Self Appraisal for Initial Personal and Professional Practice - Essay Example

?Self Appraisal for Initial Personal and Professional Practice There is sufficient evidence indicating that successful career planning depends on evaluation of both internal and external environments. According to Rothwell et al. (2005, pp. 4-5), development of a career plan should take into consideration the current and future personal and workforce realities, upon which three career influencers emerge; behavioural/personality, trends at the global level and the workplace itself. An individual’s personality determines their professional behaviour and ultimate job outcomes. Global trends determine the best set of skills and professional conduct that are working in the contemporary world. Dynamics at the workplace also influence career development; for instance, vertical and horizontal covert and overt acts of violence may cause high rates of turnover from a given sector. This study is an analysis of self appraisal of my initial personal and professional practice based on SWOT analysis and two metric tests; the MBTI typological test and a career test. The self assessment metric tests are first discussed informing the SWOT analysis. A conclusion is then arrived at about my initial personal and professional practice disposition after the self evaluation. MBIT Typological Test According to Vos, Clipeleer and Dewilde (2009, p. 761), there is a strong relationship between personality and career progress as indicated by structural equation modelling testing of career plan theory. Personality heavily influences an individual’s professional practice and ultimate career success. This is because personality not only determines an individual’s career planning but also their behaviour when in the professional field. As a result, a number of personality type tests and aptitude metrics have been generated to help individuals to determine their personality and their preferential professions and employers determine whether the candidate employees have the right personalities needed for the jobs. The MBIT is a typological metric test for personality; the test has been proven to discern an individual’s personality, thus, informing its choice for my personality testing. After taking the MBIT test at Human Metrics (2011), the results indicated that I am of the ENFJ personality type explained by the following scores; 56% extraverted, 75% intuitive, 38% feeling and 45% judging. The description of the EFNJ personality type indicated that such individuals are highly expressive and good communicators, enthusiastic and passionate about their roles, close connection with those around, imaginative, idealistic and intuitive. The results also suggested a range of areas that may suit my career aspirations basing on my personality; these were management, counselling, psychology and education. Career Planning Test According to Abele and Wiese (2008, p. 735), the contemporary world, more than ever, needs individuals to plan and self-manage themselves in order to develop their professional lives. Changes in the socio-economic structures of the modern world and the dynamics of the labour market translate to a situation where it is necessary to plan career development. One of the ways through which career planning can be initiated involves taking a career test which details an individual’s likely career path based on their interests and personality. Career planning tests entail not only the skills and qualifications that a person has but also their interests and the styles they employ to execute tasks. Thus, taking a career test was selected as an approach to self-appraisal as it is effective in establishing the initial considerations for personal and professional practice. The test I selected in this case was the Career Planning Test by Career Path (2012), where 24 statement pairs are used to discern the individual’s career preferences, interests and styles of performing tasks. The results cover the areas of interests and styles of executing tasks and are colour-coded as red for expediting, blue for planning, green for communicating and yellow for administrative. My results indicated blue for interests and yellow for styles of executing tasks. This translates to interests in planning roles and administrative skills in job performance. SWOT Analysis The two metric tests I took part in inform the next level of self-appraisal for my initial personal and professional planning; undertaking a SWOT analysis. Importantly, this will enable me to identify my internal determinants including the strengths I already have towards personal and professional development; the weaknesses I will need to overcome. The external opportunities and threats will also be analysed. Strengths The metric tests highlight strengths in communication capabilities, leadership and planning. Importantly, the two tests undertaken are both in agreement on the strengths that will spur my initial personal and professional development. For instance, the MBIT typological test concludes that management is one of the potential areas I may consider for career development. The logic behind this is my EFNJ personality type that balances communication, intuition, judgment and feeling/empathy. This is supported by the Career Planning test which identifies my interests to be in planning, which is an important function of management alongside administrative duties as highlighted by style of task execution. I also note that another strength brought by the balance of empathy and communication is the relevance it brings to current and future trends in management practice; there is considerable evidence indicating that participative management is instrumental in organizational success, as opposed to authoritative management (Ebert and Griffin 2005, pp. 272-273). The strengths in leadership also concur with earlier roles; I have served in club leadership while in high school. Weaknesses One of the weaknesses highlighted by the metric tests is being extraverted. The balance between communication and extraversion may be delicate to maintain and at just over the average (56%), my extraversion may be counteractive to the much valued participative management. It may intimidate the people around me and create a communication barrier with others. I will need to address this to lower it to the average percentage in order to balance off administrative performance and inclusive leadership. The other weakness is idealism as highlighted by the MBIT typological test. This is a weakness especially when it comes to management (rather than the other areas of psychology and education) where practical decision making and problem solving alongside keeping track of reality are necessary. I realise the truth in the metric tests in highlighting these two weaknesses; in real life, I have on several occasions argued unyieldingly from an idealistic perspective which shows both weaknesses in action. Opportunities The two metric tests indicate a number of areas in which I may find relevant and suiting opportunities based on personality, interests and styles of executing tasks. These include management, psychology, counselling and education as identified by the MBIT test, backed by the Career Test’s identification of strengths in planning and administration. I appreciate that the current trends in globalisation and the advent of multinational enterprises places a demand on global business leaders; hence, management is a relevant area that I may build upon. The fields of psychology and counselling appear to be ever-green and relevant in today’s society. The education sector is also a crucial area that can only grow further into the future. Besides, a clamour exists for the review of education systems in both developed and developing nations, thus strengthening this opportunity. Threats A number of environmental factors emerge as threats to my initial personal and professional development planning. The recent economic crisis and protectionist practices by some countries inhibit globalised management, which thus threatens one of the areas I perceive to have opportunities. The current labour dynamics also indicate high rates of unemployment around the world. Besides, the last half decade has seen unprecedented lay-offs and redundancies in numerous sectors of the economy all around the world. These massive disturbances in employment threaten my professional development plans as I may not get the right environment to roll out my development plans. Nevertheless, having undertaken this self appraisal and using this module to help plan my personal and professional development may prove the right way of handling such disturbances in the job market. Conclusion Initial personal and professional development planning is absolutely important in career success. In this, a self-appraisal to determine the internal strengths and weaknesses and the consequent external opportunities and threats proves important in leveraging for professional development. I took the MBIT typological test and the Career Planning Test as metric tests to inform an effective SWOT analysis. The MBIT indicated that I have the EFNJ personality balancing the aspects of 56% extraverted, 75% intuitive, 38% feeling and 45% judging. The career planning test indicated that my interests lie in planning and that I have potential for administrative skills. Based on these considerations, my strengths are communication capabilities, leadership and planning. The weaknesses established are being an extravert and highly idealistic. The opportunities present include management roles, counselling, psychology and education practice. However, a number of weaknesses revolving around the recent economic trends and labour market dynamics inhibit my path towards professional development. Successful completion of this module and prudent personal and professional development planning will effectively offer redress against such external determinants. Upon reflection, I feel that this study has already established the first steps towards my personal and professional development. I now have clarity in the resources I currently possess, the threats and weaknesses to my plans and pointers to where I will need to improve. References Abele, AE and Wiese, BS 2008, “The nomological network of self-management strategies and career success”, Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, vol. 81, no. 4, pp. 733-749. Career Path 2012, Career plan test, viewed 28February 2012, Ebert, R and Griffin, 2005, Business essentials, Prentice Hall, UK. Human Metrics 2012, Typology test, viewed 28February 2012, Rothwell, W et al. 2005, Career planning and succession management: Developing your organization’s talent for today and tomorrow, Praeger, UK. Vos, AD, Clippeleer, ID and Dewilde, T 2009, “Proactive career behaviours and career success during the early career”, Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, vol. 82, no. 4, pp. 761-777. Read More