Developing Professional Skills

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Developing Professional Skills

• Year 2 Computer Networks
• Skills Awareness Workshop
• Andrea Duncan, PDP Coordinator

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Aims to help you

• Identify and explain evidence of skills important
  for professional roles in computing
• Become more aware of individual strengths and
  qualities, including contribution to teams
• Improve ability to present yourself to others eg
  CVs and interviews
• Improve ability to reflect and take stock of
  academic learning and other experiences

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Personal/professional development processes of
reflection planning.

• Formal or informal activities
• Looking back and looking forwards
• Writing down thoughts, ideas, feelings, hopes
• Thinking about what went wellor didnt go so
  well
• Setting new goals and making things happen
• Links directly to CPD
• eg professional registration with BCS

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Everyone is doing it....

• All students in UK strongly encouraged to use PDP
  processes
• Common practice in the workplace
• - for ongoing professional development
• UN support outlined on NILE ( PDP tab) linked to
  tutorials and/or to core modules on your course
• NUPAD web pages and MyPAD e-portfolio to help you
• ..but its YOUR responsibility!

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PDP supports both STUDY and EMPLOYABILITY It
is a two-way process.

• Looking Forward..
• Defining goals and objectives
• Targeting any gaps
• Action plans

• Looking Back
• Reviewing progress
• Evaluating performance
• Reflecting on learning
• experiences

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Academic Experiencethinking it through

• Thinking about skills you are using and
  developing
• Reflecting on strengths how to fill any gaps
• Practising translating skills into language for
  work contexts
• Taking action on comments for improvement eg
  attending skills workshops/Centre for Academic
  Practice
• Attending tutorials using PDP tools

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Your best example of teamworking?
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Articulating your skills orally

• In pairs ask each other the question
• Give an example of how you contributed to
  the work of a team. What challenges did you face,
  and how did you address them?
• Switch roles and repeat
• Consider what went well think about how you
  could improve your evidence.

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Group tasks..

• Setting personal and shared goals
• Interpersonal skills
• Managing meetings and tasks
• Time management
• Problem-solving
• Presentation skills
• Keeping records minutes
• Evaluating work of others (peer marking)
• Reflective skills
• What specific contribution might you make to
  your team projectHow might you help your team
  work more effectively?

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PDP for your future success becoming (
staying) employable

• Employability? - any job? graduate job? career
  promotion? beat recession? own business?
• Work-based experience essential - need skills
  gained from studies AND part-time / voluntary
  /vacation activities
• Understand how your learning can transfer to new
  situations
• Have a clear view of who you are becoming, what
  you can offer essential for effective
  applications

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What employers look for in selection - for
placement/graduate applicants

• Evidence of specific skills
• Examples you can describe
• Experience gained in different situations
• Enthusiasm knowing what you want and why

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• You need more than a degree . making your
  experience count
• The majority of employers are interested in any
  experience you have the trick is to be able to
  show what you have learnt and how you have
  developed.
• Im looking for graduates with good
  communication skills, and the ability to work in
  a team. I like to see initiative, particularly
  when it involves problem-solving. Time
  management, organisation and business awareness
  are invaluable
• Make your experience relevant
• Increase your chances by standing out from the
  crowd!

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Application forms - how will you answer these.?

• Give an example of a problem you have had to
  solve. How did you go about it?
• Describe a situation which demonstrates your
  ability to deal with difficult people?
• What do you consider to be your most important
  achievement and why?
• Give an example of how you have worked
  successfully in a team.

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Build up your store of individual mini-stories

• academic project (team/individual)
• research task
• part-time/vacation job
• voluntary project
• family responsibility
• student activity
• travel experience
• organising role
• personal challenge

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What is reflection..

• Making sense
• Standing back
• Repetition
• Deeper honesty
• Weighing up
• Clarity
• Understanding
• Making judgments

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PDP as a continuous process - on work experience
and everything
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Getting the most from work-based experiences

• knowledge of organisations structure and systems
• keeping notes on learning experiences
• looking out for opportunities to learn new skills
• responding to change coping with pressure
• thinking reflecting on skills and personal
  qualities developed

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The art of translation..translating your
experiences into CV/interview language

• The SO WHAT? EXERCISE
• Task/responsibility/achievement
• so what?....I developed skills in..
• so what?....specific EVIDENCE statements which
  demonstrate that these skills and aptitudes could
  be applied elsewhere.
• Ideally these should be linked to the job/person
  requirements of the opportunity (to show how they
  can add value for the organisation)

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MyPAD e-portfolio space on NILE

• Your personal storage space to track your
  development, thoughts and plans
• Use blogs and wikis to build your profile
• Suggestions to help you get started - content and
  presentation up to you
• Link to other useful/interesting web resources
• Use to track progress with study topics, on-line
  discussions, work-based learning
• Potential resource for CVs, applications,
  interviews, promotion..

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Why should you bother to write things down?

• its easy to forget the detail of our feelings
  and reactions to particular tasks
• putting into words what we have learnt /need to
  learn often makes it clearer
• future employers are interested in detailed
  examples, even negative experiences
• a good habit to develop for career progression
  in the workplace
• Reflective notes can be short and sharp!

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Finding out more