Introduction
Self-reflection is a cognitive process involving refocusing the brain on past or present encounters meant to shape or acquire a deeper insight regarding an aspect for present or future application. Folks engage in self-evaluation for various purposes, including the desire to avoid faults committed in the past. Often, people struggle to resolve an issue they faced in the past or that someone else experienced. Such moments force persons to reminisce about something they overcame or apply a lesson learned from past happenstances. Self-reflection is a significant source of self-awareness as the process aids in examining self and past interactions and judgments. The cognitive practice also helps in withholding biases and questioning dogma, thus assisting in shaping a holistic being. The present work delves into the self-examination subject by defining and evaluating its basic concepts. The work also applies the self-reflection scheme to my past schooling experience and the future HR profession.
Purpose and Benefits of Self-Reflection
Humans have an innate desire to manage all the situations coming their way with ease and never like concealing defeat. Very few experiences happen to humans once in life, explaining the need to remember the past and examine history for cognitive development. David Kolb’s experiential learning philosophy forms a substantial background for learning self-reflection (Lehane, 2020). The theory posits that practical learning occurs in at least four ways. Such methods include material learning, immaterial conceptualization, vigorous experimentation, and reflective scrutiny. Reflective observation involves the direct examination of personal experiences using the peculiar inner lens to mirror the deeper meaning of their experiences. The theory terms these four methods of learning as necessary cycles that parties seeking to realize self-awareness and unbiased knowledge must undergo.
Learning Cycle
Gibbs’ reflective cycle provides one of the complete forms of inner reflection that individuals and learners can apply. The model leads self-reflection through six phases surrounding a situation or specific personal experience (Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah, 2019). Such stages include narration, emotions, assessment, examination, deduction, and action plan. The six phases of self-reflection follow each other in a systematic order that helps individuals start and end the process with vivid comprehension of new skills or insight (Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah, 2019). The reflective model belongs to Graham Gibbs and offers knowledge from experience. Markkanen et al. (2020) cheer Gibbs’ model of self-reflection as a great philosophy of learning that combines empiricism and rationalism. Empiricisms refer to the epistemological model that views experience as the primary source of knowledge, while rationalism maintains reason as the source and test of authentic knowledge (Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah, 2019). Through self-reflection, individuals use experience and reasoning to fine-tune knowledge for actual development.
Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle
Gibbs’ reflection model is among several prototypes people can use for self-reflection. Adeani, Febriani, and Syafryadin (2020) note that the scheme stands out when applied either in a stand-alone experience or a situation. However, the last stage, the action plan, is not applicable in independent experiences. Adeani, Febriani, and Syafryadin (2020) thus commend the model for reflecting on frequent occurrences among humans. The following discussion covers each of the stages of Gibbs’ self-reflection paradigm.
Narration
Narration is the first stage in self-reflection, as per Gibbs’ model. The phase describes the specific encounter or situation under reflection in detail. Narration mainly offers an account of the past happenings without providing a judgment. During this stage, the individual remembers the events, the venue, the parties present, and the person’s actions during the event (Constantinou et al., 2020). Providing the various aspects allows the individual undertaking self-reflection to vividly comprehend the context and the reason for being in the state.
Moods
The moods phase involves exploring thoughts or emotions during the reflected experience. The individual examines how the moods experienced then affected the situation’s outcomes (Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah, 2019). Intrinsically, the reflector investigates their feelings before and after the state under review. The stage also looks at one’s thoughts on how the others felt about the position and the party undertaking self-reflection (Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah, 2019). Lastly, the individual outlines their feelings during the past experience or crisis and now during reflection.
Assessment
The assessment stage allows a self-reflector to apply feelings, unlike in the earlier two phases, where one only describes issues. Lehane (2020) notes that the appraisal stage requires objectivity and honesty to evaluate what worked or failed to work during the past encounter. The person needs to consider both the negatives and positives regarding the situation to be exploitive. A critical issue to focus on during the stage further concerns the personal contributions impacting the state under reflection, whether negatively or positively.
Examination
The examination phase is where an individual makes sense of the situation’s happenings on focus. Besides focusing on mere details, the examination stage gives the individual a chance to acquire significance from past incidents (Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah, 2019). The person looks at the different features, both right and wrong, and asks why such happened. Consulting academic literature at this level is crucial for acquiring the correct meaning of each aspect regarding the reflection.
Deduction
The deduction stage elucidates the happenings and summarizes critical takeaways from the reflected scenario. Moreover, the individual investigates what changes can occur to improve a similar situation in the future (Constantinou et al., 2020). Furthermore, the self-reflector seeks ways to improve the condition, including developing the necessary skills to manage the matter better. Similarly, the individual looks for alternative actions to mend the case if a similar encounter repeats itself.
Action plan
Action plan forms the last stage of self-reflection, according to Gibbs’ model. At this phase, the individual establishes a method for handling a similar situation in the present or future (Lehane, 2020). The step also involves establishing a plan for new skills to become more aware of self. Setting reminders on the corrective measures similarly occurs during this step, making the individual highly equipped to face the future with increased certainty. During this last stage, Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah (2019) argue that an individual exhibits essential information about several things, including biases and knowledge inadequacy leading to past failure or compromises. The stage further allows self-reflection to appraise and acknowledge the essence and effectiveness of learned skills, such as managerial abilities.
Reflective Outline
HR professionals affect the quality and quantity of individual employees’ output via their management style. Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah (2019) provide self-awareness as superior knowledge that people must have to become influential HR professionals. Self-awareness helps HR leaders to appreciate their strengths and weaknesses. According to Adeani, Febriani, and Syafryadin (2020), the skill can be nurtured through self-reflection. The following discussion thus describes my self-reflection process by applying group work experience at the college level. The point that college-based group works involve teamwork skills makes the situation similar to the HR management tasks I anticipate in the future.
Narration
The present self-reflection process majors on a previously written group assignment that my two classmates and I undertook. The desire to save time made us divide the assignment’s sections to allow each person to research a specific area. The expectation was that we would combine the different works a day before the submission deadline, meaning that we had not scheduled time to review the results together before the set date. However, the reality that each of us had written the assignment differently hit us hard on the agreed date, compromising all our plans and schedule. We all had to forgo our evening plans to work through the night to fix the work.
Moods
I was happy and contented when bringing my research work, expecting that everyone had superior work like mine. I was also hopeful that we would complete the compilation in a short while and proceed to the evening plans uninterrupted. The idea of subdividing tasks seemed brilliant, and I viewed my team as an informed one for the decision. The realization that our decision was a tremendous mistake made me frustrated. I additionally became guilty that we inconvenienced our friends by canceling our earlier plans to redo the project that evening. However, I feel satisfied now that we utilized our time well and worked hard to beat the deadline despite the earlier mistake.
Assessment
All the group members were goal-oriented and focused, which helped us work within the set schedule. Canceling our evening plans also motivated us to utilize the remaining time well, thus boosting the team’s work morals. However, the assumption that we could deliver similar work messed us up.
Examination
Having each member choose the topic to cover during the group work made our tasks’ sub-division a success. The success comes from each member taking a subject that matchers their strength, as noted by Ardian, Hariyati, and Afifah’s (2019) team roles’ concept. The strategy resulted from a previous group work where the same idea worked well. However, failing to plan the structure of the work together before going to work alone led to the mistake, probably due to the collective rationalization issues (Graham, 2020). Challenging our assumptions concerning the plan would help us foresee the threat and develop a strategy to avoid it. Appreciating the “collective rationalization” and “illusion of invulnerability” blunders will help me avoid such group-related slipups as the HR professional.
Deduction
The experience taught me the need to plan, as a group, before dividing tasks. Doing this makes combining sections handled by individuals easy. The same also helps in time management and quality work delivery. I purpose to allow people to subdivide tasks based on their strengths and abilities to promote efficiency and quality (Lehane, 2020). Moreover, I now understand the need to challenge group decisions to avoid agreements resulting from groupthink.
Action Plan
I purpose to identify the strength and ability of each group member the next time I will be working with one. I also endeavor to lead the tasks’ subdivision process based on the individual members’ abilities to promote quality and efficiency. Moreover, I will always insist that we handle the initial tasks together to understand what each member should deliver. Similarly, I will encourage team members to challenge our initial decisions to curb groupthink-related mistakes. Furthermore, remembering that I want the best results will enable me to differ with shared mentalities, even when such feels abrasive.
Reference List
Adeani, I.S., Febriani, R.B. and Syafryadin, S. (2020) ‘Using Gibbs ‘reflective cycle in making reflections of literary analysis.’ Indonesian EFL Journal, 6(2), pp.139-148.
Ardian, P., Hariyati, R.T.S. and Afifah, E. (2019) ‘Correlation between implementation case reflection discussion based on the Graham Gibbs Cycle and nurses’ critical thinking skills.’ Elsevier, 29, pp.588-593.
Constantinou, C.S. et al. (2020) ‘Critical reflection on own beliefs for cultural competence in medical education: An analysis of tutors’ reflective narratives.’ Qualitative Research in Education, 9(3), pp.273-299.
Graham, J. (2020) ‘Ideology, shared moral narratives, and the dark side of collective rationalization.’ Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 43.
Lehane, L. (2020) ‘Experiential learning—David A. Kolb.’ In science education in theory and practice (pp. 241-257). Edited by Akpan Ben and Kennedy Teresa J. Switzerland: Springer, Cham.
Markkanen, P. et al. (2020) ‘A reflective cycle: Understanding challenging situations in a school setting.’ Educational Research, 62(1), pp.46-62.