From my own perspective, I do think it’s vital that we have a robust accreditation process and some ‘common language’ to bind us together as a profession. That said, I agree entirely that the APMP competencies are far too biased towards government / defense / larger bids – and it sometimes strikes me that there’s an implicit arrogance within this (i.e. that their heavier-duty processes are somehow the right ones, so that – for example – everyone needs to understand their interminable review processes and the associated jargon).

There are whole areas of the syllabus that need to be addressed, never mind many of the questions in the database. And I think the problem is even more acute at Practitioner Level, when some of the ‘mandatory’ requirements are frankly far from best practice in the commercial world.

The majority of those *we* train and work with don’t operate in those markets; when presenting our Foundation Level course, I’ve always thought that one of the secrets of success has been to help those attending to (a) understand the theory needed to pass the exam, whilst (b) talking about how they can apply the core principles in their own work – where lead times are tighter, bid teams smaller, processes less formal and (in some cases) the buy-in from senior management far lower.

As the accreditation scheme moves on to its next iteration – with early discussion already having taken place around options to review the syllabus / competencies / exam questions – you can be sure we’ll be fighting hard to make sure it becomes far more relevant to the commercial world.

Proposal Manager
Healthcare sector