REVISE

Running Head: REFLECTIVE REPORT 1

REFLECTIVE REPORT 12

Reflective Report

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Reflective Report

There is a common statement that says that “we learn to serve”. However, I believe that the statement can be rephrased to say that “we serve to learn”. My recent internship in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) gave me an invaluable learning experience to compliment my online and class setting. In pursuit of the internship program, I set numerous objectives, which include obtaining detailed knowledge regarding job responsibility in my future career; experiencing the actual working or job environment; comparing the actual working scenario with what I have learned in my Master program and previous skills gained throughout my education; and fulfilling the requirements of my master program. For many years, I have been passionate about learning about management at a higher level, which I believe would significantly contribute to my future success as a leader. I am glad that my goal to pursue the management course has been a huge success, thanks to my resilience and commitment towards ensuring that I achieve it.

The CRM internship gave me a worthwhile experience, especially in terms of helping me gain remarkable professional knowledge regarding the pursuit of my tasks in both the current role and my future career. In particular, I was keen to complete the various tasks that I was supposed to undertake while also attempting to learn how other people performed different tasks in the organization. In the advent of the internship, I established numerous learning goals that I sought to accomplish. These include understanding the working conditions and functioning of the institution; gaining experience in working in real job environment while also enhancing my communication skills, applying my knowledge and skills obtained from my master program, and seeing the specific skills and knowledge that I was required to enhance for the betterment of my future professional environment.

Notably, during my internship, I was dealing with customers, particularly using the CRM software. The software was fundamental as it helped me in effectively tracking and organizing the existing and prospective partners and customers. The CRM gave me an opportunity of learning more about the demands and needs of the customers, especially in terms of developing stronger and more desirable relationships with them. More importantly, I partnered with various employees in different departments such as the Information Technology (IT) and Human Resources (HR), something that ensured that I gained insightful perspectives related to the behavior of consumers. In my daily CRM endeavors, I was keen to establish rapport with partners and customers while also establishing lasting relationships and connections as a way of ensuring that I offered up-to-date services. I also leveraged the CRM in ensuring the relevance of contact information and details for the target markets.

More importantly, constant interactions with the CRM system during the internship period made me realize that the software offers a strategic element to service interactions, in addition to being a tremendously important tool in the acquisition of deeper market knowledge and research regarding competitors and customers. I cannot deny the fact that the CRM internship was instrumental in ensuring that I acquired valuable working knowledge and necessary skills in various departments, which provide a strong foundation for an illustrious and successful career in the future. I remember one day during a meeting with my line manager, he emphasized how effectively dealing and communicating with clients and consumers is fundamental in my future endeavors. In my daily interactions with consumers, I would be the first contact point, which required me to sharpen my communication skills. With the ever dynamic world of trading and communication, it was important that I was ever prepared to learn effective ways of interacting and dealing with consumers from various parts of the world. I am glad that the CRM internship gave me the opportunity of experiencing the significance of offering quality services to all consumers.

There are numerous tasks and responsibilities that I performed as a CRM intern, which are worth mentioning in this report. These include: facilitating both online and phone reservations; performing customer up-selling and follow-ups; providing consumers with clear and correct information regarding their enquiries; establishing good business and customer relationships and interactions; performing market analysis and research of competitors and customers; negotiating between business-to-customer (B2C) contacts as well as business-to-business (B2B) contacts; establishing rapport with consumers and providing high interaction levels and promoting customer satisfaction; managing products and services; managing the organization’s brand; engaging in negotiations for service packages and prices with partner businesses and consumers; and identifying new opportunities for selling. Ultimately, the knowledge and skills that I obtained from the CRM internship helped me in gaining better insights that are necessary to effectively deal with diverse situations. Through providing value-based relationships with my customers in a productive and systematic manner, I greatly contributed to the realization of long-term goals and objectives of the organization. More importantly, the CRM internship helped me in realizing the significance of good communication skills as well as the best strategies of effectively communicating with individuals from different backgrounds.

There is no doubt that “practice makes perfect”. In light of this statement, I cannot deny that internships provide students with a perfect opportunity whereby they can gain the desired experience in their career fields of choice (Patiar, Kensbock & Cox, 2017). My recent CRM internship presented me with a greater opportunity for growth in my experience, especially as a master student who is more focused on the real job environment. In general, the working experience gained during the internship program had significant implications on me in terms of increased knowledge base in the management world. All the duties undertaken during the program acted as fundamental learning points, and they significantly helped me in valuing both transactional and rational experiences. In my reflection of my internship program at the organization, I am very grateful that I managed to gain diverse skills at my worksite.

I can confidently argue that my internship term significantly helped me in integrating the theoretical knowledge obtained in class into real-life scientific and technological worlds. Being one of my initial opportunities to experience real working environments, the internship provided me with a rare opportunity of getting hold of my skills that had not been transformed into a practical shape. The internship project is arguably one of my biggest achieves in my life. I was keen to train myself towards planning ahead of time, analyzing results, and working accurately. Most of my work duties and responsibilities required that I undertake intensive research and make informed decisions. This attribute played a fundamental role in ensuring that I opened my eyes towards leveraging the numerous databases and resources that were at my disposal, thus enabling me in finding desirable information. After this endeavor, I am confident that I am capable of getting more resources, which may accompany my schoolwork for the realization of more desirable outcomes in my future educational endeavors and careers.

Another attribute associated with my internship program is that in was able to obtain key insights regarding how I may turn practical results into meaningful information. I would like to thank my colleagues as well as my supervisor, who greatly helped me providing the appropriate guidance on the best techniques that I may implement towards interpreting the outcomes to valuable conclusions. In the process of collecting management information and interpreting results, especially those relevant to CRM usage, I was able to learn about management failure. In this regard, I realized that not all actions or decisions lead to the most desirable outcomes. However, what I learned from such experiences is that knowing how to respond to the management failures from a positive perspective is important in preparing for greater challenges that may arise in the future. This is a skill I have to continue embracing on a daily basis because I believe that it has a profound impact on my career path and life in general. The idea is to acknowledge the fact that not everything will go according to the plan, but what is more important is to understand that there is a need to always move past the failures while utilizing them for individual growth in the coming days.

Being a student taking numerous courses as well as having my CRM internship has granted me an opportunity of learning a lot about myself, managers, as well as colleagues. The completion of my internship and taking various examination has been important in ensuring that I understand my weaknesses and strengths not only as an employee, but also as an aspiring manager in the future. The completion of the internship was a great eye opener for me, especially regarding may management skills. The numerous activities and assignments both in class and my internship played an integral role in ensuring that I clearly understood and realized different areas where I am able to excel, including identifying what I need to focus on so as to realize a greater level of success in my career path. One of the most surprising elements I learned through the internship and may master in management course is that I am an individual who is a very social and understanding employee and manager. This can be evidenced through my greater capabilities in terms of connecting, adapting, and forming relationships with others quite easily. More importantly, the internship program helped me realize that I am capable of performing a job very efficiently and effectively. On the other hand, I understood that I have I have a weakness when it comes to coaching others and myself at the workplace, which is an area that I need to improve on for increased chances of success as an aspiring manager.

Establishing my strengths was not a difficult task for me. I tend to learn quickly and I do not struggle in terms of learning new concepts. Most of the things that we learned in the master program were easy to understand, at least for me. Across the various classes that I took in my master program, I realized that one of my primary strengths is my ability to coexist with others quite easily and being a down-to-earth manager in my future career. I have a strong conviction that many people would love to work under me because I will always give them a listening ear while ensuring that they realize their full potentials through the support I will offer them. I remember at one point during the internship, I was given the responsibility of leading a team of employees in completing various tasks in the organization. During the exercise, I always held the feeling that the colleagues or employees exhibited a greater level of efficiency and assumed a better mood, which was a higher level than they usually. One of the key things I inculcated in the team is the importance of embracing teamwork whereby everyone feels like is the leader.

One of the theories in management I so cherish is the McGregor’s theories. McGregor developed the idea of two types of managers, a Theory Y manager and a Theory X manager. I have no doubt that I am a Theory Y manager, I will explain why. To start with, a theory X manager holds the belief that workers generally lack ambition, dislike work, and can only perform based on the classical “command and control” directive and style (Felipe, Roldán & Leal-Rodríguez, 2017). On the other hand, the Theory Y manager presents an exact opposite to thee Theory X manager. This because this type of manager holds the belief that employees show a greater willingness to work, have the capacity of having self-direction and self-control, and they are creative and responsible. This is the feeling I held when I was granted the opportunity of managing numerous tasks in the absence of our manager. I realized that the employees worked with an incredibly higher level of enthusiasm.

In supporting my case, I completed an assessment on management traits. I believe that I can perceived as a successful manager who exhibits stronger traits or characteristics in terms of being able to easily get along with others. This element is congruent with my capacity towards forming relationships with diverse people I am working with. During my internship program, I was able to develop a strong culture with my colleagues, which I believe is significantly inculcated in the master program. I can confidently say that during my internship, my colleagues and I were more than being co-workers. The bond we established is still manifested to this day. We could hang out after work, and everyone was always looked forward to seeing the other the next day at work. Anytime I was given tasks in a new department, I was able to easily connect and adapt within the team, which made me realize that I am an individual who never struggles to form relationships.

Having numerous strengths of tremendously important towards realizing success in future endeavors. However, it is extremely important to acknowledge individual weaknesses. During my coursework and the internship program, I realized that I had numerous weaknesses that I need to overcome if realizing meaningful career success is anything to be achieved. One of my biggest weaknesses is that I am extremely open and easily accept responsibility. Although I perceive this this attribute to be my weakness, it has its merits and demerits. For instance, being an aspiring manager would imply that carrying on that attribute to my role would be instrumental in helping me establish healthier relationships with my followers. One thing I know about myself is that I am able to understand others, in addition to being quite empathetic and understanding. I am an individual who believes that all people should be treated equally despite their backgrounds. A given background cannot be utilized as a measure of success for an individual, which implies that the backgrounds of employees may not dictate their outcomes. To this end, as an aspiring manager, I would ensure that I embrace diversity, which includes respecting all people and giving them opportunities to realize their potentials.

My master in management program has played an integral role in ensuring that I remained sharp in my mind, particularly through learning, researching, reading, and studying. Generally, I believe that the course has been consistent with my primary objective in life, which is largely focused on inspiring others. Personally, I obtain great pleasure when in work with and inspire other people. I believe that supporting others is one of the major ways that I can realize my career and professional goals. As they usually say, “no man is an island”, which basically means that the realization of any meaningful goal cannot be done in solitude, but rather with concerted efforts that enhance efficiency and effectiveness.

Through the use of my master program, I have explored numerous ideas that could be directly applied in my workplace in future just like I did during my internship program. In most cases, I endeavored to directly apply my master in management knowledge towards addressing various challenges and issues that I was faced with during my internship program. My pursuit of the course was motivated my great desire of experiencing my studies from a student’s perspective. To this end, I hold the belief that my master program is capable of benefitting many university and college students in terms of having the freedom and choice in terms of representing and offering the desired knowledge regarding the key attributes addressed in the course. My own understanding is that in the future, students will be able to gain significant benefits from the course if they are offered more opportunities towards submitting subject-based deliverables as opposed to turning in many written papers. In addition, my humble opinion is that the master course I pursued would be more beneficial to many learned due to its attribute of learner centricity. From the course, one of the attributes I learned is that it is quite difficult to make changes. As such, different approvals may need ample time because their approval process is slow due to a multitude of layers that have to be executed before an approval is made.

Throughout my academic pursuit, I have been keen to ensure that whatever I learn in class is relevant to my daily life. In this regard, my learning has been focused on integrating my learning into real life aspects. I believe that I have gained significant success in terms of applying my classwork outside the classroom environment, which can be evidenced through the success I realized during my internship program. In my master’s program pursuit, I was always dedicated towards producing authentic and lasting work outcomes. In some assignments that I had the feeling that they were of a lesser relevance, I was confident that I would at least gain something that can make sense at some point in my life. During my coursework, I managed to implement numerous projects with my colleagues. My excitement was that I successfully developed and implemented those projects.

When I enrolled for my master’s program in management, my biggest interest was to participate in a program that was capable of challenging me, holding me to higher expectations, as well as making me a better person in my profession and career. I am glad that my current program has helped me realize that objective. Throughout the program, I have been able to successfully understand the definition and implications of management, including how the same could be replicated or incorporated into my education. My intention was to establish the best ways that may help me in meeting numerous personal and organizational needs, both during my learning in school and elsewhere. I am confidently convinced that I have indeed realized and even exceeded the various goals I set at the advent of my master’s program. Indeed, the program has been thoroughly enjoyable. I do not deny that the entire process has been expensive, time consuming, tiring, and sometimes frustrating, but I acknowledge the fact that it has been a great experience for me. after completing my master’s degree, I hold the belief that it is just the continuation of my desires to being successful in life as opposed to the perception of it being the end.

References

Felipe, C. M., Roldán, J. L., & Leal-Rodríguez, A. L. (2017). Impact of organizational culture values on organizational agility. Sustainability, 9(12), 2354.

Patacsil, F. F., & Tablatin, C. L. S. (2017). Exploring the importance of soft and hard skills as perceived by IT internship students and industry: A gap analysis. Journal of Technology and Science Education, 7(3), 347-368.

Patiar, A., Ma, E., Kensbock, S., & Cox, R. (2017). Hospitality management students’ expectation and perception of a virtual field trip web site: An Australian case study using importance–performance analysis. Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Education, 29(1), 1-12.