BUU22591 Personal and Professional Development Programme (PPD)
(5 ECTS)
Lecturer:
Dr Sheila Cannon, Associate Professor
Email: cannonsh@tcd.ie
Office Hours: By appointment
Career Advisor: Fiona Hayes, Ca
Careers Services
Email: fiona.hayes@tcd.ie
Pre- Requisite Global Business Only. Not available to exchange students
Module Description:
This module is designed to assist you to acquire knowledge and practical experience of the skills needed for personal and professional development. The focus of the module is on developing your self-awareness, personal and career insight, and the organisational ‘soft-skills’ of team-work, communication and leadership.
Throughout the module students will gain an understanding of and practice these skills, reflect on their development and be exposed to the current employment market through alumni and other guest speakers. All of these developmental experiences have specific learning outcomes and deliverables; you are expected to update your journal of your personal learning in as you progress through the programme, which contributes to your final Personal Reflection assignment. These personal reflection submissions will reflect the skills developed and deliverables obtained from the programme and will also provide you with a starter tool-kit to pursue a career path in a professional managerial manner.
Learning and Teaching Approach:
This course is interactive and participatory. It is different to your other business courses, because the subject is your own career, in relation to your skills, interests and experiences, and in the context of a rapidly changing job market. The lecturer will coordinate the content that will be drawn from the Business School, TCD Careers Service and industry representatives
Learning Outcomes:
- Improve your self-awareness and self-knowledge and a deeper understanding of your strengths and interests in relation to your personal and professional development;
- Identify a range of careers available, sources of information, internship prospects, and job search strategies;
- Identify, and reflect on your personal interests, skills, values you’re your personality and deliberate how you can match them with your professional networks and future career aspirations;
- Understand how to creatively market and showcase the best version of yourself (i.e., write an inspiring CV and cover letter, prepare an elevator pitch, hone interview skills, and utilise social media effectively).
Relation to Degree
This module helps you connect the learning from your business degree with potential career paths. It will help you think about your interests, strengths, and values, and explore pathways that will help you take critical steps towards your future career. Personal development is a central part of your business degree, and this course links the personal aspect of self-development with career progression. The skills and knowledge that you gain in this course will prepare you for the choices and opportunities that you will face in your career and work life.
Workload
| Content | Indicative Number of Hours |
|---|---|
| Lecturing hours | 22 |
| Preparation for lectures | 22 |
| Individual assignments: CV, cover letter, and LinkedIn profile | 32 |
| Personal reflection | 22 |
| Reading of assigned materials and active reflection on lecture and course content and linkage to personal experiences | 22 |
| Final exam preparation | 0 |
| Total | 120 |
Textbook and Reading Resources
Required Core Course Textbook: N/A
General Supplemental Readings
Bolles, R. N. (2022). What colour is your parachute? Your guide to a lifetime of meaningful work and career success. Ten Press Speed.
Dowson, P. (2015). Personal and professional development for business students. Sage.
Dutton, J. E. & Spreitzer, G. M. (2014). How to be a positive leader: Small actions, big impact. Berrett-Koehler.
Heath, C., & Heath, D. (2013). Decisive: How to make better choices in life and work. Crown Business.
Krumboltz, J. D. & Levin, A. S. (2010). Luck is no accident: Making the most of happenstance in your life and career. Impact Publishers.
Pollack, L. (2012), Getting from college to career: Your essential guide to succeeding in the real world. HarperCollins Publishers.
Roberts, L. M., Spreitzer, G., Dutton, J., Quinn, R., Heaphy, E., & Barker, B. (2005). How to play to your strengths. Harvard Business Review, 83(1), 74–117.
Spreitzer, G., Porath, C. L., & Gibson, C. B. (2012). Toward human sustainability: How to enable more thriving at work. Organizational Dynamics, 41(2), 155-162.
Wrzesniewski, A., Berg, J. M., & Dutton, J. E. (2010). Turn the job you have into the job you want. Harvard Business Review, 88(6), 114–117.
Student preparation for the module - Review the content on Blackboard for the module.
Course Communication
Administrative information and relevant changes (e.g., dates, times, venues, group membership, deadlines, etc.) will be posted on the course Blackboard page. Students taking this course are responsible for:
- regularly monitoring their TCD email address;
- regularly monitoring the course Blackboard page;
- assuring that they have access to the course Blackboard page.
Please note that all course related email communication must be sent from your official TCD email address. Emails sent from other addresses will not be attended to.
Assessment:
Assessment 1 – (10%): Participation
The class follows a relational teaching philosophy and professional norms of behaviour are expected of all participants, including attendance at all classes. Active participation and engagement in the exercises and practices of the class will count for 10% of the mark awarded for the module.
Assessment 2 – (10%) CV & cover letter
You will learn about marketing yourself in job applications. For this assignment you need to identify an internship or job of interest to you and prepare your CV and cover letter so that you could potentially apply for this position. It is important that you tailor your application to the role that you have chosen. Please submit your tailored CV and Cover Letter along with the targeted advertisement to cannonsh@tcd.ie by week 10.
All students can avail of a CV, cover letter or LinkedIn profile review at one of the weekly clinics with Trinity Careers Service.
A team of PhD students, who are fully trained CV Reviewers, review your CV, cover letter or LinkedIn Profile. CV / LinkedIn Profile Clinics take place weekly all year round (even out of term time) so you can choose a date and time that suits you best. You can book a slot on MyCareer. As the Clinic takes place at different times and days every week please check the date and time before attending.
Assessment 3 – (80%): Individual Personal Reflection Paper
The final assignment for this course is a final Personal Reflection (3,000 words) that requires you to reflect on the entire module and apply the learning to your own life. This assignment includes your personal and career plans and the career path which you feel, at this stage, is of most interest to you. This will be submitted to the Module Coordinator and will be graded. In particular, you will be required to:
1) Identify and critically examine links between yourself (skills, interests, values, strengths, personality, areas for development) and the requirements of your chosen career:
- Refer to evidence that you have developed soft skills in the module e.g. teamwork, leadership skills
- What skills and qualities do you offer? What are your key strengths and areas for development?
- What skills and qualities will you realistically need in order to enter and survive in this career? Do you have these, how can you demonstrate you have them, or how will you get them?
- You might identify your own strengths in relation to the career - are there areas you need to address in order to follow this path?
- How does the career fit in with your values and your areas of interest? How will you demonstrate this when applying for jobs/ courses?
- How does your personality fit with your career area of choice?
- Indicate how you plan to work toward your goal: for example, do you need to apply for work experience (paid or voluntary), or a specific postgraduate course as a stepping stone towards the career? Or will you explore a range of careers to find a more suitable fit?
2) Students should complete a psychometric assessment, which should inform your Individual Personal Reflection paper and can be useful when planning career next steps and. Profiling for Success is a series of online psychometric tests that can help you learn more about yourself and your strengths, which will help you to make informed career and personal choices. Assessments available through Profiling for Success which are recommended for you to explore are:
- Values based Indicator of Motivation
- Type Dynamics Indicator (TDI) personality type questionnaire
- EI Questionnaire Plus
- Career Interests Inventory
- Learning Styles Indicator questionnaire
The tests are exclusively available to Trinity College students. Please read more here. Students will need a Trinity username and password to access the assessments through the Resources tab in MyCareer.
3) Consider how best to prepare yourself for your chosen career for the rest of your time in College, including a specific action plan and timeline.
4) Do not treat this assignment like an assessment of the PCD module. Use the learning from the PCD module to write a real reflection on your own possibilities, ideas, thoughts, strengths and weaknesses at this point in your life. Here are some questions to journal about to help you articulate thoughts for this reflection assignment:
What motivates you? What are your passions? Have you discovered them yet? Have you rejected what is expected of you, or are you aspiring to fulfil what is expected of you? What about yourself - what have you been surprised about? Who are your biggest influences in life? What are your biggest challenges? What are the internal obstacles that you still need to overcome? What are your talents? What do you have to offer the world? What are your biggest strengths? What is your vision and purpose?
The reflection paper will be due on April 21, 2025.
Reassessment
Students who fail the module and are allowed to complete a supplemental assignment within the Supplemental period. This assignment will be an essay question in order to (re)assess the student’s ability to demonstrate the range of learning objectives in the module. The mark on this exam will count for 100% of the module mark.
Biographical Note
Dr Sheila Cannon is Associate Professor of Social Innovation in Trinity Business School. Her research focuses on organising for social change, including social enterprise, digital social innovation, social movements and social and environmental purpose organisations. Sheila teaches social entrepreneurship and Personal and Professional Development; and supervises doctoral and master’s dissertations. Sheila is Director of the Trinity Executive MBA Programme, and Director of Engagement at the Trinity Centre for Social Innovation, where she connects research, practice and learning to deliver real-world impact. She is Chair of the Board of Shuttle Knit, a social enterprise employing women Travellers to create knitwear and address historic exclusion, based in her hometown, Wicklow. Sheila worked in the nonprofit sector in peacebuilding organisations for over 12 years, in the Balkans and in Ireland. She was Director of Development at the Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation, and Programme Director at the Centre for Democracy and Reconciliation in Southeast Europe. She has a Bachelor’s degree in The Classics from Vassar College, New York. She has expertise in project development and management, grant writing, facilitating groups, teaching and qualitative research.
Fiona Hayes has a BA in Psychology and Music from TCD, and an MSc in Occupational Psychology from the Institute of Work Psychology, University of Sheffield. She has also completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Career Education, Information, and Guidance in Higher Education at the University of Warwick. In addition, she is an MBTI practitioner and holds BPS Level A and B in psychometric testing. Before working in Trinity, she worked in various market research and human resource roles at the Bank of Scotland (Ireland), Lansdowne Market Research, and Radio Teilifís Éireann.