Critical Evaluation and Analysis of Employability Skills - Essay Example

This is a critical evaluation and analysis of employability skills for my professional development plan relating to my career objectives. My organisational objective is to achieve a world leading centre of excellence in service delivery. Having specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and timely objectives is important in assessing my employability skills. Evaluating my areas for development will further shape and improve my skills, knowledge, and interests in spinal research coordination skills which employers in this field want. My main focus was to improve my skills in report writing, because as a spinal research coordinator, I am required to write various projects and business cases. In addition, my skills in budgeting, assertiveness, leadership, team working and knowing how to deal with difficult situations in line with HR policies are all important skills. 2.0 Evaluation of my Employability Skills Evaluation is an important stage in the self-reflection as it helps me to focus on my career goals and those of the organization (Pedler, 2001). In my role as a spinal research coordinator I am required to liaise and coordinate with different levels of staff - medical and non-medical - within the spinal deformity unit and across the hospital. The coordination of various research projects, managing elements of operational delivery of the spinal deformity unit, and resource planning and assessment, are all requirements of my role. These requirements are in line with my plan to become more conversant with HR policies. Thus I have developed team building skills since this role involved ffamiliarizing myself with HR policies and regulations would enable me to work with human resource activities which require management. This plan has helped to improve my service delivery in the field of human resources and use my time more effectively to fulfil my potential and further my career. My personal development plan was to improve my report-writing skills which seem to meet the requirements of my organisation. The role of a spinal research coordinator in my organisation requires someone with knowledge of writing various reports and working on business cases. Since at the moment I have little skills in regard to report writing, developing these skills shall be of paramount importance in attaining my organisation’s requirements in this area (Schon, 1991). Other requirements of my organisation, such as assisting the human resources department in recruitment and resource planning, are tasks that a resource manager should be accountable for. These are skills I planned to achieve but I have not yet achieved them since my writing skills are still low. I have not achieved them but I hope to apply my strengths to report-writing to be able deliver reports quickly and on time, so I am confident I can develop in this area. My career objective is to one day work as a service manager. However, being a manager requires the ability to perform a lot of tasks and use problem solving skills in various situations. In my plan I wanted to develop team-working skills and decisions making. Having to deal with the problem of team working and knowing how to make decisions in difficult situations might be important in the realization of my dream of becoming a service manager, as I can apply my problem-solving skills to improve in these areas. Public speaking is an important skill in management (Pedler, 2001). I realized after my SWOT analysis that I have a fear of public speaking which I needed to develop. Since I want to be the service manager of my organisation I need to work on being confident at public speaking as during the course of my role as a service manager I might be required to represent my organisation at meetings or give speeches regarding the vision and mission of my organisation. 3.0 A Review of Theoretical Principles I have developed leadership skills that would enable me in fulfilling my role and the aims of the organisation. The position of service manager is a vital role in my organisation and therefore having the required management skills is imperative. Having the necessary skills to run my business would enable me to avoid a variety of dilemmas when confronted with a problem. The basic skills I planned to improve include decision making, problem solving, planning, meeting management objectives, delegation, communication and managing oneself (Pedler, 2001). Since my organisation has a diverse number of functions I had to develop my leadership skills so that I can manage them efficiently. These basic skills in management and leadership are also important in developing practices in the hospitals. If my organisation struggled to meet certain standards in a given area, this would be attributed to my inadequate skills as compared to the organisation’s inability to implement the appropriate techniques in management and leadership (Schon, 1991). 3.1 Decision Making Skills and Problem Solving There is need to work with a lot of people in a group. Management is a role where solving problems and making decisions are often inevitable. This requires the careful weighing-up of a situation to find the most effective solution. I have developed these skills so far in my organization. This skill of decision making and problem solving is in line with the requirements of my organisation to be recognized as a world leading clinical centre of excellence. Situational theory calls for leaders to use a variety of their skills in solving a given issue. Leaders are required to employ a variety of both related and leadership behaviours that are in line with the situation that they are confronted with, such that they can achieve the required level of performance . Achieving leadership skills are crucial if I am to assist my organisation in guiding it through any potential difficulties that may be faced in the future. Conclusion In observing all of the plans I had for my personal development, I have developed some, got other skills I had not planned for while there is need to develop other skills to attain my organizational goals. This report has enabled me to assess my personal development plan and its relevance to the skills employers want in organizations. The SWOT analysis that I had previously used to identify my weakness can now be used as a way to make the most of my strengths. In using my skills I hope to be able to turn these weaknesses into strengths. References Pedler, M., 2001. A Managers Guide to Self Development. London: McGraw-Hill. Schon, D., 1991. The Reflective Practitioner: how professionals think in action. London: Ashgate. Appendices Blog 1 Kolb’s Learning Cycle (3) suggests that humans can use their experience to learn and develop. I applied my skills in class when a number of students who decided they didn’t want to do the assignment sent by the lecturer since the lecturer had not turned up for the class and had decided to email the job instead. A few students were claiming that by so doing the lecturer was becoming lazy and was unwilling to deliver the lectures. I used this opportunity to practice my leadership role and advised the class to attempt the assignment because those who refused would affect the whole class, and that the whole class was a bit critical or of more significance than a few individuals. This experience taught me that even in my organization, I would at one time have to choose between employee interests and those of the organization. I discovered that the organization is always “bigger” than any individual. Blog 2 Developing effective leadership styles impacts positively on a person’s life. The company’s director that I worked for was able to impact me positively because of the leadership styles he was able to put forward for the survival of the company. This is how I developed the leadership skills. His use of leadership styles he was able to save much money and effort that the company had to spend on new processes, efficiencies and cost cutting methods. Having a pace setting leadership style where one is expected to model excellence and self direction. Thus through this style, it has impacted my motivation and skills required in the workplace. This leadership style used by my director is efficient in giving quick results and through it has not only improved my motivation skills but also in improving the innovation of the other employees and advocating for team work. Blog 3 The organization which I worked for is that one that observes its structure and culture in a concise manner. This organization had defined its class of membership in its constitution and through this; it would build the team spirit that is needed at any workplace. The organization had additionally got to define how promotion is to be held and the specific steps to be followed in the given process. Thus through specifying the whole work and by giving its employees time to gain skills in the given area of study helped me to achieve my planned employability skills. Once an organization has defined roles for specific employees the given employees are able to increase their motivation and team work development as people are required to work on the areas which they are experienced. These organizational management styles ensure that as an employee one develops the required relationship skills at workplace. My organization observed their structure and that there is a given sequence where issues are dealt on in the organization. This made me to achieve my personal development goals in employability skills development. Blog 4 The manager whom I have worked for, observes the structure of the organization he is running, ensures that the culture of the employees is observed and through this, the organization easily achieves its goals. The organization has had a number of new customers, increased team performance within the organization and contingency, relationship skills have improved in the workplace. The way the organization director relates well with all the staff members has been vital to improving my motivation and my empowerment. I feel that this has gone in an extra mile to improving my overall employability skills. The director through his coaching style of leadership has been critical to developing communication skills. Communications kills are critical in any person to their personal development and the organization. Read More