives.

What are we aiming to achieve through CPDs?

Here at HarrisonStevens we collectively inspire and look forward to the learnings that CPDs have to offer and how they can not only benefit the knowledge but also be implemented within design and standards of the practice.

It is important to keep up to date with the latest developments of policies, practices and sustainability measure and here at HS in order that our clients and collaborators benefit from best practice and the most relevant professional landscape advice.

The role of the practice’s CPD co-ordinator is a rotating annual role, offering the team the opportunity to become the CPD co-ordinator and take responsibility for finding, researching and organising future learning opportunities.

This dynamic engages everyone within the office to have the opportunity to develop the professional understanding  and gain the responsibility while developing organisational skills.

Over the past year we have gained a lot of valuable knowledge from a wide range of topics. Most notably would be the site visit to Denfind Quarry.  Understanding how the process of the hard landscape is excavated, extracted, processed and finished to client and design needs. Not only was the Scottish weather kind to us but it made us realise how important it is to understand how and what we are specifying.

With internal CPDs comes a whole array of physical samples, our samples library at HarrisonStevens is growing. Seeing and touching the materials that make up the landscape we design is invaluable.  Keeping on top of the samples library is another task of the CPD Coordinator.

Further Learning Opportunities?

At HarrisonStevens our annual study tour is a long weekend trip full of learnings and exploration. We believe in the huge educational benefit of site visits and experiencing projects at first hand.  Out annual trip looks to discover projects award winning and used as precedents in our design studies.  Each of us is asked to present a project while there in the space, and share with the team the relevant learnings and design approach of a place.  

This trip is a weekend long internal CPD opportunity for everyone to take part in and proves to be a great resource and bank of knowledge when all is shared with each other. It is also a fantastic opportunity to share experiences as a team and to bond through our passion of design and unique place making. Presentations back at the office follow as we reflect back on the trip and the learnings and take-aways.