The Maryland State Board of Public Accountancy has voted unanimously to adopt the final CPE regulations for nano learning, or 10-minute CPE increments. The regulations will be in effect by March 31, 2015. Maryland joins Ohio in the official approval of this new CPE format.

This is an important first step in moving Maryland toward the “future of learning” for CPAs. The “future of learning” is a profession-wide initiative to advance the CPE model started by the AICPA. Maryland’s own Jackie Brown participated on that task force. Jackie said, “The trend in ‘just-in-time’ learning was clear among major firms and corporations, which is why we wanted to move forward on this initiative.” We worked with the AICPA, the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy (NASBA), and Ohio in formulating this regulation as an effort to maintain uniformity as these new formats for CPE are addressed.

[plugin:quote]”In a period of rapid change and increasing complexity, the winners are going to be those people who can keep their rate of learning greater than the rate of change and greater than their competition, or L>C^{2″ –} Tom Hood, CPA, CITP, CGMA[/plugin]

But this is just a first step. Nano learning is just one area of how we are changing up our learning formats to fit today’s busy professional. We believe learning is the next competitive advantage for CPAs in today’s rapidly changing environment. Here are five ways we are changing up learning:

1. Social: We have been using Twitter hashtags for several years to supplement learning at conferences (before that it, was Second Life and CPA Island). We are now exploring some more formal ways of capturing and documenting this learning using Badges and the PLIYP (Professional Learning in Your Pocket) nano-learning platform.
    
2. Mobile / nano, or “Just When You Need It” learning: Our State Board officially approved 10-minute CPE last year and is now offical as of March 31, 2015. We are also working on a innovative learning platform using Twitter that will track nano or micro learning from Twitter and LinkedIn.
    
3. Cloud: In what we call the four Cs of talent development, the AICPA Navigator allows us to offer Competencies, Career Path, and a Curriculum on a Cloud-based learning platform that allows firms and companies to move their talent development to a strategic and systematic approach. See our on-demand leadership bundle, BLI Express for Leaders – 50-plus hours of leadership on-demand for $17 per month.
    
4. Collaborative: MBSN (Management By Sticky Notes), Conferences.io, and the ThinkTank Collaboration platform are highly engaging ways of increasing learning through involvement.
    
5. Competency-based learning with our Bounce framework (which maps BLI programs to the new CGMA Competency framework): We have always believed in a competency-based approach to learning. In fact, it is where our Business Learning Institute (BLI) came from – the initial research in 1998 from the AICPA Vision Project that identified the top five competencies for CPAs in the future.

You can see the future of learning in Maryland on May 4 as we bring Dan Burrus, one of the world’s leading futurists on global trends and innovation and a best-selling author, to talk about his latest research on trends and competencies needed for CPAs (information and registration here).

We have worked with Dan to bring an innovative learning program called the Anticipatory CPA, an accelerated learning system with rapid application tools to help CPAs develop the No. 1 competency needed to be future-ready – anticipation. Dan has worked with our Business Learning Institute and a customer co-creation group of CPAs, organizations, firms and companies to customize his Anticipatory Organization program for CPAs and accounting / finance professionals. Join us on May 4 to hear Dan’s latest research about the future and learn about how you can become an Anticpatory CPA.

• Ohio Accountancy Board Approves 10-minute CPE Program
• What is the Future of Learning? Maryland Passes 10-minute CPE
• The Death of CPE