Essay: Personal SWOT Analysis For Managerial Role At Woolworths.

Following from the first assignment, students will create a personal SWOT analysis and comment on their fit with the organisation identified in their first assignment submission.The second assignment should include:
• the use of three naturally occurring data (e.g. conversations, emails, corporate artefacts that regularly occur, etc.);

• assessment of personal strengths and weaknesses as viewed by self and others (ensure you reflect on who is giving you what feedback, how you appear to be  progressing, and how you fit within the organisation where you work, or want to  work);
• a critical assessment of how you are placed or misplaced within the chosen organisation; and
• a discussion of self-improvement for continuous improvement.  

The report is to be limited to 2000 words, exclusive of formal document sections (i.e. title page, executive summary, table of contents, references list, appendices, etc.), citations, tables and graphs.  Students should submit one file through Turnitin. There are a number of forms the report could take.  The exact form the report will depend on the additional research the student will undertake; students should aim for the demonstration of deep learning, founded on reflection, rather than on getting any aspect of the brief ‘right.’  

Students should commence this assignment early, keep regular backups and ensure they submit the correct, final version.  Students should use this brief as the instruction set for the assignment requirements.  Additionally, the rubric below can be used to describe what unacceptable, functional, proficient, advanced and exceptional assignments might look like according to the criteria in the leftmost column of each row.  As this is a Masters level subject, students are expected to engage with high-quality academic journal articles, using the Torrens University Library.  Textbooks, Wikipedia and, in general, anything that can be obtained through an open Google search page are considered 
supplementary material, unbecoming of a postgraduate.  

Personal SWOT illustrates the ability of a person to tackle a situation both in personal and professional life. About my personality I can say that I am a very introverted kind of person. I prefer to spend time by attaining more ideas through theoretical approach rather than discussing problem with others. Additionally, I can say that I am very imaginative, open-minded and curious kind of person and emphasizes on future possibilities and opportunity for long lasting success. Chamorro-Premuzic and Furnham (2014).

stated that approach to work, planning and decision-making represents the tactics with which an individual perform the business works. In my context, I can say that I am a prospecting individual and my strength in this case is that I am good at improvising and spotting opportunities. The lat trait that drives the identification of a person is identity, which can be either be assertive or turbulent. I am assertive kind of person which means I am self-assured, even-tempered and resistant to stress and hence possess the ability to handle all kind of business situations.

In this business report, I will discuss my strengths and weakness for describing by ability that whether or not I am fit for the managerial position in Woolworths.

Mentioned in the previous assignment, the role of the managers can be witnessed through their ability for effective planning, planning organization’s staffing, directing and controlling. Thus, it can be said that I have to prove my competency in this field in Woolworth’s. I can relate my ability to be a manager in the Woolworths as I can handle all the business procedure and monitor the progress as I prefer novelty over stability. I am very much focused on the exact information that I am looking for accomplishing a work. This ability allows me to take effective and full-proof decision that furthermore drives the profitability of Woolworths.

I can also say that in this case, being an intuitive person, focused decision help me to allocate necessary resources for destined work. As a manager it is equally important for monitoring the recruitment and their retention liability. Moreover, an active business field like retail industry, Woolworths also serves millions of customer every week. In such circumstances, selecting good, efficient and interactive employees is a necessity. As a manager, I know that my role in this context will be providing direction to the employees and to motivating them is one of my main responsibilities.

According to my personality, the nature that I possess is more towards of ‘thinking nature’ rather than ‘feelings’. This quality makes me to focus on objectivity and rationality compared to the emotions of the other individual. As a manager I should see efficiency as more important factor rather than giving value solely to cooperation. I can illustrate this discussion with an incidence. Since I can motivate my subordinates and I also utilize relevant approaches and strategies to motivate my employees in Woolworths. I personally prefer the strategy of reward system that is based on every one’s ability but there are other effective strategies as well like increments or gamified working atmosphere along with work-life balance

Fit with Woolworths

. I can monitor the progress through the productivity and profitability of Woolworths prior taking the motivational approaches and after implementing the same approaches. This can be my strength in my responsibilities. Taken for instance, once I sent a mail to all my employees that if they fill their target that is serve 50 customers a day, they will get rewards and an extra day off  according to their preference. I have noticed that all my employees willingly work and serve more than 50 students. The extra day off strategy allows them to spend some time with their family. So, they have made a badge for me that have written on it “Thank you, for make us happy’. I felt very proud that I have done something for my employees. I think that it proves my leadership skills. But at the same time, I also get review from my seniors that I may focus on productivity and less on employees. But I say them that happy employee serve the customer better than unhappy employees.

The next trait that I want to discuss is ‘tactics’ that represents a person’s approach to work, planning and decision-making situation. Carter et al. (2013) on the other hand describes that tactics also resembles the attitude towards certainty and structure both in terms of physical and cognitive levels. According to my personality, I use prospecting tactics that is to deal a situation with more flexibility and relaxed mood in case of both expected and unexpected challenges. I always think about betterment of a situation. In case of Woolworths, I may suggest effective ideas that can increase the profitability for the organization.

Taken for instance, in the technological world, atomization has increased to a great extent and people prefer to use technology for ordering things and get the delivery at their door step. However, as a manager I also have to check whether or not all the customers are targeted. On finding that some people do not feel conformable to use website shopping, I have to suggest some idea and I e-mail to our manager head regarding ideas like incorporation of virtual shopping or a doorstep van, which took orders from the residents and then deliver the same within their preferred time. I got a positive reply from the head that he will surely implement these strategies as this is innovative and can results in more profitability. Thus, I can say that my strength is that I can suggest the best possible solution but the time I took much more.  So, I think to assess my skills regularly by giving suggestions on different situations. In this way I think I can make decisions more fast and accurate.

In context of an identity, Rust et al. (2014) portrays that there are two kinds of identity- assertive and turbulent. Jauk et al. (2014) furthermore described that this trait represents whether or not an individual is confident enough in their abilities and decisions. Assertive people have the ability of being self-assured, resistant to stress and even-tempered (Davis and Humphrey 2012). On the other hand people with turbulent identity, people are referred as self-conscious and sensitive to stress (Kosinski et al. 2014).

Self-improvement

These people are more likely to willing to change a job and think for a while regarding their life and the direction they are following. According to my identity the weakness that is I do not take time to think about the past mistakes and working approach. Another weakness is when situation become more sensitive or critical I do not push myself too much. I can remember once when we have face competition from ALDI, many of my subordinates suggested that we should impose competitive pricing strategy. At that time I got tensed and kept on discussing the same things to everyone. In this case I have learnt that even though I got tensed, I need to understand the situation first and then find out two to three alternative solutions and then discuss with everyone regarding the best strategy among those solutions. In this way, my leadership skills and decision making ability will be enhanced. 

Quilty et al. (2013) furthermore suggests that turbulent individuals perform better to achieve superior results as they know their desired goals; however, assertive individuals do not worry a lot regarding the outcome. However, my strength is to handle such situation by discussing with other personnel and implement the most agreed solution. I can relate this situation from the above mentioned incident that if I come up with some solutions and then ask for suggestions, my subordinate can see my efforts for the betterment of the organization. However, if I always ask for suggestion on the situation and not on the developed solutions, there is a chance that my subordinates can questions my competencies. This provides me more satisfaction and confidence in their abilities to handle challenging and unexpected situations. Thus, I follow both the identity tactics for handling crucial situation.

Thus, I can say that I have the ability to become the manager in the concerned organization that is Woolworths though I have to improve in the case of interaction with people socially and communicate my thoughts to all the stakeholders. Moreover, discussing or formulating all the business plan together by aligning all the competencies of employees and objectives of other internal stakeholders enhances the transparency and boosts the organizational performance of Woolworths.

The network diagram that corresponds to my quality in the organization is represented below:  

Below is the personal SWOT according to my nature:

Table 1: Personal SWOT Analysis

(Source: Created by Author)

Conclusion

Thus, it is concluded that a manager has the role of planning, organizing, staffing, directing and controlling. However, in order to test the same that is whether or not a manager is capable to perform all these functions, personality traits have to be considering that varies from individual to individual. Psychometric tests and personal SWOT analysis allow identifying the advantageous and disadvantageous of a person for handling a situation with effectiveness. It is concluded that I am suitable for the position of manager in Woolworths as I have proper knowledge of the organization and the demands of customers and employees.

However, I have to improve myself in interacting with them and communicate concerning my ideas with them so that proper transparency can be maintained. I can also incorporate continuous improvement in my traits by research about the changing needs and preferences of the customers and employees respectively. Communication with the business experts and IT professional also allow me to interrelate the business needs and technology together so that necessary ideas can be formulated that on the other hand provide an effective competitive advantage.

Reference 

Carter, A.J., Feeney, W.E., Marshall, H.H., Cowlishaw, G. and Heinsohn, R., 2013. Animal personality: what are behavioural ecologists measuring?. Biological Reviews, 88(2), pp.465-475.

Chamorro-Premuzic, T. and Furnham, A., 2014. Personality and intellectual competence. Psychology Press.

Chamorro-Premuzic, T., 2016. Personality and individual differences. John Wiley & Sons.

Davis, S.K. and Humphrey, N., 2012. Emotional intelligence predicts adolescent mental health beyond personality and cognitive ability. Personality and Individual Differences, 52(2), pp.144-149.

Graham, J.R., Harvey, C.R. and Puri, M., 2013. Managerial attitudes and corporate actions. Journal of Financial Economics, 109(1), pp.103-121.

Jauk, E., Benedek, M. and Neubauer, A.C., 2014. The road to creative achievement: A latent variable model of ability and personality predictors. European journal of personality, 28(1), pp.95-105.

Joseph, D.L., Jin, J., Newman, D.A. and O’Boyle, E.H., 2015. Why does self-reported emotional intelligence predict job performance? A meta-analytic investigation of mixed EI.

Kaplan, R.M. and Saccuzzo, D.P., 2017. Psychological testing: Principles, applications, and issues. Nelson Education.

Kline, P., 2013. Personality: The psychometric view. Routledge.

Kosinski, M., Bachrach, Y., Kohli, P., Stillwell, D. and Graepel, T., 2014. Manifestations of user personality in website choice and behaviour on online social networks. Machine learning, 95(3), p.357.

McDonald, R.P., 2013. Test theory: A unified treatment. Psychology Press.

Quilty, L.C., Ayearst, L., Chmielewski, M., Pollock, B.G. and Bagby, R.M., 2013. The psychometric properties of the Personality Inventory for DSM-5 in an APA DSM-5 field trial sample. Assessment, 20(3), pp.362-369.

Rust, J., Golombok, S., Kosinski, M. and Stillwell, D., 2014. Modern psychometrics: The science of psychological assessment. Routledge.

Shonin, E., Van Gordon, W., Dunn, T.J., Singh, N.N. and Griffiths, M.D., 2014. Meditation awareness training (MAT) for work-related wellbeing and job performance: A randomised controlled trial. International Journal of Mental Health Addiction, 12(6), pp.806-823.

Urbina, S., 2014. Essentials of psychological testing. John Wiley & Sons.

Vander Elst, T., De Witte, H. and De Cuyper, N., 2014. The Job Insecurity Scale: A psychometric evaluation across five European countries. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 23(3), pp.364-380.