How RCPsych Enables and Empowers its Members Through e-Learning

We want to create an enabling environment, where everyone is listened to and feels empowered.

Katie Hughes, Head of eLearning, RCPsych

Where does e-learning fit into RCPsych’s growth strategy?

We have 21,000 members, but not all of them subscribe to our e-learning content currently. We see big potential for growth here. To be able to do this well, we’re examining what our learners want—particularly after they’ve completed their initial training exams – and how they want to access our content as they progress through their careers.

We’ve introduced more blended learning options, for example, and have reduced the emphasis on face to face. We’ve also launched more podcasts with CPD points attached, and currently have over 150 to choose from. Members have the option to listen to them via Spotify or Soundcloud, at a time that suits them, and then complete the accompanying assessment within the e-learning platform. We’ve seen big increases in the numbers of people doing this.

What do you see as the biggest opportunities?

We’re currently assessing all our content and looking at how we can repurpose it and offer it to members in different ways. For example, we’re working more closely with our events team to record sessions from our conferences. For people who couldn’t attend in person we’ll be offering the option to purchase individual webinars.

Another potential avenue for growth is through partnerships with other institutions. We see an opportunity to act as a reseller to organisations that potentially have hundreds of members that could benefit from our e-learning content.

Is that changing how content is produced?

Essentially, we’re putting learners at the heart of our content design. That means more content produced by people with lived experience, for instance, or content that is explicitly driven by what doctors have said they want their students to learn. It’s vital that our research and thinking is always as current as it can be.

Part of our strategy is also to improve content sharing across the organisation, for people with differing levels of knowledge and interest in particular areas. So, if we’ve worked with one of our authors on an in-depth journal, for example, can that be repurposed for e-learning—in a more digestible, micro module format for CPD purposes?

What are your short-term goals and challenges?

Resources are a challenge, in terms of both time and people. We’re keen to bring more e-learning content online as quickly as possible, but there are so many opportunities, and we have to prioritise carefully.

The more content we produce, the more we also need to make sure that this is communicated across the association and is being shared and promoted appropriately. For example, if our strategic comms team is promoting a report on menopause via email, could we potentially ask that they also signpost to a module or free seminar on menopause – as part of our e-learning offering.

So, interoperability and search are key short-term priorities for us. If one of our members has a particular interest in eating disorders, we want it to be easy and intuitive to find all of our content on that subject—whether that’s events, podcasts or journals.

This could lead to ways of grouping learners together, to see where common areas of interest lie. If we can start to make recommendations based on those interests, then we’re really moving towards personalised learning.

How are you using data to analyse performance?

Everything I’ve mentioned above relies on having the right data. We’re investing time and resource into gathering more insights and using it to inform content design and marketing. This will enable us to understand how long someone has spent on a specific module, for example, where people are engaging more or what the most popular topics are, as well as which formats and lengths are seeing the highest completion rates.

We’re also gathering more feedback from our learners which we’re sharing with our authors. We’re encouraging everyone to gather as much insight as possible so we can make continuous improvements. We want to create an enabling environment, where everyone is listened to and feels empowered to embrace new ways of working—for the benefit of all our members.

To explore these themes further, and hear from more associations on the industry landscape and how their learning strategy has opened up fresh opportunity for growth, check out our brand-new whitepaper, Unlocking opportunity: how professional associations are using learning to empower members and grow revenue.

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