CPD Course Planning Template

Most CPD applications fail not because the content is bad, but because the planning skipped a step. Outcomes don't match the content. Hours don't match the assessed time. Assessment doesn't actually measure the outcomes. This template walks through the planning we'd do for our own courses, and gives you the worksheets to do it yourself before you submit anywhere.

It's free. No email gate. Use it, copy it, adapt it.

Section 1 — Course profile

The five lines you should be able to write before you write any content. If you can't fill these in cleanly, the course isn't ready to plan.

• Course title — the name learners will see, written for them, not for SEO.
• One-line description — what the course does, in one sentence. ("Equips practising HR professionals to handle redundancy consultations compliantly under TUPE.")
• Target learner — role, sector, prior experience. Be specific. "HR Business Partners with 3+ years' experience" beats "HR professionals".
• Problem solved — what does the learner walk away able to do that they couldn't before?
• Format — self-paced video, live cohort, blended, webinar. The format constrains everything that follows.

Section 2 — Learning outcomes

Outcomes are the contract between the course and the learner. CPD accreditors care about outcomes more than any other single element. Three rules:

1. Each outcome starts with an observable verb: apply, evaluate, design, calculate, conduct, select, distinguish, justify. Avoid understand, know, learn about, be aware of — they aren't assessable.
2. Each outcome describes what the learner will be able to do, not what the trainer will cover.
3. Three to five outcomes is the sweet spot for most CPD courses. Fewer means the course is too thin; more means the outcomes are too granular.

Worksheet:

Section 3 — Outcome-to-content map

For every outcome, list the specific content elements that develop it. If a piece of content doesn't ladder to an outcome, it's filler — cut it or move it to a "further reading" appendix.

Section 4 — Structured learning time

CPD hours are based on the active learning time the course actually requires — not its calendar duration. A four-week course with 2 hours of weekly content is 8 CPD hours, not 4 weeks. Use this estimator and total it up:

• Direct instruction time — videos, lecture content, structured reading. (Real-time, not skimming.)
• Active exercise time — workshops, simulations, applied scenarios.
• Discussion / reflection time — peer discussion, reflective writing, Q&A.
• Assessment time — the time a competent learner needs to complete the assessment, not the time-limit setting.

The total is your structured learning hours. Use the CPD hour calculator to compute it from these inputs directly.

Section 5 — Assessment design

Assessment is the proof point that the outcomes were actually achieved. Match the depth of assessment to the depth of the outcome:

• Recall outcomes ("identify", "list") → multiple-choice quiz with explanatory feedback.
• Application outcomes ("apply", "calculate") → worked scenarios with model answers.
• Analysis / evaluation outcomes ("evaluate", "compare") → case study with structured response prompts.
• Synthesis outcomes ("design", "develop") → workplace artefact assessed against a rubric.

A common failure mode in CPD applications is mismatched depth — an outcome at "evaluate" level assessed only by a multiple-choice quiz. Reviewers spot this fast.

Section 6 — Pilot & iterate

Run with 3–5 learners drawn from your real target audience before you submit for accreditation. Capture:

• Time-on-task per section (does it match your estimate?)
• Completion rate of each exercise.
• Open feedback on what was unclear, redundant, or missing.
• Assessment performance (if 100% pass with no struggle, it's too easy; if <60% pass, it's too hard or not aligned).

Adjust before submission. Submitting an unproven course costs more time in the long run — accreditors send back drafts that don't meet the framework, and the rework cycle is slower than the pilot would have been.

Mapping to the VeritasCPD 8-point framework

If you're planning to submit to VeritasCPD specifically, this template covers six of our eight assessment dimensions. The remaining two — currency of content (sources, citations, last-reviewed dates) and accessibility (subtitles, transcript, alt text, keyboard navigation) — are best handled during build, not planning. We have separate guidance on each in the accreditation process page.

Use this template

Copy the sections above into a Notion doc, a Google Doc, or a printed worksheet. Work through each in order. Most teams find sections 2 and 4 take the longest — that's normal, those are the ones reviewers care about most. If you'd like a printable version, hit File → Print or Cmd/Ctrl+P; the page is print-styled to render cleanly.

When you're ready, submit the course for accreditation. Application takes about 10 minutes. We assess within 5 business days.