World of Work

Exercise: Success & Disappointment Stories (10%)

Reflecting on why a personal success story turned out so well can also give you more in-depth insight into
yourself – instead of simply thinking “I’m good with people”, Miss A may realize that in fact she is very
empathetic and understanding, good at motivating others, and very tactful. Mr. B, who also feels he is
“good with people”, might have quite different characteristics – he may be very persuasive, charismatic
and have a great sense of humour. Miss A and Mr. B are both good with people, but would probably do
well in very different circumstances – and their specific personal experiences would demonstrate their
specific strong suits and areas that need improvement.

For this exercise, you will write two success stories, and one disappointment story.

Your two stories do not necessarily need to be work-related, although it would be best to choose stories
that illustrate something about yourself and/or what you learned that you can actually apply to your
career. Candidates are often asked during interviews, “What is your greatest strength/weakness?”… and
that question is often followed up with “Can you tell us a story that illustrates this strength/weakness?”

For your two success stories, complete these five steps:

1. create a title

2. provide the approximate date the success took place

3. describe (in detail) the situation, your actions, and the result

4. THEN summarize the story in one to two lines

5. identify the skills you used during the experience (for a list of ideas for this, try these sites:

http://www.youth.gc.ca/yoaux.jsp?ta=1&flash=0&auxpageid=203&lang=en or

http://www.quintcareers.com/transferable_skills_set.html or
http://www.csuchico.edu/plc/jobskills.html )

For your disappointment story, complete these seven steps.

1. create a title

2. provide the approx. date the disappointment took place

3. describe the situation

5. describe the results you achieved

6. describe the results you did not achieve and the transferable skills that might have helped in
resolving the issue

7. describe what you learned through this disappointment

Basically, you are going to show that you've given this serious thought and have come up significant
things that say something to you about yourself, and you're showing that you've reflected on what you've
learned or attained from this experience. Reflecting in this way can help you to understand yourself and
articulate your self-awareness, and these questions are increasingly coming up in interviews; having a
well-thought-out story prepared can be very impressive to a prospective employer.

Grading
This exercise will be graded as follows:

Success Story 1: Clarity, Occupational Significance – 18%

Success Story 1: Strengths/Analysis – 12%

Success Story 2: Clarity, Occupational Significance – 18%

Success Story 2: Strengths/Analysis - 12%

Disappointment Story: Clarity, Occupational Significance – 25%

Disappointment Story: Learning Analysis – 15%

Examples
Below are examples of satisfactory submissions for this assignment; they meet the minimum specified
requirements. These submissions would have been stronger with further elaboration /description that tied
the transferable skills to the story--how exactly were these skills made evident in the story?

SUCCESS STORY 1 TITLE: Yearbook Cover DATE OF STORY: 05/01

FULL STORY: Taking on the job of yearbook cover designer was a hefty ordeal, but one I decided to take in order
to expand my graphic portfolio. It started with developing a number of rough concept designs under the guidelines
set in place by the yearbook staff. After a presentation of these concepts and a constructive critique, a final design
was chosen. Designed entirely on computer and to the strict specifications of the publishers, the cover took another 3
weeks to develop into a final design. 1300 copies of that yearbook were printed, all of which bore the cover I
designed. I received numerous compliments for my work from teachers and students alike.

STORY SUMMARY: Designing the yearbook cover required being creative under strict guidelines. It also
required working with a creative grouping rather than alone, and working to the professional expectations of the
Publisher. The design was finished on time to the liking of the whole yearbook staff as well as the student body as a
whole.
These are the skills I feel I have demonstrated in this success:

Transferable Skills:

Coordinating: People

Negotiating
Decision making/problem solving

Visioning
Creativity and Innovation
Knowledge Management

Planning and Organizing

Interpersonal
Oral Communication
Artistic Expression & Composition

Organizational Systems
Time and Resource Management

Critical Thinking

***

DISAPPOINTMENT STORY TITLE: Exhaust Polishing DATE OF STORY: 03/03

FULL STORY: In the summer of 2002, I made a number of business connections in the hot rodding community of
the GTA. One such connection was Bruce, a very wealthy car builder who decided to take a chance on my small
company by throwing us a big order. The order was to polish a full exhaust system for his hot rod, right from the
rough metal state up to a mirror polish. Having hired 3 of my friends expressly for polishing within my company, I
presumed with confidence that we could easily handle this order. Was I ever wrong. Two of the three basically just
all together stopped working on the order, leaving the third and newest employee to tackle it all on his own. No
matter how hard he worked it was not possible to finish the huge order, and after delaying it as long as we could,
Bruce came to pick up his not even half finished order. What made things far worse was that I, being the owner of
the company, was the solely responsible party, thus I took the loss. In order to try and salvage are reputation in
Bruce’s eyes and the eyes of all his network we charged him a mere fraction of what he owed us for the work done. I
ended up paying my employee out of my own pocket and taking a huge financial blow.

RESULTS ACHIEVED: Managed to please the customer at least to some extent; managed to pay the employee
what he was owed.

RESULTS NOT ACHIEVED: Failed to complete order and satisfy customer completely.

MY DISAPPOINTMENT LEARNING: Learned to be far more careful in estimating the capabilities of myself and
my employees, and to be very careful to take potential delaying factors into account. I also learned that I must be far
more careful in whom I trust to work for me, especially when there is a deadline that a customer is depending on – I
need to develop my ability to understand others’ abilities and limitations, if I want to own my own business and hire
my own staff.
If you have any questions, please let us know! We hope you’ll enjoy this exercise and give it some
serious thought – most students end up loving this assignment. We will look forward to reading your
submissions.

WebCTSubmission Instructions:

1. You should create the assignment in MS Word.

2. When you have completed and saved the assignment, come back to this page, and hit the
“Add attachments” button (in the window to the right).

3. From there, you will be able to choose the file you want to upload.

4. If you’d like, you can type a short comment in the “Add Comment” field.

5. Hit the “Submit” button. Please note: I will be able to see your assignment only after the due
date has lapsed, so if you decide to change something on your assignment before the due date, you
can go in and change the file. (Remove the old one, submit a new one.)