Developing Skills for Business Leadership

Gillian Watson, Stefanie Reissner, Gillian Watson, Stefanie Reissner

• Publisher: CIPD - Kogan Page
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781843983651
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Commerce
• Subtopic: Leadership

Mapped to the CIPD Level 7 Advanced module of the same name, Developing Skills for Business Leadership focuses on three core areas for successful professional development and practice: managing yourself and others, transferable managerial skills and postgraduate study skills. Each skill is covered both conceptually and practically by a subject area expert to help all readers analyze and critically evaluate, manage more effectively, make sound and justifiable decisions and lead and influence others.Covering key concepts such as developing your professional identity, effective management of interpersonal relationships at work, people management and interpreting financial information, this fully updated 2nd edition of Developing Skills for Business Leadership is ideal for all postgraduate business students taking a module in professional development, career development or management skills. Integrating IT skills into each chapter, it includes a new chapter on reflecting and coaching, updated references to the CIPD's HR Profession Map, additional coverage of stress, health and wellbeing and an enhanced international dimension throughout the text. Online supporting resources include an instructor's manual and lecture slides as well as additional case studies, and sample assignments, checklists and exam guides lecturers can use in their teaching.

CHAPTER 1

Skills for Continuing Professional Development and Practice

STEFANIE REISSNER and GILLIAN WATSON

1.1 INTRODUCTION

A university education isn’t just about getting a degree – it’s about preparing you for the world beyond study. (Newcastle University, Careers and Employability Service 2013)

In an applied discipline like business and management, employers increasingly expect graduates to contribute to the organisation’s success from the moment they join. While subject knowledge will undoubtedly play a crucial part in your ability to make a difference for your organisation, even more fundamental are the skills, that is, the capabilities and expertise (Leitch Review of Skills 2006), that you bring with you into your chosen career or role. Of particular importance are transferable skills, which are required for a wide variety of roles regardless of the organisation and industry in which they are being employed (Bennett 2002). Such transferable skills include the ability to manage oneself and others, to analyse and resolve problems, to negotiate, to lead and to manage change (Rankin 2003). Your programme of study will include both acquisition of knowledge and development of skills, and most universities will also offer careers and employability services to help you make the most of your learning in preparation for your future career.

However, ultimately it is your responsibility to develop and maintain the key skills required for your chosen profession during your programme of study and beyond. Unlike knowledge, which can be acquired by sitting in a lecture or reading a book, skills development takes time and typically requires interaction with other professionals. Many transferable skills are relational, with negotiation and leadership being obvious examples. In other instances, the relational nature of skills is less obvious; for example, other people’s responses to our behaviour can tell us what effect we have on others. We can then reflect on whether this is conducive to the situation at hand or not – a key part of self-management.

Moreover, skills can always be developed further for even greater professional proficiency. Let us take presentation skills as an example. Most students entering a postgraduate course will be able to give an adequate presentation. By this we mean that they are able to identify a clear argument, structure the materials in a logical order, provide visuals and handouts where appropriate and speak relatively freely and fluently. Because they are able to do all of this, we suggest that they have basic presentation skills. But does this mean that they are as good as a professional speaker? Probably not. But the more presentations these students give, the more experienced they get and the better their presentations are likely to become until they get close to the standard of professional speakers. And even then, professional speakers will continually hone their already excellent presentation skills to maintain and improve them.

The same applies to other transferable skills such as the management of interpersonal relations, decision-making, problem-solving, negotiation and leadership. Once you have acquired such skills at a basic level (for instance during your programme of study), you need to develop them continually to be able to contribute to your organisation’s success over time (see Routledge and Carmichael 2007). This is where continuing professional development (CPD) comes in, which is fruitfully defined as ‘the maintenance and enhancement of the knowledge, expertise and competence of professionals throughout their careers according to a plan formulated with regard to the needs of the professional, the employer, the profession and society’ (Madden and Mitchell, as cited in Jones and Fear 1994, p50). It involves ‘a combination of approaches, ideas and techniques’ that will enable professionals to manage their learning, growth and development (CIPD 2013a), including training, mentoring, coaching, networking and reflective practice.

Notice the role of employers and professional bodies in these definitions. Employers can do their part to support their employees’ continuing professional development, for instance, through providing (or funding) training, mentoring or coaching. Professional bodies such as the CIPD will offer a variety of courses and networking events, and they will also monitor their members’ CPD activities on a yearly basis. Recognising the importance of skills among HR professionals, the CIPD has also created the CIPD Profession Map, which explains ‘what the most successful HR professionals know and do at every stage of their career’ (CIPD 2013b, p2). We will introduce the CIPD Profession Map in more detail in Section 1.4 of this chapter.

Developing Skills for Business Leadership has been written in response to the increasing need for professionals to demonstrate both subject-specific knowledge and transferable skills at work. It aims to help prospective professionals in HR and cognate areas develop the key skills required for a successful and rewarding career. This introductory chapter consists of two parts. Part 1 outlines the rationale, approach and structure of this book as it seeks to support your skill-building and continuing professional development during your programme of study and beyond. Part 2 focuses on the skills required for continuing professional development in an increasingly diverse work environment. It also discusses issues pertinent to the debate about skill-building and continuing professional development from both an individual and an organisational perspective, such as competence, diversity, career development, succession planning, talent management and human capital.

PART 1: RATIONALE, PHILOSOPHY AND APPROACH OF THIS BOOK

1.2 WHY WE WROTE THIS BOOK: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

As university lecturers, we have experienced the importance of skills in three key areas. Firstly, the British Government has made universities one pillar of their skill-building agenda (Leitch Review of Skills 2006), and there is increasing pressure (also from employers) to make skill-building more explicit in the curriculum (Bennett 2002). Hence, we are encouraged to reflect on the provision of skill-building measures and identify new opportunities to help our students build new and hone existing skills. While some skill-building will be integrated in existing modules, new specialist skills modules are being developed to meet the need for systematic and focused skill-building among students and professionals. It is likely that you are using this book in one of the latter.

Secondly, employers are increasingly looking for staff – both graduate and postgraduate – who can think critically and independently, analyse and evaluate complex situations, and resolve challenging problems (for example Forbes 2012, Banbury 2013). Moreover, an increasing number of employers expect potential applicants to master such skills prior to employment (Bennett 2002). As university lecturers we are required to provide our students with the opportunities to build these skills and to hone them as part of their studies to allow them to ‘hit the ground running’ after graduation. This also includes creating an awareness of the skills that they possess and the ability to identify any skills gaps as well as any development measures to fill such gaps; this is an important part of managing oneself and one’s career (see also Chapters 4, 5 and 18).

Thirdly and most importantly, as university lecturers we work with you, the student, on a daily basis and we know how much easier studying becomes with the right skills. All the ambition and hard work of this world will only get you so far if you do not possess the right skills to study and work smartly. It may be useful to think of skills as tools, which, if applied correctly, will make a task much easier. The trick, it seems, is to help you learn how to learn (Rawson 2000), whic...