We question the current role of professional associations in developing a culture of learning beyond a sufficiency or competency level. This brings into question the underlying philosophy of Professional Standards legislation. This legislation mandates continuing professional development for professionals without stating what should be achieved and how to achieve it. Professional development for professionals is influenced by the twin economic requirements of work-readiness and risk minimisation. These requirements, while important, do not necessarily account for career development of individual professionals needing to deal with complex and ill-structured paradigms. Therefore the paper argues the need for professional associations to develop learning environments which enable the effective continuing career development of professionals and sets out the essential elements for this learning environment--for example, work-integrated learning, contextualised constructivism and self-directed learning. The paper also discusses the potential within professional associations to develop cultures and communities for learning. (Contains 4 tables.)