Reflective Account on Performing Research

This reflective account explores the experience of performing research in the module 'Mental Wealth: Professional Exchange and Applied Research'. It discusses the challenges faced, learning experiences, and personal development. The account also provides references for further reading.

MENTAL WEALTH: PROFESSIONAL
EXCHANGE AND APPLIED RESEARCH
1

Contents
Assessment 2: Reflective Account..................................................................................................3
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Main Body.......................................................................................................................................3
Personal reflection on performing research.................................................................................3
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................5
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................6
2

Assessment 2: Reflective Account
Introduction
Reflective report can be stated as a brief written explanation of experience as well as actions
which a person gets in a particular circumstance, event or situation. It is a piece of writing which
assist an individual to summarise critical reflection on subject (Shum, and et. al., 2016). It
involves information or data related to what went good, not good, learning of a person from the
complete experience etc. It is a reflective account report in which I present reflection on my
learning and experience during undertaking the overall module. This reflective account gives me
an opportunity to appraise my actions during the course of the research process along with
reflection on my skills and knowledge. This reflective account is also helpful in determining the
efficacy of my engagement with others and enable me in recognizing my own areas of
development.
Main Body
Personal reflection on performing research
I am a student learning in the module named as “Mental Wealth: Professional Exchange and
Applied Research”. I am reflecting on the experience which I gain by undergoing the module. I
had assigned the responsibility to develop a proposal poster for the research project by my tutor.
The topic of my proposal is financial performance analysis of steel companies of United
Kingdom. I have no knowledge regarding how to develop proposal and prepare a poster
presentation as I have never done it before. I lose my confidence level at that time and thought
that I cannot did it. But the best part is that I had to perform that task in the group and my group
members was very helpful. They helped me a lot and motivate me to do the assigned task
appropriately (Johns, 2017).
In order to perform study on the topic, I had to search information regarding the companies
and their financial performance in the market. But, I did not have any knowledge about which
source as authenticate and I can use in my research and which is not. I faced difficulties at the
time of searching data on the topic. But my tutor taught me that the source which is not older
than 5 or 10 years can be used in the research. This learning from the classroom helped me a lot
at the time of researching on the topic. I faced difficulties because of my less effective research
skills but, with the assistance of learning which I get during the module, I enabled to collect data
3

on the study area. By the researching on the topic, I learnt that the organisation should analyses
their financial performance effectively in order to determine the financial health and profitability
of company. Apart from this, it involves analysis and interpretation of the statements of
organisation in a way that it undertakes full diagnosis of financial soundness. I also learnt that
the main purpose of analyzing financial performance of companies is to can we understanding
about financial aspects of the entity. Good financial performance of the company helps
stakeholders and investors in taking investment related decisions easily and also assist companies
to attract more number of investor towards the business (Moussa-Inaty, 2015).
During performing in the group, I faced difficulties to work with other team members
because of my ineffective teamwork skills. I never worked in the team before and faced
difficulties initially because of it. However, my all the team members were very supportive and
support me every time when I faced any kind of issue. By the help of my group members, I was
able to fulfill all my assigned roles and responsibilities in an effective way. I performed all the
assigned work on time and completed the project successfully. The overall experience I got
during the module was excellent and this module helped me in learning a lot of things. This
improved my skills along with my knowledge base, competencies and capabilities. I learnt that
how to work in team, how to research effectively on a particular topic or subject area, how to
communicate effectively with others, how to manage each activity on time and performed it
within the specified schedule etc. All these learning will help me in future and provide me with
the growth opportunities (Gibson, and et. al., 2017).
However, I felt that I required to work hard on improving my team working and research
skills. So, for improving my research skills, I will do proper planning before conducting the
research, ensure that all the authentic content will be involved and take advantage of new
technologies while searching. This will assist in improve my research skills can make me able to
research effectively on the particular topic. On the other hand, for improving my team working
skills, I will participate more and more in the groups and take participation in each group
working activity. This will assist in enhancing my team working skills can make me able to work
in coordination and cooperation with team members and perform my assigned tasks successfully.
All this learning help me in my professional development along with personal development and
make me able to get good employment in future (Pasternak and Rigoni, 2015).
4

Conclusion
As per the above provided reflection, it can be concluded that reflecting on own experience
will provide an individual with the opportunity to know about their strong areas as well as the
weak areas. Apart from this, through the help of reflection, I am able to take appropriate actions
for improving my weak areas and learn new skills and knowledge. Reflecting on a particular
event, experience, or situation, help in exploring personal feelings regarding that particular
situation or event and provide me with the opportunity to reconsider the thoughts and events
from fresh perspective. It also helps me in documenting my own contribution in the group
working in an effective way. Reflecting on learning improves my knowledge base and skills
which will help in my future growth.
5

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Shum, S.B., and et. al., 2016, April. Reflecting on reflective writing analytics: Assessment
challenges and iterative evaluation of a prototype tool. In Proceedings of the sixth
international conference on learning analytics & knowledge(pp. 213-222).
Johns, C. ed., 2017. Becoming a reflective practitioner. John Wiley & Sons.
Moussa-Inaty, J., 2015. Reflective Writing through the Use of Guiding Questions. International
journal of teaching and learning in higher education, 27(1), pp.104-113.
Gibson, A., and et. al., 2017, March. Reflective writing analytics for actionable feedback.
In Proceedings of the seventh international learning analytics & knowledge
conference (pp. 153-162).
Pasternak, D.L. and Rigoni, K.K., 2015. Teaching reflective writing: thoughts on developing a
reflective writing framework to support teacher candidates. Teaching/Writing: the journal
of writing teacher education, 4(1), p.5.
6