Essay: Personal Development Planning For Graduates - A Comprehensive Guide.

• The overall object of this module is to enable you to acquire key transferable skills i.e. skills that will not only enable you to succeed in your career at University, but will also be of value to you in your future.

These key skills are highly valued by employers, and as a result the Higher Education’s Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) has specified a set of core skills which they determine that all graduates should have.

Using the above QAA standards, and activities engaged in during tutorial sessions, produce a Personal Development Plan, outlining how far you feel you have met them with regard to your future action plan.

Introduction

Introduce the aim, giving a brief overview of the whole assessment.

Personal Development Planning 

What, in your opinion, is Personal Development Planning?

• Give some examples of the benefits that Personal Development Planning might bring to students at University

Personal Goals

Outline the goals you originally set for yourself, listing them as CSMART goals.

What progress have you made towards achieving these goals?

How do you know whether you have achieved any of these goals?

Don’t worry if you have not fully achieved a goal, but what difficulties have you encountered and to what extent have you been able to overcome them? 

Developing Learning and Study Skills

With reference to textbooks or other sources discuss your preferred learning style and methods of how you have acquired skills that you consider to be important.

Identify what you see now as your main strengths and weaknesses in the  learning environment –give examples

Conclusion

Give a brief summary and please make any other concluding comments.

Personal development planning is the procedure of developing an activity plan which relies upon awareness, indication, values, setting objectives and organizing self-awareness in relation to the context of a profession, knowledge, connection or for self-development (Cottrell, 2015). This report will assess my personal development in regarding communication skills and self-awareness. The concept of the personal development plan is not just restricted to self-advancement, but also involves formal and informal activities intended to make other too. The report explains the advantages of personal development, outline the objectives set for self-development and the progress that has been made towards in accomplishing these objectives.

In my opinion, personal development planning refers to a set of activities that one can involve in for increasing self-knowledge and character. According to De Vos et al. (2011), personal development planning includes abilities and potential advancement, establishing of human capital and employability, enhancing the personal satisfaction, and has a vital role in the acknowledgment of aspirations and dreams. In other words, I can say that personal development planning is a procedure that is created to enable us to think about and arrange for your own personal, academic and career growth. The main goal of personal development planning is that it guides the individuals towards accomplishment of their long term and short term objectives (Sadri, 2012). For example, there are many points in the student lifecycle at acceptance, in consider skills units, arrangements where the technique of self-improvement planning is already embedded. The active participation of students in the process, and as a segment of the educational programs, and may be motivated to proceed with the practice throughout their studies and beyond their time at University. According to Leigh & Blakely, (2016), the main advantages of involving in Personal Development Planning may help students to:

• Be more encouraged
• More participative in the development
• Better learners
• Enhance self-confidence
• Enhance their employability
• Perceive and satisfy their potential

According to Braat & de Groot (2012), goal setting is a strong procedure for thinking about our ideal future, and for encouraging and change our vision of this future into reality. In order to enhance my decision making skills and self-confidence, I set the following goals to make improvement in self-development plan:

Be confident: Being assertive means standing up for what we think and stand on our principles. To enhance our confidence, we should listen others carefully and understand what they are trying to say. We can participate in the activities to increase our confidence and can grab the opportunities which motivate us to take appropriate decision for solving the problems. For example, I set the goal to speak in front of 50 people to enhance our self-confidence and also improve communication skills.

Personal Goals

Ask questions to clarify: Another goal set for enhancing listening skills is to ask the questions to clarify our point of view. We should ask the questions when the subject is unclear to us or not able to understand properly. It is better to ask the questions than to presume that we know do not know (Northouse, 2015).

Keep an open mind: We should have the ability to keep an open mind in order to express our ideas to others. We should research and investigate the subject and express the information to audience. According to Woodcock (2017), team work is also helpful in expressing your ideas and thoughts to the audience. We should be capable to work well with others, and deliver that subject to teachers, and prospective employers. The more open we are to others, the more imaginative we become (Arnold & Boggs, 2015).

Focus on your strength and weakness: According to Komarraju & Nadler (2013), self-awareness people were aware of their strength and weakness and are capable to work in that environment. In my opinion, being aware of our skills means that we know when to reach out for assistance, and when we are depend our own capabilities.

On the other hand, I set the benchmark or blueprint to make the progress in achieving these goals. At present, I am capable to speak in front of 30-40 people carrying the positive traits, and also have the capability to act as leader in order to build forward-looking and estimated growth. I am capable to take responsibility for my personal activities, positive adaptability which can help me to get along with the others, and positive body language, gestures which make my speech more effective and attract the audience to listen.

By analyzing the above goals setting for improving the personal development, I also develop the knowledge, capabilities and competence in a wide range of information and communication technology which empower me to collect variety of information and progression for further education (Kukulska-Hulme, 2012). The positive attitude and body language make my speech more effective and enhance self-confidence to present myself in a more appropriate manner and also enhance motivation skills (Eisele et al., 2013).

On the other side, the main difficulties still I faced in speaking is little hesitation of audience response and not make proper eye contact with the audience In order to overcome these problems, I should make my speech more effective which attract the audience attention, make eye contact with the audience which enhances my self-confidence, data should be authentic, and information should be unique.

Developing Learning and Study Skills

According to Schmeck (2013), learning theories refers to the conceptual platforms explaining how learning is immersed, prepared, and retained during learning. Often, the similar content can be made in different ways. Learning theories gives a structure for such learning results. The key learning styles and methods that I have focused on enhancing research and interpersonal skills is explained as follows (Sekaran and Bougie, 2016):

Behaviorism: According to Alzaghoul (2012), behaviorism learning style is depending on the observable modifications in the behavioral patterns of an individual. This learning style concentrates on the new behavioral model being rehearsed until the point when it turns out to be automatic. In behaviorism learning style, the learner relies on a teacher for procurement of knowledge. For example, in an online learning course which needs learners to remember the capital cities of states show the following outcomes:

Practice opportunities were given to the learner using a basic diversion based approach.

The suitable response was given.  

Cognitivism: According to Huang et al. (2012), cognitivism learning style depends on the adjustment in conduct through the successive advancement of a person's psychological capacities. This learning style shows the thought procedure inside the student's brain. For example, in an online learning course that included two arrangements of groups with different knowledge levels taking similar application training.

A pre-test was used to explain the suitable learning way for each learner profile.

A visual coordinator was composed, which enabled the learners to expand the subjects to their knowledge levels.

The intellectual stream was identified as per the current ranges of abilities and the substance was accordingly pieced into important subjects or lessons.

In my opinion, the main strength and weakness in the learning environment are described as follows:

Strength:

• My communications skills and self-confidence increases, and basic skills are improved and now my comprehensive knowledge is basically good for my level of training.
• I can take responsibility for my actions and can take initiative for executive those actions.
• Having the chance to lead over a group an expanded over time, I showed that I have the capacity to speak in front of the large audience and also attract their attention towards my speech.  
• I can express my ideas well and motivated towards our thoughts.
• Building the quality of team work, analysis the situation, time planning, and openness to express the ideas.

For example, good command on language, fluency in English languages, improvement in personality traits such as positive attitude and body language, eye contact, no hesitation, enhance self-confidence, clarity and a good listener in order to become a good communicator.

Weakness:

• I have to take time in presenting a speech thoroughly before briefing to the audience.
• I cannot handle pressure.
• I cannot provide relevant ideas and thoughts on specific topics.
• I cannot solve issues easily.

For example, still need to improve many things like not having the sufficient knowledge of the topic, ignoring the rumors or whispers.

Conclusion

In my opinion, from this report, it has been concluded that personal development planning is a procedure of reflecting on success, learning to benefit from the strengths, determining and assessing the areas of development. This report makes a personal development plan in relation to communication skill and self-confidence. The personal development plan is very imperative in empowering the tracking of development modifications that are essential for the accomplishments of objectives. My personal development plan will confirm that I acquire skills that enhance interpersonal skills and independence. This personal development plan helps me to think and comprehend that there are lots of skills that I want to gain. To improve communication skills and enhance self-confidence, we need to know how to communicate with the various individuals. This planning also helped me to understand that I should not be waiting for the ideal time to begin accomplishing my goals and objectives. The different learning styles also helped me to improve my personality traits and increase self-development. This learning style also helped the learner to know the important factors which should be considered in achieving the goals and objectives.

References

Alzaghoul, A. F., 2012. The implication of the learning theories on implementing e-learning courses. The Research Bulletin of Jordan ACM, 11(11), 27-30.

Eisele, L., Grohnert, T., Beausaert, S. and Segers, M., 2013. Employee motivation for personal development plan effectiveness. European Journal of Training and Development, 37(6), pp.527-543.

Kukulska-Hulme, A., 2012. How should the higher education workforce adapt to advancements in technology for teaching and learning?. The Internet and Higher Education, 15(4), pp.247-254.

Cottrell, S., 2015. Skills for success: Personal development and employability. Palgrave Macmillan.

De Vos, A., De Hauw, S., and Van der Heijden, B. I., 2011. Competency development and career success: The mediating role of employability. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 79(2), 438-447.

Huang, E. Y., Lin, S. W., & Huang, T. K., 2012. What type of learning style leads to online participation in the mixed-mode e-learning environment? A study of software usage instruction. Computers & Education, 58(1), 338-349.

Komarraju, M., and Nadler, D., 2013. Self-efficacy and academic achievement: Why do implicit beliefs, goals, and effort regulation matter?. Learning and Individual Differences, 25, 67-72.

Woodcock, M., 2017. Team development manual. Routledge.

Northouse, P. G., 2015. Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage publications.

Sadri, G., 2012. Emotional intelligence and leadership development. Public Personnel Management, 41(3), 535-548.

Schmeck, R. R. (Ed.). (2013). Learning strategies and learning styles. Springer Science & Business Media.

Sekaran, U. and Bougie, R., 2016. Research methods for business: A skill building approach. John Wiley & Sons.