Personal development plans (in primary dental care) – getting started

What is a personal development plan

Personal development plans (PDPs) have been in existence for many years in many guises. The New Year's resolution is, in many respects, an example of a plan. In its simplest form, a PDP is a list of things you wish to learn or learn to do differently over a given period of time. It has long been known that plans which are written down and reviewed are more likely to succeed. The Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) in 20091 defined PDP as

The key aspect of a PDP is its link to the way the owner learns and the process of developing a PDP and its outcomes involve reflection and are linked to learning theory.2 The General Dental Council has indicated that a PDP will be an essential part of a dentist's revalidation portfolio in its consultation on Revalidation in 2009.3 The NHS salaried dental services have expected staff to have a PDP for a number of years. To the busy practitioner, having a PDP probably seems like yet another bit of bureaucracy that takes one away from treating patients. Certainly, if that view is taken it is unlikely that a PDP will be of value. On the other hand, if one embraces the concept, it brings great benefits to the individual owner of the PDP, his/her patients, staff and colleagues. The benefits of a PDP can include the following:

How does one start making a PDP?

The starting point of any plan is deciding where one wishes to get to. Some of the questions that may help determine this include:

Developing this personal vision, whilst not essential for developing an annual PDP, helps give focus. The five year plan need not be detailed, more a direction of travel which acts as a reference point for each year's PDP. Why choose five years? There are no absolute rules on choosing the timeframe for a plan. The world is a rapidly changing place and few of us could have predicted all the changes in the past decade, so choosing a date which is far enough ahead to allow for a reasonable amount of time to accomplish the goals, but not too distant to be worthwhile, is worthwhile. Whilst developing the plan, one should also consider the practice one works in and its development plans so that the plans synchronize where the goals are similar.

Having determined, ideally, where one wishes to be in five years, the next stage is to identify where one is now. This can be done by asking the following questions:

These questions are the basis of a SWOT analysis (Figure 1). Filling in the boxes of the SWOT matrix can be a quick method of reviewing the current situation. Very often the same item may appear in two boxes. For example, a drop in NHS funding of dentistry may be a threat to an NHS dentist. It may also be an opportunity as it may allow one to develop areas of private practice.

What should a five year plan look like?

A five year plan should be broad brush without too much detail, eg

My own practice sets its long-term goal for its three partners of having a practice that would allow us the flexibility to allow each partner to pursue his/her interests in a supportive way. We then defined what the practice wished to achieve for its patients:

The resources issue meant what the patients could afford, wish and what the practice could deliver within these constraints.

This then sets the direction of travel and we determined that reducing debt was the key goal to allowing flexibility in the future, and so that became a key goal, with the partners drawing less.

Having determined the long-term direction, the plan can be broken down into annual steps.

Annual plan

What is in the five year plan that needs to be addressed this year? Then again, one needs to determine where one is now. In terms of one's professional practice, a personal SWOT may be helpful in determining what goes in the plan.

The following questions can be helpful in determining areas for development.

Dr Richard Eve,4 in the 1990s, developed the concepts of Patients' Unmet Needs (PUNS). This was when a patient asked for advice and one gave it but was not certain that it was the latest position on the subject. So it might be what one prescribed as an antibiotic for an infection, but was it the best one for the condition? From this he generated Doctors' Education Need (DEN) which could just as easily be Dentist Learning Need. Having established the learning need it can be incorporated into the PDP.

For me, I felt that my root canal therapy was an area that could be improved upon.

What areas could one include in a PDP?

A PDP is a personal document that defines what you wish to learn over a specified period of time, and as such it can contain any learning goal the owner of the PDP wishes to determine.

Educationalists have defined the three components of learning as:

The synthesis of knowledge with experience allows one to make a judgement, which is a critical skill in deciding how best to deal with situations.

The PDP may need to contain these elements.

Having determined what one wishes to learn, the next stage is to formulate this into a series of objectives:

Taking the objective and trying to make it a SMART objective is a critical stage in developing an effective PDP:

Determination of goals

So, from these questions, one may determine various learning goals which are all part of the PDP. The analysis of what needs to be learnt and how tends to make learning more effective. It may be that one determines that the solution to the problem is not attending courses, rather tackling the obstacles in practice to obtain the desired result. This may just involve allocating more time to procedures to achieve the desired result, ie achieving the Aim: improved root canal treatment, giving an example of a PDP (Table 1).

The step of demonstrating success is one which can be challenging. If it is thought that if success is not clearly measured, it is less likely to be achieved, then types of measuring techniques need to be adopted:

The GDC has suggested that the domains of revalidation are:

One might chose to set one objective in each domain each year. In the first year it might just be that one undertakes surveys or audits in each area to determine the learning priorities for the future.

If all of the stages have been followed, then the PDP is likely to result in improvements in one's working life, which hopefully will make it more satisfying. The other factor that may be critical in success relates to the SMART objectives in the PDP.

It pays to be realistic, ie not setting too many goals in a year is very important to the success of the plan. In general, a few well chosen objectives each year is important. If too many objectives are set which all require a lot of time and effort, then they are less likely to be achieved. So it may be more important to determine which goals will have the greatest benefit and make these the priorities. Having a maximum of six objectives may be wise. One can always cover other objectives the next year, or later in the year, if the main ones are achieved earlier in the year. The plan is personal, so it can contain personal learning goals outside work so as to maintain work/life balance, eg setting goals of attending the gym at least once per week or taking an evening class in a subject that interests you.

Personal development plans and practice development plans.

Whilst a PDP can be something developed in isolation to meet personal goals, there may be benefits if items in it link to practice development plans. The days of practising independently have diminished for most of us. The cost of cross-infection control, technology and patient demands have made it difficult to practise on one's own. If a clinic or practice is to survive, it needs to try and deliver as many services in house so, having a plan to develop the practice is beneficial and may result in different practice members developing complementary skills, and so the practice plan will define who will develop which skills. The individual's PDP will define how that will be done and the outcome measures. Having both practice and personal development plans available for annual appraisal aids the process, as it can give a focus to discussions on successes of the year, obstacles and areas for future development that are agreed by the parties involved.

Summary

A well constructed PDP need not take long to develop. It gives a focus and structure to one's professional development and it should clearly define the outcome, uses and SMART objectives to maximize the chances of success. The result is the sense of achievement which benefits both the individual and his/her patients, which hopefully makes for a more enjoyable professional life.