Reflection on Personal Development Plan | Assignment

Reflective personal development plan
journal

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The present study states my four major skills; negotiating skills, team work skills, public
speaking skills and conflict resolution skills. The study is about the analysis of my strengths and
weakness regarding my four core skills. It shows the betterment required in the areas of the
weaknesses I have in my skills. A development plan is prepared in the present report which
highlights the problems areas, what needs to be done to improve those areas and what time is
needed for the desired improvement. My major weaknesses are; poor public speaking due to lack
of self confidence and nervousness, lack of patience when working with the team and ignoring
situations all the time to avoid conflicts and not taking stand for resolving the disputes. The
report described that public speaking can be improved through attending public speaking
courses, by being more presentable in the classroom. Patience level can be improved by taking
guidance from the experienced mentors and senior for becoming an efficient member in the
team.

Table of Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.............................................................................................................2
REFLECTIVE JOURNAL ENTRY................................................................................................3
SUMMARY AND ACTION PLAN................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12
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REFLECTIVE JOURNAL ENTRY
REFLECTIVE JOURNAL ENTRY PRO-FORMA 1
What is the core skill to develop?
I want to furnish my negotiation skills. Negotiation skills is the capability of discussing and
coming to an agreement, the outcome of which is beneficial for all the parties involved in the
negotiation. Negotiation skills includes various attributes such as good vocal communication
abilities, rational decision making skills, focus and active listening skills. Though I am good in
negotiating with others, however I want to develop some other attributes which will make my
present skills more polished.
Why is this core skill important? Why did I select this skill to reflect on?
Negotiation skills are important for me because good negotiating skills will help in avoiding
conflicts with my peers, colleagues. Negotiation skills leads to respect for others. It helps in
building the confidence in oneself as good negotiation provides satisfactory agreement to the
parties in the negotiation process.
This is an important skill because it would boost my confidence level, it would help in
improving my communication skills and would make my decision making process more
rationale.
Reflect on your current competence regarding this skill. How did you assess your
competence?
By closely observing and reviewing myself, I discovered my present level of competence skill.
My negotiation skills are satisfactory now as I am continuously working on it and asking
different groups like peers, tutors, colleagues so that I could make my skills more effective. I
assessed by current competence level by taking the feedbacks from various groups in my
surroundings and most importantly my inner feelings about the competence I posses.
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Feedback from peer groups: I have asked about my present skills effectiveness from my peers
which helped in assessment of strengths and weakness. Although majority of my peer members
gave me the positive feedback but some of them commented my lack of confidence while
negotiating and were of opinion that I become a little coercive during the negotiating process.
Appraisal data : Appraisal data helped in knowing my competency level as the data showed
me that at what my current level is and at where I need to reach through the academic reports.
Opinions of colleagues: Colleagues gave me the reviews which were positive to a large extent.
Self assessment: My gut feelings are that I posses good negotiating skills as mostly reviewed
by my peers groups and colleagues through which I came know to weaknesses that I need to
convert into my strengths.
Can you identify any contradictions from your analysis above? For example, is there a
match between how you see yourself and how others see you, or not?
No, I have not found any contradictory opinions because the negative reviews which I got about
the lack of confidence and a little coerciveness in my negotiation are actually my weaknesses.
If I become more polite and subtle while negotiating with others, it would enhance my
negotiating skills and it would help in making me more efficient.
How might this skill help me in the future?
Negotiation skill is one the most important skills, a recruiter fore mostly sees and observes in
an individual so there is no doubt about how much this skill will influence my career when I get
placed somewhere. I want to become a leader in an organisation which would require me have
effective negotiation skills for leading people in the organisation. This will have a great
influence on career development plans in the future.
REFLECTIVE JOURNAL ENTRY PRO-FORMA 2
What is the core skill to develop?
Team work is the quality I need to improve for becoming more efficient in my life. Although I
work quite good when working together with other individuals, tries to maintain coordination
with team members and offers help to everyone in the team. However, I still need to develop
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my this core skill. I sometimes do lose my patience level while working in the team which
makes feel irritated and frustrated. Also, sometimes I fail to understand other member's way
of thinking which creates problems for me.
Why is this core skill important? Why did I select this skill to reflect on?
This skill is important because working with team provides an individual quality work, better
decisions regarding any matter, faster completion of work. Team work enhances the
interpersonal skills of members in a team, which ultimately help in personal development of
an individual. These benefits of having a good team work skills helps in maintaining cordial
relationships professionally and personally at the workplace, colleges, schools etc.
I selected this skill as my core skills for development because this would help me a lot when I
will start working for some company where I will have to work with teams. My ambition of
becoming a successful leader largely depends upon this skill. Progress theory of team
management states that a leader should 6 different factors for achieving the team goals in an
organisation.
Reflect on your current competence regarding this skill. How did you assess your
competence?
I have a positive opinion regarding my team work skills along with some issues that pose
some problems to me when I work in a team. I have assessed my present competence through
various ways such as :
Feedback from peers:I have taken feedbacks from my peers and I got mix reviews from
them. They were of the opinion that I work with dedication, good team spirit, participates
actively while working in the team but they also said that I get irritated of little things very
early which sometimes affects my performance.
Tutor: I have also asked from my tutor regarding my performance when working in a team
and he was of the opinion that I am good and show good team spirit along with maintaining
co-ordination with the other team members. He also pointed out my weakness of not
understanding others' perspective and mind sets of other team members which I should
overcome.
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Toolkit: I assessed myself by measuring my performance when I work alone and when I am
working with teams and I realised that my efficiency level increases when I work together
with different individuals.
Can you identify any contradictions from your analysis above? For example, is there a
match between how you see yourself and how others see you, or not?
I am of the same opinion as those of peers, colleagues and tutors that I have patience issues
while working as team with other members. I need to work on my patience level and should
show more calm attitude towards other team members. For improving my team skills I will
have to overcome my these weaknesses which will make me more open to others in the team,
understanding different perspective will in some way increase my knowledge of
understanding human behaviours which would eventually be add ons in my career
development and personal development.
How might this skill help me in the future? (use references to support your argument)
Team work skills are important because working in a team creates a feeling of unity in the
members for achieving team goals. Working in a team will improve the performances of each
members through continuous feedbacks of others and this increases the efficiency of the
person.
So for becoming an efficient manager, I need to improve more myself in terms of having team
spirit as this would help me in working efficiently in the team in an organisation and also it
would enhance my career growth in the future.
REFLECTIVE JOURNAL ENTRY PRO-FORMA 3
What is the core skill to develop?
I want to develop my public speaking skills. I face a lot of issues when I have to speak in front
of large number of people. Lack of self confidence and nervousness restricts me in while
speaking publicly. I really need to develop this skill because without having self confidence
and believing in myself, my all other skills would be a waste.
Why is this core skill important? Why did I select this skill to reflect on?
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This skill is necessary because improving this skill would also enhance my communication
skills and increase my self confidence. Public speaking skills helps in developing my
leadership qualities, it would show people that I have good amount of knowledge, it would
differentiate me from peers and colleague.
I selected this skill as my more core area for development because this will help me in my
college debates, competitions and later on for building me career as a leading manager in an
organisation.
Reflect on your current competence regarding this skill. How did you assess your
competence?
My current competence regarding the Public speaking skills is not very good for which I have
to work hard and this weakness I know myself and also from friends, colleagues and tutor.
Toolkit: I tried to speak on some matter in front of my friends which I could not do
appropriately and that made me realised that I am not good at it.
Tutor: My tutor saw my general performances where I had to speak in front of the class and
he advised me to join public speaking classes, be more confident while speaking.
Peers: Peers also had the same reviews on my public skills that i need to work on this skill.
Can you identify any contradictions from your analysis above? For example, is there a
match between how you see yourself and how others see you, or not?
My views about myself regarding this particular skills does not contradict the opinions of my
peers and tutor. For succeeding in life and making a bright future for myself ,I will have to
consider the suggestions and reviews seriously which would motivate me to polish myself and
become a more confident person.
How might this skill help me in the future?
This skill is going to help me in building my career as manager in a company. A confident
manager helps an organisation in attaining the objectives of the company. Manager's
confidence in himself makes him successful in the organisation and my future plan of
becoming a manager requires me to be a good public speaker for addressing different matters
in front of whole organisation and public and also it would help in managing people more
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efficiently.
REFLECTIVE JOURNAL ENTRY PRO-FORMA 4
What is the core skill to develop?
Conflict resolution skill is needed to be furnished. Though I posses fair amount of this skill
but it still needs to be develop. Conflict resolution is the capability of resolving the conflicts.
This skill helps in building trust level between people and it can be solved through various
methods such as compromising, collaborating, avoiding the unnecessary arguments with
people in the surroundings.
Why is this core skill important? Why did I select this skill to reflect on?
This skill is necessary for maintaining peace in life personally and professionally. Conflict
resolution skills are important at the workplace because unnecessary conflicts might arise
which hampers the performance of an individual in an organisation.
I selected this skill to improve because this quality will not only prove beneficial for my
career growth and development but my overall personality would also be enhanced.
Reflect on your current competence regarding this skill. How did you assess your
competence?
The current competence of my conflict resolution skill is average which I have to make it
more effective. I somehow manage to resolve the conflicts but it had to be done more
conveniently for which I decided to improve it by taking feedbacks from different people.
Feedback from peers: Peers gave me positive reaction when I asked them about my conflict
resolving skills. They said that I remain calm in conflicting situations and do not get involved
in useless arguments with the people.
Tutor: My tutor told me about my calm nature that helps me in avoiding the conflicts with
people around me. But he also pointed out my weakness of always comprising with the
situation is not an answer to resolve the argument.
Can you identify any contradictions from your analysis above? For example, is there a
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match between how you see yourself and how others see you, or not?
There is no contradictory thing with the peers and tutor's opinion. I remain too calm which
helps in ignoring little things which would a plus point for me in my life. It would reflect in
my career and personal development.
How might this skill help me in the future?
This skill of resolving conflicts will be beneficial for me in the future. Managers needs to be
calm for managing number of employees in an organisation. He posses the quality of solving
the disputes of different employees whenever it arises in the company. Manager handles
people coming from different cultures, backgrounds might involve in nasty arguments which
could results into long lasting conflicts amongst them thus, managers possesing this skills will
handle the situation more efficiently and will maintain harmony in the company. So, for
becoming a successful manager I would need a sound conflict solving skills as a pre-requisite
thing in my development plan for future.
SUMMARY AND ACTION PLAN
Analysing my different core skills, I have realised that there are weakness that require a
lot of improvement and have some strengths which helps me in my regular work. The various
strengths and weaknesses that I discovered during reflection is given below:
Strengths:
 I easily negotiate with people.
 I have good communication skills which enhances my negotiation abilities.
 I show good team spirit while conducting a team task.
 I manage to resolve the conflicts quickly and do not hold grudges against the people in
the work area.
Weaknesses:
 Poor public speaking skills, afraid to speak in public and become very nervous.
 Lack of patience while working in team.
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 Always compromising the situations for resolving the conflicts
Development plan
Specific Measurable Attainable Relevant Time
Development
area 1
I want to become
a confident
person for better
public speaking. I
have to attend
more public
speaking courses,
personality
development
classes.
I will measure
my improvement
in performance
by asking the
reviews from
friends,
colleagues,
tutors and will
also self assess
my improvement
through self
evaluation.
The
improvement
will help me in
better
addressing of
the different
matters publicly,
it will help me
in college
debates,
competitions
and class
assignments and
lastly boosting
of my
confidence
level.
I will have to be
more open and
confident while
speaking in
public.
2.5 months
Development
area 2
I want to be more
patient when
working in a
team so that I do
not get frustrated
on little things. I
can learn this by
spending more
time with seniors,
mentors and
It could be
measured by
taking feedbacks
from the team
members, peers.
The
implemented
action would
make my team
work skills more
efficient and
would be more
polite towards
team-members.
I have to listen
more to the team
members, and try
to understand the
different
perceptive of
individuals in the
team.
1 month
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seeking their
guidance.
Development
area 3
I need to very
specific in a
conflicting
situation for
resolving a
dispute rather
than just being
calm in all
situations and
ignoring it. This
could be
improved by
taking guidance
from experienced
people around me
and applying
their experience
in my situations.
For measuring
the
improvement,
self evaluation,
opinions of peers
and colleagues
can be taken.
It will enhance
my overall
personality. It
will make the
career
development
pathway easier
for the future.
Taking stand in a
conflicting
situations and
making understand
others the reasons
and outcomes of
the dispute and
then resolving the
matter.
2 months
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REFERENCES
Megginson, D. and Whitaker, V., 2017. Continuing professional development. Kogan Page
Publishers.
Quinn, V., 2018. Critical thinking in young minds. Routledge.
Schön, D.A., 2017. The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. Routledge.
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