Academic and Employability Skills Module: Reflective Report Analysis

This reflective report delves into the development of employability skills, focusing on the application of reflective thinking and writing to enhance career prospects. The report examines the importance of skills such as teamwork, problem-solving, and communication, and how these are crucial for professional success. It includes a self-assessment of the author's strengths and weaknesses in presentation skills, with feedback from senior colleagues used to analyze areas for improvement. The Gibbs reflective model is introduced as a framework for continuous learning and skill enhancement, and its stages (description, feelings, evaluation, analysis, conclusion, and action plan) are discussed in detail. The report explores how the author can utilize the Gibbs model to improve presentation skills, and overall employability, by analyzing past experiences, identifying areas needing improvement, and developing strategic plans for future skill development. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of continuous learning and adaptation in the professional world.

Reflective
Report

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY ..................................................................................................................................1
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................5
REFRENCES...................................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
Employability skills is defined as those skills which can be transferable and that must be
needed by a person in order to make them employable. In this employer having good subject
knowledge and technical understanding can outline skills set that they want from their employees
(Dennison, 2012). There are several types of employability skills such as teamwork, problem
solving, organizing, leadership, negotiation, confidence, motivated and many more. Respective
report will include reflection related to how learning model help a person in developing their
employability skills by considering their in class activities feedbacks. Along with this it will also
include theory related to reflection like Gibbs reflection model in order to improve
understanding.
MAIN BODY
It is essential for every individual to develop effective thinking and writing skills because
it help them in career development. Reflective thinking is considered as a part of critical thinking
procedure that refer to specifically process of evaluating as well as making judgement related to
particular situation. On the other hand reflective writing refers to analytical activities in which
person who is writer describe a particular real or imaginary scene, memory, form, event,
interaction and so on. These all reflect incident, emotions, feeling, situation and thoughts of a
person's life. Moreover, it is also essential to have knowledge of cover letter which is also known
as covering letter or motivational letter which is considered as introduction that attached to a
document such as curriculum vitae, resume and many more. There are several benefits are gain
by respective documents such as help in getting attention, emphasize positive, share personality
and so on. For every person who want to develop their career in corporate world it is essential to
have several employability skills, it refers to skills, attributes and knowledge which are required
for gaining an employment. This types of skills are beneficial for employer, employees or
individual and economy because through it all get grow as well as attain their desire goal
(Fischer-Kern and et. al., 2015). There are numbers of employability skills such as
communication, team work, application of IT, literacy, problem solving, world awareness,
numeracy, self management, organizing and many more. While I am working at Madman Event
Ltd., I conduct various works as well as I also go through numbers of experiences which help me
in realising that some of my skills are strong and there are also several skills in which I am
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lacking behind. In addition to this I also get feedback related to my skills, attitude and knowledge
when I was delivering presentation in front of my seniors on different different topics, through
this feedback I able to analyse some of my skills denotes my strengths whereas some reflect my
weakness which may negatively impact on my career plans and practices. So in order to enhance
or improve my skill and attitude I can adopt numbers of methods such as attain training, adopt
model analysis and many more. This is so because that help in develop proper guidelines for
developing skills as well as abilities. While presenting my view point on different topics I know
that I have different style of presentation which reflect my diverse strength and weakness such as
in delivering first topic I have effective knowledge but when I am delivering third topic I have
very limited or no knowledge of topic that impact on by presentation. But in all three
presentation my performance is average which is rate as 3 out of 5.
While I am giving presentation of first topic my senior rate presentation at 3 out of 5 and
they provide some overall comments i.e. I need to enhance my information about the topic so
that I can deliverer more effective informative presentation. This review is based on different
aspects and their rating such as my content of presentation is rate as 4 but its concise and
information is rated as 3 which is average. My content and modules relevancy is rated as 4 which
mean it is very good. Along with when it come my enthusiastic level of topic, maintenance of
eye contact and organizing skill I am ranked with 4 which is very good but I have 3 rating in
several aspects like body language, time management, developing interest in presentation and
many more. In addition to this when I am delivering second presentation on different topic my
some strength and weakness get changes which also affect my presentation due to that I get 3
number out of 5 which is consider as average or good. I also get some overall comments in my
favour i.e. I have great knowledge of topic area, I also maintain good eye contact while
presenting this topic but I am bit louder which is not appropriate for a professional presentation.
While conducting presentation on this topic I get know that my some skill are very
appropriate and in that I get 5 rating out of 5, such as I presented this topic appropriately as well
as I also related every thing properly to the issues. Moreover, while doing presentation I also
maintain proper eye contact as well as I also do presentation without any helping notes, my topic
is also relevant to the topics as well as it is also relevant to the module. In addition to this there
are my some skills which I need to improve such as conduct presentation more concise and
informative, deliver more clear introduction related to topic and many more. These are some
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skills and capabilities which I need to improve related to this topics so that I can deliver one of
the most effective presentation which help me in gaining high numbers. This shows that skills,
attitude and knowledge of a person's presentation is depend upon its selection of the topic for
example if a topic is interesting then presenter also feel enthusiastic about it which help in
delivering quality presentation (Gardner and Tang, 2014). On the other hand if the presentation
topic will be not interesting then it will directly impact on the an individual's presentation quality
because they didn't fell motivated as well as enthusiastic about the topic. Along with this which
presenting this type of topic they also not able to develop connect with audience that affect
quality of presentation. Same thing happen when I am delivering presentation on third topic.
The overall rating which I get for delivering presentation on third topic is 3 out of 5 and
that mean it is average. But according to feedbacks which is based on different perspective of
topics and presentation skill I analyse that there are several skills which are my strength and
some are weakness. Such as skill which I need to enhance on priority basis are skills related to
deciding interesting topic, present topic more concise and information, explanation with
examples. Along with this I also need to enhance skill while presenting this type of topic are
maintain proper eye contact, maintain proper body language, time management and I also need
to study about the topic properly so that I can deliver presentation without helping notes. These
skills are essential to improve for conducting presentation related to topic because in this I get 2
score out of 5 which mean these skills are poor in me. In addition to this I also need to enhance
some of my skills because I get 3 ranked out of 5 such as clear understand of topic, develop
knowledge about topic, be enthusiastic for all type of topics, conduct organized presentation,
conduct clear introduction and conclusion and many more. This is essential to enhance these
skills because their will be chance that I have to conduct presentation on same topic in future so I
need to be prepare for it.
Furthermore, there are several method or practices which can be adopted by a person in
order to enhance their skills, abilities and knowledge such as Gibbs reflective model, Holistic
Reflection Model and many more. Gibbs model is based on the learning procedure through a
person experience in particular situation whereas Holistic Reflection Model include learning
procedure through different stages. Such as self awareness, description, reflection, influences,
evaluation and learning. In respect of this report I am attaining training and development
programmes through Gibbs reflection model. This model is developed in year 1988 by American
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Sociologist as well as psychologist Graham Gibbs which is published in book i.e. Learning by
doing. Through Gibbs reflective cycle a person able to encourage themselves to do work
systematically so that they can conduct work effectively in each and every situation as well as
phase. Along with this, it may also encourage a person to think about their experiences, event or
activities in detailed manner in order to develop action plan in order to attain desire goal and
target (Ha and et. al., 2013). The respective model is starts from description then continues
clockwise and more to feeling then it goes to evaluation, analysis, summaries and it end at action
plan, then after it return to description.
I can adopt Gibbs reflective cycle model in order to enhance my employability skills so
that I can develop my career effectively as well as this will also help me in improving my
presentation skills according to the topic. In this first stage is description in which I need to
describe about the situation, activities and event in deep detail without developing any
conclusion. In this there are some common questions which I need to evaluate in order to
develop objective such as what happened, when did it take place, where did it take place, who
are involved in that activity, what activities I done, what other did and what was the result of
these action. In respect of this I will conduct analysis related to my presentations on all three
topics as well as I also need to evaluate my experience at the Madman Event Ltd.. The next stage
is related to feelings, in which evaluation will be done related to what someone think during a
particular event, activity or program. In this stage awareness is consider as most essential
objective which is essential to analyse, there are also several questions which are consider in this
such as what a person feel during event, what did a person feel for leading up to event
(Hendricks, 2017). Along with this it will also consider other questions like what an individual
feel after accomplishment of event, how a person can look back on particular situation, analyse
how a person feel or think during event. In respect of my experience I will analyse situation at
the time of presentation because it will help me in determining what others things about my
presentation as it will help me in conducting improvement.
Moreover, third stage is evaluation in which a person need to evaluate experiences of a
particular event whether it is good or bad (Gibbs Reflective Cycle by Graham Gibbs, 2019). In
this stage I also need to evaluate situation through different questions such as evaluation of
things which conducted effectively during event or activity and what are not, contribution of a
person in conducting activities effectively, contribution of others and many more. In respect of
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my experience of presentation and working at Madman Event Ltd. I will conduct evaluation of
all these question so that I can develop proper strategic plans or strategies. In addition to this,
next stage will be analysis in which learner need to conduct analysis of situation, event or
activities in which they are involving. This can be done in both negative as well as positive
manner in order to analyse problems according to issues and problems. In respect of my situation
which will be related to my presentation as well as working experiences at Madman Event Ltd.. I
will analyse my working along with others in order to understand positive as well as negative
experiences so that I can conduct changes accordingly. In Gibbs reflection model, last stage will
be conclusion at which a person can evaluate decision as well as ask team members for more
effective decision. In this I will interact with my seniors so that I can know more effective
strategies for improving my skills, abilities and capabilities. By implementation of this model I
can improve my skills in which I am lacking behind as well as that will also help me in attaining
my desire goal as well as target effectively.
CONCLUSION
By above discussed point it can be conclude that for every person it is essential to
improve or enhance their employability skills because that will help them in conducting their
work in effective manner for the attainment of goal as well as target. There are numbers of
employability skills which are essential to develop career in event industry such as presentation,
communication, understanding, convincing and many more. This is so because through it an
individual can effectively interact with their customers as well as it will also help in convincing
them to take services from them. Along with this for the enhancement of several employability
skills a person can adopt different theory like Gibbs reflection model because that will help in
developing proper guideline for enhancing as well as polishing skills.
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REFRENCES
Books and Journals
Dennison, P., 2012. Reflective practice: The enduring influence of Kolb’s experiential learning
theory. Compass: Journal of Learning and Teaching. 1(1).
Fischer-Kern, M. and et. al., 2015. Transference-focused psychotherapy for borderline
personality disorder: Change in reflective function. The British Journal of
Psychiatry. 207(2). pp.173-174.
Gardner, B. and Tang, V., 2014. Reflecting on non‐reflective action: An exploratory think‐aloud
study of self‐report habit measures. British Journal of Health Psychology. 19(2).
pp.258-273.
Ha, C. and et. al., 2013. The measurement of reflective function in adolescents with and without
borderline traits. Journal of adolescence. 36(6). pp.1215-1223.
Hendricks, C.C., 2017. Improving schools through action research: A reflective practice
approach. Pearson. One Lake Street, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458.
McKinney, P. and Sen, B.A., 2012. Reflection for learning: understanding the value of reflective
writing for information literacy development. Journal of Information Literacy. 6(2).
pp.110-129.
Mena-Marcos, J., García-Rodríguez, M.L. and Tillema, H., 2013. Student teacher reflective
writing: what does it reveal?. European Journal of Teacher Education. 36(2). pp.147-
163.
Morel, K. and Papouchis, N., 2015. The role of attachment and reflective functioning in emotion
regulation. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association. 63(4). pp.NP15-NP20.
Schafer, A., Snider, L. and Sammour, R., 2016. A reflective learning report about the
implementation and impacts of Psychological First Aid (PFA) in Gaza. Disaster health.
3(1). pp.1-10.
TIERNEY, W.G., 2012. Reflective evaluation. Increasing access to college: Extending
possibilities for all students, p.217.
Online
Gibbs Reflective Cycle by Graham Gibbs. 2019. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.toolshero.com/management/gibbs-reflective-cycle-graham-gibbs/>.
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