Reflective Essay

by

Name of Student

Name of Institution

Date of Submission
Contents
Introduction..........................................................................................................................3

Description...........................................................................................................................3

Feelings................................................................................................................................4

Evaluation............................................................................................................................4

Analysis...............................................................................................................................5

Conclusion...........................................................................................................................6

Action Plan..........................................................................................................................6

References............................................................................................................................7

Appendices..........................................................................................................................8
Introduction

The study module, in other words, development of the business practices, is seen in this

reflective essay. The essay also refers to the perceptions and emotions in the module which have

emerged. It progressively helped me to acquire adequate information and a thorough learning

experience during this module. Any knowledge and experience, either positive or negative,

offers lessons that could serve to transform life’s viewpoint. There are several interactions that I

have derived from this platform in conjunction with this, which helped me to change my

concepts and effects my professional life and way of thinking. I observed that this module had

given me an opportunity to gain very helping insights through interpersonal communication

skills as well as I was also lucky to perform in multicultural teams having individuals with

diverse cultures and multiple skills. I had also encountered some issues in the team-building

process and communicating to the members of those multicultural team. The basic domain of the

module, including the usefulness of working in such a multicultural project team, were

inculcated in this reflective essay.

Description

To improve the business processes, management and practices, this module helped me

substantially to enhance my business development practices. While studying in this module, I

learned that business management is indeed an imperative aspect while interacting with the

workers and keep them dedicated to corporate goals and objectives. Study of Ranjith (2016)

suggests that while gaining a competitive advantage, a business needs to adopt these important

practices with proper management of employees. In terms of organisational and leading

capabilities, I developed and introduced with several new business concepts and practices

throughout this module. Through in-depth learning and experienced coaching, and also through
getting the feedback and mentorships of the module instructors who made me believe the module

will help me in my future professional life. I was also encouraged by my teachers and other team

members to get into a deep understanding of business practises, those helped me in

understanding the corporate business practices.

Feelings

While studying in this module, I have an opportunity to know about the most important

pillar of a business that is teamwork. Alghamdi and Bach (2018), proposed in their study that

teamwork within a business is imperative because it is regarded as a strength of a business in

contemporary business practice in the world. I also formulated a verbal survey to know myself

and to know about my personal expertise, weaknesses and how to enhance them. While

completing the survey, I evaluated that my strengths and shortcomings from the findings of the

analysis are also important to cross-check with my teammates and take suggestion on how to

overcome the weaknesses. In addition, the survey finding also reveals that I am strong enough in

several areas such as evaluation, completeness, investigation. I also feel that, while working

within a multicultural team and individuals with diverse cultures, communication and teamwork

skills need to be improved. In addition, the module learning helped me to critically analyse my

strengths even when I am confident enough that I am good at it. According to the analysis of

Srikanth (2016), teams with multicultural members are often challenging to an individual with an

entire change culture. Although it is not an easy task to work within a multicultural team, I

observed that my strengths helped me to interact with the team members with confidence.

Evaluation

During the module, the task assigned to my team was to learn team-based projects that

were planned for the team to complete this module. My team was also encouraged to build a
group that helped me understand the team-building process and to become an active listener,

team worker and for this purpose, my strong communication skills are important to be an active

member of the team. I also observed that while operating in a multicultural community,

additional qualities and abilities to familiarise within the team are also important. This project

encouraged me to develop my communication skills since there were individuals of diverse

racial, social, and language backgrounds. The study of Kirkman (2016) suggests that while

working with team members with different cultures, it is important to observe their point of view

and thoughts, to know them well and to respect their way of thinking. For the purpose, I always

pay attention to every team member and the innovative ideas proposed by any team member that

obtained effective results for the entire team. Moreover, by reflecting on trends, cross-cultural

communication improved my skills in communication with other team members having diverse

cultures.

Analysis

The learnings of the building business Practice module also helped me to gain insights

into the complex working climate. The study of Harvey (2017), analysed that within a team, not

every member is capable enough of doing things successfully. To cope up with the situation and

the natural weakness of the team, I bring my skill with more coordination, thorough thinking and

frankness with teammates. Through doing so, it made it easier for me to fully comprehend with

my teammates and effectively understand ideas and opinions proposed by team members. This

team working taught me a lesson that in any situation, it is necessary to thoroughly understand

the scenario and prioritise the importance of tasks before initiating any kind of job.
Conclusion

This module gave me an opportunity to learn building business practise. The learning

experience while studying in this module gives me the confidence to cope up with challenging

situations. In this module, I have faced several challenging situations while working with

individuals with diverse cultures while improving interpersonal and communication skills. The

learning experience of this module makes me more confident and knowledgeable of a diverse

team making process and interacting effectively with other individuals having different thoughts.

Action Plan

With the passage of time and after successful completion of this module, I will improve

my skills regarding interacting with the team members having different cultures. On the other

hand, I will also enhance the presentation skills that will be beneficial for me in my future

professional life. I will also take advantages of my strengths and avails new opportunities with

overcoming my weaknesses that may be a treat for future professional life.

References

Alghamdi, A. and Bach, C., 2018. Developing teamwork at the workplace. International Journal

of Business and Management Invention (IJBMI), 7(2), pp.28-40.

Harvey, S., Currall, S.C. and Helland Hammer, T., 2017. Decision diversion in diverse teams:

Findings from inside a corporate boardroom. Academy of Management Discoveries, 3(4),

pp.358-381.

Kirkman, B.L., Shapiro, D.L., Lu, S. and McGurrin, D.P., 2016. Culture and teams. Current

Opinion in Psychology, 8, pp.137-142.

Ranjith, V.K., 2016. Business models and competitive advantage. Procedia Economics and

Finance, 37, pp.203-207.

Srikanth, K., Harvey, S. and Peterson, R., 2016. A dynamic perspective on diverse teams:

Moving from the dual-process model to a dynamic coordination-based model of diverse

team performance. Academy of Management Annals, 10(1), pp.453-493.

Appendices

Reflective Journal: Week 1

In the very first week of developing business practise module, there are several concepts

and terms that are new to me, and I was unaware of various aspects of business practices. It was

indeed an ice-breaking session for me and all of the team members to introduce themselves and

to know each other. I feel that physical sessions are the more comfortable platform for me and

everyone else for effective interactions and communications. It also removes confusion as

everyone is present physically in the classroom. In addition, I also found myself very anxious,

and uncomfortable during online study sessions as this my first experience to study online.

Moreover, in the introductory session, our instructor for the module Pam Croney introduced

herself and the layout of the module. Afterwards, our instructor encouraged us to express our

feeling and what we were expecting from this module. Our instructor also encouraged us to

express our thoughts in a reflection which needs to be submitted every week. At first, I felt that

this would be very difficult for me to write reflective papers, as I was not familiar with the style

of reflective writing, but the instructor supported me while learning several methods and

concepts of writing reflective paper. I have set the main goals and objectives for the

respective academic year, which are focused on developing expertise and skills by being a higher

achiever. After that, I felt relaxed that I had an intelligible and cooperative module instructor

who would make the most of passing the module successfully.

Reflective Journal: Week 2

During the second session, we were required to do some evaluation to examine our

personal strengths and abilities. I have realised that we must learn regarding ourselves and strive

to redesign our skills and capabilities to achieve a competitive advantage. The assessment was
carried out by performing a SWOT study, i.e. strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Through analysing the audit’s personal qualities and skills, I have come to learn that I possess

some skills of leadership, dedication, people-oriented, and critical thinking skills that will allow

my personality to be more efficient. Considering the weaknesses, I do not seem to be in a

position to communicate effectively, and cannot adopt a Directive approach with respect to

the opportunities, self-confidence, extrovert, and people management. After the study, I found

that I had the potential to turn my vulnerabilities in the form of strengths and threats and then

into opportunities to be a stronger individual through enhancing personality characteristics.

Because of the threat factor, it has been recognised that I require to be further flexible and agile

to provide a balance amid emotional and physical intelligence. The topic was centred on a case

study called “Save Your Squad”, and we were expected to have the responses as needed. This

allowed the opportunity to learn awareness about team activity and its efficiency. In addition,

within this session, we also included the question of the efficacy of team activity.

Reflective Journal: Week 3

Within the third session, the findings of questionnaires based on the team and

surveys were to be discussed. I had no clue about the survey and the questionnaire that caused

me both intrigued and anxious at the very same moment. The questionnaire was developed

centred on Belbin’s nine positions as a team, and the other hand, the survey was centred on

Parker, and the subject of this session was “Introduction to Collaboration”. The Behavioural Test

was inculcated in the Belbin questionnaire to determine the function of the team-based

workplace environment. With this in mind, I have taken some support from classmates to

improve my skills. After providing the answers, the findings indicated that I possess the skills

related to shaper, completer, and implementer. The fields of growth that are important to my
working life seem to be the co-ordinator and also the team worker. However, I need to focus on

skills that involve managing the evaluator, the expert, and the plant. Furthermore, another survey

that was performed by me was the Survey of Parker, which is meant to determine the team

player’s style. Such surveys equipped me with insights into my positions and my team player.

From these survey findings, it has been seen that I have a challenging personality as a team

member.

Reflective Journal: Week 4

The Week 4 Session was focused on the Team Agreements theme reported by

Bloomberg. This session went quite well as we performed for the very first time face-to-face

contact aside from online meetings. Prior to heading towards the session, we were instructed to

review all the important reading materials. However, after the text’s reading, my curiosity has

been established to learn more regarding the subject described above to raise my awareness and

obtain a deeper perspective. It modified the behaviour of studying and reading since I am not the

sort of person who usually reads books or newspapers. After understanding one another, it left

me relaxed. My participation in projects is important, as I would appreciate working as a team.

In particular, we were advised that we had to brace ourselves for a project based on the team for

the respective module. I was nervous and intrigued about how we were able to do something like

this. I was on a team of 4 boys, and I desired to head the team, so I chose to lead the group. The

groups were created by the tutor of the module who relieved the pressure between choosing and

making groups.

Reflective Journal: Week 5

This session helped me to learn and understand about virtual working in the environment

based on the team. In this session, we explored the subject, for example, the virtual teamwork
that is perceived to be important in today’s world. The session was structured to demonstrate the

value of the environment related to the virtual team and to show the various skills and abilities

that everybody has to learn to function in a virtual team I have come to realise that we are

constrained by the present situation and that it has had a huge effect on the environment

of working. I want to focus on my conflict solving skills because I didn’t have an idea about

them, which made me think that I could adapt them in an effective manner. With respect to my

project and presentation, I experienced challenges when operating in virtual work based on the

team as I needed to enhance my skills of interpersonal communication. This point was put into

account because I was the leader of my team, so I need to offer creativity and organisational

expertise to individuals to get things accomplished.

Reflective Journal: Week 6

This session was fascinating because I also possess analytical capabilities, but I did not

think critically, which rendered me ineffective. The session was focused on reasonable thinking

and information on how to refer. This has assisted me throughout my project since I want to

direct my team members about how to use critical terms to make it more successful. By

performing this session, I learned that analytical thinking contributes to carrying out a research-

based initiative, such as knowledge derived from websites, including journal articles. This task

appeared to be highly challenging for me, but I have had expertise in critical assessment and

referencing that will strengthen my capabilities to do the job successfully.

Reflective Journal: Week 7

 This session seemed to be impressive because it was associated with the interest that I

desire to improve the way things are managed efficiently. This session’s topic was “time and

project management”. Project management by the title is viewed as challenging, but the scope of
this issue is wide. These skills related to project management and time management assisted me

in handling my project and in introducing it in an appropriate way. Because of my deep interest,

I have not had any problems comprehending the subject adequately. The tutor of the module

asked for the process sheet related to the team that gave details regarding the contribution of each

team member. Effective teamwork is so difficult because of differences of opinion, ideas,

thoughts, and feelings. Yet being a successful leadership trait kept me empowered to inspire any

team member to do their job well and consistently.

Reflective Journal: Week 8

This was the project presentation week that left me feeling stressed, frustrated, and

insecure because my team members weren’t good at introducing themselves. Our group

presentation was the only one to raise my anxiety to the end. We agreed, upon our turn, that I

was the one to show. With such an order, I ended up taking the start and demonstrate

successfully, and the entire presentation went well, making me feel comfortable. The quality of a

successful leader is to inspire and empower their subordinates to perform their best. I tried the

same thing, and I kept them inspired and empowered so that they could introduce themselves in a

positive way. In this way, I have learned that every person is unique and distinct from each other.

And that it is highly essential to possess the potential to people-oriented, and also helpful while

understanding the thoughts and feelings of others.

Reflective Journal: Week 9

In week nine of this module, I have come to understand the real process regarding the

fund’s management that is the essential component to the project management. Thus, the session

this week was more focused on an analysis of the suitability for handling the funds of clients and

how these funds are consumed. The issues emerged in teamwork with individuals having diverse
cultures, and that also gave me an opportunity to enhance my project management skills and

capabilities. Being on a team typically includes the handling of customer funds. With this

analysis, capabilities have been improved and developed with time management by giving

priority to the project based on the team. Due to this, I have realised that time management is

very important in project management because every project needs to be done within a time

frame. This module also gave me an opportunity to schedule and complete assigned tasks on a

given time period. Time management will also be beneficial for me in my future management of

the projects.

Reflective Journal: Week 10-12

In Week ten, we were presented to learn the ways of preparing a CV and what the value

of a CV is in a work career. The use of numerous social media applications has also been

addressed and asked to improve the LinkedIn CV update profile. Throughout this session, it also

was stated that we had been supposed to have ten minutes of project two presentations. This

helped me feel a little uncomfortable as it was once again a challenging job to handle team

members efficiently. This session was important to me as it would enable me throughout my

future life to plan a CV and to learn new knowledge to make it successful. The 11th session

concentrated on employability qualities to improve the experience of professional life. To this

end, I have split the heads between the members of the company in order to prevent any

mismanagement. When presenting Project 2, given the limited time span, time management, and

strong interpersonal communication skills were required. After that, I directed them with their

heads to fix the problems of misleading. The session Week 12 ended, because of a limited

amount of time, I was a little concerned about if we could succeed efficiently. There were some
errors in our presentation that rendered me dull when presenting. However, our presentation as a

whole went well, and the instructor was pleased with our results.