Future Options: Aligning your Skills and Aspirations with the External Options

PORTFOLIO

Future Options: Aligning your Skills and Aspirations with the External Options

Baral Abita                                                                                     

Summary

A portfolio is an assortment of individual skills, attitudes, behaviour and so on which demonstrate the degree of achievement that individual has achieved regarding the goal and vision; and show skills which are undeveloped. I have developed my personal portfolio. The aims of this portfolio are:

·         To increase self awareness and personal reflection;

·         To be aware of my strong skills, values, traits, behaviours, attitudes, perceptions, needs, interests, motivators, cognition and emotional intelligence;

·         To develop undeveloped skills those are important for my career development;

·         To plan how to achieve my goal by defending the challenge;

·         To analyze the labour market, etc.

This portfolio is completed by carrying out research from different academic and non-academic sources and by using different test list and management tools such as SWOT, SMART, Boston Box Matrix, etc for self analysis.

My long term goal is open my own business in my country Nepal. In order to achieve this goal I will need to achieve some other short term goals such as, to complete my study and gain work experience. I can achieve these goals because I am hard working and aware how to achieve the goal and my goal is SMART

Contents

1.    Introduction. 2

2.    Personal Skills Review.. 3

3.    Personal Aspirations Review.. 6

4.    Labour Market Analysis – Relevant to Aspirations. 8

5.    Alignment between Skills/Aspirations/Labour Market 8

6.    Personal Action Plan. 9

7.    Conclusions. 10

 1.      Introduction

Personal Development planning is a plan carried out by individuals to help them develop self awareness and set goals. Personal development planning aims to promote learning and to provide individuals with the knowledge and portfolio of transferable skills that will help them to progress their careers. According to Cottrell (2003) the elements of a personal development plan include developing self management; forward planning; taking responsibility; improving performance; increasing personal responsibility; reflecting on personal skills and skills development. The result of test ‘Do I need Personal Development Planning?’ (Appendix 1) show I need personal Development Planning.

2.      Personal Skills Review

Skills can be defined as expertness or experienced capability. Skills are capabilities which are essential to communicate socially, compute and to carry out action. Skills are frequently described in perspective of work production, and are classified into different types such as technical skill, human skill, conceptual skill, design skill, social skill, etc (Carey, 2000)

The reason I am studying BA (HON) in business management is that I was drawn from young age toward business as it runs in my family. And I have emotional connection to business world. My biggest influences are my parents, who have taught me about being independent and self employee. Furthermore my goal and dreams are related to business. I want to be independence; make money; achieve short and long term goal related to business and my natural progression toward business from high school are all factor inside and outside me which encourage me to study a BA (HONS) in business management. 

Skills and qualities that I have increased from my experience and my BA HONS are:

Communication skill (competent in technical writing skills, presentation, proficiency in English language, listening, interacting with team and group, team work, interpersonal skill, research, analytical skill, multicultural understanding, empathy, management of learning, leadership, referencing  etc)

Technical skill (financial skill, IT skills, marketing, motivation, determination skill, project management skill, initiative skill, business management skills, human resource management skill, etc)

Personal management skill (self awareness, personal values, personal needs, personal perception, personal attitude, personal interest, personal strength, personal weakness, personal opportunities, personal threat, personal personality, etc)

In addition to the skills above, I am confident, punctual, organized, willing to learn, leader, proactive, responsible, time management, team worker, conflict management, negotiation skills( Appendix 10, 11, 15 and 27,). For instance: In first year of studying BA HONS, I got poor marks because of improper communication skill and referencing style, but now I get good mark in research, communication and referencing style. These skills can be transfer in my job related skill for time management, managing large amount of information, working to decline, decision making, and project management. My weak skills are communication (speaking: can’t say certain English words), stubborn, arrogant, stereotyping. So far I am concern these will affect me in professional life and may bring barriers in effective communication.

According to Dr. Scott Williams, the elements of self awareness are values, personality traits, behaviours/attitudes/perception, emotional intelligence, needs, cognitive style. I will be discussing each of these with reference to myself within this portfolio.

Values are a conception, accurate or explicit, distinct of an individual or characteristic of a group, which persuade the segment from available, resources, and ends of achievement (Begley and Johansson, 2003). My strong values are discipline, time management, social rule, respect to elders, ethical principle, family and friends, independent, money, etc. (Appendix 2, 3, 4, and 5). Value of independent motivated me to attain my goal of opening business. And other values which are stated will help to run business in systematic ways.

Traits are informal agents or simple summing up of practical behaviours (Buss and Craik, 1983), Mischel sees a trait as the conditional prospect of a class of behaviour in a category circumstance (Matthews et al, 2003). My stronger traits are confidence, caring, loving, optimist, punctual, trustworthy, positive, social, loyal, and manage and organized (Appendix 11). The advantages of these traits are that I can learn from failure and step forwards in my life. For example: in 1^st year of BA HONS I failed in one assignment, but my trait of confident, optimist and high locus of control allows me to step forward and rewrite assignment.

Attitudes can be described as the degree of positive or negative affect connected with a number of psychological objects. At this point psychological objects refer any sign, slogan, motto, individual, organization, perfect or idea toward which individuals can vary with high opinion to positive or negative effect. (Thurstone, 1946)

Needs can be defined as necessity; but all needs may not be necessary. Needs may differ from each other with factors such as age, sex, personality and family background. Maslow (1970) suggests that needs can be classified into five levels which are physiological, safety, love belonging, esteem and self actualization. The most basic need is physiological. Once that is satisfied, other higher needs arise. Linked very closely with needs are motivations. Motivation is the degree to which an individual wants and chooses to certain specific behaviours (Mitchell, 1982). What I really want in my life is independent, achievement, money, family life and self esteem (Appendix 6 and 7).  The value and needs of opening my own business motivates me to struggle and move ahead even in those situations when I feel the journey towards my goals is very hard.

Behaviour is defined as the sum total of psyche which comprise desires, inspiration, wishes, driving forces, characters and passions, which are expressed by a person’s behaviour (Sadock et al, 2007). Behaviour categories from measureable, observable or accidental response; and those aspects may comprise age, sex, health, socio-economic circumstance, time etc (Parrish, 2010). My behaviour is affected by my attitudes, beliefs, traits, needs and values. For instance, I speak with gentle voice because I value in discipline and respecting other.

                       

Emotional intelligence refers to the competence to identify and express emotions, understand emotions assimilate emotions in thought and regulate emotions in self and in other (Lazarus, 1991).  According to Goleman 1998 the traits of emotional intelligent are self awareness, self regulation, motivation, empathy and social skills. According to the emotional intelligence test of Goleman, (appendix) I possess traits of self awareness, self regulation and motivation. And I have to develop the traits of social skills and empathy which is related to managing and understanding other emotion. Emotional intelligence traits will help to understand me and my short and long term goals. And self awareness is the beginning of all wisdom.

3.      Personal Aspirations Review

A goal represents the foundation of strategies which definitely concludes all subsequent steps as well as the whole methodological framework of conceptual approaches (S. von Wirén-Lehr, 2000). Goals are more associated with practical world and dreams are more associated with angle world and may not be reality (Appendix 23). The Goal should be SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realist and time).

All these skill and qualification which I achieved from my experience and BA HONS studies are useful for me in my future career and goals.  These all skills are very important for my career because my long-term goal is to be set up my own business at home. Further, they are career related skills; and these skills increase my managerial skill, motivation, aspiration, innovation, decisional making, proper conflict management, negotiation skills and conflict management. Further I have developed my job related skill, adaptable and transferable skills.

The skills that are required for my career goal are:

Self awareness, stress/time pressure management, problem solving creatively, communicating supportively, gaining power and influence to people, motivating other, managing conflict, authorizing and delegating , building effective teams and team management, change management, positive leadership, etc (Appendix 10).

Cognition is the development of the ability to recognize, memorize and categorize about the behavioural propensities, motivations, and emotions of other people and self (Brooks et al, 1984).According to cognitive style indicator test (Appendix 12), I have planning Cognitive style. The advantages of the planning style are individual with planning style emphasizes structure, preparation and planning. An individual seeks agendas, well-developed outlines, and clears process. People with a planning style are best at processing range of information and putting that information into a concise, cohesive, logical form. The disadvantages of planning cognitive style are an individual with less inclined toward acquiring information by interacting with people and are more interested in thinking through a logical problem. An individual may resistant to change, intolerant of ambiguity, overwhelmed by chaos, and can’t handle illogical issues. Therefore I have to hire people with cognitive style of knowing and creating.

Generally after achieving long term goal people feel successful. For me, success is never achieved because the more you get, the more you want. The reason for more advancement in the scientific world is because of nature of success. For example, laptops were invented because scientists were not happy with the success of the PC, and they want to achieve more. Internal needs, willingness, desire of achievement are motivational factors for success. Success doesn’t come easily to anyone. We have to make effort for success. In the path of success there are so many ups and downs that a person has to face. For me, the greatest challenge which I am facing now is will I be able to complete my BA (HONS) degree with first class HONS degree.      

I have some short term and long term goals. I use SMART management tool for goal setting. I have set some short term goals to achieve long term goals (Appendix 21). My long term visions motivate me to reach my short term goals. I have planned my goals using some management tools such as SMART, Action plan, Force field analysis, SWOT, etc ( Appendix 21, 22, 25 and 26)

My smart goals are to complete BA HONS by July 2011 with first class degree; to do MBA from American University by 2014; and to find a job related to my study by 2015.

I have to go with many challenges to achieve my goals and find out what are my strength, weakness, opportunities and threat regarding my goal. I have used SWOT analysis. And through SWOT analysis my strength, weakness, opportunities and threats are:

Strength: Fresh graduate, global market, flexible field, communication skills, confident, etc.

Weakness: fresh graduate, no experience, managerial skill still undeveloped,     communication skill (English is my second language), finance, etc.

Opportunities:  Fresh graduate, European degree, global market, etc. 

Threat: Non EU, Immigrant, economic crisis, rules and regulation, finance, etc.

4.      Labour Market Analysis – Relevant to Aspirations

This section provides a summary analysis of Nepal’s labour market, in the context of a general socio-economic overview. The analysis takes into account existing Nepal demography, employment and skills objectives. According to World Bank, the total population of Nepal is 29,330,505. The main occupation of Nepal is agriculture. About 76% of labour forces of Nepal engage on agriculture, 6% on industry and 18% on service. But agriculture cover only 35% of GDP, 16% is cover by industry and 49% by service sectors. 65% of the population are educated and the employment rate is 54% in Nepal. According to the Nepal Labour Force Survey (2009), labour force participation rate for population aged 15 years and above was 85.2%. Educational attainment of participate workforce is only 48% and still educated people are unemployed because main occupation is agriculture and still tradition system of framing is used    

Through the labour market analysis, the main challenges that Nepal is facing is poverty and high level of unemployment and uneducated rate. In Nepal the educated people are also unemployed. And the main source of income for Nepal is agriculture. For opening business in Nepal there are both opportunities and threat. The opportunities are that Nepal is developing countries therefore the level of education and awareness is increasing, labour force for high class and low class job are easily.  The changing patterns of lifestyle of people bring other opportunities. The threats for opening business in Nepal are its current political situation, the increasing rates of inflation, undeveloped technology and so on.

For opening business in Nepal I have to consider both the opportunities and threats that labour market brings to me. However I am targeting to open my business in Pokhara which is one of the developed cities of Nepal. Therefore, labour forces are easily available for the business which I want to open. And there is high demand for my product where I am targeting to open. 

5.      Alignment between Skills/Aspirations/Labour Market

I have already discussed the alignment between my skills and aspirations (please see Section: Personal Aspirations Review).  In this Section, I will discuss the alignment between my aspirations and the labour market. I will also discuss the skills that the labour market requires and compare them to the skills that I have developed myself.

The skills labour market require for opening a business in Nepal:

Technical skills (marketing and sales, financial skill, IT skills, marketing, motivation, determination skill, project management skill, initiative skill, business management skill, human resource management skill),

Social and empathy skills (work place diversity, discipline, ethical issues, punctual, creativity, risk taking, innovation, internal locus of control, cultural issues)

Management skills: (Self awareness, stress/time pressure management, problem solving creatively, communicating supportively, gaining power and influence to people, motivating other, managing conflict, authorizing and delegating , building effective teams and team management, change management, positive leadership, negotiation,  etc.)

So far I am concern, I have developed some skills from BA HONS which are requires. But I don’t have some technical skills, managerial skills, and social and empathy skill which are required for opening business in Nepal. For developing all these skills, first I will gain some work experience on marketing and sales, administrative, accounting working on different field after my graduation and I will open my business.

6.      Personal Action Plan

In 6 months from now I will be preparing for attainting my graduation ceremony

A year from now I will join MBA in University in America.

3 years from now I will finish MBA and search for study related job for developing my career.

5 years from now I will make my business plan and search source of finance (Appendix 22)

7.      Conclusions

The portfolio helps to review my strong and weak skills, behaviours, values, attitudes, emotional intelligence. It makes me aware how those skills can be developed and how those skills can be useful for my career goals. Further it reviews my personal aspiration what parts of inside and outside inspire and motivate me and what are my shorts and long term careers goals which motivate me. It consist of labour market analysis of Nepal and what labour skills I have developed and which labour force skill I have to hire for opening my business. And it consists of alignment between my skills, personal aspiration and labour market.

    Word count: 2445 (excluding bibliography)

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