Personal and Professional Development - Essay Example

Personal and Professional Development Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Self-managed Learning 3 Approaches of Self-Managed Learning 3 Informal orexperimental learning 3 Coaching 4 Mentoring 4 Life Long Learning 4 Continuing Professional Development 5 Personal Development Planning 5 Evaluation of the benefits of self-managed learning in my context 6 Reflective Learning Journal 7 Summary of What Was Done 7 New Learning 8 Personal Reaction 9 Action to be Taken 9 Reference List 11 Self-managed Learning Self-managed learning is defined as the process through which an individual can observe and learn different things in a variety of ways in the society, in workplace or any other diversified environment. Self-managed learning also deals with setting goals for learning by evaluating the purpose of learning and the ways in which these goals will be achieved. Through this method, people are seen to learn various things like, culture, perception, personality and behaviour of different peoples. Individuals who are persuading their studies, still in colleges and yet to join organization can learn from friends, newspapers and internet. Self-managed learning provides the people with chances of innovation with their own learning strategies. In some cases, many of the learners are seen to adopt short term learning strategies but the changing environment has made it inevitable that the learners should take up long term learning (Garrow, 1998). Approaches of Self-Managed Learning In colleges, students can learn through research, this is even possible when the individual is in his workplace. There are several learning approaches that the individual can follow for learning. However, the most common approaches are discussed below: Informal or experimental learning Most of the people are seen to learn through informal or experimental means. This includes learning while in job, by observing colleagues, talking about any task, swapping stories or working together on a same task and offering mutual support to each other. This method also involves learning from conferences, seminars, social networks and internet. People can learn from seminars and conferences and the experiences they get from there can help in changing the future. These events provide them with confidence to speak in public and develop presentation skills. Through social networking sites, individuals can chat with their friends and colleagues and can learn from them. There are various written materials along with articles that enhance the knowledge base of the individuals. Coaching Coaching is the art of facilitating the enhancement of the development, learning and performance of the others. It has a personal form that is one to one on the job approach. This approach of helping people assists in developing the levels of competence and skills. Mentoring Mentoring is the process through which some trained individuals are specially selected to provide support, guidance and pragmatic advice in order to help the individual or a group of persons, under the responsibility of the trained individual, to develop and learn. Mentors help the individuals in performing better in the future and grooming them to attain greater heights in their career, which is commonly referred as career advancement. Mentors provide suggestions to the people for learning contracts and drawing self-development programs. They also provide help with learning programs and guidance regarding the necessary skills and knowledge that can be acquired to perform the new job roles. Life Long Learning Lifelong learning can be defined as a learning activity that can be conducted throughout one’s life, with an aim of enhancing competencies and knowledge skills within a social, civic, personal and employment-related perspective (OGrady, 2013). The two different ways in which lifelong learning, in a personal and professional context, could be encouraged are Continuing Professional Development (CPD) and Personal Development Planning (PDP). Continuing Professional Development CPD is the enhancement and maintenance of the competence, expertise and knowledge of professionals throughout their career as per the plan designed with regards to the requirement of the society, profession, employers and also, the professionals. It provides lifelong learning with several benefits. It helps the learner to maintain a steady state, which signifies no signs of decline and simultaneously, enhances the existing abilities. It signifies that CPD helps in extending both skills and knowledge and also, acknowledges the presence of existing expertise. It is a career-long process, which implies that there is a proper planning to direct the development in line with the profiles, portfolios and review of individual performances. Thus, it can be suggested that CPD does not only cater to the requirement of the individual but also, to the need of the profession or the employers. CPD is of great importance to the learners who are into professional world. Through CPD, they not only get to learn new skills and knowledge, but also enhance the existing skills and competencies. This leads to both professional and personal developments that in turn help in changing, developing and widening the roles and responsibilities of the individual. This learning approach leads to career development via refining and acquiring the skills that are required for new roles and responsibilities. These skills will be of great use when implemented in team or in multi-professional context (Quinn, 1998; Rattan, Chambers and Wakley, 2002). Personal Development Planning It is a supported and well-structured process undertaken by an individual to enhance their own achievement, performance and learning and also simultaneously, plan for their career, educational and personal development. A PDP should be designed as such that they cater to the needs, developments and aspiration and time lines. The personal development plan is written in the beginning of every year. In this planning, the individual states the educational or professional priorities for the year, ways to accomplish the priorities and the methods of evaluating the accomplishment of the individual (Crawford, 2005; Kumar, 2008). This plan offers enough flexibility to the learner to add some new priorities in the middle of the year along with removing some older ones, which no longer seems appropriate. This type of planning does not only ensure that the individual learns new skills but also evaluates the accomplishment regarding the skills, so that if any gap is identified, it could be filled immediately. PDP establishes what an individual needs to learn, rather than what one intends to learn. Thus, the planning ensures that the skills of an individual improve adequately, rather than just reinforcing the existing ones (Rughani, 2001; Rughani, Franklin and Dixon, 2003). Evaluation of the benefits of self-managed learning in my context I am presently working in London School of Business and Finance, which requires me to enhance my existing knowledge as well as acquire new knowledge. The competitive environment in today’s business is as such that in order to remain competent, the organization are looking for employees who have advanced skill set and uses them in an optimum manner for maximum output. Employees are believed to be an integral part in the success of the business. In this context, the training imparted by the organization is equally important as the Self-managed learning. Apart from academic knowledge, acquired during my college days and are being implemented in my current work, the experiences that I gain from the job is equally valuable. According to me, the experience that I get every day from my job provides me with a huge experience in learning and transforms me into a better individual. In my job, I incorporate Self-managed learning through interacting with my colleagues, discussing my tasks with them provides me with a better understanding regarding the skills that I require to perform the task. Apart from this, the training that the organization has provided me during my initial days has also led to Self-managed learning. My manager has been acting like my mentor right from my initial days, providing me the guidance regarding my both professional and personal development. He has groomed me to perform better in the future by channelizing my potentialities towards the knowledge that is essential to possess. This guidance provided to me by my mentor has helped me to be a better individual and contribute significantly towards the growth of the organization. These will be even helpful to me when I leave my present organization and join a new one. The knowledge and skill transfer will lead to the betterment of my future organization too. Reflective Learning Journal Summary of What Was Done During my academics, I had an opportunity to learn and enhance my basic skills in manners as follows: active learning, listening, reading, writing, speaking and Critical thinking. Active learning helped me in understanding the implication of learning new skills in decision making and problem solving. Listening, reading, writing and speaking were the other common skills that I had learnt while listening to my professors delivering their lectures, reading the books and other materials, then imbibing the ideas from them and expressing them through speaking or writing. All these skills required to be executed with full attention and motivation. Critical thinking was little different from these. It involved both reasoning and logic in order to approach towards the solution of any specific problem. This skill required the use of reading, writing, listening and speaking abilities so that proper logic can be applied while solving any particular problem. All these basic skills that have been nurtured by me during my academics have been applied in my work after joining London School of Business and Finance. Here my work is related to maintaining accounts of the institute, which mainly involves record keeping and retrieving them whenever required. In this job, I need to use my basic skills like, reading, writing, listening and critical thinking. These basic skills have assisted me to perform my work in a qualitative manner. New Learning Through my opening into the professional world, my basic skills were not only enhanced, but I got to nurture some additional skills like, problem solving and social skills, which were new to me. Problem solving skills were implemented by me when I had faced certain complex problem, which could have created an adverse affect on my organization. For instance, as an accountant, my job is primarily to keep a check on the accounts which need to be recorded in an accurate manner. Accurate here signifies that there are zero mismatches between the records. However, in certain situations, I do encounter with the problem of mismatches, where I need to use my problem solving skills in order to settle the problem. This skill has taught me how complex problems can be identified, review the information related to that problem, evaluate all the possible alternatives that can lead to the solution and implement the solution accordingly. Along with problem solving skills, social skills are also enriched. As an accountant, I do not work as a lone individual, but instead I need to work with a group that comprises of three to four people. Social skills include coordinating, instructing, negotiating, persuasion, service orientation and social perceptiveness. While working in a group, I have coordinated with my group members, instructed them, in case of team conflicts, I had taken initiatives to negotiate the whole matter, persuading others to change their minds and also, develop social perceptiveness. Personal Reaction The skills that I have developed during my job and my organization has made be transform into a more confident individual. The basic skills and the special skills that I have gained during my job have given me the capability and the competency with which I can work in a group and deliver my duties in an efficient manner. Working in a group has given me huge pleasure since it has made me capable of understanding and working with people with different mentality. However, working in group has certain disadvantages like, if a group member is incompetent and does not perform well, it in turn affects the productivity of the whole group. Thus, the main challenge lies here. I, along with my other group members, coach and train that individual so that he achieves competency and delivers his responsibilities efficiently. Action to be Taken Although I have got ample learning opportunities through my job, yet I have believed that there are no limits to learning. As the business environment is highly competitive and all organizations are fiercely competing in order to sustain it, it becomes important for the organization to have a set of competent people who will help in the sustainability. In this respect, I would like to enhance my knowledge in accounts by joining some accounting courses so that I can deliver optimally as an accountant. Reference List Crawford, C.J., 2005. Corporate rise: The X principles of extreme personal leadership. California: XCEO, Inc. Garrow, V., 1998. Self-managed Learning: Development for the 21st Century [pdf] n.p. Available at [Accessed 16 November 2013]. Kumar, A., 2008. Personal, academic and career development in higher education: Soaring to success. Oxon: Taylor & Francis. OGrady, A., 2013. Lifelong learning. London: Routledge. Quinn, F.M., 1998. Continuing professional development in nursing: A guide for practitioners and educators. Cheltenham: Nelson Thornes. Rattan, R., Chambers, R. and Wakley, G., 2002. Clinical governance in general dental practice. Buckinghamshire: Radcliffe Publishing. Rughani, A., 2001. The GPs guide to personal development plans. Buckinghamshire: Radcliffe Publishing. Rughani, A., Franklin, C. and Dixon, S., 2003. Personal Development Plans for dentists: The new approach to continuing professional development. Buckinghamshire: Radcliffe Publishing. Read More