Continuing Professional Development (CPD)

Continuing Professional Development (CPD) is the ongoing, documented education a research administrator or research-adjacent professional completes after entering the field, either to maintain a professional credential’s active status or, more broadly, to keep pace with an evolving regulatory and operational landscape. In research administration specifically, CPD is not a single program — it is a mix of mandatory, credential-tied continuing-education (CE) requirements set by certifying bodies and voluntary, non-credentialed training offered by professional associations.

What makes something count as CPD (operational definition)

Not every conference attended or webinar watched counts as CPD in the sense the term is used by certifying bodies. Activity counts as CPD, operationally, when it is:

• Tracked — the professional logs the activity (hours, points, or credits) against a specific reporting period.
• Applied — for credential holders, the logged hours are submitted to the certifying body as evidence toward a recertification cycle, not simply attended informally.
• Relevant — the content relates to the professional’s field of practice (e.g., sponsored-programs administration, clinical trial coordination, research compliance), sometimes with a sub-requirement that a portion relate directly to regulatory or policy content specifically.

Attending a single one-off session with no hours logged and no application toward any credential’s renewal requirement is professional development in the general sense, but it does not meet the operational bar certifying bodies use for CPD — see the counter-example below.

Credential-tied CE requirements in research administration

Several credentials relevant to research administration and clinical research operations attach a mandatory CE requirement to maintaining certified status. Specifics vary by body and are set independently by each:

• Certified Research Administrator (CRA), administered by the Research Administrators Certification Council (RACC): for exams taken from 2023 onward, a 3-year certification term renewable via 42 contact hours of qualifying continuing education. Certifications issued before the 2023 policy change follow the prior 5-year term / 80 contact-hour requirement until their next renewal. See CASRAI’s Certified Research Administrator (CRA) Credential and Exam guide for the full recertification structure.
• ACRP’s four credentials — CCRC (Certified Clinical Research Coordinator), CCRA (Certified Clinical Research Associate), CPI (Certified Principal Investigator), and ACRP-CP (ACRP Certified Professional) — all renew every 2 years and require 24 continuing-education points earned during that period, plus a renewal fee.
• SOCRA’s CCRP (Certified Clinical Research Professional): renews every 3 years, requiring 45 continuing-education hours within that period, at least 22 of which must relate directly to clinical research regulations or policy, plus formal reapplication to SOCRA’s Certification Committee before the credential expires.

These CE-hour figures and cycle lengths are each body’s own policy and should not be assumed to transfer between credentials — hours logged toward one body’s renewal do not automatically satisfy another’s requirement, even when the underlying training overlaps in subject matter.

Non-credentialed CPD: professional-association offerings

Two of the field’s largest professional associations run CPD-oriented programming that is not itself a certifying body but is commonly used both to accumulate qualifying hours toward the credentials above and as standalone professional development for administrators who aren’t pursuing (or maintaining) a specific credential:

• NCURA (National Council of University Research Administrators) runs workshops, certificate programs, and its annual meeting, aimed at both departmental and central sponsored-programs office staff. See CASRAI’s Departmental vs. Central Sponsored Programs Office guide for how NCURA’s training maps onto these organizational models.
• SRAI (Society of Research Administrators International) similarly publishes professional-development and exam-prep resources, including materials commonly used by CRA candidates, without itself administering the CRA credential.

Worked examples

1. A sponsored-programs officer holding the CRA credential completes a mix of an NCURA regional workshop, an SRAI webinar series, and an internal compliance training over a 3-year period, logs a total exceeding 42 contact hours, and submits that log to RACC ahead of their recertification deadline — this is CPD in the full operational sense: tracked, applied, and relevant.
2. A clinical research coordinator holding the CCRC credential completes 24 ACRP-recognized CE points across two years covering GCP updates and protocol-specific training, submitted with their renewal fee at the 2-year mark — the same pattern, under ACRP’s own cycle and point system rather than RACC’s hour system.

What does not count as CPD (counter-example)

A research administrator who attends a single national conference session out of general interest, takes no notes toward a CE log, and never reports the attendance to any certifying body has engaged in professional development in the everyday sense of the phrase, but not CPD as the term operates within these credentialing frameworks — there is no tracked, applicable record tied to a renewal cycle. The distinction matters because credential holders are responsible for maintaining their own CE documentation; a certifying body generally does not retroactively credit informal, unlogged activity.

Related terms

• Certified Research Administrator (CRA) Credential and Exam
• Departmental vs. Central Sponsored Programs Office
• Clinical Research Coordinator (CRC)