MG408 Graduate Challenge E-Portfolio and Skills Reflection

This report is a reflection on a student's experience in the MG408 Graduate Challenge module, focusing on skill development through three compulsory challenges: the Apprentice challenge, the presentation challenge, and the T-Shirt challenge. The student identifies and analyzes the skills utilized and developed during these challenges, including emotional intelligence, time management, business skills, teamwork, communication, and research skills. The report details the application of these skills in each challenge, providing insights into the student's strengths and areas for improvement, particularly in decision-making and leadership. The student also reflects on how these challenges have improved their understanding of business operations, financial modeling, and team dynamics, supported by references to relevant academic literature.

GRADUATE CHALLENGE

THE T-SHIRT CHALLENGE REFLECTION
In this module we were required to go through three compulsory challenges, those were:
Apprentice challenge, presentation challenge and T-Shirt challenges. These challenges helped
me in developing various kinds of skills that are required to succeed in the university.
Undergoing these skills helped in in understanding skills that are required to be worked on or
developed in order to bring improvement within myself. In this challenge a logo of a T-shirt
brand was identified. In this challenge we were required to identify financial modelling statement
of a company (Brackmann and et. al., 2017). In order to make T-shirt affordable companies are
required to identify overall budget of the T-shirt. In this challenge we were required to identify
overall profitability of printing a T-shirt by separating variable and fixed cost of printing a T-
shirt and separating it from overall budget. There are various kinds of skills that have been
demonstrated through which challenge which further helped in identifying that my main
strengths with the help of which I was able to complete this challenge were emotional
intelligence, technical skills, time management skills and various kinds of business skills. Each
skill has its own importance and were used to complete this challenge. Five elements of
emotional intelligence helped me in completing this challenge in an appropriate manner such as
self-awareness, self-motivation, empathy, social awareness and many more. Emotional
intelligence not only helped me in completing this challenge in an appropriate manner. Another
skill that helped me in completing this challenge was Time management skills. This skill helped
me in completing whole challenge in a timely manner and meet all the deadlines prior to the
submission. Other than this, Business skills helped in learning usage of spreadsheets, MS word
helped me in understanding and segregating overall budget of printing both mono and coloured
T-shirt. My Excel skills helped in calculating overall expenditure of printing a T-shirt with logo.
However from this T-shirt challenge, I also learnt that there are various kinds of skills that were
required to be developed or improved such as: decision making and problems solving skills even
though my emotional intelligence skills are good but I lack in effective decision making and find
it difficult to find a solution to a problem.
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PRESENTATION CHALLENGE REFLECTION
Another challenge undergone by me was a presentation challenge. In this challenge my
main task was to develop a presentation upon Tesco in order to understand what kind of business
operations are focused on by Tesco, activities undergone by the organization, their financial
performance as well as their comparison with their tough competitors such as Aldi and Lidl. I
was also able to learn about their history. On the basis of this information we have also provided
some information on ways in which Tesco can bring improvement within their overall
performance and market share. There were various kinds of skills that helped in completing this
challenge which also made me realize that there are various kinds of skills in which I am good at.
Some of the main skills that helped in completing this challenge were teamwork skills,
communication skills, research skills, time management skills and presentation skills. But one of
the most important skill that was developed during this module was team work skill. With the
help of these challenges I was able to learn different ways of working within a team effectively. I
have also learned that it is important to have an effective team in which roles and responsibilities
of each team member is clear and well understood as it helps un in successfully complete given
task or challenge. Other this with the help of presentation challenge I was able to understand they
one of my strength is oral communication as I was able to give presentation in a smoother
manner, was able to communicate my ideas with my team members in an accurate manner. Other
than this with the help of my research skills I was able to find out, identify and analyse all the
necessary and important information about Tesco. With the help of my research skills we were
able to complete the presentation upon time with accurate information i.e. no false information
was used for this presentation (Walker, 2018). Presentation skills helped in preparing the
presentation in such a manner that it was attractive, information within the skills was distributed
in an appropriate manner with appropriate number of images of pictures. Other than this with the
help of time management skills all the team members were able to meet their deadlines on time
as a result we were able to give out presentation in a timely manner. From this presentation
challenge I have identified that I need to bring improvement within my leadership skills so that I
can effectively lead a team towards goals that are required to be achieved, people management
skills for management of whole team.
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APPRENTICE CHALLEGE PRESENTATION
In this challenge LSST presentation was developed by us during the induction. There
were various kinds of skills that helped me in completing this challenge on time in an effective
manner. Written skills were one of the most important skills that were used within the challenge
because of which this challenge was compared in an appropriate manner. Written skills also
helped me in preparing for the presentation. Other than this self-awareness heled in remaining
attentive during the induction because of which I was able to complete the challenge without any
issues or doubts. I was able to use all my knowledge and put it in form of words in an effective
manner with the help of my written skills (Hutchings, 2019). Other than this my presentation
skilled also helped me to present this challenge in an excellent manner. However, this challenge
helped me to understand that there are various kinds of skills that are required to be improved by
me in an appropriate manner such as problem solving skills this is because whenever used to face
any problem or issue it used to become extremely difficult for me to find an appropriate solution
for it. I also need to become adaptable because it is difficulty for me to adopt in the changing
environment.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Brackmann, C.P., and et. al., 2017, November. Development of computational thinking skills
through unplugged activities in primary school. In Proceedings of the 12th Workshop on
Primary and Secondary Computing Education (pp. 65-72).
Walker, H., 2018. A Critical Investigation into How Year 8 Students’ Narrative Writing Skills
are Developed Through the Medium of Oral Storytelling. Journal of Classics
Teaching. 19(37). pp.35-45.
Hutchings, S., 2019. The social skills handbook: practical activities for social communication.
Routledge.
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