About Me!

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Welcome to My Professional Blog!

I designed this blog to help me demonstrate to my readers how I have developed through my professional practice course at York St. John University. 

In this blog you will find blog entries from taking part in university events, certifications that I have completed and how I have found them, photos of evidence from activity on LinkedIn and a reflection upon how I started the course in terms of my growth mindset attitude and how I am walking away from it having gained a lot of knowledge of the course and who I am as a person. In the blog I will also be touching upon my past experience which led me to gain the skills that I started this module with. 

Personal Reflection

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Prior to my Professional Practice module I had very low confidence in interviews. This held me back when attempting to apply for jobs and as a result I have missed many opportunities which could have led to professional development. Throughout the module I made a conscious change to my fixed mindset and began to develop a growth mindset instead of taking opportunities which otherwise would have been missed. This change of mindset was a significant factor in leading me to apply for the role of student ambassador, where I was invited to an interview. As a result I went into the interview process with a confident attitude which I believe worked in my favour. Had i not had this confident attitude i believe it would have shown immediately in the interview and resulted in a very quick rejection. However, I believe from the feedback I received that my positive outlook and confidence meant that I stood a greater chance of success than I otherwise would have done. While I ultimately did not get the job I believe the process was key in helping me develop a confident outlook and a growth mindset in relation to interviews. 

In addition, before the process began, I had a very underdeveloped CV with gaps in the additional skills area. As a result of developing the growth mindset I made the effort to pursue qualifications in this area and this can be seen by my recent completion of my Microsoft Office, Career Thinking and digital Marketing certifications. Through a combination of these factors I believe that I will be in a better position in the future when applying for jobs.

Workplace Reflection

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In my last role as a sales assistant at the Loughborough students union there were many occasions where conflict arose between staff and customers which I did not know how to manage. I did not have the necessary people management skills to resolve the situations however, if I had the situations may have been resolved in a better way. One example includes a situation where a customer purchased raw chicken and ate it, she then returned to the store to complain that we had sold her uncooked chicken. At the time I had little in the way of confidence when facing workplace conflict and as a result refunded the item without question. Going forwards and having developed more confidence throughout this process I would have raised the issue with my manager to come to a satisfactory resolution for everyone involved. This would involve further development of customer service and conflict resolution skills which I hope to develop before having interactions with customers in the future.

Growth Mindset

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Having researched and watched Carol Dweck’s video on Growth Mindset (2014), I have gained knowledge on ‘The Power of Yet’ and ‘The Bridge to Yet’. The power of yet allows for learning curves and development in specific areas of a person, she mentioned that some of the test children said that they loved a challenge and anything that will develop their skills, this being called having a ‘Growth Mindset’. However, some children said that they found it very challenging and that next time they had to take the test that they would cheat instead, this would be called having a ‘Fixed Mindset’. 

I also found her concept interesting on ‘The Bridge to Yet’, where she described this as being the process of engagement, improvement and resilience if children are praised wisely for their hard work. This gives children more confidence in their work and can also change their mindset from being pushed outside of their comfort zone, this can develop into a growth mindset. I would also like to add that she spoke about equality in the ability to develop a growth mindset as long as the term ‘yet’ was used when targets were not achieved, thus transforming a child who has difficulty with tasks to an overachieving child whose neurons have made new connections in the brain. 

From the contents of carols ted talk I have realised myself that as a child I grow up to have a very fixed mindset, where if I did not achieve the first time I would not want to try to achieve again. However, since growing up and becoming more of an adult I have developed a ‘Growth Mindset’ without really realising what I was trying to fix. This is also something that I will discuss in my reflections which are also located on my Blog.

Student Ambassador Blog

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In January of 2021 I applied for the role of student ambassador, a couple of months later and my application had been accepted along with an offered interview. I applied for this position because it was a great way to gain experience and new skills while still being able to focus mainly on my degree. I received an email not long after being offered an interview about what preparation was required of me, this information said that I needed to create two presentations. One presentation had to be based on why students should consider applying to York St. John University; for this I chose to discuss that all 1st year students are guaranteed accommodation, 97% of students are in employment or education within 6 months of graduating and that York was voted the best northern city to live in (2019). These options gave me an advantage as these are the reasons why I chose to attend York St. John. The second presentation was based on something that I was passionate about and this was where I could really allow my flare of creativity to come into use, so for this I chose to talk about my love for cooking. This is something that I am very passionate about and something that I enjoy doing everyday for friends, family and those who I live with.   

However, a few weeks after all of the interviews had been completed I received an email and unfortunately, I was unsuccessful in getting the job. A further investigation as to why I was not successful for the job was carried out, this led me to ask for feedback on what I could improve on in the future. In terms of jobs this was my first rejection that I have experienced, to say the least it was very disheartening at first. I expected this feeling though so it was no surprise, I was more disappointed in myself not for the lack of trying but for the lack of confidence in myself. The Feedback that was given to me is attached to this section of the blog, this will help me within my reflection further into my blog. 

Feedback: 

Dear Kayla,

Thank you for getting in touch regarding feedback for your Student Ambassador interview. We had a high number of applicants and a significant number of strong candidates this year. You interviewed well but unfortunately your score meant you weren’t selected for the role on this occasion. This was due to lower scores on the questions about barriers to HE and safeguarding. For the barrier question we were looking for some understanding of the underrepresented groups of people we work with who can face barriers such as those first in family, care leavers, ethnic minorities, amongst others. This is part of our Widening Participation work and you should be able to find out more about this with some research on the university website/around the Ambassador role. 

Your presentations were good and the only thing I would suggest to improve these is more time practicing so that it feels less scripted, and people see more of your personality come through. This was more evident in your passionate presentation. 

Thank you again for your time preparing and attending the interview. It was nice to meet you and I wish you luck with your future endeavours.

Digital Marketing Blog

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My certificate for Digital Marketing was achieved as part of my professional practice module at YSJ. I achieved this certification as I was unable to complete the workplace experience due to covid-19. However, I personally feel that I have gained more knowledge from doing this certification than doing workplace experience. There is only so much you can gain from the workplace such as, customer skills and insights as to how a specific business is run. 

Through this certification my business knowledge has been expanded on topics such as, the concepts on strategy, digital tools and marketing, SWOT analysis, SMART objectives, digital marketing channels, a variation of media channels, digital marketing performance and KPIs. Throughout the course I also had to fill in a workbook so that I could keep all of my notes from the lectures to look back on. You will be able to see this workbook attached to my portfolio. 

In the first session I watched the lecture based on strategy, since I had never heard of this before. I was very interested to learn about how businesses used it to create a focus on where they wanted to be within a certain time frame. This may be important for me to know in the future if I want a role in Human Resources Management, I will need to know how to structure goals through using strategies to help them be achieved. Following this, I also gained knowledge on the SWOT analysis, which defines a businesses strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This would be something I could apply towards employees and looking for gaps as to what needs to be improved internally, this would also link to strategy as well when past strategies are considered this model can be used to identify what worked and what needed to be done better. 

The second session that I completed was based around Digital Marketing channels and how they could be implemented effectively. Digital Marketing also needs a strategy as to how the marketing will come across to consumers and how effective it is, this can be identified through using statistics from google analytics. Overall there are 3 main media channels that are used within organisations, these being paid, owned and earned. These channels allow for tactical implementation where organisations are able to target their specific audience that they want to attract. 

In session three, the focus was around Digital Marketing performance which is measuring the success level of an organisation. Measurement for organisations allows them to identify consumer behaviour, what they are doing right and what they need to work on, this also helps organisations keep up to date with their KPIs. This is where organisations may use SMART targets to achieve specific needs of the customer journey, this will also demonstrate to users that they are working hard to improve performance. 

Overall, I really enjoyed this short course and the level of engagement that Mediaworks were still able to obtain through recorded lectures. Having gained all of this Digital Marketing knowledge it could allow me to make advancements within the workplace while in any job position. It has also given me a wider insight as to how an organisation works within the Digital Marketing sector and it allows me the flexibility to be involved in any kind of Digital Marketing work that I may be offered in the future through them acknowledging that I have achieved this certification.

Career Thinking Blog

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Today I completed the Certificate in Career Thinking, this short course allowed me to gain more information on how to improve my confidence and how to generate a good CV. I am very grateful that I had the chance to complete this small course, as I feel that I have a lot more career readiness now. At the start of the short course, I thought that I already knew everything that I needed to know about the future of work. However, this was not the case as my knowledge has been expanded on what employers look for and how to prepare for application processes, this has really given me a great insight to improving my chances of achieving the role that I dream of having.

This short course involved completing 5 small units that gave different insights as to what I can do with my degree, looking at what my options are in terms of my career or further study. The course also went through where I should be looking for job roles and being in an applicant position, where I should be presenting myself as someone an employer wants to hire; this being through applications, CVs, and Interviews.

Throughout the 5 units, I made sure to make notes of all important information that will benefit me in the future when applying for jobs. However, to achieve the certificate I had to produce notes regardless, as evidence of learning throughout the different units. I found this very helpful as it meant that in the future I have the option to go back and look for advice on what I should or need to do from the information that I gained from the course.

As part of the evidence for this I will discuss some of the key points that I was able to take away from the short course. The first key point being, use smart targets to make sure you are reaching your goals efficiently, You will be able to see that I have demonstrated this information in my portfolio through my short, medium and long term goals. I took away new information surrounding employability in terms of the different ways to apply; CV, cover letter and applications along with tips for improving both my CV and future applications. In my portfolio, you will also have seen a CV comparison and in creating my new CV I used some of the tips suggested trough this course. The last key point that I personally thought was very important was the interview tips, I find interviews very daunting however, through listening to this short course I now feel a lot more confident in what I should be doing to make a good first impression. This including examples such as, body language, positivity, clarity and enthusiasm; these are tips that I have taken away and you will see these skills demonstrated in my video interview in my Portfolio.

Overall, I really enjoyed this short course, there were a lot of tips provided that will definitely be useful in the future. This short course was put together by the York St. John careers team who are Matt, Sophie and Lauren, they all did an amazing job of making it all so engaging even though it had to be done virtually. 

LinkedIn Reflection

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At the start of my time at York St. John I decided through the university to set up a LinkedIn profile, however I was not aware of the site’s potential and so I did not realise how to take advantage of my profile. I felt that I needed to start making connections with professionals from different organisations so I could gain an insight into working in specific organisations that I was interested in. I realise now that when first creating my profile I should have been more proactive in actually seeking information myself either through university services or online research. However, now that I am in my second year I have been seeking information on how to develop my profile and how to start gaining exposure. In the future to improve this I am going to make sure that I post more on my LinkedIn profile, I start gaining more connections and increase interactions with organisations through liking, sharing and commenting on posts. 

Now that I am more aware of what LinkedIn is capable of and what I can achieve through using it, I am now beginning to research new ways of interaction and what employers will be looking for when looking at my profile. This has created a great way to express my emerging identity as a professional person and I hope that this will show employers that I am always improving.

Through my recent achievements through York St. John University I have been more active in posting about events that I have partaken in and certifications that I have achieved. This has gained a lot more recognition and I have had an increase in the amount of people looking at my profile. I have also had recognition on my posts through likes and comments congratulating me on many of my achievements. The evidence of this can be found in the photographs section of my Blog.

Microsoft Office Specialist

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Completing the Microsoft Office Certificate has been very challenging for me personally due to the number of technical issues that I encountered when trying to download the software onto my laptop. It is only just now, 4 weeks later, that the technical issues have been fixed and I have been able to download the software to be able to practice for the exams. My exams are booked for the 21st, 22nd, and 28th of April which allows me time to be able to upload my results and feedback onto my portfolio, which I am very happy about. 

In terms of using the Word practice tests I found that even though I use Word at least once a week or more for my other university assessments, I was very surprised at the little knowledge I had of how to navigate the Word test documents. On the first test run that I did with Word, I had no choice but to apply the help button to get them correct. However, this was all part of the learning curve that I had to take and after doing this I have been able to complete more practice tests without the help button and with more confidence. Having now completed my Word exam I was thrilled to find out that I had passed, and my evidence of this can be found in the certification section of my portfolio. In the photographs section on my Blog, you will also find evidence of me posting about it on my LinkedIn page.

Then, I moved onto the Powerpoint practice tests which I felt more confident with due to the fact that I had used Powerpoint a lot at college. However, I did require help on some questions which again, I was surprised at since I thought I was a lot more knowledgeable with the software. Repeating from the Word section above, It was a new learning experience and I am now able to go through the practice tests seeking less help and still achieving the correct answer. Having completed my PowerPoint exam I was amazed to find out that I had passed, and my evidence of this can be found in the certification section of my portfolio. You will also be able to find evidence of me posting about my achievement on LinkedIn in the photographs section on my Blog.

As I continued to progress through Word and Powerpoint, I abstained from the Excel practice test. Using Excel has always felt a little daunting for me, I have had little to no experience with this software so I knew it was going to be a challenge. This is one of the reasons why I plan to do my Excel test last out of the three so that I can have more time to practice. I know that I have a long road ahead before I think I am capable of completing the practice test without the help button. However, I have now been focusing more on my Excel practice tests, as well as the others and I am gradually gaining more confidence with the practice tests. As I said at the beginning my Excel test was booked to be taken on the 28th of April however, the test did not go to plan and the results came back to say I have failed the exam. I was very disappointed with this result as I had been practicing a lot however, I knew I would be able to take it again and build even more on my confidence with the software. I now have a new test booked for the 4th of May and I am already feeling more confident from even more practice, so I am hopeful that the next test result will come back as a pass.