Personal Development and Ethics: Business and Reflective Evaluation - Essay Example

PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT AND ETHICS by Personal Development and Ethics Introduction Higher education provides us with remarkable learning and growth opportunities. The value of collaboration and teamwork in higher education classes can hardly be overstated. Apart from the fact that the mechanical engineering course teaches students the basic professional skills, it also leads to the development of additional, ethical and entrepreneurship talents. I often believed that being an entrepreneur is the same as being a talented musician: one has to be born with special knowledge and skills required to become an entrepreneur. After this course, I have come to realize that being a talented owner of a small business is possible and real, and persistence and perseverance can provide the groundwork for the development of profitable businesses in any field of performance. Starting your own business Starting a small business is not an easy task, but I believe I have the knowledge and skills required to be a small businessman. In present day markets, technical knowledge is highly valued. The labor market of humanitarian professions is oversaturated, whereas technical disciplines and professions lack talented and experienced labor force. I believe that I could provide firms working in the technical or engineering fields with consultations and advice. I have sufficient knowledge of technical disciplines to guide businesses through complex projects and challenging tasks. In other words, I would like to have a small consulting business related to my primary specialization. I believe that I could readily succeed in this endeavor. However, one of the basic questions is what skills, knowledge, and attitudes I would need to become an entrepreneur. Certainly, there is no definite answer to this question. The range of KSAs essential in entrepreneurship may vary, depending on the situation in business and economic environment. However, generally, I would have to be honest, enthusiastic, motivated and ambitious, as well as reasonably risky and respectful for every customer. These are the fundamental attitudes needed to become a successful entrepreneur. In terms of entrepreneurial skills, I will definitely need to listen to my customers, be problem-solving and able to distinguish between more and less important things. I will have to be persuasive and able to make predictions and objective evaluations of other people and problems. I believe that, to be a successful entrepreneur, I will also need to have assertiveness and perfect communication skills. This is how I will establish and maintain productive contacts with customers and partners. Finally, when it comes to knowledge, I will not only need good knowledge of the services I offer and the current state of the consulting market, but I will also need to monitor and understand what customers are looking for. In addition, I will need to know how to advertise my business, how to manage my limited financial and knowledge resources, and how to deal with market uncertainty. All these skills and attributes will help me to achieve my business objectives. Like everything in this life, entrepreneurship has its pros and cons. On the negative side, the issues of uncertainty in profitability and markets should not be disregarded. “Entrepreneurs looking to exploit market opportunities and create economic value must concern themselves with both value creation and value appropriation” (Alvarez & Barney 2005, p.776). Unfortunately, not all entrepreneurs possess the skills and knowledge needed to deal with uncertainty. One of the greatest strengths and, simultaneously, greatest weaknesses of owning a small business is in that entrepreneurs have no one to rely on; their earnings depend on how well they work. Their mistakes usually cost thousands of dollars. They have no right to make unreasonable decisions. However, the freedom and autonomy of small business ownership make it a valued dream for many individuals, including mechanical engineers. Running a small business is a remarkable source of valuable experiences, which can become a perfect instrument of professional decision making for years ahead. Individual reflective evaluation Personal reflection is a good way to look back and criticize the strongest and weakest aspects of individual and team’s performance during the course. Our course was divided into two terms, Term 1 and Term 2. I had different impressions from both terms, and although I feel that I performed well, I still think that I could have improved my skills and quality of cooperation with other team members. At the individual level, the course appeared to be highly beneficial for me and my future profession. As future engineers, we should not limit ourselves to purely technical knowledge but should also know how to grow and develop long-term. In this course, I have learned to work individually and in group towards a common goal. I have learned the types of skills and knowledge I will need to make a good career or, if I want, become a small business owner. The course has given me knowledge to evaluate my own and others’ achievements and skills: by solving questionnaires and tests, I have developed a better view of my own personality and, simultaneously, have learned how to monitor changes in my personality and their effects on my professional performance. For example, I can use the X-Y theory questionnaire, to re-assess my attributes and skills. I have been particularly successful in learning how to write academic reports and doing a SWOT analysis. Both skills are of particular value for everyone looking to run their small business. I think that I have succeeded in self-evaluation activities, and I have a better view of my strong and weak professional sides. The results of self-evaluation will guide me in my self-development efforts and decisions. For example, I know that I need to improve my CV writing skills and develop a better understanding of workplace motivation. The former is needed to find a prospective job, whereas the latter will become the crucial factor of personal success, if I decide to open a small business. Of particular value has been my participation in a team. I am convinced that, in teamwork, we discover new personal and professional attributes and can reconsider our achievements from a new angle. Through my participation in teams I have come to see myself as a plant type of personality, according to Belbin’s team role specifications. The plant type of individuals is characterized by individualistic features and is well-known for the presence of serious-mindedness and unorthodox approaches to decision making in the professional field and business. I know that I have intellect and imagination, but I tend to be up in clouds and disregard important details. At times, these weaknesses are allowable, but they often cause considerable professional difficulties. With the help of the team, I had a chance to discover these features, understand their nature and impacts on my professional performance, and learn how to deal with them. Again, I have developed better awareness of personality features and types and have learned how to deal with people. Term 2 has been particularly valuable in terms of teamwork. I have learned what it takes to be a team member and, additionally, what strengths and weaknesses teamwork can offer. For example, teamwork ensures greater creativity and diversity of ideas, when several minds come together to work on a common task. In the meantime, teamwork is associated with considerable personal differences, and team members can face serious conflicts simply because they view one and the same problem from different angles. Therefore, the success of teamwork is largely in how these differences are transformed into benefits. This is why I have been extremely thorough in my analysis of group cohesiveness and performance and various factors influencing them. I have learned the main reasons leading to group conflicts and possible ways to resolve them effectively, without major losses. I have improved my critical thinking skills and, today, I think that I am prepared to work as a member of professional engineering teams. Despite these achievements, I still feel that I am just at the very beginning of my personal development path. I still have to learn more about my strongest and weakest sides, as well as the ways to deal with personal weaknesses and overcome difficulties. Moreover, the fact that many important topics were presented during one lesson leaves much room for further improvements. I lack knowledge of conflict management in teams and do not understand whether my plant type of personality is the source of benefits or limitations for my team. Nevertheless, the knowledge I have acquired during my participation in the team and individual performance creates a good basis for continuous improvement. One of the main tasks I am currently facing is to develop personal goals and try to understand what I want to achieve in short- and long-term periods. The more specific I am in goal setting, the better are the chances that I will be able to achieve these goals. As of today, I have sufficient knowledge of personal and team development to pursue my goals. I will have to be particularly persuasive and assertive in my movement to the desired goal. References Alvarez, SA & Barney, JB 2005, ‘How do entrepreneurs organize firms under conditions of uncertainty?’, Journal of Management, vol.31, pp776-793. Read More