This article aims to focus on the motivating and inhibiting factors relating to teachers’ engagement with continuing professional development (CPD) and to analyse the data in relation to Herzberg et al.’s (1959) two-factor theory, as a means of drawing implications for the future provision of CPD in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. The findings indicate that teachers’ intrinsic motivation to seek out their own CPD continues to apply to actually engaging in CPD. Teachers in this study expressed a preference both to seek out and to pursue CPD areas that they valued for their own personal reasons and in response to their own personal and/or professional needs. The findings demonstrate that intrinsic (personal) factors – namely career advancement, potential growth and achievement – were the chief catalysts in motivating teachers in this study to engage in CPD.