Reflective Essay: Cadet Engineer's Workshop Experience and Learning

The assignment is a reflective essay by a cadet engineer on a workshop event held for subcontractors in a civil construction organization. The essay details the author's role in organizing the workshop and their initial expectations, which were later contrasted with the successful outcome. It analyzes the actions and emotions involved, including the impact of insufficient materials. The essay highlights the lessons learned, emphasizing the use of leadership skills and their application in professional engineering scenarios. The author plans to enhance future performance by utilizing Key Performance Indicators and giving importance to others' opinions. The essay references several academic sources related to engineering education and construction management.

Reflective Essay
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Stage 1
A workshop event was held in a reputed civil construction organization, to provide relevant
information to the subcontractors regarding construction building work (Goh & Chua, 2016). As
a cadet engineer in the same organization, I was held for organizing the workshop. Before the
workshop, I expected that I would not be able to deliver appropriate information to the
subcontractors. Whereas, the positive results after the event made me realized that I was
successful in providing adequate information.
Stage 2
Before organizing the workshop, I made an action plan on what measures to be taken to present
the workshop systematically. The subcontractors actively participated in the discussions made
throughout the workshop (Towey, Walker & Ng, 2018). During my experience, I was worried
about whether the workshop will prove to be a successful event or not. However, this feeling did
not create a negative impact on my actions. While conducting the workshop, I was not provided
with sufficient materials. By looking back on my emotions, I am happy that I conducted the
workshop successfully. This will affect my approach in the future as I will be more confident in
managing different workshops. Based on the circumstances, I believe that I could do much better
by gaining more confidence.
Stage 3
From the workshop, I learnt that it is necessary to use different leadership skills while
approaching others. It helped in strengthening the relationship with the subcontractors that will
help in the future to achieve the desired goals. The lessons gained from this experience can be
applied to other professional engineering situations like meetings and hiring employees for
construction work (Lattuca, Knight, Ro & Novoselich, 2017). It helped in understanding
organizational needs, along with the needs of subcontractors.
Stage 4
To enhance my performance in the future, I will make efficient use of Key Performance
Indicator tool that will help me to gain appropriate leadership skills with the guidance of senior
executives. It helps in measuring organizational needs and achieving success (Gainsburg, 2015).

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In the future, I will change my behaviour by giving importance to others opinion and respect
their ideas. I believe that this plan is appropriate as I am a customer-focused and goal-oriented
person.

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References
Gainsburg, J. (2015). Engineering students' epistemological views on mathematical methods in
engineering. Journal of Engineering Education, 104(2), 139-166.
Goh, Y. M., & Chua, S. (2016). Knowledge, attitude and practices for design for safety: A study
on civil & structural engineers. Accident Analysis & Prevention, 93, 260-266.
Lattuca, L. R., Knight, D. B., Ro, H. K., & Novoselich, B. J. (2017). Supporting the development
of Engineers' interdisciplinary competence. Journal of Engineering Education, 106(1),
71-97.
Towey, D., Walker, J., & Ng, R. Y. (2018). Traditional higher education engineering versus
vocational and professional education and training: What can we learn from each other?.
In Proceedings of the 2018 International Conference on Open and Innovative Education
(ICOIE 2018) (pp. 474-486).