Developing Employability Skills at The National Trust

Desklib provides solved assignments and past papers to help students succeed.

EMPLOYABILITY SKILLS
1

Contents
INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................4
LO1........................................................................................................................................... 5
1.1 DEVELOP A SET OF OWN RESPONSIBILITIES AND PERFORMANCE OBJECTIVES.........5
1.2 EVALUATE OWN EFFECTIVENESS AGAINST DEFINED OBJECTIVES..................................7
1.3 RECOMMENDATIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT....................................................................8
1.4 REVIEW HOW MOTIVATIONAL TECHNIQUES CAN BE USED TO IMPROVE QUALITY OF
PERFORMANCE.....................................................................................................................9
LO 2........................................................................................................................................ 12
2.1 DEVELOP SOLUTIONS TO WORK-BASED PROBLEMS....................................................12
2.2 COMMUNICATE IN VARIETY OF STYLES AND APPROPRIATE MANNER AT VARIOUS
LEVELS................................................................................................................................ 14
2.3 IDENTIFY EFFECTIVE TIME-MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES...............................................15
LO 3........................................................................................................................................ 16
3.1 EXPLAIN ROLE PLAYED BY PEOPLE IN A TEAM AND HOW THEY CAN WORK TOGETHER
TO ACHIEVE SHARED GOALS.............................................................................................. 16
3.2 ANALYSE TEAM DYNAMICS.......................................................................................... 18
3.3 SUGGEST ALTERNATIVE WAYS TO ACCOMPLISH TASKS AND ACHIEVE TEAM GOALS. .20
LO 4........................................................................................................................................ 21
4.1 EVALUATE TOOLS AND METHODS TO DEVELOP SOLUTIONS TO PROBLEMS...............21
4.2 DEVELOP AN APPROPRIATE STRATEGY TO RESOLVE A PARTICULAR PROBLEM...........23
4.3 EVALUATE THE POTENTIAL IMPACT OF IMPLEMENTING THE STRATEGY ON THE
BUSINESS............................................................................................................................ 24
CONCLUSION.......................................................................................................................... 25
REFERENCES........................................................................................................................... 29
2

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: MASLOW'S HIERARCHY NEEDS..................................................................................9
Figure 2: HERZBERG TWO FACTOR THEORY...........................................................................10
Figure 3: BELBIN'S TEAM ROLES.............................................................................................16
Figure 4: TUCKMAN'S TEAM DEVELOPMENT MODEL............................................................18
3

INTRODUCTION
Employability skills refer to the soft skills possessed by an individual that provides them with
the opportunities for employment and make them employable. These skills include good
communication skills, self-management skills, problem-solving skills, emotional intelligence,
team working skills, etc. In the following report, being appointed as a Membership and
visitor welcome manager of The National Trust, I must have significant skills and abilities
that help in providing best services and a great experience to the visitors or tourists.
The National Trust is an organization offering charitable services to the public since 1895.
The organization provides safety and security to public places such as farmlands, gardens,
forests, villages, coastline, beaches, island, nature, etc. and takes good care of such places.
The National Trusts welcomes 20 million visitors every year to visit its properties and enjoy
at these places and gain an unforgettable experience (Mingay, 2017).
4

LO1
1.1 DEVELOP A SET OF OWN RESPONSIBILITIES AND PERFORMANCE
OBJECTIVES
Being selected in the National Trust as membership and visitor welcome manager, a
reflective report is prepared in this task to describe own responsibilities and develop
objectives for this position.
RESPONSIBILITIES AS A MEMBERSHIP AND VISITOR WELCOME MANAGER AT THE
NATIONAL TRUST:
Being a manager, it is my responsibility to manage effective interactions with the customers,
resolve the problems faced by them fairly and efficiently, treat them with respect and
enhance their satisfaction by offering them great services. I have certain responsibilities for
my team members. I must inspire them to work together and achieve the organizational
goals efficiently and delegate responsibilities to all the members of the team effectively
based on their skills and interest to boost their morale and increase their productivity
(Waddock and Bodwell, 2017). I must encourage their participation in the meetings and
provide them with a safe and friendly work environment so that they perform with the best
of their efficiencies and contribute to achieving success.it is my responsibility to follow the
employment legislations an conduct the activities of the business ethically and consider the
rights and interest of the employees and the society at the time of decision making to
increase the effectiveness. I must prepare an effective budget to undertake all the activities
effectively by allocating funds and managing optimum utilization of funds (Waddock and
Bodwell, 2017).
PERFORMANCE OBJECTIVES:
As a manager, SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-specific)
objectives should be set that include:
 Enhancing the brand image of the organization by increasing the satisfaction of the
visitors and maintaining long-lasting relationships
5

 Boosting the morale of the employees by offering them a good working environment
and increasing their loyalty and retention
 Managing the conflicts between parties effectively and providing a fair and quick
solution
 Providing effective leadership and motivation to the staff and managing risks at the
workplace
 Promoting the services provided by the company and increasing the number of
visitors by 10% until 2021
6

1.2 EVALUATE OWN EFFECTIVENESS AGAINST DEFINED OBJECTIVES
As a welcome manager, evaluating own skills and abilities is necessary to identify the areas
where improvement is needed to attain the specified business objectives of The National
Trust. Therefore, I have evaluated my current skills against the objectives of the organization
in the following way:
DECISION-MAKING SKILLS: I am good and taking decisions but I cannot take quick and
effective decisions. I require a lot of time to understand the situation, analyse it and select
the best solution from the various alternations identified. The manager of The National
Trust must make decisions fast and efficiently to manage the activities at the workplace by
involving the participation of others and increasing the satisfaction of the staff and thus,
increasing their morale and loyalty (Stewart and Brown, 2019).
LEADERSHIP SKILLS: As a manager, I lead my team effectively by delegating them the
responsibilities and achieving targets timely. But I cannot increase their motivation and
maintain good relations with all the members of the team. The objective of the National
Trust is to increase the motivation of the employees by maintaining good relations with the
team and increasing their productivity that helps in enhancing their satisfaction and
retention (Stewart and Brown, 2019).
Therefore, to increase my effectiveness, I must work on my skills by using effective tools and
techniques for improving my abilities and performance and resulting in the achievement of
the objectives of the organization.
7

1.3 RECOMMENDATIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT
According to the evaluation of my performance, it was identified that I must work on my
decision-making and leadership skills to increase my effectiveness. Therefore, to improve
the needed skills and abilities, the following recommendation is provided:
I must conduct a SWOT analysis on identifying and understand my strengths and
weaknesses and grab opportunities available in the organization an environment for
improving my skills and capabilities (Morden, 2017).
I can improve my decision making skills by working hard to enhance my critical thinking and
analytical skills, practicing case studies, listening to the experiences of my seniors and taking
lessons from them, involving the participation of all the team members to get new and
innovative ideas, thinking out of the box resolve similarly occurring problems with different
solutions every time. I can use the technique of performance appraisal ad ask my superiors
to monitor my performance and provide feedback that can be useful in making
improvements and also utilize effective training methods like coaching, lectures, case
studies, etc. that would be useful in enhancing my performance and abilities (Morden,
2017).
To improve my leadership skills and become an effective manager at the National Trust, I
must improve my leadership skills by learning and gaining knowledge of various theories
and concepts of motivation and styles of leadership that help understand how the team
members can be motivated. I will improve my performance by applying situational
leadership at the workplace. I must read different journals and articles written on
inspirational leaders and their methods of working (Morden, 2017).
To improve the performance, incentives can be used as a motivation factor as they help in
moving in the right direction and resulting in improving the performance.
Therefore, I would try to apply these recommendations at the workplace to increase my
effectiveness as a manager of The National Trust.
8

1.4 REVIEW HOW MOTIVATIONAL TECHNIQUES CAN BE USED TO IMPROVE
QUALITY OF PERFORMANCE
Motivation refers to the motive of an individual that derives a particular action. Motivation
can be explained as a need of an individual that he/she wish to satisfy. The application of
motivational theories is very important for every organization to consider the rights and
interest of the employees and encourage them to work effectively for the success of the
organization while enhancing the satisfaction of the employees (Black and Allen, 2018). The
motivational theories and concepts that help improve my performance as a manager and
the performance of the whole team are as follows:
MASLOW’S NEED HIERARCHY:
This theory is useful in fulfilling the needs of an individual by satisfying the needs from the
lower level to a higher level. According to Maslow, there are five needs of every individual
that they wish to satisfy and they are physical needs, safety needs, belongingness needs,
prestige needs and self-actualization needs (Fallatah and Syed, 2018). The employees of The
National Trust can be motivated by providing a safe and friendly work environment,
recognition and appraisals, etc. that helps in meeting their basic and psychological needs.
Figure 1: MASLOW'S HIERARCHY NEEDS
(Source: Fallatah and Syed, 2018)
9

HERZBERG TWO FACTOR THEORY:
This theory states that there are two major factors, hygiene factors and motivators that help
in increasing the motivation of the employees at the workplace. This theory is useful in The
National Trust for improving my performance as a manager and also motivating the staff by
providing recognition, job security, growth and development opportunities, promotion, etc.
(Alshmemri et al. 2017). The motivators and hygiene factors can be explained with the help
of the following:
Figure 2: HERZBERG TWO FACTOR THEORY
(Source: Alshmemri et al. 2017)
10

REWARDS AND INCENTIVES:
The rewards and incentives like bonuses, allowances, leaves, awards, recognition, etc. must
be used at The National Trust to increase the motivation and boost the morale of the staff
that helps in enhancing their productivity and improving their performance (Black and Allen,
2018).
CONCLUSION
Therefore, it can be concluded that being appointed as a welcome manager at The National
Trust, I must evaluate my skills and abilities to identify my weaknesses and take actions for
improvement using various theories and models of motivation which also helps in improving
the performance of my team (Black and Allen, 2018).
11

LO 2
2.1 DEVELOP SOLUTIONS TO WORK-BASED PROBLEMS
The national trust is facing some issues at the workplace as the staff is not working
efficiently and are not being able to manage their workload. Also, the staffs engage itself in
arguments which have resulted in an unfriendly work environment. Being a manager, the
problems need to be resolved by providing effective solutions and effective time-
management strategies must be applied in business to increase effectiveness (Van Aken and
Berends, 2018).
Problem analysis: The employees of The National Trust are unable to manage their
workload and accomplish their tasks on time, many arguments are occurring between the
employees and the atmosphere of the organization have started becoming unfriendly and
some employees feel afraid at the workplace (Van Aken and Berends, 2018).
Changes needed at the workplace: The employees of The National Trust must be motivated
to work hard and the managers must provide support and guidance to reduce their
workload. The employees must be provided with a safe and friendly work environment for
all the employees to reduce their fear and increase their productivity (Noe et al. 2017).
Solutions to the problems: The following problems can be solved by the managers by taking
certain steps:
 The managers must conduct meetings and involve the participation of all the
stakeholders to find effective solutions to the identified problems.
 The managers must use conflict management strategies such as arbitration,
mediation, negotiation, etc. to solve the disputes between the employees effectively
and fairly (Rahim, 2017).
 The managers must provide support and direction to the employees and assign tasks
that according to the interest of the employees so that they can accomplish their
work on time and reduce their workload.
 The managers must conduct activities and games monthly to grab the attention and
involvement of the employees and improve the relations and communications
12