Embedded Professional Development
Building students’ skills for successful futures
At The University of Buckingham, we understand that higher education is about a lot more than studying for a degree. The experiences you gain at university, through both academic and extracurricular activities, promote your self-development and give you many opportunities to practise and improve skills that will benefit all areas of your life now and in the future. These skills, which we refer to as professional skills, are also sought by employers and so also boost your employability.
We support your development of skills through a Professional Development Portfolio, in which you will write reflectively about the skills you acquire and use during your time at university. Workshops and video-based skills masterclasses will be available for you to access.
The Professional Development Portfolio is incorporated into undergraduate degree programmes within the faculties of:
- Business, Humanities and Social Sciences;
- Computing, Law and Psychology.
What are professional skills and why are they important?
The skills that you develop and write about in a Professional Development Portfolio are important because they will help you to succeed in your studies as well as prepare for your next steps after university, whether that is employment, self-employment, further study or other personal goals.
The skills covered in the Professional Development Portfolio are:
- Self-awareness and self-management
- Digital literacy
- Communication and influencing
- Teamwork and collaboration
- Creativity and problem solving
- Leadership and responsibility
- Social responsibility and embracing diversity
- Being enterprising and commercially aware
How will writing a reflective portfolio help me to develop professional skills?
Writing reflectively helps us to become more aware of our learning, where our strengths lie and what we need to do to improve. Self-reflection through the skills portfolio will therefore help you to identify ways to develop and extend your professional competence. This, in turn, will help you to fulfil your potential at university and beyond. What is more, your Professional Development Portfolio will help you write better job applications and prepare for interviews. You will be able to talk confidently about what you have learned, how that has improved you as a person and how you have acquired and used the skills that employers look for in graduate recruits. It will help you to stand out.
For more information, please contact our Careers and Employability Service: careers@buckingham.ac.uk.
