Understanding of My Profession Capabilities and Competency - Example

REFLECTIVE REPORT Name Institution Course Tutor Date Reflective Report Introduction The increasing rate of unemployment has caused much competition in job market today (Office for National Statistics 2012). Graduates are coming out to pursue the limited job opportunities and vacancies (Peacock 2012). This has given employers opportunity to choose applicants that best meet their demands for the intended jobs. They observe close areas of capabilities of the applicants and assess employ them according to how capable and competent they are towards the duties and responsibility of the intended job. This report will present my professional capability analysis based on the evidence I managed to gather during self-assessment activity I undertook. My self-ratings before and after the activity are also reflected upon in this report. This report is to understand my capabilities supported by the time I have been in school and other activities I have managed to engage in over the period. It also presents reflection on areas that I still believe to improve in so reach my maximum professional competency, and be able to meet the top job market demands. Experience in the University Being an international student, I figured out that I possibly have difficult time starting academic journey in anew learning environment. I thought that catching up and managing situations of such would require some extra knowledge on top of what my course was purported to give me. Therefore, I took some extra classes to facilitate this knowledge acquisition. After some times, I adjusted and felt much comfortable with the curriculum of the university. When I took this course, I had some feelings that some of the areas will be quite challenging. I feel I might have some difficulties with some units. I figured joining group discussions on issues of such areas will facilitate my understanding. I got friends who are taking the same classes as me; we put efforts in all the areas and with the help of our very friendly tutors, I found the subjects even simpler than I thought they would be. Furthermore, Smale (2009) says that, a student has to challenge the areas likely to pose challenge before they do. The results of my extra efforts I gave to academic demands reflected greatly on the evaluation results. During the course, I we undertook exams and assignments that clearly reflected the rewards of my extra efforts I had been putting. Some of these assignments involved research activities that, in many ways, elevated my capabilities to find out quality solutions to the problems of my tasks. However challenging they were, they gave me the capabilities of researching and supporting my arguments I possess today. I believe to be competent in research work and areas that require support evidences to arguments. Within the school, there were several societies, groups, and many other academic curriculum activities. I became part of some of them and I came to gain a lot out of them. We would share our argument, and from others’ reasoning, I came to see how a problem can be tackled in different ways. I even developed capabilities to work in a group or team context. I was able to learn the demands of groups and how they are to be met so as to achieve the best results in the group. Self-Assessment: Evidence gathered, Analysis, and Reflection Based on my perception and feeling about myself, I rated myself as far as profession capabilities are concerned. I then undertook self-assessment activity to accurately determine if I rated myself correctly considering the knowledge I have gained and development I have had over the period I have been in school. Among the evidence I gathered are SWORT, project and personal management plan, and team role alongside communication style. SWORT Evidence, Analysis, and Reflection I went through my academic results, evaluated how I have been undertaking academic activities and other group work. I also reviewed and reflected upon how I have been able to carry out myself over the period I have been in school. However, coming out with the true SWORT evaluation results was not quite easy. Having to judge myself according to the way I think I am was not enough to prove my prior self-ratings. I reviewed the responses and comments I have been getting from my friends and group members whenever we undertake group activities, and out of this, I was able to come up with SWORT analysis evidence to prove my capabilities and areas that still need to improve in. Previously, before the self-assessment activity, I rated myself relatively high to possess much capability in effective communication. At least I thought I had become much competent when it comes to presenting my views and ideas to others, both in written and spoken manager. From my SWORT analysis evidence, this was an overrating. I possess capabilities and competencies in verbal communication, but I still need to work on my written communication. Grammar and academic writing still need some few last steps to gain maximum ratings. Computer skills and competencies have also been my worrier. Even though I this was among the extra classes I undertook, I still did not believe to possess much capabilities on it. However, after I undertook some evaluation tests, I realized I have become much competent and possess quality skills in computer activities. I underrated myself previously. I am cable and competent with computer activities. Among other strengths and opportunities that related to possess after this activity are listening skills, listening skills hardworking, motivation, determination, patience, as well as organization of work. Figure 1: SWORT Analysis Summary Communication Style and Team role: Analysis and Reflection Podcast is the measure I used to evaluate how effectively I have become in communication style. I deem this a very useful method of evaluation of confidence in verbal communication (France and Wheeler 2007). Within the seminars and group activities that I have been able to participate in, I was able to see how capable of communicating my views I have become. I was able to organize myself, ideas and present the ideas clearly, supported by clear arguments and reasoning. Listening to my podcast recording of a seminar I was part of, presenting a research findings to my colleagues as well as tutors, I related I am good at verbal communication more than I thought prior to this self-assessment activity. It makes me realize how I underrated myself previously. I am capable of competently and effectively communicating verbally. However, as I have mentioned earlier, I believe I still have to add something and maximize my written communication styles. Berlin, in his role, portrays how following protocols present in groups and other gathering purported to some task can be a great problem. I realized that with myself. I demonstrated good qualities of leadership in this self-assessment activity, planning and seeing to it that other group members are coordinated effectively, and objectives met. However, I did not follow all of the set protocols for the group task; I was doing what I perceived to of impotence and interest for the group as far as the task is concerned. This, in some way, impacted negatively on my group members and I felt incompetent in such areas that require strict observation of the protocols and demands of group work. I believe with few steps of practice, I will be able to elevate my capabilities concerning such. Management Plan Evidence: Analysis and Reflection The key elements of a good management plan include aims, actions, resources, review and time scale. Furthermore, it is these elements that would help set a management plan that is specific, measurable, achievable, and well-timed (Smale 2009). Coming up with such a management plan is one of the things I have been associating my efforts with, acquiring information and ideas of how to effectively come up with personal and even group management plans to aid my organization of task capabilities as well as leadership skills. Moreover, observing the key elements of a good management plan helps to avoid unnecessary procrastinations and disappointments coherent to it (McMillan and Weyers 2011). In this self-assessment, we were able to come up with a task or project management plan, composed of aims and objectives of the work, actions required to achieve those goal, and the resources that have to be in place to enable the achievement of the set goals and objectives. I competently demonstrated my leadership capabilities, coordinating and organizing the task project from the beginning up to the final steps of it, and saw to it that the desired outcomes were achieved in line with the set goals and objectives. We were able to lay figure out the task demands, objectives and goals to be achieved, and resources required to achieve the goals. In addition, we were also able to formulate relevant actions required and follow them till the task was completed. This demonstrated clearly how competent I am when it comes to leadership and project management. The fact we were able to achieve those goals within the time frame we set for them, clearly indicated that I am capable of managing a project as well as myself, not only to achieve the objectives within a required time limit, but also maximize the desired outcomes. Conclusion This reflective repost was facilitating understanding of my profession capabilities and competency. The report was also to enable understanding of the areas that I still need to make some steps and gain the maximum capabilities that the current graduate job opportunities demand. My self-rating prior to this self-assessment activity was in some cases over the actual capabilities that I possess and, in others, under what I actually have. I overrated myself in some few areas, and underrated my capabilities in some areas as well. Over the period I have been in school, through the activities within my course, I have been able to develop and acquire capabilities that are some of graduate profession requirements. However, I believe to gain more capabilities in the areas I showed lower ratings. I will continue to practice in such areas like academic writing, report writing, and grammar, to improve my written communication skills. Reference List Belbin, 2012. When and how to use Belbin Team role. Available from http://www.belbin.com/rte.asp?id=406. France, D, and Wheeler, A, 2007. Reflection on using podcasting for student feedback. Planet, Vol. 18. McMillan, K. and Weyers, J, 2011. The Study Skills Book. 2nd Edition, Harlow: Pearson Office for National Statistics, 2012. Characteristics of young unemployed people. Office for National Statistics. Available from http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/lmac/characteristics-of-young-unemployed-people/2012/index.html [2016]. Peacock, L, 2012. Number of graduate job set to shrink in 2012. The Telegraph. Available from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/jobs/9039252/Number-of-graduate-job-set-to-shrink-in-2012.html [2016]. Smale, B, 2009. 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