Employabilty Skills Report

Executive summary:

Self-reflection is the process of determining strength, weakness, skills, knowledge and abilities on oneself through reflecting on previous performances and learning process. Employability skills are the abilities and qualities that are needed for grabbing good career opportunities in professional field. employability skills are communication skill, interaction sill, time management skill and decision-making skill. Employees need many skills that are important for having a good position in the organisation such as presentable skill, role play, analysing skill, decision making skill, self-confidence, numeric skill, networking and IT skill, intellectual ability, time management skill and many others. Through reflection, employees can modify these skills and make these skills relevant to the current employment situation that will assist them to deal with any work situation. This portfolio will reflect on the employability skills that I have gathered throughout the module. In addition, I will also reflect on the feedback that I received during the module and how these feedbacks assisted me to shape these skills and developing new professional as well as a personal skill.

Introduction:

Self-reflection is the process of determining strength, weakness, skills, knowledge and abilities on oneself through reflecting on previous performances and learning process. In this portfolio, I will reflect on the employability skills that I have gathered throughout the module. In addition, I will also reflect on the feedback that I received during the module and how these feedbacks assisted me to shape these skills and developing new professional as well as personal skill.

Employability skill:

Throughout the module, I have developed many important skills that are important for my career development in the near future. As mentioned by Bennett et al. (2020), employability skill are they abilities and qualities that are needed for grabbing good career opportunities for people such as communication skill, interaction sill, time management skill and decision-making skill.

Presentable and communication skill:

During the first session of module, I was very nervous and shy which put me into trouble to communicate freely with my teachers, lecturers and classmates. During the first session of the module, I was assigned to the team for working on a project assignment. While working in this group I learned how to be presentable in front of other people to make a good impression on them. A stayed by Bennett et al. (2020), presentation skill highly important career-oriented people who need to grab the attention of the interviewer in the interview panel. In class, I also learned how to use smart communication and tactful interaction with people to express my viewpoint politely but firmly in front of them. In this context, Bennett (2016) argued that sometimes presentable skill is misunderstood with smartness, however, the presentable skill involved many other aspects that a candidate needs to have while he or she will be participating I any interview such as fluency in communication, right gesture and posture, self-confidence and presence of mind. As I belong to a south Asian community, I had difficulties in fluency in spoken English that was one of the barriers in terms of being presentable in front of other people. Throughout the module, I have worked with different project team in which my team members and team leaders assisted me to develop my English-speaking skill. On the other hand, I also attended group discussion session during the module, which assisted me to improve my English accent as well as grammatical knowledge. As mentioned by AV and Aithal (2018), to be presentable in professional world, only communication is not enough, rather the person needs to be smart, punctual and self-confident. Although during the first week of the module I was shy and had poor confidence level as I feel embarrassed to interact with teachers and classmates due to poor spoken English ability, as the time passed I was able to maintain strong rapport with my classmates and teachers that helped me to get valuable feedback from them regarding how to improve my decision-making skill and self-confidence and spoken English. The group discussion in class, teamwork and conversation with teachers in free time had improved my spoken English and self-confidence to express my viewpoint on any particular topic. Additionally, while working on university project I used to interpret the project in front of the class that assisted me to develop smartness and time management skill while establishing any viewpoint in front of people.

Networking skill:

One of the most important employability skills that I gathered throughout the module networking skill, that assisted me to gather strong knowledge on how to use online files, send official mails, make spreadsheets, developed online projects, using projectors and making PPT slides. As mentioned by Yawson et al. (2020), networking and computing are two major aspects in modern job market, in which people who have better knowledge and skill in handling networking and software would be provided with priority to grab the job opportunity. Therefore, the networking skill will assist me to grab a strong career opportunity in professional filed.

Roleplay and teamwork:

As mentioned by Di Gregorio et al. (2019), different roles play is important for people to learn as it enhances their efficiency in fitting to any work situation. I had played many roles while working in university project. Throughout the modules, I had worked with different teams and had been allocated with different responsibilities that developed my knowledge on how to perform manifold roles in any organisation such as leaders, managers, team members, monitor, administrator and mentor or coach. In this context, Pengnate (2018) argued that, although different roles play in teamwork is important for professions field, it can enhance the chances of high level of conflict and unhealthily competition within team. While working in module project, I had to face conflict with team members and team leaders that not only affected my self-confidences but also hampers my concentration as well as productivity towards meeting the desired goals. During the first session of the I had played a role of team member while working on an assigned project in which I had learnt how to communicate the issues, needs and important information regarding the project with team members and the team leader. While working in team I have also learnt to manage conflict within team by maintaining healthy and positive relationships with team members. I also had played the role of team coordinator in another team in which worked under the team leader and coordinated the entire project work done by the team members. I use to overhaul everyday researcher that my team member did on the project topic and check whether they can meet the assignment criteria. During the module, I also involved in many other teams in which I had paid roles of mentor, administrator and coach. All these roles are highly effective in assisting me to learn how to manage manifold roles in the professional field to maintain good balance among all kind of task.

Prioritisation skill:

Another important skill that I have learnt throughout the module is prioritisation skill, that assisted me to determine the most important task first and then go to the other task. As stated by Bano and Vasantha (2019), prioritising skill is important in grabbing desires career opportunity as it assisted candidate to have enough skill to meet the deadlines of most important task thereby completing each task in a systematic manner. My teachers and team leaders assisted me to how to select assignment based on its importance and what is the possible way to manage time smartly to complete each assignment in effective manner by meeting all tutors’ criteria. Sometimes I was confused about choosing the prioritise task among many tasks as all have similar criteria and aspects that most if times put me into trouble. In this context Chowdhury and Miah (2016) only having good prioritisation skill is not enough in terms of working in many tasks in a systematic manner in professional field, rather than an employee needs to have a strong presence of mind to chose which task would be more effective and fretful over the others. This skill is going to be highly helpful for my future career, in which I would be able to analyse each task and determine their importance, that will help me to take the necessary step to complete the tasks that are on priority.

Argumentative skill:

I have developed this skill through attending regular group discussion in class and taking part in debate with peers about any university topic. As mentioned by NA (2017), argumentative skill is highly important employability skill, that improves the ability of a person to analyse and evaluate the underlying aspects on any projects and determine the needs a of the task to meet the desired outcomes. I have learnt how to make justified and valid reason behind any argument to establish string viewpoint regarding the topic. This ability will assist me in my future work to make reasonable as well as justified interpretation of any project in front of my colleague’s ad clients to express my understanding and opinion regarding this.

Gaps in my skills and knowledge:

The feedback that I received throughout the module regarding my activities were highly effective in shaping my existing employability skill and developing new professional sill. As mentioned by Ayala Calvo et al. (2020), feedback is an important part on reflecting on employability sill, in which an individual can reflect on only the strength but also on the areas of improvement that need to be improved. While interacting with teachers in class on any topic to solve my queries, my teachers used to correct my English accent and grammar that assisted me a lot to shape my communication skill and interaction skill. These two skills will assist me in my future workplace to represent my clear viewpoint in front of my colleagues and seniors a subordinate staff. On the contrary Bennett et al. (2020), the feedback process needs to be in such a way that will motivate people to improve strength and work on their weaknesses. In my class, there are some lecturers who made very rude behaviour and irritative behaviour when I asked for help to solve any queries or subject related issues that made me depressed. However, later on, I understood that they wanted to make me self-confident so that I can deal with my issues first rather than asking for help without trying it to solve. The feedback that I receive from my team leaders, teachers and peers assisted me to understand the gaps in knowledge and skill that I need to develop such as lack of IT skill, written communication skill and numeric skill, that are important for grabbing a good position in professions field. The feedback that I got from my teachers on eth project that I submitted help me to find out the gaps that I have in Grammatical knowledge that made me unable to write simple and meaningful sentence. On the other hand, the group discussing and interaction with my teachers assisted me to find out that I had to work on my IT skill and numeric skill that are highly important for solving any critical task-related issues in few minutes. More all these feedbacks are helpful to me to determine what are my weaknesses and strengths. I use to work on these weaknesses to shape them in effective way that will assist me to grab a good position in professional field.

Conclusion:

From the overall discussion, it can be concluded that employees need many skills that are important for having a good position in the organisation. Their skills are presentable skill, role play, analysing skill, decision making skill, self-confidence, numeric skill, networking and IT skill, intellectual ability, time management skill and many others. Through reflection, employees can modify these skills and make these skills relevant to the current employment situation that will assist them to deal with any work situation.

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Reference list:

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Yawson, D.E., Yamoah, F., Owusu Sarpong, F. and Abban-Ampiah, G., 2020. Inculcating employability skill sets in Undergraduates through employability embedded courses: students experience anatomisation. Archives of Business Review, 8(6), pp.165-179.