ahmednaim2047

[ahmednaim2047]

Individual Reflection

**Introduction **

Starting the journey wasn’t flexible for me where I had to arrange my resources and dream for moving to UK from a little developing country, Bangladesh. UK has close historic connection with this connection and the people of Bangladesh have been living in this country for century. However, I managed my family for arranging resources to go there to complete my higher education. After a period of struggle regarding convincing my family, arranging money and other facilities, I finally arrived in this country last year. Here, I have experienced challenges for managing my livelihood, earning money and continuing my study. While living with my family, I led a relaxed life without any suffering of earning money, preparing foods and self-control. But I am now doing all household chores by myself besides earning money through part time jobs. Aside these, I have been experiencing a new learning area for improving my skills, understanding newness and becoming self-dependent.

  A new culture of disciplined and advancement along with the facility of understanding has increased my way of living. Moreover, this institution is full of learning opportunity where all are cooperative and supportive to one another in advancement and gaining knowledge.

A special thanks to Miss Laila who have eased my learning journey at this place and suggested my way of performing activities on different courses. She has been a supervisor to me while searching for new opportunities and learning in the institutions and solving a problem faced in the journey.

  Introduction to myself and my Reflection

Thanking to my respected supervisor Miss Laila, I am this reflection which has been a great opportunity for introducing myself and my journey in this university of the UK. I am Ahmed Naim from Bangladesh and I am studying MFP second term for updating my academic skills. I love travelling and the adventure of exploring the new beauty of nature and new places. I travel with my motorcycle when I get time to enjoy and leisure period.

In travelling, I like bike riding most where I go for new roads and places to engage myself with nature and its beauty. From numerous natural beauty, I love enjoying the rain that connects my heart. I am honest with my words, work, and responsibility that expresses my reliability and responsibility. For reaching my dream destination, I always focus on improving my skills, and thus I follow a personal development plan. In the plan, I have listed out some skills such as time management, communication, leadership, business IT, presentation, continuous improvement, and stress management (Reeves, 2012). I am aware of myself, study, and goals where I have developed my quick learning skill and hardworking ability to achieve the dream (Diener and Lucas, 2019).

Figure 1 Enjoying bike ride and rain

Source: Personal Album

According to the academic requirement, I had to submit a reflective essay on independent study, its importance, my activities on independent study, and skills developed during the MFP course. In the essay, I mentioned my experience of developing assignments using online sources, report writing, experience in the UK, and the difference in the academic process from my home country. In addition, I reflected on my improvement and ongoing activities of time management, interpersonal skills, writing skills, and online resources for learning new (Cottrell, 2019). My teacher Miss Laila praised my responsible effort in preparing the essay and fulfilling all requirements. My respected teacher came supervisor on the reflective essay gave me good marks and motivated me to explore my opportunities ahead in MFP. I received remarks on my work according to my expectation as I put a good effort into the task. This was my first experience of learning an academic reflective essay in the MFP course. And this has enhanced my inspiration of increasing my effort in academic practice for attaining the desired result. The reflective essay also guided me on the right track of personal evaluation on strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities that could be utilized efficiently for attaining my academic and professional goals (Wong, 2014).

   **My SWOT analysis **

Figure 2 SWOT analysis

Source: Created by writer

The SWOT analysis tool is an effective tool for identifying strengths, weaknesses, threats, and opportunities of an organization or institution, or person. I used this tool for revaluating myself where this assisted me in understanding my capability, threats, and weaknesses (Rangkuti, 2015). I inspect myself through the lens of others for reviewing my situation and condition to the future orientation. While conducting my SWOT analysis, I focus on my surroundings, environment, future profession, organizational context, competition in the job market, and my skills (Rangkuti, 2015).

  In describing my strengths, I mentioned my earned and learned skills such as teamwork, motivation, problem-solving, communication, leadership, etc. where these skills can help in exploring my opportunities in personal and career life (Wong, 2014). I was neutral in identifying my weakness as the identification could guide me on the right path of improvement. I found my weakness in stress management, conflict management, and lack of confidence in my corporate career (Rangkuti, 2015). Accordingly, I also identified some threats such as competition in the job market and employers’ expectations that are to be managed properly. After the preparation of my weakness, I have found opportunities to explore for improving my employability skills and academic performance to enrich my knowledge to adapt to market change and competition.

**My SMART Lesson **

Specific

To prepare personal development plan  including change management, continuous improvement, business technology, presentation,  and performance management. In addition, I will improve some academic skills  such as report writing, plagiarism, note-taking, revision strategies,  reviewing online sources to collect information (Wong, 2014).

Measurable  

I can measure the skills against the professional  standard and academic results.

Achievable  

I will continue my personal development  plan till I achieve the maximum result. And I can improve my academic skills  with practice and learning knowledge.

Realistic  

All are realistic based on academic and  professional standard

Time-based  

I will require 3 months for improving my  academic skills and 2 years to achieve professional skills.

 Before preparing this session, I remembered the lesion of my teacher Miss Laila who suggested use to be honest and pragmatic while developing the goals using the SMART model for improving professional and academic skills. I have prepared these SMART goals for improving the academic and professional skills that will support me in attaining excellence in academic and career performance. Though I have listed a range of skills, I can achieve those skills with perseverance and strategic effort. I can improve my academic skills through learning knowledge, practice, and suggestion from teachers. And I will improve my professional skills through a training course, learning, knowledge, practical experience, and observation (Wong, 2014). I have the confidence of achieving my SMART goals for extending my performance ahead in the MFP course and future career.

My Curriculum Vitae

  CV refers to curriculum vitae that is a short summary of personal information, career, educational qualification, and other skills. A detailed and informative CV is necessary for drawing the attention of employers where a good and healthy CV creates success path of achieving a job and career (Teixeira da Silva et al., 2020). CV writing is a required skill for students in higher education where the quality of presentation improves chances of job acceptance. I prepared this CV keeping the necessary information and the importance of this in mind where I tried to include all required information to complete guidelines (Teixeira da Silva et al., 2020). I started with career objectives and employment status where I mentioned my future objectives and current responsibilities in job placement. I continued with my educational qualification and I mentioned all my academic accomplishments in the section. I also introduced my skills such as computer skills, communication skills along with other qualities and skills such as honesty, hardworking, career orientation, adaptability, teamwork, motivation, etc. that could be attractive to meet employers’ expectations. In the CV, I also included my personal information that could present myself to the employers. My interest in book reading, travelling, are also mentioned in the list to share my personality with employers to impress. I tried to prepare an updated and detailed curriculum vitae that could reach employers for meeting desired expectations (Teixeira da Silva et al., 2020). I failed in meeting all professional standards while preparing the CV but I worked responsibly. I can improve my CV and CV writing skills with the improvement of my academic skill and suggestion from supervisors.

**Research Project Module **

For academic purposes, I have been assigned the task of performing a research project on any specific topic. For completing Richard’s research project module, I have selected the topic “how does advertising affect market performance in retail industry: A case study of Primark”. An academic research project is an effective work for improving the research skill of students. This is my first experience of conducting a research project at the MFP level though I performed research on a small scale during my bachelor's degree. I have attended lectures of my supervisors who have instructed use them easily for conducting the research project in the proper format. As I faced difficulty in understanding the functionality of meeting the research project module, I talked with my supervisor who taught me in a friendly manner. I started the project with the research topic that was verified by my teacher. Then, I continued with chapter one where I included the background of the study, the reason for selecting the topic, aims, and objectives (Thomas, 2017). After getting approval and feedback from my supervisor, I prepared a literature review that enhanced my experience of learning and research writing skills. In this context, I used my capability of online resource searching and reading which helped me in finding out the right literature for my research (Thomas, 2017). Moreover, this has enhanced my skill of searching online resources and collecting the right information where I can utilise this skill in future performance. In line with this, I prepared a taxonomy that seemed complex to me at the outset. But I managed to complete the part efficiently with the suggestion and support from my supervisor and classmates. Recently, I have completed the research methodology that has been developed for preparing the research structure (Thomas, 2017). And I have submitted my research project with three chapters as the introduction, literature review, and methodology for collecting the supervisor’s feedback.

**The Trolley problem lesson **

The Trolley problem that I was taught along with others in the classroom by Miss Laila through understandable example and discussion is an ethical dilemma. I found this more psychological and philosophical issue to me and this I can utilise in solving a real-life problem (Greene, 2016). In the illustration, the lever is diverted to lead the trolley over one person for saving five lives (Greene, 2016). In this way, I can apply this ethical decision-making process in resolving a complex situation. I found this difficult and complex in the utilitarian context as this lets the life of either a person or five persons. While explaining this to us, Miss Laila shared the example of restricted people who are unable to move. In the discussed I learned how to make decision for maximum benefit by sacrificing minimum cost that was taught by the teacher. According to the lesson of Miss Laila, I found that this problem can be utilised in the business context for managing issues and solving out problems at hard times by making effective decision. However, I can select the best solutions by sacrificing a benefit or opportunity for having major benefits (Greene, 2016). I need to analyse my psychological context of utilising this trolley problem and find an effective solution for my ethical dilemma in life ahead.

 Figure 3 Trolley Problem

Source: (Greene, 2016)

      **References **

Di Stefano, G., Gino, F., Pisano, G.P. and Staats, B.R., 2016. Making experience count: The role of reflection in individual learning. Harvard Business School NOM Unit Working Paper, (14-093), pp.14-093.

 Diener, E. and Lucas, R.E., 2019. Personality traits. General psychology: Required reading, 278.

 Cottrell, S., 2019. The study skills handbook. Macmillan International Higher Education.

Greene, J.,

Solving the trolley problem. A companion to experimental philosophy, pp.175-178.

 Muir, F., Scott, M., McConville, K., Watson, K., Behbehani, K. and Sukkar, F., 2014. Taking the learning beyond the individual: how reflection informs change in practice. International journal of medical education, 5, p.24.

Rangkuti, F., 2015. Personal SWOT analysis. Gramedia Pustaka Utama.

 Reeves, D.B., 2012. Transforming professional development into student results. Ascd.

Teixeira da Silva, J.A., Dobránszki, J., Al-Khatib, A. and Tsigaris, P., 2020. Curriculum vitae: challenges and potential solutions. KOME: An International Journal of Pure Communication Inquiry, 8(2), pp.109-127.

Thomas, G.,

How to do your research project: A guide for students. Sage.

 Wong, L.,

Essential study skills. Cengage Learning.

[ahmednaim2047]

Riding Bike Exciting life lead!