Exploiting free online learning for continuous professional development in nursing: a theoretical framework to support individual and organisational learning.

Abstract

This primary research explored how registered nurses use free online learning, including open education resources, as continuous professional development. The research comes in response to the issues caused by the decentralisation of continuous professional development practice for nursing. The burden of continuous professional development activity has been placed on individual nurses. The aim of the research was to develop a theory that will support nurses to use free online learning as continuous professional development. A scoping literature review, undertaken to situate the research, revealed a paucity of existing research in the field of continuous professional development practice. There is a lack of research relating to the specific use of open education resources as continuous professional development, both in nursing and generally. Using a constructivist grounded theory methodology, eighteen registered nurses across clinical practice and education-based settings were interviewed. Data analysis resulted in two theoretical categories: ‘learning as a social endeavour’ and ‘being swallowed up in practice’. The categories reflected challenges for nurses around using free online learning as continuous professional development, that arise from the controls placed on their post-registration learning by their employing organisations. The research found that online mandatory training practices created barriers to nurses’ independent use of free online learning for professional development. Mandatory training was often completed in nurses’ own time, using their own resources. This resulted in nurses’ secondary socialisation to online training practices, so that learning could be finished quickly and signed off for their managers. These practices became established as theories-in-use for engaging with free online learning as continuous professional development. The research findings add to the scholarship of organisational learning theory, specifically focusing on the novel area of free online learning for continuous professional development. The research resulted in the development of a theoretical framework to support the integration of free online learning into organisational learning activities, in the context of learning for service improvement.