Coworkers and supervisors - Networking Skills Essay - Chevening Scholarship

I have written below statement to Chevening scholarship and would highly appreciate your comments, correction and feedback.

positive relationships at a workplace

We are looking for individuals with strong professional relationship building skills, who will engage with our 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.

Building positive relationships is important task of your everyday life. Additionally, social networking through communication and workplace interactions is an effective way to become successful in the workplace. Building positive relationships and using open communication with your managers, peers, and subordinates creates a more cohesive and efficient work environment.

One way I work to build relationships is by serving as a role model for my team members and always working with professionalism. I not only put forth my best work, but also recognize the work being completed by my teammates. I look for positive things to say to each member on a daily basis in order to motivate and encourage my team. When working with subordinates, I create an advising environment rather than a critical one, and I use constructive criticism in conjunction with positive feedback in order to improve productivity. This has allowed me to keep communication open and collaborative between myself and those working under me. Additionally, I build team relationships by encouraging members to recognize each other's strengths. The benefits of effective face to face communication are immense. Not only does it build relationships, but it helps individuals get an understanding of the task at hand as well as the desired outcomes of those tasks. While employed at XXXX group, my largest asset was my ability to communicate in an effective manner with my teammates. Taking the extra time to listen to your coworkers, and hearing what they have to say, can make the difference between being a successful team leader or not.

When interacting with my coworkers, I openly discuss problems and work to maintain positive office relationships. At my previous job as a Reservoir Engineer at XXXX, two of my teammates did not get along, and things escalated to the point that it affected productivity due to their refusal to communicate. Once I recognized the problem, I talked with both of my teammates in order to understand each person's perspective. I found the two had a disagreement that stemmed from a conversation unrelated to work. Without taking a side on the issue, I worked with them to put the disagreement aside and act professionally in order to accomplish their tasks. Both my teammates were able to do so and productivity soon improved.

Building relationships with my supervisors was another asset I employed while at XXXX. Building a positive relationship with my supervisors enabled me to have a resource to go to when I have questions about my job tasks. The benefit of asking my superiors is they have previously experienced all of the same issues that I was facing. I could take their wisdom and apply it to the problem I was facing in order to make a more informed decision. As I continue forward, I hope to keep improving my communication skills and building meaningful relationships with my peers. Although there are many variables that influence achievement, it is through relationship building and open communication that you will find success.

Hello EngOmar09,
Nice to meet you.I think your essay is weak when making network since all examples are based on your office.You should write taking part in associations outside your office but it is directly related with your career,and write in a very concise and clear style how to extend your networks and what is your contribution by utilizing your networks.If you like to use office-based examples,please combine all paragraphs into one and find another very effective examples that lead fruitful reults to you and others.You do not show how to make communication in Chevening community and make connections and influence other people who are the same careers with you.You should highlight your profession much more,why networking is important in your job,and also your future plan to extend your network is weak lacking detail plan.You can use social media and online platform.Your writing should be more concise, detailed ,impressive and persuasive.If you can,try another which will be definitely engaged Chevening community.Thank a lot.Have a good time.

Omar, this is not a competitive essay. Your essay is lukewarm and simply, average. It does not stand out in presentation of facts, it is boring in terms of work related leadership and influencing issues, it lacks proper leadership traits and influencing abilities. The reason that the essay will not be able to work as a scholarship essay is because you have limited everything in the narration to your workplace. It is further weakened by your last paragraph that indicates how you refer to your superiors for advice and decision making procedures. The scholarship requires you to show a strong leadership character and a sense of right from wrong as an influencer. You do not come across as that even in your workplace.

You need to think of a clear leadership incident that highlights a strength of character when handling people. The instance of employee disagreements that you chose did not require leadership skills but it require some simple influencing skills to get the two to work together on the project successfully. I am of the opinion that you should take that particular instance and make it the fill discussion for the 500 word essay.

Explain what the project was about, and how you put your team together. That will help to explain how you build and maintain those relationships in practice aside from your written explanation. Add how the project fell apart, who caused it and why, then explain how you influenced the two to work together for the success of the project. Be specific about how you influenced them either in a group or individual discussion format. Make that sound interesting but do not exaggerate not lie about how it happened. Just be creative in telling the story. Then, write a paragraph at the end that explains how this situation helped you to develop a particular type of leadership style or skills that you hope to use these skills in the future.

By revising the essay to focus on an actual event that exemplifies your leadership and influencing skills, you will (hopefully) be able to create a more interesting and somewhat competitive essay presentation for consideration. Do not be misinformed. You are writing a leadership and influencing essay, not a networking essay.