BSBWOR501 - Manage personal work priorities and

professional development

Assessment 2 – Project (Case Study)

Priorities tasks and develop professional competencies

Anirbit Ghosh

ICM0788

International College of Melbourne

Table of Contents
Introduction..................................................................................................................................................................... 4
Maintain personal performance........................................................................................................................... 4
Action plan........................................................................................................................................................................ 6
Use of technology.......................................................................................................................................................... 7
Web-based System.......................................................................................................................................................... 7
Priority Mapping.............................................................................................................................................................. 7
Assess personal knowledge and skill against competency standard...............................................8
Learning style and developmental opportunities....................................................................................10
Networks to enhance personal knowledge.................................................................................................. 11
Skills to achieve competitive edge.................................................................................................................... 12
Personal Development Plan................................................................................................................................. 12
Appendix......................................................................................................................................................................... 14
Executive Summary

The case study delves into managing personal work priorities and professional
development of the customer service aspect of Australian Hardware Wollongong Store.
First a personal development plan has drafted in accordance with inputs from the CEO
of the company and following the managing guidelines. The personal goals where then
assigned to the organisational goal of the employees to achieve success. The paper
secondly uses performance competency standards to measure the personal
performance and take corrective actions. Finally, case study concludes by providing
feedback and analysing different learning styles that can adapted to enhance the
personal performance and organisational objectives. With the help of this case study
one can model their own behaviour to suit the requirement as customer service
manager.
Introduction
The case study here represents the competency created to perform activities in order to
establish personal work goals, set and meet own work priorities of Australian Hardware
Wollongong Store. The store has decided to help staff by providing guidance to manage
personal work priorities and professional development. The priority was set by the
customer services manager after conducting a review with the CEO that the focus is on
personal competency and professional development of employees. The current work
ethics of individuals in the company have been the key factor that has impacted work
performance, culture, productivity and patterns of the employee behaviour. Managers
are generally looked upon as role models in the workplace. Individuals at management
level possess great organisational skills. The customer service manager of the
Australian Hardware Wollongong store was involved in identifying how an individual
act as a role model which helps in providing high standards and developing personal
work goal for employees in order to improve productivity. The manager believes that he
should be a team player and know his roles and responsibilities. Lack of awareness was
the main reason for a manager to be a poor model but with the introduction of new
technologies information will be available to all the employees over the intranet and
targets would be tracked to meet goals. The case study involves events that are likely to
occur in an organisation which relate to the following

a) Establishing personal work goals

b) Organising and prioritising activities
c) Create personal career plan
d) Research and recognise useful technologies and networking tools

Customer Service is the main area of focus in the case study. Customer service
competency standards and the “Customer service policy” are reviewed and the goals of
the company need to be identified and prioritised to improve the customer service
activity of the Australian Hardware Wollongong Store.

Australian Hardware Wollongong Store believes in making decisions and acting upon
them with integrity in order to achieve goals. The professional competence to measure
success in the organisation was as follow:
 a) Customer-focus- The organisation is customer orientated and provides efficient
customer service designed to customer needs. Great customer service leads to
customer referrals
b) Performance- The aim is to always set the bar high and strive to do better by
setting smaller achievable goals.
c) Work Ethics- The business is built on trust and honesty. Employees that build a
positive work ethic can offer a better customer experience by building better
bonds and relationships.
d) Teamwork- The organisation assists everyone to grow and perform together.
Productivity is high when individual support and respect each other to achieve
success as a team.
e) Community and environmental responsibility- part of the community that
practices sustainable ways to achieve success.

Maintain personal performance

The organisation has identified varying work conditions, work contexts and
contingencies that may arise. There is a need to maintain the personal performance by
assigning measurable values. Personal performance is an activity where you achieve
goals in an efficient and effective way in accordance with organisational goals. A tool is
used to evaluate and compare the manager’s strengths and weaknesses to that of
others. As a customer service manager, it is vital to discover the skills and knowledge
required and the leadership style to create a positive role model. The various employee
work practices need to be measured to understand if these are the best in the market
compared to the competitors.

Once the broader goals are set its essential to create smaller goals to be able to measure
personal performance under vary work conditions, contexts and under contingencies.
From customer service managers view the below listed ways suggest the required
personal performance.

a) Make the customer representatives happier so they take an extra step to achieve
customer satisfaction.
b) Train and educate employees about customer service process, so they are more
equipped to handle problems.
c) Develop a hiring process to recruit better employees.
 The goals and the measurable values for customer service manager is shown below:

Goal Reason KPI (Measurable value)

Improve employee Happy employees corelate Weekly meetings to study
satisfaction by 10% in to happy customer. This satisfaction and run
next 6 months. implies to better customer internal surveys
service and less customer
churn.
Employees achieve 85% The team needs to stay at The grade system on the
scores on training and par with the new quiz assists in
product quiz. technologies and understanding the
necessary training should personal performance of
be arranged to adequately the employee.
train employees to tackle
problems faster. An
individual that holds good
knowledge and skills about
services can satisfy
customers better.
Increase the Net The employee that leaves a The percentage helps the
promoter score by 20% lasting impression on a business understand how
in next 6 months customer generally helps likely people are
in retaining customers and interested to recommend
getting more referrals for the service to friends and
taking an extra step to family.
cater the customer needs.

As a customer service manager, it is necessary to be customer-centric attitude. As if

manager doesn’t put customers at the centre of everything they do, the sub-ordinates
won’t do either. Being in customer service department, it is important to have powerful
communication skills. It is necessary for a manager to communicate effectively with
their teams and influence the stakeholders too. Manager should handle the most
problematic customer service situations when teams fails to deliver it, and to do this, it
is prerequisite to have powerful communication skills to navigate these thought-
provoking situations. Good managers should inspire themselves and motivate the
team to always looking for how they can make difference for their customers, team and
to the Australian Hardware Store. A great team manager is master of priorities, knows
to set balance the team’s time spent in delivering the service to the customer with the
time spent in resolving their issues. Team manager should have work-life balance, it
inspires the team to be well organised and to have a plan. And last but not least,
providing constructive feedback. It is very necessary to highlight the mistakes the
team is committing but in a constructive way. This way team will be inspired by their
manager and work on their flaws. Activities of customer service manager

a) Efficient at working priorities- Managers are required to establish objectives and

break them to smaller goals. The goals are then prioritised in order to meet
organisational goals. Good managers can set priorities based on requirement and
action them to achieve success.
b) Courageous- Manager should be well equipped to handle new technologies. They
need to encourage and empower their team to push boundaries and take
chances.
c) Goal orientation- Managers should be driven by goals to make a decision.
d) Inspired and contagious enthusiasm- Good leaders help foster a sense of
enthusiasm in team members. Team members look at their leaders in search of
inspiration. Keeping a positive outlook about the role can be contagious.
e) Desire to help others grow and succeed- A great manager is the one who has the
desire to assist their members to grow and succeed together. The care and
nurture to motivate a team mate to achieve goals by creating a synergy where an
employee feels more than just a part of the organisation.

Action plan
Activities Dates/Timelines Accountability
Determination of staff Monthly Customer service manager
requirements
Knowledge and skill Bi-monthly Customer service manager,
assessment HR manager
Recruitment of skilled Quarterly Customer service manager,
staff HR manager
 Performance Yearly twice Customer service manager
management
Quality Assurance Bi-monthly Customer service manager,
review Quality assessment
manager
Training employees on Monthly Customer service manager
customer service skill
Review employee salary Yearly twice CEO, Customer service
package to meet manager, HR manager
industry standards

Use of technology
Technology has become an integral part to enhance performance and meet
organisational objectives. In order to create an efficient way of performing tasks to meet
your priorities it is important to use the appropriate technology to manage the tasks at
Australian hardware Wollongong Store.

Web-based System
A web-based tool like MS outlook would be the best suited business technology to be
used to create, use, organise and prioritise tasks and commitments for this role.
Managers rely on data present in a document such as word processors are excellent
method of communication about event in the organisation. These serves as historical
evidences that allows an individual to revisit the copy of the document and analyse to
identify issues and tackle them thus increasing efficiency. Handling services over the
internet can save the organisation time and save money. Online services like video
conferencing, conference call has enabled teams to work in synergy from anywhere in
the world. It negates travelling times to attend meetings and hence increase
effectiveness and efficiency. Use of web-based applications like Visio and Microsoft
project can help a manager to visualise a scenario from a new perspective and make
appropriate decisions. In recent times the mobile phone has been used as an effective
tool to store our tasks, set reminder and communicate with team members via email or
voice calls to achieve their organisational goals and objectives.

Priority Mapping
The priority map explains and enables every individual in the organisation to have the
understanding about the priorities of the co workers which is essential to achieve
success. The priorities are marked for each entity related to the business to achieve
success in customer service. The priority map prioritise the relationship of the shared
stakeholders in the organisation like customer and employee. In this demonstration the
priority with top concern is marked as Priority 1 and the relationship that are of least
concern are marked as Priority 3.

Assess personal knowledge and skill against competency standard

To make sure that the organisation can meet and maintain standards, it is vital for a
manager to measure his own performance. With the help of the job description, roles
and responsibilities a manager should create a tool to track professional competency
standards. These are used to measure the degree of measure and take corrective steps
to meet the standards. There are generally two types of competency i.e.

a) National standards which is specific to industry and followed nationwide in

terms of formal qualification.
b) Enterprise specific standards that are consistent specific to the specific business
which are also known as organisational standards.
Skills and Competency standard Actual Corrective
knowledge performance actions
Committed Experience in managing Review Interacting more
and customer expectations and employee sales with employees to
dedicated identifying customer needs to understand understand the
hard worker trends and carry drawback and
out surveys. plan actions to
tackle customer
requirements
Risk High level of interpersonal The work ethic Training
management skills and ability to deal with currently fails to employees in need
distressed or angry address on weekly basis
customers handling to upgrade
distressed interpersonal
customers and skills
lack of
awareness
doesn’t allow
employee to
provide relevant
information
about services.
Customer Understand customer At the present Technologies
satisfaction perspectives and ensure 70% of the should be used to
responsiveness to their customer ensure every
needs. receive customer is
responses attended as per
regarding the “Customer
queries. Service policy” .
Creativeness Identify customer service Close 80% of Give more time
needs and implement calls related to and attention to
solutions issues. customers to gain
more knowledge
about a case to
 reach resolution
Teamwork Collaborate with internal and Have quarterly Conduct monthly
external parties to improve team bonding team bonding
customer outcome activity. activity to
understand team
members.
Customer Maintain relationships with Reached 10% Add incentive for
relationship key customer in area of rise in NPS in employees who
expertise the last quarter. great the highest
counts of
customer referrals
Connect and collaborate with Team bonding Networking
relevant stakeholders within activity is the events to be
Networking
the community. sole networking developed to
event. create more value
to employee skill
and give them the
opportunity to
grab exposure.

Learning style and developmental opportunities

The organisation has range of training programs to develop staff skills and meet business
requirements. The employees learning style should be translated to mixed learning techniques.
Every individual is so exclusive and hence no single style is same. Learning styles define
different kinds of people and the ways they perceive information. Learning abilities assist you to
use information in the best format suitable to address the circumstances.

The VAK – visual, auditory and kinaesthetic technique is the best suited approach at
Australian Hardware Wollongong Store to address the development opportunities. It is simple
way of learning through either visuals, audio or physical aspects. The model provides enhanced
perspectives about available information that is relatable to the real-world scenario. The more
you observe and understand other perspectives the better you see and understand the learning
style of team members and colleagues.

Charts and graphs would be used to analyse sale percentage and handling customer issues.
Visual representation of the goal, target and the result required to meet objectives can enable
people realise their duties with clarity. Holding regular meetings and conducting performance
reviews twice a year can help employees align their goals to competency standards to meet
priorities and accomplish goals. Managers should not restrict their employees from learning and
some employees have the ability to pick up skills and knowledge based on their personal
physical experience and practical knowledge. There is no preferred learning style and the aim is
to provide various learning styles to facilitate employees upgrade skills based on their own best
learning abilities.

Networks to enhance personal knowledge

Three networks to enhance the personal knowledge skills and work relationships are
operational networking, social media networking for instance Instagram and Facebook
and conferences & meet up events.  Being in the customer service department, it is very
important to maintain cordial relationship with customers and business partners. So, it
is necessary to have a Hardware store page in the social media like Instagram and
Facebook which not only helps in branding but also increases the customer interaction,
customer relationship and business partners will get an idea about the store popularity.
The conferences and meet ups provide a great opportunity to target specific people,
expertise and skills. Operational networking to have a good relationship within the
hardware store.

 Development plan for increasing the networking –

1.      Connecting with the customers via email or phone calls to get their
feedback. This will make them feel that we value them and are willing to resolve
their issues. This can help to establish trust and may even prevent them from
sharing their concerns or negative comments on social media channels. Also,
sending personal newsletter once per month with new product details that are
available in the store or about upcoming sales or guidance to repair the product
that are bought in the store.
2.      Operational networking - All managers need to build good working
relationships with the people who can help them do their jobs. The purpose of
this type of networking is to ensure coordination and cooperation among people
who have to know and trust one another in order to accomplish their immediate
tasks.
3.      Strategic networking – Figuring out the future priorities and challenges and
to get the shareholder support for them. Being a customer service manager can
 understand the needs and priories of the customers. Thus, it is very important to
convey it to the stakeholders to get things done.

Skills to achieve competitive edge

Customer service is a meek tool for attaining a competitive edge in any hardware
market. The seamless bonding with shareholders is based on trust, support,
commitment, clarity and reliability; none of these is possible without the outstanding
customer service.  

A great customer service team, helps to run day-to-day busy hardware store at
Wollongong smoothly, being at sorting quick query or helping to place a new order. This
creates a brand. Hence, customer service is face of the brand. Customer service also
offer transparency in the system, i.e. partners and customers are involved in the
throughout the process, and not presented with surprised prices. Thus, helping in
boosting customer retention.

Further old-style customer service can help hardware store by engaging customers and
business partners in all the channels like online and offline deals. For instance- offering
exclusive deals on channel products and services.

Personal Development Plan

Current role – Customer service Manager
Name – Anirbit Ghosh
Store – Australian Hardware Store
Development Focus: Improved effectiveness in current role and preparation for
potential senior leadership role.
Top 3 Strengths
1.      Customer service expertise
2.      Powerful communicator
3.      Problem-solving & decision-making
Top 3 Development Needs
1.      Cross-functional skills development
Development Action: Speak to my manager about my desire to lead a high-level, cross-
functional process improvement team. This would leverage some of my existing
strengths and allow me to gain experience in leading change and strategic thinking, as
well as learn about other functions in the store.
Training program – Technical training
Timing: Next week, for potential second-quarter project
Cost: None, just my time
2.      Coaching and developing my team
Development Action: Work with each of my team members to create Individual
development program (IDPs). Be sure to use a coaching approach, asking for rather
than telling. Practice my listening skills and ask for feedback.
Training program – Managerial and leadership training
Timing: Start next week, one per week
Cost: None, just my time
3.      Handling conflict
Development Action: Work with hardware store manager and HR on my own IDP; get
assistance in working with my employees.
Subscribe to the company management newsletter.
Timing: This week, and as needed
Cost: None, just my time

Appendix
1) Stakeholder Consultation format
2) Personal development Plan