MG408 The Graduate Challenge: Reflection on Skills Development

This report reflects on a graduate's participation in various challenges, including an apprentice challenge, presentation challenge, and t-shirt challenge, to identify and develop essential skills. The author analyzes the business aspects of each challenge and personal skill growth, particularly in leadership, problem-solving, communication, and creativity. The report further details an action plan to improve teamwork, emotional intelligence, meeting skills, and business acumen. Ultimately, the reflection emphasizes the importance of experiential learning in preparing graduates for future professional endeavors, highlighting the need for continuous self-improvement and adaptability in today's dynamic environment.

MG408 The Graduate
Challenge
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Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
The Challenges and skills............................................................................................................3
Action Plan..................................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES:...............................................................................................................................7
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INTRODUCTION
In today's environment, it is crucial for every individual to prepare themselves for the
future upcoming challenges (Liu, 2019). This can be possible with the assistance of development
of skills and knowledge that assists an individual to overcome with the upcoming challenges. It
is important to note that every individual should focus on participation of challenges in their
graduations as it is the time where they can develop some necessary skills and knowledge. This
reflection report aims to analyse the graduate challenge so that they are able to achieve the goals
and objectives. It will summarize business angle of each challenges. In addition to this, it will
also cover development of personal skills and potential areas for continuous improvement.
MAIN BODY
The Challenges and skills
It is crucial for every individual that they should develop some skills and knowledge. But
for that purpose, individual needs to participate in challenges so that they can understand the
impact of challenge and then able to find the areas where individual feels improvement. In my
case, I identified that firstly I have to identify and participate in the challenges so that I am able
to know that what areas need skills development. I identified three important challenges in which
I have to participate so that I am able to understand the business environment and analyse the
need of skill development. The three important challenges are mentioned below:
Apprentice challenges
Apprentice is an important method in which organisations are recruited to the graduates
so that they are able to train them for their future career (Evans and Richardson, 2017). It is the
real job training in which organisations are employing graduated people in order to perform
towards organisational goals. The apprentice challenge aims to enhancing of communication
skills and also inspiring team members in order to come up with creative ideas. I found that
apprentice is used by organisations so that they can boost their staff communication. I already
know that effective communication is important for the productivity of employees. I identified in
my organisation that they provided a challenge in which they selected people randomly and
group them. It was very important for us to select a group leader and name the group. After that
we had an assignment in which we have to create a brand for our organisation. In this task, w
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have to create an effective and innovative marketing strategies so that organisation is able to
achieve their target market. If it will be successfully achieved then organisation provided a
trophy to the group who won.
I found that it was a very good experience as I developed many skills during that
challenge. It was not easy to perform for me but yes it was a great experiences which taught me
that how my developed skills helps in overcoming with the challenges. I developed a leadership
skill as I was the leader of that group in which I have to take all decisions related to our team. In
addition to this, I also enabled to develop problem solving skills. We need to formulate
marketing strategies and which was not easy as it should be effective so that company is able to
brand out in the market. I used many business skills so that our group is able to design best
marketing strategies in order to improve the branding of company in the market. Due to this, I
developed effective communication skills as marketing requires an effective communication.
Presentation challenges
It is very important for the organisations to have the effective presentation skills so that
they can effectively present their brand in the market which have a potential to attract more and
more customers towards their organisational products and services (Fearon and et.al., 2020). It is
found that how an organisation present their brand in the market provides a great impact on the
decision making process of customers. For providing desirable products to the customers, it is
crucial for a company to produce good quality of products and services.
In our session, we got an idea that we have to use Power Point slides in front of the
customers so that are able to understand and attract towards goods and services of organisation.
In addition to this, we decided that we have to use simple but attractive slides to present our
brand so that we were able to convince them towards our organisational brand. In addition to
this, we also decided to give a short and brief speech about the brand so that every person is able
to get full knowledge of the products and services.
During this challenge, I have earned many skills as now I am good at presentation. That
means now I am formulating better Power point slides which even not need to explain as the
effectiveness in slides already tell everything about the content. I am using graphics and images
in the presentation which is very good for my career. I am able to easily collaborate with the
people as teamwork skills are developed during this challenge. Now I am understand the feelings
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and sentiments if people during decision which assists me to make the assumptions rightly for
people. Furthermore, I also developed time management skills as it was very important for us to
to explain each slide in decided time which assists me to improve time management skills.
T shirt challenges
It is know by every organisation that the success and growth of an organisation is
depending on the creativity and innovation (McDermott, 2019). It becomes more important in
the case where an organisation is starting a new brand in the market. They need to come up with
the creative ideas so that they are able to catch the eye of customers. This can be possible with
the use of T shirts as it wore by each and every person. It is found that it is one of the best idea in
order to advertise the organisational products and services in the market. This is the reason that
we have decided to print the t-shirts in order to advertise the brand of company (Chapman,
2018). But at the same time we had to make sure that it should be cost effective as advertising is
an important key element of business. We got an idea that we have to use logo in the t-shirts so
that brand recognition will be become easy for every individual.
In this challenge, I found that it was a very great experience for us as we all felt very
confident and able to face more challenges. I developed creative skills as I had to capture the
customers' attentions. It was not easy as procurement and designing of t-shirts is very
challenging. We use bright colours so that it became easy to attract customers. I also attained
meeting and time management skills. I also found that financial conditions is an important matter
as it provides a negative impact on teamwork when it becomes tough to arrange. That time, I
found that teamwork skills needs to improve.
Action Plan
After participation in three important challenges, it is very important for me to develop
some important skills and knowledge (Rodrigues, 2019). During the challenges, I found that I
was lack in teamwork skills, emotional intelligence, business skills, meeting skills, etc. For that
purpose, there is an action plan which is discussed in below table:
Skills Importance Action plan Time
Meeting
skills
It is very important for an
individual to improve their
In order to improve meetings
skills, I have to make a clear
8 months
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meeting skills so that they
are able to achieve
effective communication,
interpersonal skills, etc.
objective, don't be late, don't be
confuse, be prepared for the future
uncertainties and on time always.
Emotional
Intelligence
It is the ability to use,
understand, manage
emotions in positive ways
to relive stress, empathize
others, communicate
effectively, defuse
conflict, etc.
In order to improve emotional
intelligence, I have to work on
active listening, self motivation,
practising self awareness, etc.
9 months
Teamwork Teamwork is very
important for the purpose
of achieving the goals and
objectives of an
organisation (Batson,
2018).
It is necessary for me to engage
more in a team and also I need to
work on understanding of
individual's behaviour.
6 months
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the above discussion that it is necessary for the graduates to
develop some skills and knowledge. This can be possible with the help of participating in the
challenges which provide a real experience of situations. This reflective report also discussed an
action plan after the participation of challenges. It is the plan in which an individual is able to
develop skills which are required in improvement plan.
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REFERENCES:
Books and Journals
Batson, K. C., 2018, June. An approach to teaching academic writing to international graduate
students in colleges of engineering. In 2018 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition.
Chapman, B. A., 2018. Change, Choice, Chance, Challenge: An SLP reconnects with her inner
graduate student—by making a career change to teach. The ASHA Leader, 23(2), pp.72-
72.
Evans, C. and Richardson, M., 2017. Enhancing graduate prospects by recording and reflecting
on part-time work: A challenge to students and universities. Industry and Higher
Education, 31(5), pp.283-288.
Fearon, C., and et.al., 2020. Graduate employability, skills development and the UK’s
Universities Business Challenge competition: a self-determined learning
perspective. Studies in Higher Education, 45(6), pp.1280-1297.
Liu, Y., 2019. Using reflections and questioning to engage and challenge online graduate
learners in education. Research and Practice in Technology Enhanced Learning, 14(1),
pp.1-10.
McDermott, R. J., 2019. Life, Career, and Graduate School–Challenge and Opportunity for
Students. Florida Public Health Review, 12(1), p.8.
Rodrigues, J., 2019. Class of 2019 Graduate Students Urged to “Make a Difference”.
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