Building on feedback from both employers and candidates, the TPP Professional Standards Committee has made a number of revisions to the requirements of the TPP qualification.

Keith Mitchell, Chair of the Committee, explained 'with just over a year’s experience of offering the TPP qualification, it is has become clear that the requirements have been set at the right level for it to be a qualification that is challenging enough to be worthy of respect amongst professionals and clients alike, but we were probably rather too prescriptive about how candidates could chose to demonstrate their professional competence in their Portfolio of Evidence.'

Future candidates will have to demonstrate Experience rather than Proficiency in  'Stakeholder Engagement', leaving 'Data' as the only Mandatory Proficiency requirement.

In addition to the Mandatory requirements, candidates now also have a choice between selecting either: -

• four additional Proficiency Units (giving a total of five Proficiency units, as before) and one additional Experience Unit (as before)

or

• three additional Proficiency and three additional Experience Units

The restriction that only one of A4, Transport Models and Forecasting, and A5, Assessment, can be selected as an additional Proficiency Unit has been removed.  Both can now be selected.

There have also been some revisions to the detailed requirements of the Units  to clarify the extent to which candidates need to demonstrate their competence within particular technical areas. 

 'The purpose of these changes is to enable those candidates who can demonstrate a broad range of experience and management capability, but who have had less opportunity to lead teams, or work independently, outside their core discipline, to obtain the qualification. We are confident that they will help candidates satisfy the requirements of the TPP qualification, whilst maintaining the challenge of demonstrating a high level of professional competence'  said Keith.

All the changes are covered in a new version of “The Portfolio of Evidence and Professional Review: Requirements, Guidance and Template”, available at www.tpprofessional.org

Changes have also been made to the Portfolio of Technical Knowledge: to provide further information on, and to clarify, the requirements. The revised version of The Portfolio of Technical Knowledge: Requirements and Template” is available at www.tpprofessional.org.

The next round of Professional Interviews will be in May 2010, for which candidates must submit their Portfolio of Evidence by 9 April 2010.