Business Skills for Leadership

This document discusses the importance of business skills for effective leadership and provides insights on developing decision-making, problem-solving, communication, and delegation skills. It explores reflective models like Gibbs's Reflective Cycle and Kolb's Reflective Model and suggests an action plan for improving weak areas.

BUSINESS SKILLS FOR
LEADERSHIP

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................3
Decision Making and Problem Solving.......................................................................................3
Effective communication and delegation....................................................................................5
Effective team work.....................................................................................................................8
Leadership in organisations.......................................................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Reflecting writing is the process in which the person explain the past experience of an
particular experience he had in past and even in the on going situation.Business and leadership
abilities are very important to a person who wants for gaining huge success in the career of
business or corporate sector. Basically, leadership skills are big part of the business skills,
because leadership practices always run by people under the business or venture. There are many
of innovative methods simply available for people or employees to develop their skills and
abilities (Alvi, 2017). The assessment help in understanding the skills of the person and also the
ways in which the experience can help in understand the situation in future and make plans
accourdingly. The report will explain the reflection writing with the help of the different models,
and the ways by which the models can help the person in developing the skills and growth for
future. This assessment discusses many productive skills of a person which enable it to improve
self-personality and professionalism. There are various reflective models has used in existing
assessment to perfectly reflect on the development of many skills or abilities, like; decision
making & problem-solving skills effective, communication & delegation skills, teamwork skills
and leadership abilities, etc.
MAIN BODY
Decision Making and Problem Solving
GIBBS’S REFLECTIVE CYCLE
Gibbs’s reflective cycle is currently used by me to reflect on own different skills or
abilities which I have developed for the development of personality & professionalism.
Generally, in year 1988, this Gibb’s reflective cycle first presented by Graham Gibbs. Mr. Gibbs
has provided a logical structure to be learnt from experience. In this reflective cycle of Gibbs,
there are six stage includes which has been mentioned below for reflecting on self-improvement
of skills.
Description
Recently I have participated in a group discussion with various colleagues. In that
discussion, me and colleagues have discussed on lots of topics. In this situation, that discussion
was putted positively effect on my daily life (Bowen and Bowen, 2017). Reason is, in that
discussion, all people were discussing such topics and factors which made use highly motivated
for improving our own personal & professional life. From the self management lectures I
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understood that solving personal skills and knowledge is important in a group so that everyone
can benefit from them. Generally, all members of that group discussion have shared such
productive techniques and strategies with each other which enable used to develop own skills
and abilities in every effective manner. In that group discussion, we are total six members were
participated which induces me. Basically, in discussion, all people were very excellent in own
respective areas of knowledge. So that enabled me to learn lots of new things through colleagues
in the last group discussion. From the time management lecture I also understand the importance
of reducing stress and that can take place when all the tasks are completed on time and the
problems are also solved effectively. All people have discussed on personal and professional
development topic, because our main target was, to make our self to effectively develop different
skills and abilities. Reason is, development of skills and abilities is very necessary task for
developing personality and professionalism. Performance has to be managed and for that
problem solving and decision making is very essential for myself so that there is going to be a
better result which can come out from it.
Feelings
That group discussion was really productive for me because I gained a lot of knowledge
and skills which are essential. Basically, when me and colleagues was discussing various topics
in discussion of group, then I was focused on listening, because if we listen things properly, then
we can simply analyse them. I have felt that, only speaking not makes any conversation
effective, because we always have required to maintain a productive balance between speaking
and listening. The group members had a lot of knowledge and skills in respect to this topic which
is why they were able to give in their best. I felt less confident because I did not have the right
knowledge to be able to take the right measures. I told to my different colleagues also this same
thing that, we have to maintain balance between speaking and listening to get appropriate results
and outcomes.
Evaluation
After knowing my opinion on the balance of speaking and listening, my colleagues was
completely agreed with me. One of the colleague told me that, you have deeply understood the
skill of decision making, because you’re work distribution opinion has shown great knowledge
of this skill (Cortellazzo, Bruni and Zampieri, 2019). That colleague told me that, after
developing your problem solving skill, you will enable simply to develop your personality and
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professionalism. Another colleague was told me one thing that, problem solving skill are not
enough in the terms of developing personality and professionalism. That colleagues have said
that, decision-making and problem solving also plays an excellent role on developing personality
and professionalism.
Analysis
The experience helped a lot to me and talking to the colleagues gave a positive impact on
the situation and the suggestion of making work on the decision-making and problem solving
need to be worked on. The experience showed me the weak points which need to be analysed
and after understanding the ways by which the decision-making can be improved and the
problem solving improved, which further help me in the future also as it is something which
came on the daily bases and it's important to have a good decision-making skills on critical
situations and in this situation which required quick decision-making skills. After colleague’s
suggestion, I get focused on developing my skills of decision-making and problem solving.
These skills are enough to for taking any appropriate decision, and also solving different
problems in daily operations and activities. After that group discussion, I go to home and have
started to finding ‘how to develop decision-making and problem-solving skills. Then, I got
different ways and methods for developing these skills. For example; we can read different
books and journals which has based on decision making and problem-solving skills. On the other
side, currently there are lots of blogs and informative videos simply available on the internet, in
which I have learnt different blogs on internet and also watched lots of informative videos which
has made by different personality development experts and specialists. After conducting these all
methods in daily life, I have succeeded in the development of my decision-making and problem-
solving skills.
Conclusion
It can be concluded that, we always have to participate in different group discussion and
teamwork, because these things always give chance to us for developing our lots of skills and
abilities (Drouvelis and Lohse, 2020). Recently after being part of a group discussion which
affect me in the personal skills and the improvement of skills added a lot to the values in the
personal life. It also helped me in getting the problem solved in better way than before and the
decision-making gets improved. Recently I have participated in the group discussion, in which
that group discussion has added lots of value in my personal life. With the support of that
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discussion, I was able to get motivated for developing my decision-making and problem-solving
skills. Basically, in recent group one of the colleague told me that only communication is not
important in personality development and in the professional world. It requires more skills than
only the communication as personality development include many more things. Discussion
showed the colleague my one colleague told me that, only communication skills are not enough
to develop personality and professionalism, because there are other skills and abilities also has
played equal role. So that, colleague has suggested me that, I have to develop my decision-
making and problem-solving skills as well. In this situation, after few practices, I was enabled to
develop these skills, and now I have well-developed personality and professionalism.
Action Plan
I still have some things which are completely undeveloped and poor, like; leadership skills,
interpersonal skills, people management abilities. In this situation, I have to make an effective
action plan for developing these all skills (Sousa and Rocha, 2019). Without these skills, I will
not able to fully develop own personality and professionalism. So that, actions plan will enable
to me for developing various undeveloped skills.
Skill Timeline Activities Measure
Problem-solving 4 weeks There are a lot of maths
equations which I could solve
so that there is a better
understanding of this skill.
Family and friends will be able
to give me honest feedbacks so
that there is going to be better
functioning. There are a lot of
aptitude tests online which I
could attend online so that there
is going to be a overall
development.
Effective communication and delegation
Kolb’s Reflective Model
Kolb’s reflective model is a experimental learning framework that is used to express own
experience which is further reviewed, examined and evaluated precisely in proposed three stages.
This model was proposed by David Kolb in 1984 and published his learning style through this
model. This model comprises four learning stages i.e. concrete experience, reflective
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observation, abstract conceptualization and active experimentation. This model is quite different
from Gibb’s reflective model because it is an experimental leaning model while Gibb’s is a
iterative model. I used this model to express my experimental learning that I developed through
project which is assigned by manager in during training session. Learning cycle of Kolb’s model
is described as follows: Concrete Experience: It is a primary stage of Kolb’s reflective model which states that
experience achieves with doing something in which company or manager assigns a task.
According to Kolb, learning cannot come by simply watching and reading. Individuals or
team can be learned effectively when they actively involved in learning event. I was
working in UK-based retail company whereas me and other candidates are selected as
marketing employees. Manager of the retail company organize employee orientation
program for all new joiners in order to understand how perform at the workplace (Weiss
and et.al., 2017). Within a month marketing manager assigned me task to conduct market
research and improves sells of existing products. To complete this task assigns me 1
week by manager. It was first task of mine as new joiner so I was bit anxious. Later on, I
communicate with my team to conduct market research so that enable to understand
needs of customer and competitive positioning of the company. Me and me team have
limited time and task was time-consuming so I delegated tasks among team members and
perform different tasks as resulted me and my team complete tasks on time that was great
success for me. However, me and my team has faced various while dealing tasks but at
last we finally compete tasks on time.
 Reflective observation: It is the second stage of reflective model in which discuss over
entire experience which have experienced while doing this event. I have experienced that
there are various things that went well and bad as well. For example, to understand
customer perspective conducts market research by me (Fewster-Thuente and Batteson,
2018). I have good decision making skill through which there is a requirement of enable
to communicate with wide number of people to understand their needs and their reviews
regarding products. Decisions have to be made according to everyone in the task involved
which is why I expect the best results from it. Based on the collected reviews I enabled to
identify growth of existing product in the market. Later on, I observed competitive
positioning of retail company in the UK market by communicating with users and
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customers about brand image. Then I prepared a presentation to concise my whole
information into words so that I could make them understand. Marketing manager
conducted meeting to evaluate me and other new joiners’ performance. I gave
presentation and understand staff what are the opportunities for the product that can be
led financial benefits and threats that can impact on customer’s buying behaviour. While
giving presentation I realized that I was lacking behind to coordinate my body language,
posture with my speaking due to this I have to give more force to keep my viewpoint in
front of them. Apart from this, I was too much confusing to distribute different tasks
among my team members due to this no one enable to give productive results. But my
time management and written communication skills helped us a lot that’s why we enable
to complete given project within time frame.
 Abstract conceptualization: In this reflective cycle individuals makes comparison
between two situations such as what they have done and what they already know. From
the above analysis I can compare situations such as I knew that verbal communication is
that skill that makes individuals influencer and motivator (Schmutz, Kolbe and Eppich,
2018). But it is important to understand that verbal communication cannot be prove
effective without coordination with body language, gesture etc. I knew that thing but after
that I never pay attention on this weak area. Due to this I unable to represent my
viewpoints to the other staff effectively as resulted I did not achieve those outcomes
which I expected. Delegation skill is another effective leadership skill that helps
company to operate so that they can entire in precise manner. To delegate tasks among
team requires to have self-understanding and clarity in individuals for the project. I knew
that thing but after that I never pay attention on this weak area otherwise, I could gain
best outcomes. So, I have decided I will improve these weak areas like communication
and delegation skills because these makes individuals effective leader in future.
 Active experimentation: It is last stage of Kolb’s reflective model in which express
actions that are going to take by learners to improve their weak areas which they have
identified in their practice. I have decided I will improve my communication and
delegation skills. So, I will use skill audit, skill ranking scale etc. to understand reason of
the weakness. Then I will prepare personal development plan wherein includes number of
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resources which will take in action in order to improve my weak areas i.e.
communication and delegation skills (Schoormann, Behrens and Knackstedt, 2018). In
addition, I have decided next time I will coordinate my verbal communication with my
body language while giving presentation that will immediately understand others without
giving more efforts. If I get same opportunity in future then I have decided firstly I will
understand different tasks and aligns them effectively so that I will not get confuse during
delegating tasks among team members. Thus, I will complete such tasks or project with
high quality in future and will not repeat mistakes which I did in this task.
Effective team work
Reflection
I carry various skills and abilities that has supported me in achieving the best level of
work efficiencies in team work. Team work is a group task and its not an individual role and
responsibilities. IT becomes essential to have an effective leadership skill to operate the team. I
also cary different skills like communication skill, information seeking skill, technical skill,
delegation skill and different other skills I occupy that supported me in team to work efficiently.
I always had a great communications' skill which has supported throughout as a leader to achieve
the overall objectives of team. I have been a part of any team before as well which has guided me
always to how to work in a team. It's important to coordinate constantly with other team
members who are a part of the team. Critical analytical skill is also an important skill needed to
work in a team. As a team member its important to coordinate with other team members in such
a way that all objectives can be achieved by the team. Coordination and critical analysis of the
team operations is also an important skill that needed to work efficiently in the team. I also carry
an important observation skill that guides me in analysing and observing the situation of a team.
It's important to observe the situation of team in such a way that high level of work efficiencies
can be achieved in a team. Along with various other skills I carry I also hold the monitoring skill
which guided me through out as a team member to monitor the different individual and team
operations. Monitoring is always a crucial role-play in a team. Monitoring allows to evaluate the
team operations in such a way that proper modifications can be conducted to achieve the overall
objectives of team. Monitoring skill I hold have supported me always whenever I become part of
any team.
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Analysis
I have analysed my position in team. I have analysed that due to various actions I have
taken to improve my teams working abilities I could improve my various skills like coordination
skill, communication skill, monitoring skill, evaluation skill, motivation skill and various other
skills that is needed as an individual to work effectively in team. All actions I have tried like
professional training and guidance have supported me to understand the significance of all
different skills needed to work in a team. Actions like taking guidance have supported me to
achieve the overall objectives behind part of a team. Activities like sharing experience, listening
to other, team meetings, lightening managers work load and all different activities have
suppoprted me to improve my all different team work skills. Team meetings and sharing stores
allows as a team member to create bonding with other team members and also to create a
specific influence in team to improve the team atmosphere. I have analysed that team bonding
play a crucial role in team. If the team members carry team bonding that allows them to work
more efficiently in a team. Sharing stories create friendship in between which helps us to work in
more friendly way with other team members part of the team. I have analysed that all actions
undertaken by us created a positive impacts to achieve the more effective operational efficiencies
as a team.
Action
As I worked in a team, I experienced lot many things which I had to improve. The main thing I
realized was that working in a team was much beneficial but inefficiency in that too caused many
problems and the results which left me and the team dissatisfied. So, I planned to adapt new
skills which I think can be proved useful in the organizations where I will work now.
As a team member, I must seek information about each and everything which is done in the team
and what all things are to be done in order to achieve the goals. I must have all the information
which affects the team and the organization because without or incomplete information can
results in the worst results. So, the first thing which I will apply after doing the complete analysis
is to seek each and every information which can be proved useful in the coming tasks.
The next responsibility must be to spread the information in the team so that everyone becomes
aware of that information and can work upon it collectively because being in a team every small
tasks must be distributed in order to reduce the workload and to increase the productivity with
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different types of opinions. The disseminating of the information will add the contribution of
every member and everyone will have a part to play in it.
After making everyone aware of the information, I must co-ordinate with all the members so that
a single member does not feel pressurized and the work can be done in less time. The output
generated after working in coordination is the best one as it combines the efforts of everyone by
accumulating various ideas and opinions. Then, after co-ordinate, I must monitor the activities
that are going on to achieve a certain goal because it is must for all the activities to be in favour
of the achievement of the goal. If the performance of the members is not up to the mark then I
must stop or try to improve it so that the result comes to be better. Along with this, I must also
ensure that all the members remain motivated and encouraged. The mistakes should not
demotivate the members rather make them learn to not repeat it and perform in a much better
way. I must make them energized so that they can perform each task with full enthusiasm. If I
will follow this in my team, then I am sure the results will be more fruitful and will increase the
overall productivity.
Leadership in organisations
Steve Job founder of Apple organization quoted that Innovation distinguish between a
leader and a follower. MBA students are train to develop leadership quality in work culture to
influence other and welcome new innovation and creativity. In every organization for effective
management leadership plays a great role. Effective leadership influence and motive others to
follow the leader and hence able to manage and control workforce easily. In every successive
company or rising business leadership plays a significant role. It is very well said leaders are
born but with time and experience any one can develops leadership quality. There are various
types of leadership followed in the organization such as Autocratic, democratic, transformative,
Laissez-Faire Style etc.
Reflection
When I started working in the organization, I do not understand the way in which
workforce manages or a strong leader can become. Many of my decisions in the beginning
boycotted by the workforce because of poor leadership skills or not effective communication
skills and also it create negative image of me as a leader. Experience improves my leadership
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quality and hence able to manage and control workforce in the organization. Different types of
leadership style used by me in the organization to overcome from problem and manage
workforce. It increases quality, efficiency and productivity of the workforce and hence I am able
to achieve higher goals with strong command.
Analysis
In MBA our professor discusses role of leadership in achieving goals and ways in which
it can implement in the organization (Gandolfi and Stone, 2018). When I started working in the
organization, Things were different from what we taught and I believe leadership is more
practical rather than theoretical. I deal with strong command but soon realise it has negative
effect on work performance of employees.
Workers do not like my way of communicating and it because most of aged and have great
experience in organization from so many years. My position is higher than workforce of the
organization but their experience is greater than me. I use to deal with them strictly and hence it
decreases employees’ relation. Many of trained and skilled workforce left organization because
of me.
In the end of two years, productivity and quality of the organization decreases. However,
company manage to gain large revenue. My senior quietened my leadership style and created my
negative image. There are number of times when my senior shouted me for poor leadership style
and decrease quality, productivity and efficiency of the organization. Most of experience
workforce told me to change my behaviour towards workforce.
I follow autocratic style to increase control over workforce but do not aware of its negative
impact. Following this style made me feel like a director rather than a leader because I was the
only person who is supposed to take every decision. I never invited the opinions of other
members which created the environment of the workplace very rigid. In this way, I was confined
to my views rather than asking from others.
This lacked creativity and innovation in the decisions. It also demotivated the members and
degraded their performance which was resulting in loss of desired input. After two year follow
such style, I realize have to change this style to build strong relationship between workforce and
hence increase quality, efficiency and productivity of the organization. I analysis various factor
which effecting my leadership and decrease control over workforce.
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In the end came out with effective solution and started using transformative leadership style to
manage workforce (Maner, 2016) from which I was expecting far better results. I started
following the transformative leadership model which was initiated and followed by many great
personalities which stated that the leadership must be strong ensuring the employees’ safety,
inspiration and comfort. I have not used the Qs of the intelligence which I realized during the
analysis.
Action
Then, as I started following the transformative leadership, I took time in adapting the
change in the behaviour and attitude. I started encouraging and motivating the employees to
bring innovation and creativity in the organization in one way or the other. This helped me to
inspire others and also it contributed much positively in the overall growth and progress.
I was supposed to set an example to all the employees as I was at the executive level. I developed
a strong sense of corporate culture along with the independence and ownership of the employees
in the workplace. I started trusting the employees who worked for long and are skilled and gave
the responsibility to take the decision of its particular group. This made the decision-making
process more creative and innovative as they include the opinions of every member (Sahu,
Pathardikar and Kumar, 2018). It gives the opportunity to the employees to learn leadership
skills without spending much time and money in training programs. This helped the employees
in finding best solutions to the old problems.
I, with my team, identified the need for a change and started planning about the ways to
implement it. Then, after many discussions, we together in collaboration made many plans and
implemented successfully (Boamah and et.al., 2018). This made the employees also feel valued
and respected and I too was proud to have such skilled employees who are involved in all the
activities.
This style also helped me to explore the hidden talents of the employees by giving them
challenging tasks to make them more strong and brave towards every task. I started organizing
meetings in which I communicated effectively with all the employees which made them
hesitation-free and also helped me to get their views and decisions and shared mine too.
This helped in bringing positive change in the behaviour and attitude of the employees which
made them perform with much more enthusiasm (Buil, Martínez and Matute, 2019). The
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employees started following my path as a role model and then engage themselves in all the
activities to achieve more results. This helped in enhancing the overall growth of the
organization and the employees themselves.
So, this transformative leadership style benefited me by becoming free from always taking
the responsibility to take the decisions and made me an inspiration to all the members, the
employees by making them skilled, confident and valued as well as the organization as it brought
innovative and creative results more than the expected ones. I must use the intelligence Qs like
EQ, MQ and IQ. Under the IQ that is the Intelligence Quotient, i must have the ability to think
and reason under this quotient. Under the MQ that is the Moral Quotient, I must have the
capacity to understand what is right and what is wrong and the difference between the to help
myself in decision-making. I must use my self-control, self conscience, respect, kindness,
tolerance and many more factors to exercise this. Under the Emotional Quotient I must
understand the emotions of the other people and their feelings which can affect the performance
greatly. I must recognize, understand and use the emotions in myself and the others along with
managing them. This can be used even in dealing with the customers by understanding their
demands and offer the best service.
CONCLUSION
In this report has discussed over different leadership skills i.e. communication skills and
delegation skills, problem-solving and decision-making skills, team working skills and others.
these leadership skills supported individuals to become highly competent and more successful in
their designated post. To reflect over communication and delegation skills has used Kolbe’s
reflective model. While Gibb’s reflective model is used to give refection over problem-solving
and decision-making skills.
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REFERENCES
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