Credentialing professionals agree that recertification — or maintenance of certification —is a hallmark of ongoing competence and expertise. Professionals across various fields demonstrate their commitment to continuous learning and development through this process, ensuring they stay credible and relevant.

Recertification is a distinguishing factor of professional certification programs. Unlike other types of credentials that demonstrate an individual’s competence at a single point in time, a certification program grants a time-limited credential to maintain or promote continuing competence. To retain the credential, the certified individual must meet predetermined recertification requirements on a timely basis.

Research indicates that both knowledge and skills decline over time, due to decay, obsolescence or both. In addition, professions can evolve, requiring new skills or knowledge to practice competently as the job changes over time. Recertification requirements are therefore an important component to protect the recipients of the certified professional’s services.

So, how should organizations develop their recertification requirements? Approaches vary widely depending on the organization type, the needs of the professionals and industry and the views of the credentialing board. At I.C.E., we have navigated these considerations with our ICE-Certified Credentialing Professional® (ICE-CCP) program and will share our learnings through a case study within this article.

Organizational Considerations When Developing Recertification Requirements

To develop effective recertification requirements, certifying organizations must carefully weigh several factors. These include:

• Risk of potential harm to the public or public welfare (such as health outcomes, safety concerns, financial damages and environmental impacts).
• The degree of rigor needed based on the occupation being certified.
• The degree of specialization within the occupation following initial certification.

These must be balanced with practical considerations, such as:

• The availability of resources for the certified population to access.
• The cost of the specified resources and the earnings potential of the certified population.
• The investment of time required to meet the requirements including renewal frequency.
• How compliance with recertification requirements will be verified.
• Whether certification is voluntary or mandatory in the profession.

Organizations may be able to choose from a wide variety of activities in setting their recertification requirements. There are pros and cons to each that are beyond the scope of this article. However, certifying organizations should develop a rationale for their recertification policy that accounts for how the selected activities contribute to continuing competence.

Many recertification policies offer certified individuals the opportunity to choose from among a variety of activities to account for variations in developmental needs, accessibility and financial and time constraints.

Sharing How I.C.E. Is Recertifying ICE-CCP Professionals

In the three years since its inception, close to 300 individuals (298) have proudly earned the I.C.E. Certified Credentialing Professional® (ICE-CCP®) designation. This voluntary certification, which allows credentialing professionals to demonstrate their knowledge of governance and resources, credentialing program operations, and assessment development and validation, was introduced through a beta exam administered in October and November 2021, with 128 individuals earning their credential at that time. They will be the first cohort that is due to recertify in 2025.

I.C.E.’s original Steering Committee and the Certification Services Council (CSC) that was established as the governing body for the ICE-CCP followed this process when developing recertification requirements:

1. They reviewed the Purpose Statement for the credential:

“Holders of the I.C.E. Certified Credentialing Professional® certification have demonstrated competence in professional credentialing, including in governance and resources, credentialing program operations, and assessment development and validation. Though they may be focused on certain functions in their day-to-day activities, they have demonstrated knowledge across all credentialing activities and understand the interplay among functions.”

2. They reviewed the subgroup analysis from the ICE-CCP Job Analysis Report and the demographic profiles that were created to define the target population for the credential. The Job Analysis Committee had also discussed and offered recommendations for recertification considerations.

The Steering Committee made the initial determinations of the frequency of recertification and the approximate amount of credit to be earned. This was made public at the time the ICE-CCP beta exam was announced so that potential candidates would know what would be required of them if they became certified.

Once the Certification Services Council was established, they spent several months discussing the considerations previously mentioned in this article.

Based on these data and discussions, the following decisions were made:

1. Initial certification is granted for a period of four years and recertification is required every four years thereafter. Council members agreed that this was a reasonable period of time given the nature of the credential and the rate of change in the profession.
2. Certified individuals have the option of either retaking, and passing, the certification examination, or accumulating a total of 60 hours of professional development activities over the four years.
3. Qualifying professional development activities must be linked to one of the three content domains covered in the examination. Because credential holders may work in one, two or all three domains, the decision was made not to specify which or how many domains the activities must cover. However, candidates do receive an indication of how they performed in each of the domains when they receive their exam score, and they are encouraged to use that as an indicator of where professional development may be needed.
4. Credential holders are allowed to choose from among a number of options that total 60 hours. These options include low-cost and no-cost activities (such as volunteering and publishing and delivering instruction within the profession) as well as virtual options (such as asynchronous courses and webinars). However, since there are no formal educational requirements included in eligibility requirements for this credential, a minimum of 30 of the 60 hours must be classified as “interactive education" which requires the individual’s active involvement in the learning activity.
5. Certified individuals will complete their recertification application online and upload related documentation/evidence at the time activities are entered in order to eliminate the need for audits.

For further details on ICE-CCP recertification requirements, see the ICE-CCP Guide to Recertification.

Once the first recertification deadline passes, the Certification Services Council expects to review the data and consider what changes or additions they might want to make to the Recertification Policy going forward. Factors to consider could include roadblocks, feedback from certificants and questions or appeals that were submitted.

Certification maintenance has significant benefits for both the certified individual and the recipient or consumer of their services. Given the significant investment an individual makes to earn their initial certification, they are well-advised to maintain it. A certifying organization can do much to encourage this by establishing recertification requirements that are clear, flexible when possible, and appropriate for the profession(s) they certify. How will you ensure that your credential holders remain up to date in their profession?

Recertification/Credential Maintenance References:

• https://www.credentialingexcellence.org/Resources/Continuing-Certification-Resources - Video, Toolkit
• RSRCH20 Renewal Programs in Professional Certification and Licensure – Research Study
• Credentialing Insights articles:
  • https://www.credentialinginsights.org/Article/is-it-time-to-raise-certification-renewal-requirements-1
  • https://www.credentialinginsights.org/Article/evolving-practices-in-recertification-the-competency-and-credentialing-institute8217s-cnor-credential-1
• Certification: The I.C.E. Handbook, 3rd Edition – Part IV, Recertification
• ICE-CCP Guide to Recertification