Building Personal Development Plans - Coursework Example

DTP: Reflective Writing Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Introduction 3 Groups 7 Communication 9 Learning Styles 10 Culture 10 Professional development 11 Perception 11 Personal Contribution 12 Reference List 13 Appendix 1 14 Appendix 2 14 Appendix 3 15 Appendix 4 15 Appendix 5 15 Introduction The primary objective of the current course was to identify the hidden management skills of individuals through reflective personal analysis and active group work in teams that largely differed in all possible terms. The objective of the course was also recognising individual traits, thereby gaining a wide area of knowledge about self and management. The first assignment was a reflective study of personal traits, personal skills, professional skills and an audit of the common skills of self, which shall be helpful in development of a SWOT analysis pertaining to personal characteristics as viewed by the reviewer and taker of the assignment. I was of the opinion that I had not performed a proper self-analysis as required within the first assignment; but later believed that such an analysis had helped me to realize my shortcomings and strengthen my key abilities. Over the period of the course, the training and teachings have assisted in developing professional as well as personal qualities, which were initial weaknesses in the first assignment (Brockbank and McGill, 1998). The reflective study shall identify and discuss the difference that I have been able to embark upon in the duration of my course. I was of the belief that I lacked largely in terms of interacting with people from different backgrounds and developing communicative abilities so as to yield good results. Given that I had a sheer weakness in terms of shyness to approach people for conversation, the group task allowed me to interact and communicate with individuals not only from different countries and cultures, but also from diverse lines of thought. The course enabled me to overcome shyness and apprehension with conversations. Another major development experienced in the process of this course was the ability to become a good team player. Here, the aspect of ensuring that information flows were correct, group tasks were appropriately divided and also group work was done as per schedule become critical elements (Bohlander and Snell, 2004). I learnt ways to effectively meet my deadlines as well as monitor other people’s approach towards their deadlines. This strategy allowed me to ensure that the cumulative roles were on schedule and the task was attained successfully. Our success can be measured by the fact that we were the only group to have a real client as a part of the project on completion of the group assignment. The first part of the assignment was a reflective study on self through SMART objectives and SWOIT analysis, which helped towards building personal development plans in the course period. I am an international student seeking higher education in a foreign country. The environment was completely new to me and I was also exposed to a completely new style of education, culture as well as a different set of students as group mates. Such a drastic change was slightly difficult to adapt. The group focus helped me to concentrate on intricate aspects and gradually work towards the larger aspects, thereby implying that I could direct greater focus on making friends, overcoming fears of interacting with people from different cultural backgrounds and developing group skills and communication skills in an entirely different and unknown environment (Carl, 2011). The MSc in Management course generated a working environment, which had helped towards developing a professional pattern within my attitude. The force field analysis (Appendix 1) assisted me to set short-term goals to be attained during the course as a part of the learning process and as an input towards self-learning. My objectives highlighted at the beginning of the course included development of my writing abilities as I did not have a strong grasp of the English language. I also wanted to develop upon my IT skills and render myself more industry ready by way of adopting and learning the latest software that were being used by companies. In addition to the professional aspects, I also planned to develop my cultural knowledge by gaining a higher understanding of different cultures with the help of reading as well as hands-on experiences. Shyness had been a major shortcoming in my personal characteristic traits. I wanted to overcome the issue of shyness because it acted as a major hindrance towards learning through interactions, which probably is the best mode for learning. Lastly, I wanted to develop a better control over my emotions, which had affected several of my decisions. I realized that in the professional field, decision making must be driven by rationality in order to gain success and not by emotions. This major weakness was targeted through the force field analysis. I believe that the entire duration of my course so far has observed a sea change in my personal attributes, where I reckon that I have developed a better communicative ability and discarded shyness along with higher rational thought to drive decision making. The SWOT analysis that was submitted in first assignment of the course highlighted on my weak points and helped towards developing individual and enhanced focus. The group task provided with the opportunity to develop upon these weaknesses and interact with various cultures, activities and tasks. Kolb’s theory As per the learning cycle of Kolb, the process of learning has to undergo four stages that include planning, doing, observation and concluding. The audit of personal skills that were done within the first assignment reflected that my key strengths lied in my creative thinking abilities, ability to organize and provide clarity to the thought process as well as in the identification of logic and reasoning within different tasks. These abilities have been contributed by my wide industry experience and exposure to different types of challenges. I believed that I can prove to be a useful resource within the group task through these skills. I was involved in the decision making and problems solving process and had acted towards using the concrete experience so as to observe and reflect upon different tasks based on observations, thereby conceptualising ideas and moving forth with experimentation of the same within the learning scenario. Figure 1: Kolb’s Theory (Source: Businessballs, 2013) Blooms taxonomy The taxonomy developed by Benjamin Bloom has classified the levels of learning in six stages, which are creating, evaluating, analysing, applying, understanding and remembering. Figure 2: Blooms Taxonomy (Source: Nwlink, 2013) The tasks were initially divided into sub-tasks, which formed a part of creating. These sub-tasks were evaluated and analysed over second and third stage of the taxonomy in order to develop towards implementation of different methodologies, which should be applied for achieving desired results. Such development of understanding had built the pros and cons of task achievement and also contributed towards remembering positive and negative aspects of the roles undertaken. Groups Group work can be defined as a method of learning, where the collective form is highlighted. I have had a wide experience of working in groups and quite enjoy doing so because it involves multiple leadership roles and challenging tasks in terms of management of the group and group members. The success of a team depends upon efficiency within each member of the group so as to work collectively. I have also faced several problems with this particular group that I had been exposed to and similar to each group task, this aspect also had its learning outcomes. This was my first experience of working in a group, which had people from diverse cultural and country backgrounds. There were several barriers in terms of language difficulties and communication hindrances between the members. Furthermore, the members did not initially relate well with each other. There were apprehensions about role plays and assignment of different tasks as well as regarding the individual abilities that would help towards achievement of the common goal. However, my experience with the group was quite positive, where I had been given due hearing over views and opinions and also the opportunity to share the way I perceive matters. This action helped me gain considerable control over the organization of group tasks, which worked towards the advantage of the group owing to my previous experience in the army. The members also listened to my opinions and also shared their experiences seeking guidance on further work. I was, thus, able to engage in and develop significant interaction as well as undertake large amount of responsibility for the group work. The apprehensions pertaining to communication were gradually eliminated when the group members started to take over responsibilities of making sure that the right information communication was conveyed and was understood by all members of the group. As per Tuckman’s 5 stages of group work, the forming stage involved several incomprehensible exchanges between members of the groups, owing primarily to language barriers. The individuals were mainly able to comprehend the identities of each other, along with their professional and personal backgrounds. The storming stage was evident in the few consequent formal and informal meetings, where group members discussed over the group topic and expressed their views over the way in which the task should be approached. In this context, there were a large amount of debate and discussions, which often led to confusion in the presence of language and communication hindrances. The group entered into the norming stage, when the members decided to frame a way to manage the communication problems, which were together realized to be a major setback related to achievement of the group task. After about seven meetings in entirety, the group was working actively in the performing stage, where each member of the group strived with dedication towards the personal sub-task and also discussed the progress made in subsequent group meetings. Higher understanding and knowledge sharing among the group members had facilitated a group cohesion, which reflected in positive receipts of comments made by the group members as well as proper and positive actions undertaken. The adjourning stage was accompanied by a session of responses and feedback. The Belbin analysis as done within the second assignment is based completely upon the observed behaviour of group members and their interpersonal characteristics. The team roles identified are of nine basic types within the Belbin analysis. In this respect, no single person can be assigned with all nine roles and each person is fit under different roles based on their personal characteristics. I had been a part of a team that comprised majorly of work doers or implementers of the plan. I had been fortunate to be in the position of a visionary of different tasks. This is because my organizational and creative abilities had helped me to organise and provide vision to the solution of communication problems and also task attainment problems, which the group faced at different levels of the group task. The enablers also helped me towards implementation of goals, which were decided upon by the group. Communication The main method of communication adopted by the group was in person, where individuals met over the meeting and carried out their discussion through face-to-face interactions. The direct conversations allowed better expression of ideas and also reduced the barrier in communication that was experienced through cultural differences (Schon, 1991). Each member had their own creativity in the decision making process, but face-to-face interactions enabled us to determine the best solution and approach to problems and also allowed informal exchanges for building friendly relations that were critical to develop positive reactions towards any criticism by the group members. Since it was difficult to meet for every little issue, the group also relied upon the electronic media and used telephonic conversations as well as BBM and Whatsapp in order to share views. The email was also used to exchange information. According to Mehrabian, over 50% of the communication is conveyed by means of body language and the rest is done by the tone of voice, while only a meagre 7% of the communication is facilitated through use of words (Businessballs, 2012). The group members belonged to diverse cultural and country backgrounds and it was perceive that here, differences in accepts, style of expression and speech required individuals to make use of the Mehrabian model for communication, which was critical so as to build an understanding of another person’s perceptions and ideas. As a result, it was critical for the group to hold meetings in both formal and informal manner. The meetings began in a formal manner and gradually explored into informal exchanges, which helped in building group understanding to a large extent. With passage of time, the understanding of communication developed and the use of electronic media also became useful for facilitating group conversation (Batt, 2002). Learning Styles Honey and Mumford style of learning developed by Peter Honey and Alan Mumford was responsible for the identification of four different methods of learning styles, which include Activist, Pragmatist, Reflector and Theorist (University of Leicester, 2014). Such kinds of learning are used generally by individuals in order to maximize the personal learning. I found myself to be a reflector and a theorist within the analysis. This is because of the amount of working experience that I instilled within the group, unlike the other members. I always sought solution to the problems and worked at formulating ways in which tasks could be achieved effectively. I was successful in devising and developing ways in which the group could enhance the communication and work over the differences in terms of language barriers. In this regards, I also worked towards enabling group members to share their views and helped them develop upon it by providing my insights related to their ideas. These features helped in performing quality work over different tasks that were allocated to each member of the group. Hence, as per the analysis, I was more of a thinker and observer, which facilitated group tasks (Moon, 1999). Culture Culture simply defines the persona and helps one to be distinguished from the group through his set of beliefs and customs, which are different from others. Each country has a specific set of culture and different members on my team had come from separate cultural backgrounds. Each person’s upbringing in a different country defined their ways of thought as well as modes of expression. I worked in a group, which represented a healthy composition of people from varying cultural backgrounds (Allen, Shore and Griffeth, 2003). The group faced immense language barriers and we found it difficult to communicate our ideas with others primarily because everyone was not equally fluent in English. However, as time went by and the group members gained more familiarity, we could communicate more easily and also organize our thought to present meaningful actions. I was successful in gaining everyone’s attention and also consideration for all kinds of group work. I have been adequately successful to perform well in a group, which was so diverse in terms of cultural and language backgrounds. Professional development The course is directed towards the development of individuals who are industry ready for handling various types of managerial roles, which involve large amount of group work and decision making tasks (Cowan, 1998). The force field analysis and the SMART objectives set up within the first assignment were a reflection of ways in which critical areas of professional qualities were developed. The group work entailed in several rational decision-making and interactions, which helped me to take decisions without being driven by emotions of the people within the group. The interactions had helped me overcome the shyness. After the group activity, I realized that I was a stronger being, in terms of decision making ability and also leading the group for outstanding achievements. The attainment of being the only group to have a real client instilled a sense of achievement within me and helped in generating tremendous amount of self-confidence (Kolb, 1984). Perception The group task and this course have helped me to largely develop on the personal as well as the professional front in a lot more ways that I ever imagined. I have acquired vast knowledge over the period and have been able to overcome my shyness by way of building positive relationships with my group members. I also no more feel shy while interacting with new people out of my group (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014). I would say that the PDP of overcoming shyness has been achieved successfully. I have also been exposed to several critical situations that required complex decision making while dealing with the clients. The group also faced certain issues related to communication. There were times when the individuals from separate countries faced differences in opinions, thereby incorporating the problem solving bent to my professional development. I also learnt certain software for the purpose of completing the task, but the agenda of learning industry based software is not yet fully achieved. In addition, proper break up of tasks and scheduling of activities brought in extensive planning and management skills, which also included time management and schedule management of tasks. Personal Contribution As a part of my personal contribution to the group, I believe that I acted as an enabler of tasks. I was more of a provider of visionary thought to all the members, which helped them to reach higher levels of achievement. I reckon that my industry experience has helped me gain the leading position in the group (Boud, Keogh and Walker, 1985). I also acted as a problem solver that had allowed the group to communicate effectively, which is critical to collectively achieve successful completion of the assigned tasks. I had allowed other group members to bring in creative thought and discuss their ideas so that the group was facilitated by productive and fruitful arguments and discussions. I perceive that such contributions have not only helped the group, but also supported me personally to build my personal and professional skills as well as immense self-confidence. Reference List Allen, D. G., Shore, L. M. and Griffeth, R. W., 2003. The role of perceived organizational support and supportive human resource practices in the turnover process. Journal of management, 29(1), pp. 99-118. Armstrong, M. and Taylor, S., 2014. Armstrongs handbook of human resource management practice. London: Kogan Page Publishers. Batt, R., 2002. Managing customer services: Human resource practices, quit rates, and sales growth. Academy of management Journal, 45(3), pp. 587-597. Bohlander, G.W., and Snell S.A., 2004. Managing human resources. Ohio: South-Western Publishing Co. Boud, D., Keogh, R. and Walker, D., 1985. Reflection: Turning Experience in to Learning. London: Kogan Page. Brockbank, A. and McGill, I., 1998. Facilitating Reflective Learning in Higher Education. Buckingham: SHRE/Open University Press. Businessballs, 2012. Mehrabian’s communication research. [online] Available at: [Accessed 14 August 2014]. Businessballs, 2013. Kolb learning styles. [online] Available at: [Accessed 14 August 2014] Carl, J. D., 2011. Think social problems. Boston: Pearson. Cowan, J., 1998. On Becoming an Innovative University Teacher Reflection in Action. Buckingham: SHRE/Open University Press. Kolb, D. A., 1984. Experiential Learning experience as a source of learning and development. New Jersey: Prentice Hall Moon, J., 1999. Reflection in Learning and Professional Development Theory and Practice. London: Kogan Page. Schon, D., 1991. The Reflective Practitioner How Professionals Think in Action. London: Avebury. University of Leicester, 2014. Honey and mumford. [online] Available at: [Accessed 14 August 2014]. Nwlink, 2013. Bloom’s taxonomy of learning domains. [online] Available at: [Accessed 14 August 2014]. Appendices Appendix 1 Force Field Analysis Appendix 2 Belbin’s Analysis table Appendix 3 Honey and Mumford Analysis TOTAL 5 18 17 14 Activist Reflector Theorist Pragmatist Appendix 4 Skills Audit Appendix 5 SWOT Analysis Read More