Scholarship / Maintain good relations with positive people can help developing myself as a person; Chevening essay [2]

Hi! I would love to hear your feedback on this networking essay that I wrote for Chevening scholarship application.

Networking Skills essay

Chevening is looking for individuals with strong professional relationship building skills, who will engage with the Chevening community and influence and lead others in their chosen profession. Please explain how you build and maintain relationships in a professional capacity, using clear examples of how you currently do this, and outline how you hope to use these skills in the future.

My own experience and observation have taught me that investing my time to maintain good relations with positive people can help developing myself as a person and working for greater causes, especially for an aspiring researcher as I am.

At the beginning of my time in the university, I started to build a network when I joined a campus organization called Xxxx Xxxx Xxx Xxxxxxx. In the organisation, I befriended not only with fellow students of my batch, but also with senior students. One of my seniors offered me to fill in his position at Xxxxx Xxxxx Xxxxxxxx (XXX). My obvious commitment and desire to strive in my academic career while working part-time appeared to impress my supervisor in XXX. My good academic record and ability to converse in English encouraged her to introduce me to her colleagues. Through this connection, I was given the opportunity to write a review for a research article by a professor in Australian National University. The Indonesian scholars in Australia with whom I have had good relations since my time in XXX were also willing to give recommendations when I applied for jobs as they had known about the result of my work before, both in academic and job-related field.

After graduation, I was aware that I had to step up my networking skills to succeed in my professional career. Working with prominent foreign practitioners and researchers in Xxxx Xxx Xxxx (XXX) has particularly pushed me to learn about managing relations with different parties, including the local people in Maluku, Indonesia, that collaborate closely with us. I believe that respecting other people regardless of their economic and education background is of paramount importance to establishing any trusting relationship. Furthermore, voicing our opinions in the right manner and time, and honesty, is necessary to maintain long-term personal and professional relations. By conducting myself on the basis of those principles, I earned trusts from my colleagues in XXX and the local people and government. As the result, my colleagues in XXX fully support my plan to pursue master's degree. They also have agreed to give recommendation letter to universities in the UK when needed.

My plans upon returning to Indonesia include collaborating with researchers and practitioners from different backgrounds interested in rural empowerment and sustainable development. Indonesia clearly needs more qualified and experienced individuals working in the least developed regions across Indonesia, particularly eastern Indonesia, to foster improvement in the people's well-being. My current works have allowed me to be involved in such collaboration. However, I believe that being a Chevening scholar will open up new possibilities of meeting young professionals from around the world and learning from their experiences.

(word count: 445 words)

Scholarship / Leader must be flexible, adaptable, able to communicate ideas and opinions in an understandable way [5]

Hi! I am currently applying for Chevening graduate scholarship programme and would like to hear your feedback on this essay.

Essay 1: Leadership and Influence

Chevening is looking for individuals that will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answer. (minimum word count: 100 words, maximum word counts: 500 words).

In this increasingly complex world, an influential leader must be flexible, adaptable, and able to communicate ideas and opinions in an understandable manner. I believe that I have the quality of being such leader based on my past experience in campus organisation and current professional career.

In my second year of university, I participated in a student-led international seminar and conference as a general secretary who was in-charge of formulizing the theme and the concept of the event. I observed that previous committees had had difficulties in translating the chosen themes to the public that resulted in low public engagement. My team and I were motivated to achieve our goal, which was promoting academic discussion that involved the general public. I did an extensive research about social-economic issues in Asia and discussed it with my colleagues. I was able to convince my team to pick a relevant topic of the growing of urban area in Asia by expressing my research-based opinions. It was a relief to find that the seminar and the conference that we had arranged succeeded in drawing public interest and non-academic participants.

Not long after graduation, I took up the challenge to work in Xxxx Xxx Xxx (XXX), which most of the work is done on the field and involves less familiar topics to me, so that I could enrich my knowledge and test out my adaptability skills. I consider this opportunity as a crucial turn since my previous research experience was dominated by desk-research. Driven by my desire to comprehend the issues, I listened to various kinds of people that I met during our visit, especially the local people. I evaluated the information that I received on a daily basis and tried to improve. I found that this method has not just escalated my understanding about the problems on the field, but also strengthened the relationships that I build with the locals beyond professional setting. As one of the consequences, the local people and the government appeared to value my opinions more than before.

Becoming a good leader to other people is a perpetual process since it requires an individual to constantly adapt to new people and environments. Learning from my experience, I perceive that the process is firstly determined by how I lead myself before extending my lead to others. Joining the Chevening program certainly allows me to explore diverse environments that induce me to enhance my leadership skills.

(word count: 404 words)