Personal Skill Audit and Professional Development Plan

This report examines the importance of personal skill audit and professional development planning in the hospitality industry. It explores the benefits of ongoing professional development, employer expectations, self-assessment techniques, learning theories, and a practical development plan. The report also includes a detailed analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of behavioral interviews, a common practice in hospitality recruitment.

Personal Skill Audit
and Professional
Development Plan

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
LO 1.................................................................................................................................................1
P 1 key benefits of on going professional development.........................................................1
P 2 Employer's expectations of skills and competencies.......................................................2
LO 2 ................................................................................................................................................3
P 3 Assess own skills, ability and competencies....................................................................3
P4 Range of learning theory and approaches used for personal and professional development 4
LO3 .................................................................................................................................................5
P5 Development plan to enhance skills and competencies....................................................5
LO4 .................................................................................................................................................7
P6 Job interview for the hospitality industry..........................................................................7
P7 Strengths and weakness of the interview process.............................................................8
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Personal and professional development plan is to make strategies and goals by which an
individual who is working in an organisation to meet the requirements of the job role and
understand the entire job role by enhancing their necessary skills (Stephen,2012). This
professional development plan include the ensuring the knowledge and understanding of the role
and area of expertise and this element is also include in the personal development as well that the
individual can meet the requirements of future job. Report is based on the Travelodge Hotel
which provides facility of accommodation to people in sophisticated town of Ilford and aims at
motivating and encouraging employees so that they develop their personal and professional
skills.
Report will include the key benefits of the on going professional development for
different stakeholders. This will also include the employer's expectations of skills and
competencies. Further ore this will include the self assessment of the ability, skills and
competencies for specific job and review the learning theory and approaches that is used for
personal and professional development. This report will also explain the plans that enhance the
skills and competencies within specific work. Further more will include the interview for
hospitality service industry. And review key strengths and weakness of the interview process.
LO 1
P 1 key benefits of on going professional development
Continues on going professional development is very important to ensure the continues
competent in the professional career. It is continues and and an ongoing process throughout the
career. On going professional training is beneficial for all the stakeholders of the Travelodge
Hotel organisation to enhance the skills and understanding of job role in the hospitality industry
to make their customers satisfy and fulfil their need by offering best service that the competitors
are not able to give. There are many benefits of the on going professional development plan that
can be positive influence in the workplace (5 BENEFITS OF PROFESSIONAL
DEVELOPMENT,2019).
Build confidence and credibility – This on going training development plan in the Travelodge
Hotel increase the confidence in the employees for their work and job role. No one is perfect, for
make them in their specific job role on going professional development helps and fill the gap of
missing skills regarding their job. If organisation will provide this on going development,
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employees will become more confident and trustworthy for their job and can do any kind of
service that make their customers satisfy and this will also help the employee to boos their
confident and organisation as well to increase their profit (Dymock and Tyler, 2018).
Increase Retention - On going professional development helps in increasing the retention in the
Travelodge Hotel. As some organisation cutting off this development plan in their organisation
for saving the cost where, if the organisation provide this development plan for the employees
that will show that the Travelodge Hotel is taking care of their worker and are interested in
keeping them in the organisation for longer term.
Discover the new talents – This development program helps the Travelodge Hotel's
management to identify the new talents in the organisation. By continues providing the training
in on going helps to assess the new talents and weakness of the existing employees and new
employees, thus this will help the management to provide the training according to them to get
out the best from the employees so that employees can serve better to customers (Hilton and
et.al, 2016).
Increase the productivity – On going professional development program increase the
productivity of the Travelodge Hotel. As with the help of this development program employees
get confident and learn new skills and experience then they work effectively for the customers
and guests this will increase the number of guests in the organisation , productivity will increase
and helps the investors to invest more and also beneficial for the shareholders of the
organisation.
P 2 Employer's expectations of skills and competencies
Employer hire the people for Travelodge Hotel that can help the organisation to save
money and provide the cost effective value to their customers. Employer of the organisation
expect various things from the employees that can help to achieve the overall organisational goal
within time provide best services to the guests to satisfy them, serve best food services and
attract them to visit the hotel again. There are view characteristics as according to the hospitality
industry that the employer looking for:
Positive attitude - Attitude is the thing that is shown in the behaviour and communication of the
employees. With the attitude an employee can make new relationship in the organisation and
with the customers (Schoenfeld, 2018). In the hospitality industry like Travelodge Hotel, attitude
play a vital role that every employee have to interact with each other and wither guests,
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customers and other clients. Employer of the Travelodge Hotel expects this major characteristics
of positive attitude for their hotel. If employees deal with their positive attitude the guests, they
can help the organisation to operate smoothly without any conflicts with employee and with the
guests as well.
Dependability – Being dependable means what you do, you will say and taking the ownership of
all the aspects of the jobs. Various expectations are required in the hospitality industry but
dependability is the top of the most (Sandilos et.al, 2018). In the Travelodge Hotel each
employee serve the service s to the each guests and take care of all the needs, requirements and
all the things which guest wants. So it become the responsibility of the employee that take the
ownership of all the things what they have done, including being on time, dressing and working
in professional manner. Managers like the dependable employees because they set and maintain
the clear expectations.
Communication – Another but most important and necessary requirements is the
communication skill. As the hospitality industry mainly depends on the communication with
clients, customers and guests. In the Travelodge Hotel employers expect the good and effective
communication skill that is polite which can attract the guests and helps to maintain the
relationship with them. If the communication skill would be effective employees have the ease to
deal with any kind of problem and situation they will not need to farmyard the issue to the
mangers they can handle the problem art their own level (Simpson,2019).
There are many other characteristics that the employers of the hotel expect from their
employees like, proactive, accept feedback, willingness to learn, corporation, managing conflicts,
customer services and many more that will necessary to operate in the hotel industry to serve the
best service to their guests and cutters and give the best value services to them.
LO 2
P 3 Assess own skills, ability and competencies
Assessment is done in order to identify own skill, ability and competencies using the
various self assessment methods and techniques. This process and assessment is to be done to
measure the recently have skills and knowledge of the employees and also identify that skills
which is needed in the organisation to develop the skills to get the better outcomes. Following is
the skill assessment of Travelodge Hotel.
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Personal skills and competencies of myself
as an assistant manager in Travelodge Hotel
Skills required against professional
standards and objectives of Travelodge
Hotel
 I have good knowledge of different
language, culture and tradition.
 I have good and effective
communication skill also have effective
listening ability (Sandilos and et.al,
2018).
 I have knowledge of effectively
motivating and leaning employees by
using different leadership approaches.
 I can manage the solution for different
problems regarding analytical issues.
 I have good management skill which
help me to organising, directing,
planning and controlling.
 Effective communication and
presentation skill.
 Quick and effective decision making
skill.
 Motivating and inspiring team members
to perform their best.
 Technical, analytical and problem
solving skill (Situated Learning,2019).
 Ability to maintain good relation with
all the stakeholders, customers and
other employees.
P4 Range of learning theory and approaches used for personal and professional development
There are many theories for the professional development plan and other for personal
development plan. By applying different theories according the situation and organisation could
help the organisation to maintain their on going training and development process (Wynants and
Dennis, 2018).
Learning theory for professional development
 Networked learning theory – Networked learning theory is the process of maintain and
building the new connection with the peoples and communicate with them in a way to get
information so as to support one another in the organisation (Bates and Morgan, 2018).
Travelodge Hotel can use this theory by centralise the connection as the main key point
of this network theory. This theory will help the hotel to maintain the relation with the
employees and other staff in the organisation. Employees can get the informations and
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new skills from their superiors by sharing experience and applied skilled in their work
that will support another employees to learn some new skills and perspective.
 Situated Learning theory - This situated learning theory process is to emphasizing the
socio culture activities of the people and employees within the professional community.
This means it based on the activity and behaviour of the employees how they act in
particular situation (Egert, Fukkink and Eckhardt, 2018). Travelodge Hotel can also apply
this situation theory by putting employees in some critical condition and assess them on
the basis of their act and behaviour hoe they deal with the guests and clients in the hotel
in given situation and then guide them and teach them to improve their skills.
Learning theory of Personal development
Constructivism Learning theory – This theory is based on the observation about how people
and employees learn and how the reflect their learning. By applying this constructivism theory in
the hotel company can improve the understanding of the employees. This theory in the
Travelodge Hotel apply by observing the employees how the construct their knowledge and
understanding of the world through experiencing the new things and how they reflects on those
experiences. With this they can improve the personal development of the employees (Situated
Learning,2019).
LO3
P5 Development plan to enhance skills and competencies
A professional development plan is very important and valuable for the individual and for
the organisation as well. With the help of this development plan career development goals and
strategies are to be established in order to identify and improve the skills and competencies in
any individuals. While writing a development plan or reassessing future development, this
professional development plan provide useful roadmap that outline the strengths, areas of need
and available resources with the help of those resources individual can improve its skills. This
professional development plan is very useful for the Travelodge company, as this company need
to hire employees who is very skilled and have high competencies (Mazzotti and et.al., 2018). If
there is need to train any employee in the organisation Travelodge company's employee can
create self professional development and can find out their strong and weak skills and the areas
where they need to work on, available resources that they can use to improve their skills and get
reviews on their improvement in the performance. In this development plan there is different
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section in which weaken skills of an individual which individual want to improve, and then
perform some activities to improve the skills and then all the available resources are to be listed
in the table through individual use to enhance their skills and estimate the time limit how many
time it will take to improve skill and get the review from the other employees in the Travelodge
company and also from the upper level management in the company and they will asses the
employee, whether they really improve their skills and suggest some other resources and
activities through individual can use and enhance their skill (Perry, 2017). A professional
development plan for enhance the skill and competencies is as given below:
Professional Development Plan
Skills Activities Resources Time Review
Communication
skill
Taking classes
and coaching.
Watching more
chat shows.
Take online
course, internet,
books.
3 weeks Employee can
take the review
from the other
employees
working with
them and upper
level managers.
Leadership skill Attending
workshop and
taking guidances
from the leaders
Workshop for
great leader,
4 weeks Can take the
review from the
leaders o0f the
company.
Geographical
knowledge
Explore different
cities, reading
books, watching
travel shows
TV, internet,
News paper
2 weeks For this employee
can take the
review from the
mangers who
have good
knowledge about
different
geographic areas.
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Team working
skill
Get involved
more in team and
interact with team
members.
Start working in a
group and
complete the
common target.
2 weeks Can take review
from the team
members.
LO4
P6 Job interview for the hospitality industry
Job interview means a face to face interaction between the interviewer and candidate who
come to get the job in a company. This is a process of the selecting a employee for the vacant job
post in the organisation, during the interview process employer hopes to determine whether or
not the applicant is suitable for the job role. Travelodge company can use this interview process
to select the employees for their company (What is an Interview,2019). This interview process
may be formal and informal conversation and discussion with assortment of people working
within the company. Depending on the size of the company and organisation, an candidate may
have direct one interview, in which candidate directly interviewed by the employers and in other
cases representatives of human resources management may have interview a candidate first and
then the candidate will go through from various interview series. There are different types of job
interviews that Travelodge company can use to hire the employees for their organisation. These
are:
The screening interview – This is the first and basic interview with a particular company. As
the Travelodge company someone from the human resource department will speak and talk with
the candidate on telephone or via video chat. And then if they will pass the this step then
candidate will move to further step.
the selection interview – In this employer determine whether the candidate is best suited for the
organisation or not. Employer knows qualification and by asking some series of question
employer tend to make candidates nervous (Kurian, Ribeiro and Gomes, 2016).
The group interview – This type of the interview process can also adapt the Travelodge
company to hire the employees. In this mangers or the interviewer ask the questions and have
face to face interaction with several candidates at once. This is best process to save time and to
find out whether the candidate is leader or a follower.
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Panel interview – This process can also be applied by the Travelodge company as to conduct
many interview series a number of interviewer panel take interview at once.
Behavioural interview - As Travelodge is hospitality industry based company which need
skilled people for their company the, through the behavioural interview, employer can get the
skills and competencies of the candidate and ability to required for the position and candidate
have to give real example where they have used these competencies.
As the Hospitality industry basically based on the social skills of the managers and
employees where they have to deal with the costumers and interact wit them on daily bases
(Kristensen and Ravn, 2015). Travelodge company as travel and tour company can apply
Behavioural interview, it will help to get the sense of how candidate or employee will interact
with customers and how thy will handle the difficult situation. In short Travelodge mangers
conduct a question series for the Behavioural interview to ask from the candidate and to know
the skills and competencies:
 Why do you want to work for the Travelodge company?
 Tell me about how you will handle pressure.
 Describe a time when you had to deal with an unhappy clients.
 How do you keep current with changes in hospitality industry?
 Give me an example of a time you had a conflict with team member.
 What are key skills and strengths that you can bring to a role in hospitality and travel and
tour company?
P7 Strengths and weakness of the interview process
Strength of the Behavioural interview
 As in this type of the interview candidate explain their real life experiences, so it become
easy to know for the interviewer about candidate's leadership skills, competencies and
also get to know how capable they are (Heron, Kinchin and Medland, 2018).
 Traditional interview questions are strength and weakness, whereas behavioural questions
can be tailored and customized. For example if Travelodge company want to hire
customer services manager then selection team can customized the question according to
it.
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 Behavioural questions interviewing tend to make candidates less nervous. Because the
focus will on telling a story and experience instead of making themselves look good (The
pros and cons of using behavioural interview questions when hiring,2017).
 This behavioural interview questions help to see beyond the things like candidates ore
useful and solid details.
Weakness of the behavioural interview
Where this behavioural interview is very beneficial and useful for the Travelodge
company but there is also some weakness of this interview process which are:
 It could be hard for the candidate to think past and choose the relevant situation on the
spot. Some may get freeze at the time of interview under the pressure.
 These questions are not always relevant for the future role. Candidate can be judged for
something irrelevant and unrelated situation.
 Travelodge only can get the knowledge about candidate's personal situation, skills and
competencies, but they want to hire technical employee then Behavioural will suitable for
this job role. This interview process in not suitable for all kind of the job vacancy
(Hamilton, 2018).
CONCLUSION
From the above study it can be concluded that ongoing professional and personal
development in the organisation is very beneficial for the organisation. It helps to improve the
skills and understand of the employees and make them perfect in their job role. This on going
professional development plan provide the benefits to all the stakeholders of the organisation.
Employers of the hotel has the various expectations from their employees or the people to hire
them for specific job position in the organisation that they can help the organisation to fulfil all
the requirements and achieving the target. By applying some theory and approaches organisation
can assess the employees to fill the gap of the skill. Professional development plan also help the
employees and individual to identify the weak skills and then help to enhance the skills and
competencies. Travelodge company apply behavioural interview process to hire the employees
which is helpful for the company manager to identify the skills and competencies of the
candidate.
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REFERENCES
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Egert, F., Fukkink, R.G. and Eckhardt, A.G., 2018. Impact of in-service professional
development programs for early childhood teachers on quality ratings and child outcomes:
A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research. 88(3). pp.401-433.
Hamilton, N.W., 2018. Leadership of Self: Each Student Taking Ownership Over Continuous
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Heron, M., Kinchin, I. and Medland, E., 2018. Interview talk and the co-construction of concept
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Mazzotti and et.al., 2018. Steps for implementing a state-level professional development plan for
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Individuals.41(1). pp.56-62.
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Perry, M., 2017. Personal Professional Development Plans. Canadian Journal of Medical
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Sandilos and et.al., 2018. Does professional development reduce the influence of teacher stress
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