Institute of Leadership and Man

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Shashi Bhushan Singh

[email protected]

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Section 1: Know How to identify development needs?

AC 1.1: Identify own learning styles and the learning style of

another member of the team.

Learning is an essential part of everyone’s lives. It helps us make

informed choices about our future, learning is a prerequisite to growth,
and encompasses our entire life cycle.
Learning is an ongoing process, we must have the will to learn from
others and especially from the experts.
Learning require effort, and also, for staff to step out of their comfort
zones while learning and applying new things to our daily jobs. In other
words we all need to try new things and to fail. Change is inevitable
and it is required to compete with the present scenario.

Learning Style

Learning provides the opportunities to continuously expand your

knowledge and capacities, and hence the quest for knowledge is one of
the keenest investments you can ever make. However, there’s no one
size fits all approach to learning. People differ in their learning styles
and techniques, with each individual having their own learning style
that helps him/ her to learn, or learners could also have a mix of these
learning styles. Some people may use a dominant style of learning in
most learning situations, with very less use of the other styles. Others
may use a variety of those learning styles depending on the situations,
environments, or circumstances they are in. Whatever your learning
style is, your preferred style guides the way you learn. It also has an
impact on people look at things, how they recall information, and how
they act upon it.

There are many different leaning styles, few of them are mentioned
below:
1) Kolb Learning Style
2) Honey and Mumford Learning style
3) VAK learning style
etc

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 Kolb learning cycle

Honey & Mumford Learning Style

VAK Style

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Analysis of learning styles of one of my team member and
mine:

I carried out a needs analysis for identifying the learning styles of one
of my team member and mine, I used VAK questioner to carry out the
need analysis for the learning style.

 Someone with a Visual learning style has a preference for

seen or observed things, including pictures, diagrams,
demonstrations, displays, handouts, films, flip-chart, etc.
These people will use phrases such as ‘show me’, ‘let’s
have a look at that’ and will be best able to perform a new
task after reading the instructions or watching someone
else do it first. These are the people who will work from lists
and written directions and instructions.
 Someone with an Auditory learning style has a preference
for the transfer of information through listening: to the
spoken word, of self or others, of sounds and noises. These
people will use phrases such as ‘tell me’, ‘let’s talk it over’
and will be best able to perform a new task after listening to
instructions from an expert. These are the people who are
happy being given spoken instructions over the telephone,
and can remember all the words to songs that they hear!
 Someone with a Kinesthetic learning style has a
preference for physical experience - touching, feeling,
holding, doing, and practical hands-on experiences. These
people will use phrases such as ‘let me try’, ‘how do you
feel?’ and will be best able to perform a new task by going
ahead and trying it out, learning as they go. These are the
people who like to experiment, hands-on, and never look at
the instructions first!

I conducted a VAK test on myself and Lakshan Fernando. A copy of

this test can be found in the appendix (appendix A). (To be attached)

Test Results:

Shashi Bhusan Singh: V= 14 A= 7 K= 9

Test Results shows that my natural learning style is visual learning

style, I learn more when I see the things happening in fronts of my eye

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and observe the things , i.e.: I learn things quicker when I see it
practically and my second preferred learning style is kinesthetic.

As I learnt the operation of various tools while someone is operating

and when I tried to operate,

I was thinking that getting a driving license will not be easy , but when
I saw the drivers and then I tried then I found that it was easy to drive.

Lakshan Fernando: V= 4 A= 5 K= 22 (To be attached)

Question AC1.2: Use a Simple technique for identifying own

development need and development need of another member of the
team.

For identifying the developmental needs I adapted the American

Society for Training and Development's Strategic Needs Analysis,
following steps are adapted:

1. Reviewing job description

2. Meeting with the person
3. Observing him at work
4. Gathering additional data

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5. Analyzing and preparing data

Development need for myself and for Lakshan Fernando

I followed the above mentioned method for this task and finally
preferred to do a simple analysis of my current competencies and
development requirement for the managerial position for myself and
supervisor/ engineer level position for Lakshan Fernando.

Development need for myself:

Development need for Lakshan Fernando:

Question AC 1.3 Identify potential barriers to learning

Barrier to learning:
The barriers can be found within the learner, within the Centre of
learning, due to requirement of learning etc., following may be a
barrier to learning in an organization.
1. Restricted resources – learning is not given adequate funding
and support.
2. Work-learning opposition –Lack of time due to high
production work.
3. Passive leadership – leaders don’t ask themselves the hard
questions and their boards and co-workers don’t question their
actions

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4. Non-learning culture – Organizational values, assumptions,
beliefs, behaviors, and norms do not support learning, e.g.,
recognizing (praise, reward, promotion, etc.) individual success
but not recognizing team success
5. Lack of funding
6. Resistance to change – New ways of doing things is not
encouraged, i.e. individuals are told to be creative and
innovative but not allowed to implement their ideas
7. Emotional & Motivational barrier
8. Focus on short-term, simple solutions – managers taking
the most expedient course of action without solving the long
term problems within their organizations, e.g., doing multi-
person layoffs to reduce costs when the real problem is not
offering products and services that customers want
9. Skilled incompetence – the tendency of person to avoid
embarrassing or threatening interactions, place blame on
others, and not accept responsibility for problems
10. Blame, not gain language – employees tend to use
mostly language that is judgmental and reactive rather than
language that facilitates
11. Selective attention – not seeing deliberately and,
therefore, not learning from unexpected events, e.g., two
employees attend the same presentation by their manager but
understand the new organizational direction in very different
ways.
12. Stubbornness and Resistance to Change-This is
prevalent mostly in environments with individuals who have
been at their jobs for a long time, and are set in their ways.
Older companies have a hard time with organizational learning,
if they have older career people working for them who feel they
know darn well how to do their job, and won’t have some young
guns telling them how to do it better.
This kind of mentality is inevitable, and all human beings are
prone to it, so it’s the first and most severe barrier to overcome.
This is where you as a leader must be able to win them over and
make them understand that it is for their benefit, not detriment
that changes and new ideas are being brought in.
13. Lack of Direct Leadership: Leadership that is overly
passive isn’t going to get the job done with organizational
learning. While some passive, mellow mindset helps in
leadership with modern culture, leaders need to be present and

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 involved in every aspect of learning, to motivate people and give
them the resolve and confidence they need to press on.

Leaders must ask difficult questions and be a little tough where

need be – tough love isn’t always a bad thing.
14. Neglecting Team Success: In many corporate cultures, a
mindset sinks in of congratulation and adoration of personal
accomplishments, but a sense of team spirit and unity isn’t
really there. Beyond a sense of zeitgeist within the company as
a whole, teamwork is viewed as a means to an end, and not
something to be valued itself.
For organizational learning to be successful, then team success
and unity must be valued equally to if not more than individual
success and prosperity.
15. Absence of Value for learning itself: In some
environments, learning for the sake of knowledge and wisdom
itself isn’t present, which can result in a disregard by parts of
the whole for the new learning being introduced. The problem
here is that for an organization to be trained as a unit, some
individuals must learn new information they don’t immediately
need to apply.
When individuals don’t value new learning and growth for its
own sake, this will make that aspect of organizational learning
very difficult and troublesome overall.
16. Short-Term Focus: In business, it’s often easy to focus on
stop gaps to solve short term problems without looking at the
big picture.

Question AC 1.4 Explain how barriers to learning can be overcome

Overcoming Barriers to Learning:

Strategies for overcoming the various barrier to learning
Some learning obstacles are sufficiently small that it is just as easy to
jump over them as it is to make efforts to remove them. In some
cases, however, below are some strategies which can help us to
overcome the learning obstacle.
1. Lack of importance or uncertainty of importance.
Comparing the learning goal against my vision and against the
job requirements; maybe it is more important than we think. If
we are uncertain about its importance, we need to talk to k with
co-workers or your supervisors; perhaps they can see its

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 importance in ways that we are not able to see, and finally set /
redefined the goal which is important to us.
2. Difficulty in reaching a learning goal. The best way to
make a learning goal less difficult is to break it up into smaller,
more easily achieved goals. In most cases, a difficult learning
goal is one that is too broad.
3. Stress in reaching a learning goal. Determining the specific
problem that we are expecting and want to develop specific
steps to deal with each problem. As above, most often learning
is perceived to be stressful because it is too big to handle.
Breaking the goal into smaller and more manageable goals is
often a big stress-reducer.
4. Doubts about success: many people leave the learning due
to doubts about success which usually arise because a too large
learning goal has been set or the learner is doubtful about the
success. Keep breaking the goal down until you have specific
goals for which you know you can succeed easily.
5. Lack of control. Develop specific plans for ensuring that we
will be able to control and use what we learn.
For example, we are getting a lot of learning from here and
there but due to less use of these information we are not able
to use these learning, making a plan for using the newly learn
knowledge will resolve this issue.
6. Poor attitude towards the goal. This is a very difficult
obstacle to overcome because it may be quite a long-standing,
deep-rooted barrier. The best way to remove this barrier is to
face it and experience success in doing so. This, of course, is
easier said than done. It is possible,
To do this following need to be done
(a) Break the goal down into "bearable" goals
(b) Build into your action plans lots of support from family,
friends and co-workers.
7. Lack of support from others. Although you can try to change
the behavior of non-supporters, it is probably easier and more
effective to seek out support where it exists. In other words,
build into your action plan ways to (a) avoid your critics, at
least while pursuing your learning goal and (b) find supporters
for your learning goal.

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 8. Lack of advantages. Research will be helpful here. Talk to
your supervisor, to co-workers and to well-wishers and trainers
about the potential advantages of reaching a learning goal.
Trainers will be a good place to start; they should be able to
justify what they train in terms of improved performance, easier
performance or better linkages to other learning.
9. Importance of learning and having skills: Sometimes it
seems that the fund will not be available for learning the new
skills, but once a long term plan will be made it can be easily
find out that investing money will help the team to learn the
certain skills and will help the team to resolve the issues
without work outsourcing, a cost benefit analysis must be done
to know the importance of the required skills and to get the
required resources.

Section 2- Know how to develop self and others to achieve

organizational objectives

AC 2.1. Briefly analyze learning/development options for

yourself and the other member of your team

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 Development options for Myself

Sr. Developme Support

Development activity Success criteria
No. nt objective required

1) To study all the basic Rail 1) From various

system documents. Rail system Basic understanding
Enhance 2) To attend training of all rail teams to of various rail
technical system. understand the systems and
01 understanding of
knowledge of 3) To understand the interfaces system.
Rail Systems. between different rail systems. 2) Trainings diffesrent failure
4) To understand the impact of 3) FMC/ Ops for modes and its impact
failures related to each of the impact and First on revenue operation.
rail systems. line response
1) Management of workload
2) Management of high
Enhance time
priority ,medium priority and low From superior to
02 management Timely ompletion of
priority work understand the
skills work with quality
3) Delegation of work priority of work and
4) Preparation of To do list with
priority

Enhancement of negotiation skills to

Enhance
get the work done by different
03 negotiation stakeholders with less effort and
skills within the stipulated time.

1) Attend senior management

meeting, Operation and
1) Different
Maintenance Interface meetings
Enhance meetings in SDM
2) Review the conflict issues with
2) Meetings with
05 Conflict Operation and other interface Less conflict with
Management Client and third varios department,
departments and their outcomes
skill Party
3) Attend the meeting with client
and other third party and resolve
conflict issue

Development options for Lakshan Fernando:

Sr. Developme Development activity Support Success criteria

No. nt objective required
Enhance basic 1) To study design document of the
1) Level 3 ATC 1) Better Systems
technical ATC system.
system training understanding
knowledge of 2) To study the ATC interface
01 2) Interface related 2) Deep upderstanding
ATC system documents
training of the ATC system
and its
interface
interface with
other systems

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 One coaching session from Section
head / HR manager.
(1) Develop rapport with Client and
other internal teams
(2) View some motivational videos 1) Different
and read some books to build the meetings in SDM
Persuading and ideas and get exposure 2) Meetings with 1) Feedback from
02
Influencing (3) Attend different meeting and Client and third different stake
evaluate whether you are able to Party holders .
influence other teams.

(4) Discuss difficult issues with team

and find out whether you are able
to persuade them

(1) Conduct meeting with TLs on 1) Copy of minutes

weekly basis & review the of meeting,
outcome of all the decision feedback from
made in order to enhance staff team and
engagement. Within Serco
operation team
03 Deciding and (2) Perform some test scneario premises day to day 2) PM
Initiating Action which are not performed to give working accomplishment
clear guidelines to Operation and KPI
Team accomplishment
within the control
(3) Lead the team for improvement of ATC team
of the processes and

Technical
(4) 3)
report writing

Routine
business (5) 4)
correspondence

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AC 2.2 Identify support mechanisms, such as training
resources, job rotation or coaching, for the development of
yourself and the other team member.

AC 2.3 Prepare a development plan to achieve one of the

learning objectives either for yourself or the other team
member

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AC 2.4 Describe how a method such as experience /learning log
could be used to monitor development

An experience/Learning log is a written record of learner’s learning

which he make after getting the experience. It could be any kind of
learning which could be related to his routine work, job related work or
any learning related to the his job role. It is a personal record of
learner’s own learning. A Learning Log helps the learner to record,
structure, thinks about and reflects upon, plan, develop and evidence
of his own learning.

A learning log contains record of the learner’s experiences, thoughts,

feelings and reflections. One of the most important things it contains
is conclusions about how what we have learnt is relevant to us and
how we will use the new information/knowledge/skill/technique in the
future.

It may contain details of problems we have encountered and solved (or

not solved). Examples of where we have started to try out and
practice a new skill and examples of our own formal and informal
learning. Formal learning is ‘taught’ in a formal academic setting - for
example via a lecture. Informal learning is learning which takes place
outside a formal academic setting, for example, though talking with
friends or colleagues in a social setting.

A Learning Log is a personal document. Its content may be very

loosely structured and only of relevance to the learner. Once we have
commenced a Learning Log we will find it a valuable and useful 'tool' to
help your learning and to help us to think about and structure our own
learning.

In the experience/learning log, the learner can include following:

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  It contains record of our experiences, thoughts, feelings and
reflections
 It contains our conclusions about how and what we have
learnt is relevant and how we will use the new
information/knowledge/skill/technique in the future
 It may contain details of problems we have encountered and
solved (or not solved)
 It will help us to become more aware of how we learns, what
learning tasks we enjoys (and don't enjoy) and of our
emotional and thought processes
 We can use learning Log to record courses, books,
discussions, Internet sites, and television programs we have
gone through
 Assessor can review our learning log and identify any gap in
development objective achievement to address in future
 Learning log can work as evidence for any type of assessment
for us (i.e. competency, promotion interview, membership etc.)
 Learning log is a useful for reminding us for aspects of our
learning that we may have forgotten about but which could be
useful for us in the future

For filling the experience log, following question can be asked

such as:

 What was learnt?

 Where did you learn?
 What went well?
 What could have been better?
 Key learning things?
 How it could have been better?
 How it will be improved for next time?
 How can we use this to plan for the future?
 How can we use this to plan new learning?
 Experiences
 Etc.

By regular monitoring of the learning log the learner can find out that
he is learning the new skills and can start using the new skills

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regularly, the learner an improve the techniques and skills on routine
basis, for this he need to evaluate the experience log and filter out the
newly learnt skills, improvements and other key points which were
asked while filling the logbook, and then the learner can improve his
performance based on the outcome of this evaluation.

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