Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
101
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Introduction
In this unit, you will be looking at how you can best manage your performance at work in order to support the effective working of your team, department and organisation. You will investigate methods of work planning which will help you get the most out of your working day as well as making sure you achieve your work goals to the best of your ability. You will investigate the issue of responsibility, and look at what this means in the workplace and at ways in which you can take responsibility for your own work. You will also consider the issue of accountability, and what this means for you as an employee. In particular, we will focus on the issue of behaviour at work and at the importance of professionalism in the workplace when working with others. The way in which you behave has a direct impact on your colleagues and, for this reason, you will examine ways in which you can behave to best support the effective working of the team. This is such an important skill, not only for your current job, but for your future career success and that is why you need to identify these important behaviours and when to use them.
Doing an Apprenticeship
If you are taking your NVQ as part of an Apprenticeship, you will find that the knowledge and understanding for this unit links to your Technical Certificate. Go to www.contentextra.co.uk/NVQBusinessAdmin to find summaries of the Technical Certificate units.
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Key terms
Deadline the date by which a task must be done. Deadlines are important, and missing them can affect the way a business runs. Legislation legislation refers to laws. There are special laws relating to work which are called employment legislation.
Guidelines
Guidelines are generally informal and can be for such things as answering the phone, working the fax machine (see Figure 1.1), sending an email request to a supplier, or writing a report. Businesses provide guidelines to their staff for many areas of their work in order to help them carry out their tasks in the best and safest way and to avoid errors. Providing guidelines is a good way to make sure activities are carried out effectively and consistently by everyone in the team, department and the company. Customers are often given a better impression of a business if its employees follow guidelines as they will know the level of service they can expect from the business. This is particularly important when working in reception, for example.
Key terms
Effectively to do something effectively means to do it thoroughly and well. Consistently if activities are carried out consistently by everyone, this means they will always be done in the same way.
Figure 1.1: How do you think these guidelines for sending a fax will help employees do their jobs more effectively?
Procedures
Procedures are slightly more formal than guidelines and cover such issues as: fire drills (see Figure 1.2) customer complaints reporting of accidents at work, and reporting employee absence from work. Procedures usually consist of a list of instructions to be followed.
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Unit Q201
Key terms
Industry body an industry body is an organisation set up to monitor and regulate the activities of its members. Voluntary some industry bodies set voluntary codes of practice. Businesses do not need to sign up to these, but if they do, their customers can know what standards of service to expect.
Codes of practice
Codes of practice are widespread in business these days and can be produced by a business, or by an industry body. Codes of Practice are voluntary codes setting out the minimum standards which customers can expect from businesses for such things as customer service, quality assurance and respect for privacy of personal data, among other things.
Activity 1
See how many different codes of practice there are that are relevant to your job and your organisation. Ask colleagues and managers to help you identify these. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) in the UK has published a code of practice for first aid in the workplace. It lets employers know what they must do and what first aid provision they must have available for their staff.
You can find a link that will take you to the full code of practice at: www.contentextra.co.uk/NVQ BusinessAdmin.
Links to 1.1
For this task, you need to find and list 3 of the guidelines, procedures or codes of practice which relate to your job. Think of all of the tasks which you carry out each day. Which of these have you received training for? Locate any documents which you were given at this time as they may contain important information on guidelines or procedures. Ask your line manager to help you locate information on any other guidelines, procedures or codes of practice which relate to your job. For each one that you choose, say what it is for and say why you think it is important to help you carry out your job effectively. It may help you to use the table format below to collect all of the information to complete this Portfolio Task.
Guidelines, procedures Main purpose or codes of practice 1 Why you think it is important to help you carry out your job effectively
Figure 1.3: What does the HSE Code of Practice on first aid at work mean for your workplace?
A version of this table, ready for you to complete, is available to download from www.content extra.co.uk/NVQBusinessAdmin
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Purpose of planning work, and being accountable to others for own work
There is a well-known saying that is often used in business: Failure to plan is planning to fail. This means that if you do not plan your work properly, you will not succeed in making the best of your working day and will not achieve the best results. Lets take a closer look at what this means in practice.
Key term
Urgent a task which is urgent needs to be completed as soon as possible, otherwise there will be bad consequences.
Checklist
When planning out your work tasks for the day, remember to include the following information for each task:
Key terms
Productivity productivity refers to the rate at which you work. So, if you are more productive, that means you get more done. Efficiency efficiency refers to the speed and the quality of your work, so if you complete a task efficiently you not only do it quickly, but also to a good standard.
The deadline for completing the task The time needed to complete the task Whether any help is needed from another person Whether it is urgent When you will begin each task
Accountability
At work, you will have a job description that sets out all of the things for which you are responsible, or accountable. For example, an Administrative Assistant may be responsible for making sure that the minutes of team meetings are accurately taken and then circulated to the whole team afterwards. This means that the Administrative Assistant is accountable for these tasks. They will be directly accountable to their line manager for making sure these tasks are completed on time and without errors.
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Unit Q201
My name is Dean Hunter. Im 24 and have been working as an Administrative Assistant for Excelsior Merchandise for 18 months. During that time, the company has grown significantly and we have taken on a large number of new field sales staff. I am the central contact point for them, being office based, and it is my job to keep a track on their appointments during the working day and to process the orders which they send in from customers. All of this tracking and order processing is carried out manually using a paper-based system. This worked fine when we only had 4 sales reps. However, we now have a sales force of 20, and keeping abreast of all the paperwork which is generated in any one day is becoming almost impossible, with the result that problems are beginning to arise with missed appointments, lost order sheets, and ultimately lost business for the company.
Top tips
In such a situation, it is recommended that you move over to an A electronic system. This will offer a much easier way for you to ensure accuracy in administration. Microsoft Outlook allows you to run a calendar service and it allows you to share calendars, so you can keep on top of the sales reps schedules. Also, by equipping your sales team with laptops, they could then email in all orders for customers, which you can then process electronically.
There are advantages and disadvantages to both paper and electronic diary systems. However, when there are a large number of staff to administrate, and a large volume of paperwork being generated, it is often better to use an electronic diary system. First, for the management of the sales reps appointments, an electronic calendar system will be much easier to administrate than a paper version; second, for the processing of orders, using an electronic system will allow for a much more streamlined process and will eliminate the possibility of lost orders as a result of missing paperwork.
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Unit Q201
Links to 1.3
For each one that you choose, say what it is for and say why you think it is important to help you carry out your job effectively. It may help you to use the table format below to collect all of the information to complete this Portfolio Task.
Functional skills
If you complete this task in a professional discussion with your assessor, you may be able to count it as evidence towards Level 1 Functional English through taking part in formal and informal discussions/exchanges.
Evidence collection
For the remaining tasks, you will need to carry out various tasks at work and will then need to produce evidence to show that you have demonstrated the various skills and competences listed below. Speak to your Assessor to identify the best methods to use in order to complete each task and remember to keep copies of all the evidence which you produce.
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