Self-Assessment for Business Planning Process - Reflective Report

Benefits of Reflection

This second piece of coursework for this module requires you to write an individual self-assessment of how you functioned during the planning process towards the development of your business idea, how the process might be more effectively managed in the future and what you have identified as requiring development.

This piece of work should include an element of personal critical evaluation, in terms of what you felt you have learnt about yourself as a result of the business planning process and your development throughout the module.

Additionally, you will reflect on how you have applied the information covered throughout the lectures into developing the business plan.

Along with the Reflective Essay, you are required to submit your individual learning log that you have kept and updated throughout the course of the module.

Your reflective report needs a cover page. You can use the standard cover page template which provides information on your  student ID, the course ID, the word count etc.

As an introduction, you should address the follow;

What is reflection?

What are you reflecting about?

What are the benefits of reflection?

Which reflective models exist?

Which reflective model are you using and why are you using it?

Reflection is a key aspect of the learning process as it involves examining experiences, actions, feelings and responses in order to interpret and analyse them so as to learn from them.

It is written in the first person. When writing in the first person, you put yourself inside the writing by describing how you felt and what you were doing. Use words like  ‘I’, me, my and mine. E.g "I noticed that I was not comfortable with the idea.“

Reflective learning enables you to take responsibility for your personal growth by encouraging you to always ask questions such as: ‘What did I learn from this experience? What do I need to change in the future? How can I transfer this learning to a better experience the next time round? How have I benefitted / not benefitted from this experience? The answers to the questions will assist in the development of critical reflection skills which will impact positively on ‘learning how to learn effectively’.

We recommend that you use Gibbs reflective cycle for this report. This model has 6 steps that you can use to think through your experience in a sequence that addresses the requirements stated in the previous slide. These steps are;

Description - Describe what happened?

Thinking and Feeling - What were you thinking and feeling?

Evaluation - What was good and bad about it?

Analysis – What else can you make of the situation?

Conclusion – What else could you have done?

Action Plan – If it occurs again, what would you do?

Here are a few common mistakes students make when writing reflectively;

Focusing too much on describing your experience.

Not using an appropriate reflective model

No writing in the first person

Not evaluating their experience

Reflective writing is essentially subjective. Its your view about what you experienced.