Assignment Sample on Professional Development

Task 1

(a) Critically and strategically analysing the challenges experienced by DIY Science

Table 1: SWOT analysis of DIY Science

(Source: Created by author)

DIY Science is a company that focuses on producing scientific tools for the education sector, domestic sector as well as commercial sector. SWOT has been used as a strategic analysis tool for identifying the current challenges experienced by DIY Science in its operations. DIY Science is a scientific product development company founded by Dr James Dayus, which has access to the pharmaceutical industry. As per the interview between Dr Daisy Nwaozuzu and the founder of DIY Science, it can be assumed that the company has strong marketing potential, which can help in reaching a larger consumer base. However, the company is currently struggling with allocating financial resources for the development of the products. As per the opinion of Maltais & Nykvist (2020), funding plays a crucial role in helping the organisation to continue to improve as well as expand its products and services in the market. However, gaining investment from potential investors has become a barrier to the continuous growth and development of DIY Science. It has been found that the company is currently looking for investment from Innovate UK that is operating in the same field as DIY Science. This lack of funding has become a potential barrier to the examination process of DIY Science.

As per the interview, the company is currently moving forward to accelerate its self-sufficiency including the development of a larger working space along with hiring more staff. However, the culture of the organisation has created difficulties for the management of the activities within the workplace. According to Maroto, Pettinicchio & Patterson (2019), the hierarchical structure within the organisation can result in centralising the power of the organisation as well as making the decision-making process complex. Thus, following the hierarchical structure in DIY Science has resulted in increasing complexity in decision-making. The decision of only the founder is regarded in some cases which have resulted in increased workload among the employees along with negatively impacting their day-to-day lives. On the other hand, the growth in competition has resulted in creating a threat to the survival of small companies like DIY Science.

Table 2: Porter’s five forces

(Source: Created by author)

The bargaining power of consumers in DIY Science is comparatively low as a higher quality product is delivered by the company. Porter’s five forces model can help in identifying the factors that work to affect the profitability of the organisations (Anastasiu, Gavriş & Maier, 2020). Depending on the factors of this model, it can be assumed that competitive rivalry is high for DIY Science, which has created a threat to the profitability of the company. James mentioned in the interview that competition is a higher risk in DIY Science, which needs to be focused on by the company by understanding the consumer taste along with accelerating creativity and innovation in its activities. However, conducting activities for contributing to the best interest of the consumers can help organisations to enhance their value propositions (Managers.org.uk, 2023). Therefore, DIY Science can focus on the code of conduct for dealing with the challenges in the company like higher competition in the market.

(b) Critically evaluate the communication strategies and leadership models of the organisation

Leadership model

It can be highlighted from the interview that transformational leadership approach is followed in DIY Science, which allows for delivering autonomy to the team members. As stated by Abu-Rumman (2021) transformational leaders allow freedom to the employees along with encouraging independent decision making which enhances the sense of autonomy. Similarly, the leadership strategies in DIY Science allow the team members to make decisions along with fostering creativity and innovation in the workplace. On the other hand, Ardi et al. (2019) have argued that transformational leadership can work on increasing burnout among employees by supporting unhealthy work-life balances (WLBs). Therefore, it can be assumed that the leadership model in DIY Science supports freedom and innovation among the employees however, it can negatively impact the WLB of employees due to excessive levels of commitment toward the organisation.

Communication strategies

Effective communication is a crucial aspect of strategic decision-making at every level of the organisation. In the interview, James highlighted that a face-to-face communication strategy is followed within the organisation for communicating important decisions among the stakeholders. As highlighted by Krason et al. (2021) face-to-face communication is beneficial for delivering clarity to the employees regarding any new ideas along with building trust and transparency. The founder of DIY Science believes that effective communication strategies maintained at the workplace help in being updated with information along with managing the risks. Therefore, face-to-face communication along with electronic communication is maintained at the workplace of DIY Science for communicating with internal as well as external stakeholders.

Impact of leadership and communication strategies on organisational and employee culture and performance

Leadership plays a major role in sharing information and providing guidance to team members. Founder and managing director of DIY Science, James Dayus has mentioned that the company is quite small which has maintained an effective communication process with employees. As per case study, technicians have helped DIY Science with the research and development process in which direct communication with leaders has helped significantly. According to Gemeda & Lee (2020), communication in leadership responsibility helps to inspire and empower employees that assure effective work-culture management and business success. DIY Science has inspired great communication in leadership which has helped its team-members and technicians for effective movement towards science-based tools development. Leadership practice has been implemented in guiding team-members and interns to proceed with successful process to develop significant movement in research world transformation for University research purpose. Effective model in leadership is used to influence leadership role and practice within organisation.

Figure 1: Transformational leadership Model 

(Source: Influenced by Yue, Men & Ferguson, 2019)

Transformational leadership strategy of this company has helped team members to give the opportunity to choose organisational decisions on their rights and ensure to be more innovative and dynamic. As identified by Yue, Men & Ferguson, (2019), transformational leadership philosophy helps to encourage and inspire team-members to develop and innovate continuous growth and improvement of working path to assure the company’s future success. However, DIY Science aims to develop an organisational hierarchy structure and in this hierarchy, the managing director would be responsible to make the top level of business decisions. Sharing of information and decision-making would flow to all team-members with significant use of an open communication process. Chen & Wei (2020) commented that open or direct communication in leadership roles helps to improve workplace collaboration among employees as well as with leaders. Communication openly in the leadership role of DIY Science has developed better leadership engagement with team members as leads to ensure their better efficiency in science based tool making and development journey.

DIY has implemented a leadership model with transformation leadership which has expanded scope of business to develop its business purpose in a flexible and adaptive way with dynamic requirements of marketplaces. Both communication strategy and leadership model with transformational leadership in DIY Science have facilitated effective communication systems. Along with this, this leads in development to engage more successful and open communication to share common ideas and proceeding within organisational culture. Hence, DIY Science has included its leadership practice with transformational philosophy which has kept employee rights as first priority as well as insisted on great communication to share ideas effectively.

(c) Recommendation for improvement in organisational performance

Based on current base on leadership and communication systems in DIY Science, effective communication sharing process and leadership engagement for the near future have been recommended for DIY Science to assure its business success.

Development of more engagement communication is highly recommended for DIY Science to develop successful and most effective communication among team-members. According to Yue, Men & Ferguson (2019), effective communication in leadership is vital to gain alignment and trust with employees to inspire positive change in organisation and to pursue organisational goals. This company aims to expand its business strategically with regular engagement of effective communication with team-members.

Managing employee motivation to share ideas is another recommended strategy for leadership of DIY Science. As identified by Darics (2020), motivation is a critical component in leadership practice for long-term business success and motivated leaders are able to create an inspiration and vision to help employees to achieve organisational goals. DIY Science has tried to offer a unique approach in industry and to give innovation and excellent initiative to inspire University research. Continuous motivation for employees in this context would be a more effective process to enhance organisational performance to develop its business and research based development.

Becoming more market-centric is recommended for DIY Science to ensure its successful development for service context and effective future expansion. According to Lee & Kim (2021), user-centric motivation of organisations keeps business movement and development more accurate and accepted in current dynamic market. It would be an effective process for DIY to successfully inspire its continuous development and innovation in research-based development and to contribute more effectively and efficiently to the pharmaceutical industry.

Task 2

Task 2A

(a) Appraisal of entrepreneurial practice phases from business idea phase to delivery phase

Entrepreneurial development is a set of stages that helps to shape an effective business environment. DIY Science has been proposed to appraise entrepreneurial practice to successfully deliver effective process and progress to lead ultimate business success

Idea Generation is the first stage of the entrepreneurial process which begins with an idea. DIY Science takes ideas to develop its innovation and knowledge on research-based tools development with engagement of effective technicians, interns and team-members. Decision-making is next stage in the entrepreneurial process in which managing director James needs to make effective decisions to retain team-members and other working members for the long-term. As identified by Mehmood Alzoubi & Ahmed (2019), making decisions in entrepreneurial stage insist on effective movement of organisation in the right direction and systematised business success. DIY Science has to take effective decisions to maintain interpersonal relationships among team-member and effective communicable relationships of team-members with leaders. Planning is most critical stage in entrepreneurial process which has developed intervention of planning to execute made decisions. Li et al. (2020) asserted that strategic planning in entrepreneurship develops an effective process for effective progress in organisational movement to achieve set business goals finally. Innovative management planning has been considered in DIY Science which needs to plan with successful communication manner to deliver decisions of organisation towards employees. DIY Science has to include more open communication and transformational leadership practice to deal with continuous movement to fulfil its aim to bring more organisational innovation together. This aim of this organisation with mention of togetherness has shown its tendency to engage more accurately with team-members within organisation. Hence, openly communication and effective interpersonal development among team-members would successfully insist to achieve its set business goal.

In stage of delivery, DIY Science has to insist on more user-centric research tools and educational service development. Its idea generation to bring innovation and planning with sharing of ideas and knowledge with open communication with engaged team-members would be more effective to assure effective development. As influenced by Saptono et al. (2020), the delivery stage is an effective stage that needs approval of engaged all working members to insist on continually positive progress of organisation. This would assure successful development and innovation for organisational movement and developing towards set business goals. Management and control is another entrepreneurship stage which has been implemented as last stage after delivery stage. In this stage, DIY Science has to critically manage its control of leadership with regular communication and investigating improvement and progress of working members in company.

(b) Strategies to manage risk within the new entrepreneurial business venture

Entrepreneurs are mostly risk taken in nature to calculate an effective plan to launch a product and service. As identified by Ratten & Usmanij (2021), entrepreneurs are not guaranteed income and not assured success in launching. In such a context, significant risk factors are associated with an entrepreneurship role to keep them not guaranteed success and profits. Financial risk is the most identical risk factor of entrepreneurs which leads to affect its business movement and motivation. As identified by Bansal Garg & Sharma (2019), resource management with finance and other materials is used to reduce financial risk of companies. DIY Science is highly proposed to develop its intention in effective resource management planning that would be highly effective to deal with successful development in resource and financial constraint management.

Strategic planning risk is another risk factor associated with entrepreneurs in whom they have limited ideas and experience to develop effective planning to overcome uncertainty and risky situations effectively. According to Saptono et al. (2020), understanding of users is a more critical process in the strategic planning process in rapid changes of market and business environment. DIY Science has to prepare its effective movement with research and knowing users more broadly to effectively develop its successful development in innovation and research progress. It would plan its business process to contribute more effectively and accuracy for education and pharmaceutical industry needs and demands. Technological risk is another risk of entrepreneurs that has been identified in successful proceeding and development in a rapidly changeable business environment. Entrepreneurs are seen to be less able to invest on technological equipment to bring higher innovation and accuracy of business (Li et al. 2020). In such a situation, DIY is highly recommended to develop its more successful progress in talented employee base management. Along with this, a regular training on employees would be effective to develop business effectiveness and efficiency with limited usages of technological advancement.

(c) Critical appraisal of entrepreneurial traits and characteristics of newly proposed business venture for strategic positioning

Entrepreneurial traits and characteristics that are focused are their background of education first. Passion is another characteristic of entrepreneurs, which helps in maintaining inspiration among employees to achieve success in a company. As per views of Che Embi et al. (2019), risk management skill is a major characteristic of an entrepreneur, which helps in understanding on ways risks are tackled by leaders. Newly proposed ventures need effective entrepreneurial traits to achieve strategic position in market. Vision and motivation are other traits of an entrepreneur, which assists in building encouragement among employees to constantly push their skills in enhancing working methods in a dynamic market. As per views of Panait (2020), setting goals and deadline based jobs assist in achieving success by motivating employees to work faster in correct method. Visionary entrepreneurs help in inspiring employees, which has assisted in developing effective approaches to encouraging positive working methods. New ventures need a visionary entrepreneur, which helps in achieving business goals by inspiring employees as well as it helps in achieving strategic position in market.

In a new venture, an entrepreneur needs to have decision making abilities as a trait to achieve success in mitigating problems in business. This way entrepreneur is able to avoid rushing into issues without critically thinking on ways to mitigate it.

Task 2B: Analysis in task ONE

Executive Summary

• DIY Science has helped in maintaining an effective communication process among employees, which has helped in increasing engagement.
• Founder and managing director of DIY science specialises in production of developing scientific tools for education.
• Other than that, this small company was developed by focusing on identifying tags of cancer cells by using bioluminescence.
• Optimisation of naturally occurring reactions of producing light to manufacture bioluminescent technology has not only helped in tagging cancer cells but also day to day items manufacturing as well.
• Innovation management was tackled through application and also developing the ICURe programme for funding (DIY SCIENCE, 2023).

Effective funding exposure has helped in developing this business appropriately, which has assisted this small company to achieve success.

• Implementation of leadership model has helped in incorporating transformation leadership, which has assisted in expanding business purpose to meet requirements of market in a flexible way.
• Communication strategy of this business has assisted in mitigating any conflicting issues among employees.
• This has assisted in developing an effective criterion in increasing sharing ideas accurately.
• Therefore, any issues regarding leadership and ineffective communication have been mitigated by properly implementing transformational leadership.
• Pharmaceutical industries are searching for anti-counterfeiting measures, which are tackled by bioluminescent technology.

Main risk that was identified by founder’s ways to market bioluminescent technology in commercial market to enhance its popularity in business. Other than that, DIY Science had insufficient funding, which has assisted them to develop ICURe programme that has helped in gaining £35,000 worth of funding (DIY SCIENCE, 2023).

• Main risks that were identified in this organisation are continuous improvement, which developed barriers due to gaining investment.
• Increase of workload in this business has created issues in meeting jobs accomplishments within deadline.
• Competition is a major risk for this company as there are more competitive companies that are using same technology with more investment in innovation.
• Therefore, this company has been able to associate with dynamic, changeable and creative strategies to mitigate these issues in business.
• Based on an analysis of Guiné et al. (2020), understanding customer preferences and meeting these demands have helped in achieving success in this organisation.

Thus, developing communication strategy has helped in creating a balanced working environment, which allowed employees to share their own ideas and creativity to mitigate any issues within this organisation.

• Founder of DIY Science is a visionary entrepreneur who has implemented a transformational leadership style in this organisation.
• As influenced by Virgiawan et al. (2021), transformational leadership of these leaders has helped in developing a balanced workplace culture, which has assisted in working in a correct method.
• Developing an effective communication style in workplace has helped employees to openly communicate about their ideas.
• This way new innovative ideas and its effective growth as well improvement is achieved by this organisation by proper communication strategy.

Leadership practice in this organisation has helped in achieving success through implementing right strategies to create creativity within organisations. Protecting employees’ rights in this organisation is major infrastructure, which is commendable as an effective entrepreneur.

Task 3: Personal and Professional Account

Gibbs Reflective Model

Code of Conduct is referred to “competence, professionalism, honesty and integrity” in a workplace environment, which assists in optimising good practices. I have been able to identify that it helps in maintaining ethical perspective in an organisation, which allows restricting any misbehaviour within organisations. Other than that, Yaacob et al. (2021) stated Gibbs Reflective Model helps in identifying skills and weaknesses of one’s own personal development. This model has five stages, which allows an individual to take insight on ways to develop an effective professional skill. Description has helped in identifying that acting in best interest of organisation and customer as well employees helps in achieving a proper Code of Conduct practices. This has assisted in developing an effective safeguarding and not seeking any personal advantage from any confidential prosperity. Therefore, Tripathy (2019) opposed that maintaining an honest and trustworthy manner in workplace would help in achieving success within organisation. On other hand, being responsible and accountable for one’s actions has helped me understand that it helps in improving your behaviour in workplace.

Feelings past experiences have made me understand that I have been an inadequate employee in workplace. I have been able to ensure compliance with all relevant legislation and regulations within workplace. This has helped me to create a positive impact on society by showcasing continuously developing and maintaining professional knowledge and competence. This has helped in achieving success by striving for achieving success in professional life. Other than that, Shahzad et al. (2021) stated showcasing support to achieve success in completing tasks in an efficient manner helps in achieving proper organisational practice. Respecting people at work is a major practice, which allows a diverse working nature in business. This practice development assists in achieving success effectively. Therefore, with evaluation step, I have been able to understand ways evaluating this practice would help in workplace environment.

Creative thinking skills have helped me to achieve success in respecting employees, which has assisted in developing an effective workplace culture that allows employees to openly converse. I have ineffective skills in communication, which has been very self-sufficient by putting effort in a new thinking style, which has affected communicating properly. Conclusion step helps me to realise on ways I can develop a positive practice, which would help in increasing viability within business. Using an action plan has also helped me to improve on development of Code of Conduct practices in business. Other than that, it has also helped me to achieve success in properly mitigating ineffectiveness in work culture practices. “Treating others fairly and with respect, promoting equality of opportunity, diversity and inclusion as well as supporting human rights” helps in representing dignity in workplace. Addressing interests and needs of all stakeholders in a balanced manner helps in achieving success through developing an effective criterion in business, which allows companies to achieve success.

References

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Anastasiu, L., Gavriş, O., & Maier, D. (2020). Is human capital ready for change? A strategic approach adapting Porter’s five forces to human resources. Sustainability, 12(6), 2300. doi:10.3390/su12062300

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Retrieved on: (04.04.2023) Retrieved from: https://www.managers.org.uk/about-cmi/governance/policies/code-of-conduct/

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