A lot of effort goes into maintaining a high level of quality in everything that we do as an organisation. Quality is at the heart of all we do behind the scenes, as demonstrated by our ISO 9001:2015 certification.
The side of our business that the majority of our clients experience is the training that we deliver. We stand by our tagline “Quality Training Saves Lives”, because we know it to be true. We are a large and growing national training organisation and so how do we go about ensuring that this quality standard is kept high across all of our trainers?
This is managed as a part of our Internal Quality Assurance (IQA) system and processes. This is a system that monitors and seeks to continuously improve all of our training and assessment, as well as our internal systems and every other part of a client’s journey with us.
We operate a range of different methods to ensure that our trainers are up to date with the latest technical information, training and assessment best practice, and crucially are delivering consistent courses across the country – wherever they may be! This ensures high quality training and assessment standards across the cooperative.
Continuous Professional Development (CPD) at our AGM
A large part of our annual trainer Continuous Professional Development (CPD) and standardisation happens at our Annual General Meeting (AGM), which is held each year in March and for the last three years has taken place in the Highland Perthshire town of Dunkeld.
This years AGM was a fantastic weekend, mixing business, CPD, standardisation, and of course social time too! As a Co-operative, we are all part of the development of the business as a whole, and so the first day of our AGM covers the legal aspects of a Co-operative business – reporting on the business and giving all involved the opportunity to input into it’s development.
This is always a valuable session for everyone, and although spreadsheets and graphs aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, we feel it is vital that all stakeholders have a good understanding of what goes on behind the scenes, and what our plans are for the coming 12 months.
We strive to reduce our impact on the environment while making our business more efficient. As part of this commitment we have introduced new systems for course paperwork that will involve less paper and fuel, as well as reducing costs.
The second half of the AGM focused on CPD and standardisation. This year there have been new guidelines for Asthma and Anaphylaxis medication in Scottish Schools, new advice for the treatment of chest injuries, and various other industry initiatives that we make sure everyone is aware of.
Our standardisation workshops concentrated on the delivery of some specific aspects of our 2 day courses, as well as ensuring that our assessment standards are consistent across the organisation through exercises and discussions.
The AGM is a crucial part of the IQA process, and fulfills a number of roles for us as a co-operative business. As usual we all left the AGM energised and inspired by working with a great team of people who truly believe in the difference that quality first aid training can make to individuals and communities across the country.
If you are interested in joining the First Aid Training Cooperative you can find out more by clicking here.
