Self-Reflection Paper on Journaling

Sonia Arora

Ashland University

MBA 501 Organization Development

Michael Colburn

November 29th, 2010

Journal writing is a learning tool based on the ideas that we write to learn. We use the journals to

write about topics of personal interest, to note their observations, to imagine, to wonder and to

connect new information with things we already know. Using journals fosters learning in many

ways. We can use journals to actively engage in our own learning and have the opportunity to

clarify and reflect upon our thinking. When I starting writing in journals, I found that was

recording my ideas and feelings, special words and expressions that I heard in day to day life,

interesting things that have happened to me related to the course. Journal writing offered me the

opportunity to write without fear. Before starting my journal I decided to follow these rules:-.

1. Decide what type of journal I want to create.

2. Journals may be loose leaf notebooks or folders. Individual pages should be contained in

some way so that they are not lost over time.

3. Taking notes from the class response in my own way.

4. Schedule time for regular journal use ex weekly, bi-weekly.

JOURNAL

What I learned while taking notes during this course is that you don't have to be a great writer,

perfect speller, or creative thinker to keep a personal journal. Journal writing means that you

regularly write down your thoughts and experiences. After reviewing all the notes I have taken

during this course, I see how this will prepare me for my future goals. This has been an important
class for me due to the fact that my quest is for a Master of business administration, focusing on

leadership skills. This course has shown me how all of the necessary tools can make decisions

easier as a manager or consultant.

I have never done journaling before in my life but it is a new learning which provided me a

better way to understand and learn about different topics. I found that keeping journals can be

very helpful because it is hard to remember everything that we learn from the class. I kept the

journals of the daily situations at work, home which I could easily relate with the topics I learned

from OD class. After going through all the notes in the end, I found that this course has helped

me overcome my fear of managing people in different situations.

The first day of the class was introduction about the course and how we will proceed throughout

the course. I got scared when I got to know about the learning contract but on the other end I also

felt that it is a great way to give option to students to choose their own grade. I was confused

about requirement of getting A grade in the course but at the end of the class, everything was

crystal clear to me. The class was very interactive because the course is based on what we deal

with on every day basis in our work place. As I am working with the company where our

incentives are based on RTF (REFER TO FRIEND), I always thought that RTF was made by

company until professor mentioned in the class one day about customer satisfaction survey. I

was very excited to know that the criteria of calculating customer satisfaction through RTF is

common among different big brands. I went next day to my office and explained the same to all

my colleagues who have been complaining about RTF. All through the course, professor

discussed his experience in different companies which helped in understanding topics during the

course study. I also liked when professor mentioned during one class “Everyone is telling the

truth”. When I joined the company, different people had different stories to tell and I had no idea
whom to trust. But after going through that discussion topic I realized that it is not a good idea to

assume something on basis of what people tell us. We should consider that everyone is telling

the truth until we collect data through different methods to understand the real situation and this

can be applied in our day-to-day life.

The project that I got involved during this course was based on the real time problem that I have

seen in different companies I worked with, therefore it was interesting for me to discuss about

the issue during the class. The methods that I learned from the class for collecting data were

observation, surveys and interview which helped me in collecting information from my company

and complete my project. Before, this class I always thought that conflicts are bad because the

word itself has negative meaning but when I learned that not all conflicts are bad, I could relate

that to the real time situation at my work place. Keeping notes during this course helped me to

enhance my thinking skills and come up with better ideas to deal with situations at work.

It was also interesting to learn that leadership is a process of identifying and realizing

opportunities for selecting a critical decision. Using an effective problem-solving approach helps

leaders to define the right problem in order to define the potential solution. This class helped me

to be a better person at work because I learned new ways of dealing with the conflicts happening

at work. During the class we were given an assignment to interview our manager and ask about

our own performance and their expectations from us. Earlier I was scared approaching my

manager and asking those questions because I had fear of getting negative response. But my

performance from day one in the company motivated me to approach my manager and get my

evaluations done. It took almost an hour but I think it created a positive impact on my manager

that I am concerned about my work and their expectations. I personally feel that such exercise

are helpful is building a better relationship with the management in the company. Managing
people has always been my favorite topic but also very challenging. While reading through the

entire document it was a refresher and a flashback of what I have learned so far during this entire

course.

We had a nice discussion in our office last week with American Express process manager who

explained us about the difference between Team and group. I found this discussion interesting,

therefore decided to take notes. What is learned was that not all groups in organizations are

teams, but all teams are groups. The difference between a team and a group is that a team is

interdependent for overall performance. A group qualifies as a team only if its members focus on

helping one another to accomplish organizational objectives. In today's quickly changing

business environment, teams have emerged as a requirement for business success. Therefore we

should constantly try to help groups become teams and facilitate the evolution of groups into

teams. Then we discussed about the issues or any problems that we might have with the

company or the management. When we started discussing, the process manager from American

Express asked our operation manager, team leader and HR to leave the room which reminded me

about one of the strategy that we discussed in the class to make the group feel much more

comfortable. There was absolutely no sign of one man power in the room as we had no sitting

arrangement and the process manager from American express created a very friendly

environment. I think that was the most effective team meeting I ever attended in my company.

This I could easily relate with the topic that we discussed in the class about distributing power

when conducting meeting. I agree that by distributing power in the room we can create more

comfortable and friendly atmosphere.

It was very interesting to read over my notes at the end of this course. It is not difficult to

maintain journals because it is a free form writing skills that anyone can do to have better

understanding. It works as a refresher course and can be maintained for future reference as well.

This was my first journal but I have decided that I will maintain this habit of keeping journals.