Foundation Training and Continuous Professional Development

This page is an extract from the full topic guidance on Commercial Foundation Training and Continuous Professional Development (CPD) [50KB PDF]. It details the general guidance on Foundation Training, the CPD routes available and provides a link to the Commercial Skills Tube Map.

If you have any queries on this topic, please contact the Sponsor by email: DGDC-CC-Dev1a.

General Guidance

This is a guide to Commercial Foundation Training and the attainment of professional qualifications in purchasing and supply. Routes to continuous professional development are available through any of the following: Certificate of Competence in Purchasing and Supply (CCPS), Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply (CIPS) and National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs). Details of these routes can be viewed in the professional qualification building block.

Achievement of professional qualifications by an individual is a demonstration of a commitment to learning and development and evidence of the aim to become part of a more professional organisation. The government has acknowledged the benefits of enhanced professionalism in purchasing and has set a target of 75% of key purchasing staff to be professionally qualified.

Foundation Training

Commercial Training is available through a suite of courses mapped to the commercial and procurement functional competence framework. It is mandatory for those new to the function to undertake the first element of Foundation Training (the Commercial Awareness and Practitioner Programme (CAPP)).

The full suite of Commercial Foundation courses consists of up to 46 hours of e-learning and 4 courses, which should be completed within 2 years of taking up a commercial appointment:

Course	Type and Duration
Commercial Awareness and Practitioner Programme (mandatory)	12 e-learning modules plus 2 two day activity based workshops
Business Intelligence OLT	5 e-learning modules
Commercial Practitioners Workshop	3 days activity based workshop
Service Contracting OLT	4 e-learning modules
Introduction to Negotiation Workshop	2 days activity based workshop

Students will be expected to initially undertake CAPP whilst the remaining modules may be taken in any sequence to meet with business needs. Completion of the full CAPP (e-learning and workshops) equates to CIPS level 3 qualification.

Defence Academy College of Management and Technology (DA-CMT) (formerly known as DaLearning) run the Foundation Training courses and are responsible to their commercial training sponsor, Head of Commercial Capability (HCC) (formerly Directorate of Defence Commercial Policy (DdefCP)), for the content of commercial training. Commercial officers wishing to attend the courses should apply directly to DA-CMT. There will be no automatic call up for any of the above courses; this is the responsibility of the individual concerned and their line manager.

CPD Routes

Certificate of Competence In Purchasing And Supply (CCPS)
Chartered Institute Of Purchasing and Supply (CIPS)
- Certificate in Purchasing and Supply (Level 3)
- Diploma Stage
National Vocational Qualifications

All of the above courses are explained further in the full topic guidance.

Associated Documents

Commercial Skills Tube Map [167KB PDF]

Change History

1 June 2010: Minor amendment to change the abbreviation for the Certificate of Competence in Purchasing and Supply from CofC to CCPS.
1 August 2009: Minor change to paragraphs 6 and 10 to reflect DaLearning becoming Defence Academy College of Management and Technology (DA-CMT).
1 May 2009: Change of Sponsor title.
1 September 2008: Updated Commercial Foundation Courses at Paragraph 4. Addition of Commercial Skills Tube Map available under Associated Documents.
1 March 2008: Minor editorial changes.
1 June 2007: Updated at paragraph 5 and other minor editorial changes.
1 September 2006: Updated to reflect changes to the Commercial Foundation Training, the new CIPS Qualification Ladder and changes to training course titles.