Developing, Leading and Managing Competence Portfolio for MBA project pgbm161

TNE MBA Project Guide PGBM161 (30% of the project marks)

This will be a portfolio of critical self-reflection supported by evidence and will take the form of a critical reflection upon the development of skills and competences derived from the experience of undertaking the programme of study, the added value activities and the final project. This element of the assessment will be approximately 2,500 words (for guidance only).

**** This word count of 2,500 words on "Developing, leading and managing competence portfolio" is not included in the final dissertation report word count of 15,000 words. They are two separate documents: 
(i) Developing, leading and managing competence portfolio": 2,500 words, and 
(ii) Final dissertation report: 15,000 words.

Details:

Developing, Leading and Managing Competence Portfolio This element carries a weighting of 30% of the overall mark. The Portfolio will be approximately 2500 words (for guidance only). The formal teaching will be practice-based workshops covering critical skills, research practice skills and employability which will support the portfolio element of the assessment to enable the student to demonstrate personal development and mastery of postgraduate skills ...

The portfolio will encompass an evidence-based approach to experiential learning opportunities embedded or available to students during the course of the programme. The overarching style will be critical self-reflection on the part of the student to enable them to build a portfolio which evidences their personal development. The Portfolio will also include evidence of critical self-reflection on personal and organisational learning as a result of undertaking the project and how that learning relates to the MBA programme as a whole.


A suggested structure of the essay:

1. Introduction. [about 60 words]
2. A learning reflection on the process experience of (A) the main project phases, notably, on (i) proposal formulation, (ii) literature review,  (iii) research design, (iv) findings gathering and analysis, (v) and recommendation formulation, and (B) the whole MBA programme course, subject by subject. [Part A: 1,080 words; Part B: 600 words]
3. A learning reflection on the consequential dissertation project/ whole  MBA programme course experience with regard to: (i) personal skill development/ career plan/ employability/ work-life balance impacts and (ii) organizational learning impacts. [Part i: 400 words; Part ii: 200 words]
4. Concluding remarks [160 words] 

*** For Parts 2 and 3, it is useful to provide some examples of learning episodes for illustration purpose and as "evidences" to support your reflective reasoning. 


*** For Part 3, some knowledge about the value of MBA education would be useful for reflection purpose, e.g. the future of the MBA and what is the future of MBA education. (also take a look at the video on Sunderland MBA).

Some useful e-readings

1. Gibb's reflective cycle (video) [also an example of a report in terms of Gibb's reflective cycle].
2. Kolb's experiential learning cycle (video)
3. How to write a reflection essay (video)
4. A briefing on learning portfolio, including e-portfolio (video). [another brief video is "why build a portfolio"' another video is on portfolio assessment].

Exhibit 1

Exhibit 2

*** Students are recommended to watch the above 4 videos before starting to write up the "Developing, leading and managing competence portfolio".


The following set of questions serves as a tool for reflective thinking:

Source: Bourner, T. 2003. "Assessing reflective learning" Education + Training, Vol. 45 (5), pp. 267-272, Emerald.


*** Since students are required to produce the "Developing, leading and managing competence portfolio" report, there is no need to write a "personal development" section in the dissertation report. The "Developing, leading and managing competence portfolio", being a separate document, replaces the "personal development" section of the dissertation report.

Doc 1: dissertation report
Now refer to the table of content template.

In this case, it is as follows (without Chapter 6):

Dissertation project title
Executive summary
Acknowledgement
Table of contents
List of figures and tables

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: Literature review

Chapter 3: Research methods

Chapter 4: Findings and analysis

Chapter 5: Conclusions and recommendations

References

Appendix

Doc 2: Learning portfolio

*****

Finally, I recommend students to submit both the portfolio document and the final dissertation report at the same time so that the first marker and the examiner can do the whole job of report assessment on the university canvas.


References

1. Barriers to constructing experiential learning claims through reflective narratives: Student’s experiences. (Emerald)

2. Assessing reflective learning. (Emerald)
3. On learning portfolio.
4. Slideshare on learning portfolio.
5. A student guide on the learning portfolio (pdf).
6. Introducing a learning portfolio (an article in pdf).
7. How to create a personal learning portfolio.
8. Action learning and managerial intellectual learning (pdf).
9. Scholar-practitioner notion (pdf).