Time Management And Professional Development Project Essay.

The self-evaluation checklist is a great way of understanding what one should do to effectively evaluate the personal motivation, needs, behaviour and performance at the workplace.

1. b) Self-assessment helps in achieving daily priorities by the use of self-evaluation checklist. The checklist must have questions in it regarding the day to day job function. A to do list, everyday while starting for work will go a long way in achieving the daily tasks.  It also helps in achieving personal competency because the self-assessment is a very strong framework to determine strength of the individual and thus helps in development of personal competencies.
2. c) In order to perform effectively in the job role, one must understand the structure and the function of the position and the key requirement to do the job, hence one need to conduct a training need analysis (Phillips & Phillips, 2016) TNA is a tool which helps to determine what has to be the focus for the personal development, it basically has three steps:

• Identifying the competencies required for the job
• Determine the training gaps
• Using self-assessment and advice to find the current competencies(Cascio, 2017)

Seeking feedback is very important on the journey of learning; it helps to gauge one’s own performance. Feedback helps in identifying the areas of improvement in the performance of an individual (Serret, 2017). The people who can give feedback are:

• Peers
• Supervisors
• Trainers/Mentors
• Customer/Clients
• Suppliers
• Friends & Family

When seeking feedback, following guidelines must be used:

• Ask for positive suggestions
• Do not deny the success
• Being open to change
• Do not be defensive
• Value other comments and point of view
• Acknowledge what’s been said (Hattie, 2016)
• Asking questions and clarify the understanding of the feedback

Quality is all about excellence, consistence, uniformity and dependability in any product or service which is produced by a business. Hence it is absolutely important to identify and report on the variation in the quality of the products and services according to the requirement of the organization. A variation is anything where a standard of quality is not met. Hence it becomes really important to notify the manager or superior about the quality variation because:

• If the variations are left for too long without being address, it will impact negatively on the customer’s satisfaction, which will lead to revenue and business losses.
• The seniors or superiors will ensure that the variation in quality is minimized and the quality of the product remains same throughout.

Self-Assessment and Seeking Feedback

Answer 8: Work Health and Safety legislation-It is a principle that states that each and every person affected by the actions of the business must and should have their personal health, safety and well-being protected while being at work or work related duty or in the vicinity on the workplace. Australia has a very strong legal framework which aims to protect the rights and the safety of the workers. Under the act, even the worker has to take care of the following points:

• Taking reasonable care of one’s own health and safety
• Taking reasonable care that their acts don’t cause harm to others.
• Cooperate with all the reasonable policies and practices

Privacy Legislation- It was formed in the year 1988 and is Australia’s national law governing the collection, use and disclosure of personal and sensitive information. Under the legislation, Personal information is defined as any information which can identify an individual or ascertain his identity. Sensitive information is defined any information or opinion about a person’s:

• Racial or ethnic origin
• Political opinion
• Membership of a political association
• Philosophical belief
• Criminal record
• Sexual preferences or practices.

The act also describes 13 Australian privacy principles which govern how personal and sensitive information is collected, used, disclosed, managed and maintained.

Anti-Discrimination Legislation: Discrimination occurs if a person is treated less favourably than another person on the basis of prohibited ground of discrimination (Sex, age, race, etc.). Anti-discrimination at Commonwealth level includes:

Racial discrimination act 1975: The act prohibits discrimination based on race, colour, nationality, ethical origin and immigration.

Disability discrimination Act 1992: This act prohibits discrimination based on mental or physical impairment.

Sex discrimination Act 1984:  This act prohibits sexual harassment and discrimination based on gender, marital status and pregnancy.

Human rights and equal opportunity commission act 1986: The commission was formed in the year 1986 to monitor legislation for breaches of human rights by the Commonwealth.

Covey’s time management matrix is one of the popular time management tools which is used all over the world by people in all levels of business and life.  Every task in the workload has to be placed into the category according to its importance and urgency.

Importance: Task has to be done else it will have negative consequences, task basically linked to KPI/Objectives.

Urgency: It means that there is a deadline attached to the task.

Post assigning the task according to the urgency and importance, they have to be assigned in a quadrant

• Quadrant 1-Urgent/Important
• Quadrant 2-Not urgent/Important
• Quadrant 3-Urgent/Not Important
• Quadrant 4-Not urgent/Not important

Answer 2: As explained the covey’s matrix, quadrant 3 is supposed to be dealt with a lot of caution. These are in a way the interruptions that people put on an individual, which does not contribute towards the KPI. These are short term tasks and are not important. Quadrant 3 tasks are done because they are simple and quick tasks, but at the same time these tasks can impact the time of an individual significantly and hence these should be done when the quadrant two tasks are finished. One of the following strategies can be adopted to do the quadrant 3 tasks, either to delegate it, drop it or do it immediately. In the purview of the above tasks in the Quadrant 3, the following can be done in order to save on some precious time:

Time Management Techniques to Avoid Quadrant One Tasks

Adjusting workstation correctly- Right away

Reporting WHS Incident-Right away

Co-worker asking help on some sensitive issue-Can be done during the lunch break or other breaks

Writing a non-important report- Should be delegated to an assistant

E-mail customer feedback to TL-Right away as it will take less than 5 seconds

Think for ideas for the team meeting tomorrow-Can be brainstormed while on a break with other individuals

The tasks in quadrant 4 are often referred to as time bandits and they can be left for later. These are the biggest time waster in the time management framework and affect the productivity at work immensely. It is often said that if a person gets rid of tasks of 4 quadrants, he can get an additional 10% time in a day to work on quadrant one task. The following can be done for quadrant 4 tasks:

Moving set of records to archives-2 minute task at maximum and hence can be done while performing any of the quadrant three task

Socializing can be done during team building exercises, lunch breaks or any other breaks.

Reading junk mails- This can be done while performing any other non-important work.

Catching for coffee with mentor- To be done after quadrant 1& 2 tasks are over

Smoke/Coffee breaks-To be cut down significantly.

Hence it can be said that tasks in quadrant 3& 4 should be given least importance and only to be done once the tasks in quadrant 1& 2 are over.

Answer 3:  Over the course of the week, a self-assessment checklist will be of great help to ascertain the performance and monitor the completion of the goals. Hence monitoring and adjusting the work performance is required, monitoring helps to:

• Set in place the goals. KPI and objectives to be achieved
• Regularly gather about how the goals are being tackled
• Identify the shortfalls in the performance, where the goals are not getting achieved
• Make changes in the approach to ensure that the shortfalls are addressed.

Hence, a self-assessment checklist for the entire week has to be created, and has to be marked alongside the columns of yes, no and Work in process in order to understand the achievement of the goals.

Answer 4: Quadrant 2 tasks are the tasks which are important but not urgent, but they do have a high probability of falling into quadrant 1 easily if the tasks are not given enough attention. Some of the time management techniques which can be used to not let tasks of quadrant two to fall into one are:

• Plan the day according to the priorities- The day should be planned according to the quadrant one tasks so that they do not fall into quadrant two after the deadline has passed.
• Conquering the emails- Email should be mastered, junk mails should not be given any attention, neither do the promotional mails. A quick gaze at the inbox will help in saving a lot of time
• Setting aside time for key tasks- Key tasks are the ones which affect the KPI adversely and hence, time has to be kept aside for such tasks.
• Doing it right the first time- it is often seen that people at times do the tasks for the sake of it, without thinking it might come back on their table. Hence it is advised to do the task right the first time itself
• Pass on procrastination- Procrastination is one of the biggest drawbacks amongst the individuals; they keep on saving it up until the nth hour of its completion and the tasks reaches to the quadrant one, thus procrastination has to be avoided on highest priority.

Answer 5:  The quadrant 2 tasks are not urgent/important and the quadrant 3 tasks are urgent/not important, the prime difference is that quadrant three tasks should be avoided as they do not contribute to the KPI of an individual. Hence, in case, when a manager wants an employee to do quadrant three task before than quadrant two, the following can be done in order to negotiate a positive outcome:

• Goals discussion- Discuss the goals with the manager and make him understand if at the point in time he gets into quadrant three task, it would affect his KPI adversely, which will be bad for his professional growth and development.
• Trade off- If the manager and the employee are in good terms, he could ask him to trade off quadrant three tasks with some task in quadrant two, thus reaching a win-win scenario for both.

Legislation in the Business Services Sector

The importance of training need analysis arises when an individual wants to perform well in the job role and in order to do that he needs to understand the structure and function of the position he is aiming for in the organization. Training need analysis comprises of three tasks:

• Identify the competencies needed for the job
• Use sell assessment and advice to identify the current competencies
• Determine the training gaps

Required competencies- These are the set of skills one requires to perform his job effectively. These are the skill sets a candidate does not have, but requires it for the job position. In the similar manner, the job competencies identified are:

• Product Knowledge- GSE is Australia’s leading manufacturer, designer and distributer of commercial and residential doors, windows and shower screens. Need to acquire more knowledge on how the company is positioned and the USP of its products over others, understanding of the better functionalities and usage of the product in order to sell it to the customers.
• Customer centric approach- Sales is all about thinking the customer as the king, and hence all sales strategy should revolve around the customer and how to make him feel special delighted and made to understand that his needs are the prime focus of the sales person. This requires training on understanding the customer needs and how to convert it into a sale.
• Rapport building skills- I was working in the Administration department earlier, where my job role did not require me to build a rapport with the outside people or customers. Sales though require building a rapport with the customers in order to build customer loyalty and a long term association.
• Negotiation handling- Negotiation is an important part of the sales role, a negotiation is required to handle the objections of the clients and close the deal with the client
• Buyer seller agreement- Acquiring knowledge on the T&C while selling doors, windows etc., the warrantee and the guarantee to be extended to the customer, refund policy etc. are some of the things which have to be learnt.

These are the competencies that are required in order to excel in the sales position role at the firm.

Current competencies- These are the competencies candidate already has or have developed in due course of his work. The competencies which are already present are:

• High on confidence
• Adhering to timeline & Discipline
• Good communication skills
• Mail etiquette
• Active listening
• Empathy

The template file is attached.

 A professional development plan can be seen as a formal document which outlines everything one needs to know and do in order to improve the competencies for the job. A performance development plan includes the following:

• Learning/Career objectives- SMART goals aims to understand the learning and career objectives.
• Focus areas-These are the areas which needs improvement in terms of skill, knowledge and attitudes.
• Actions to improve the competencies- The learning opportunities required to participate in the areas of focus
• Indicators for success-These are the performance measures which will indicate the achievement of the goals.