Guidance

Policy profession standards

Professional standards to meet current and future policy challenges developed in consultation with subject matter experts.

• From: Policy Profession
• Published: 10 November 2021
• Last updated: 12 April 2024 — See all updates

Documents

Policy profession standards

PDF, 881 KB, 9 pages

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Policy profession standards: annex

PDF, 1010 KB, 28 pages

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Policy profession standards: annex

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Details

The policy profession standards framework has 2 parts:

• a core document outlining the structure of the standards and learning outcomes, providing a summary of the skills, knowledge and activities that make up individual standards
• an annex of detailed descriptors setting out the specific skills for each learning outcome, designed for those who are applying the standards in their own organisation and require a deeper understanding to support capability-building or workforce planning

Policy Profession standards

The Policy Profession standards describe the skills and knowledge required by policy professionals at all stages of their career and provide the competency framework for their professional development. The Standards are built around three pillars that mirror the policy process: strategy, democracy and delivery.

Strategy

Policy professionals solve problems and improve outcomes, working collaboratively with other professions. They need to understand the wider context of their policy area, including international comparisons, citizens’ experience, the latest evidence and history. Policy professionals consider and improve existing policies as well as respond to new challenges. Examples of policy work include the design of public services, legislative and regulatory changes and promoting behaviour change.

Democracy

Policy professionals have a key role to play in ensuring democratic accountability, working effectively with different levels of government to make policy that truly works for citizens. They do this by working collaboratively across the public sector, private sector and civil society to galvanise effort around government objectives.

Delivery

Policy professionals also ensure effective delivery of policy, evaluating its impact and adapting as necessary. This can include managing systems, for example monitoring crime trends, skill levels, coronavirus (COVID-19) infections and proposing interventions to improve performance. In some cases, policy professionals directly deliver grant programmes and smaller projects, working with other professions.

Published 10 November 2021
Last updated 12 April 2024 + show all updates

1. 12 April 2024

   Added an HTML accessible version of the Policy Profession standards annex PDF document.

2. 25 April 2022

   We have updated the 'Policy profession standards' and 'Policy profession standards: annex' documents.

3. 10 November 2021

   First published.