Professional formation plays an important role in everyone's life. This process involves the continuous development of the individual and at different age stages has different content, pursuing different goals. In the current socio-economic conditions, the training of future teachers is being significantly modified. The problems of professional development, development of the teacher's personality and self-improvement are gaining popularity. The article presents an analysis of the scientific literature on the problem of professional development of the teacher. The theoretical basis amounted methodology of pedagogy and educational research papers on professional and personal development, pedagogical research on vocational education. The authors use the following theoretical methods: theoretical-methodological and scientific-theoretical analysis of the literature on the researched topic. As a result, the authors disclose the concept of "professional development", describe the main elements of professional development, as well as conditions that have an impact on this process. The article also presents the stage of professional formation of the teacher, the basis for the allocation of which serves the development of the social situation and the level of implementation of professional activity.