Lifelong learning for engineers in a global context

摘要

Continuing Professional Development (CPD) has come to be recognised as an important, even vital, means of keeping up to date in one's chosen career. As we move rapidly and inexorably towards a knowledge-based global society, Graham Guest, in the first of two articles, considers what the 21st century holds in terms of lifelong learning and CPD. Not so long ago a person joining a company, particularly a large organisation, could expect a job for life. The way into a company for a professional engineer was through a period of academic study followed by, or combined with, structured training. After this the individual would generally follow a clearly defined path of progression in his or her chosen field of employment.