Reflective practice FAQs
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There is no set way for recording your reflections and how you do it will depend on matters such as the nature of the event you have reflected on, your personal style of learning and whether you wish to use the reflection to evidence your CPD. Remember that reflection may also be a requirement for your employment or membership in a professional body and you may be required to submit this in a specific form.
As a guide, we would encourage you to focus your records on the lessons you have learned from the reflection, and any future actions that you might take as a result.
The resources on these pages will help registrants with reflective practice. Your professional membership body or employer may also have tools, guidance or other resources that can help aid your reflection and make it more effective.
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Just like your chosen method of reflecting needs to suit you and your needs, the same is true for how you record them. There are lots of different ways you can record your reflections for example keeping a journal, using an online portal or making voice recordings. Your employer or professional body may require you to reflect and you must follow their policies. For more information about the materials you can submit to evidence your CPD, see here.
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The HCPC would only need to know about your reflection if you were submitting this as part of a CPD profile.
You can provide them as evidence of your CPD or as part of your response to an investigation into your fitness to practise, if you wish.
We do not specify the types of activities that you can carry out as part of your CPD profile but encourage you to consider opportunities that are ‘interactive and encourage self-reflection’. If you are including reflective practice with your CPD profile, you must make sure that you remember to keep information about your service users confidential.
You can do this by making sure to anonymise sensitive information that can identify individuals from your notes before submitting these as part of your portfolio. You can find further information about our expectations in this area in our confidentiality guidance for registrants.
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If you submit your notes as part of a CPD audit, we will use them to assess whether you have the continued to meet our standards.
If a concern is raised against you, we will also not ask you to provide your personal written reflections. However, you may choose to share this with us to demonstrate insight or remediation.
If deciding to share your reflective notes with us in an FTP context, we would encourage you to seek advice first. This could be from your professional body, trade union or legal advisor.
If you decided to share your reflective notes with us, this will be subject to our data governance policies relating to CPD or to FTP.
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Yes. You can reflect by yourself. You can, for example, write down your experiences and what lessons you have learned.
Reflecting as an individual can be useful, but you can also collaborate with others in reflection, even if you do not work with them and even if they are part of a different profession.
If you do, please keep confidentiality in mind and only share the minimum amount of information necessary, anonymising personal information.
Further guidance on reflection
Professional bodies or your employer may have further information on reflection including resources to make your reflection more effective. Take a look at our list of professional membership bodies for the professions we regulate.
Don't forget to look through our case studies and templates to help you reflect as well.