Weekly Insight 11

            I thoroughly enjoyed last week’s class discussion. While I believe not every student should attend some type of post-secondary education, I role-played the opposite.  I think it was helpful for me to role-play the opposite of my beliefs because I could see both sides of the argument.  I shared in class that some student’s may not have the maturity to complete post-secondary education and forcing them to do so, would set them up for failure.  While I was in the service, one question we all would ask in similar settings was whether we believed that all students, who are graduating from high school, should serve at least two years in the military.  The military does have some sort of post-secondary technical trade education.  This would offer young people an opportunity to learn discipline, respect, and education.  While I was stationed in Italy, I had a discussion with one of their countries’ military members.  He said that every male, who graduates high school, has to serve at least two years in the military. 

Another significant discussion in last week’s class I thought was intriguing was what our group thought was the definition of success.  After each group presented what their definition was, it became clear to me there was a common theme.  The theme was as maintaining a quality happy life through goals, financial security, and meaningful relationships.  I wrote was a person’s definition of success depends on their goals, values, and beliefs.  Culturally, individualists tend to base success off of how much money, status, or education is obtained.  Alternatively, collectivists are likely to base their success off of their contribution to their family or community. 

            Starting to change happiness and effectiveness within a company may increase the success of an individual.  Brown’s Chapter 15 discussed how companies have seen that focusing on the success of their employees and opportunities for advancement within the company increase their effectiveness at work.  Brown (2012) discusses that United Auto Workers—Ford (UAW—Ford) has a life-work planning program which created apprenticeship programs to assist employee’s advancement within the company.  Another company offering employee focused on effectiveness of the employee is GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).  Their program focuses on changing employee’s work styles and increase management’s knowledge of work environments.

 

Brown, D.  (2012).  Career development programming in business organizations. Career

Information, Career Counseling, and Career Development (10th ed., pp. 330-348).  New
York: Pearson Education, Inc.