Is Volunteerism Enough? Reflecting on the Risky Approach to Building a Qualified Workforce in Healthcare Professions Education

Faculty development (FD) initiatives in health professions education remain heavily dependent on volunteer contributions. Any critical examination of whether volunteerism constitutes a sustainable foundation for FD must begin by interrogating the terminology itself, as ‘volunteering’ frequently denotes unpaid and unrecognised academic citizenship rather than genuinely willing participation. Attending to who actually performs this work reveals that women and individuals with intersecting marginalised identities might be disproportionately expected to take on FD‐related service, often at personal and professional cost. When structured around informal, unpaid and ad hoc participation, FD is vulnerable to fluctuating engagement, inequity and a loss of institutional credibility. Sustaining FD requires deliberate action across micro, meso and macro levels. Rather than treating FD contributions as individual sacrifice, institutions should reposition them as a shared, strategic investment. Volunteer‐led models, although valuable, cannot alone ensure the sustainability, fairness or professionalisation of FD and should be scaffolded by equitable, formally recognised and strategically embedded structures.