Each week, starting with Week 1 and concluding with Week 5, you will complete a series of skill assessment exercises. These exercises provide a self-test of your current level of management skills.

The exercises will help you to focus on the area where there appears to be the greatest need for skill building.

After completing the skill assessment and building exercises, you will record in a journal significant discoveries, insights, learning, and personal recollections.

You will prepare 3-4 slides of your impressions and conclusions from the self-evaluation tests and write in your personal journal on a weekly basis, and in Week 5, you will submit a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation summarizing what you have learned about effective management practices.

Week-wise distribution of the tasks of the course project:

Week 1: Developing Self-Awareness

You will complete an exercise to discover and develop self-awareness. In the exercise, you will need to assess your level of management skills to improve your self-awareness. Based on your self-discovery, you will record in your personal journal record in a journal the specific management skills that you want to improve.

Week 2: Developing Communication Skills

In connection with the self-awareness exercise you should develop some thoughts about how to develop your communication skills.

As part of the exercise, you need to identify a person (such as a roommate, a parent, a friend, or a coworker) with whom you have had a disagreement and reflect how your communication styles impacted the conversation. You will then record in your personal journal the specific ways in which you can improve your communication style to build positive interpersonal relationships.

Week 3: Motivating Others and Managing Conflicts

You will complete an exercise to develop your skills of motivating others and managing conflicts. As part of the exercise, you will need to identify a specific conflict involving you that occurs often. You will then record in your private journal the specific behavioral guidelines for improving your skills for managing conflicts.

Week 4: Developing Your Delegation Skills

You will continue to engage in a self-examination process that will help to explain the advantages and potential positive outcomes of delegation, taking into consideration the key criteria in determining when to delegate work to others. You will also record in your private journal the circumstances in which you can improve the skills you identified in the past two weeks.

Week 5: Becoming an Effective Manager

You will review your private journal entries from the past weeks as they relate to how you intend to become an effective manager. You will focus on the specific skills you wanted to develop or improve the circumstances in which the improvement efforts were made, the specific behaviors you attempted to demonstrate to improve your skills, and the specific outcomes that will indicate the success of your efforts. In essence, you need to analyze, evaluate, and record your efforts for skill improvement toward becoming an effective manager.

Week 5: Project Consolidation and Microsoft PowerPoint Presentation

You will consolidate the notes from Week 1 to Week 5 with your private journal entries and submit a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation of approximately 15-20 slides to present a summary of the process of developing effective management skills. The course project weekly task is not graded until consolidated in Week 5 final assignment.

Working Ahead-Course Project Part 1: Developing Self-Awareness

The MPA program is designed to enable you to work and participate in the field of public administration. Being at such an advanced level in the MPA program, you must have a job in mind that you are considering after graduation. These tests are designed for self-improvement and the course project is to be submitted in Microsoft PowerPoint format in Week 5.

Tasks

Using the information on self-awareness that you gained from the tests you have taken resources and any other research, begin working on your Microsoft PowerPoint presentation describing how you would fit in that job.

Take into consideration your level of emotional intelligence, values, learning style, attitude toward change, and core self-evaluation as well as factors such as job characteristics, work scope, and the organizational context or environment.

Use examples and concepts from your assigned readings to discuss how your personal style would affect your level of effectiveness and satisfaction.

Note:

Record in your personal journal the specific ways you can improve your delegation skills. Then, record the specific behavioral guidelines for improving your delegation skills.

You do not have to turn in the Microsoft PowerPoint at this time. However, you will need to use this information for the Microsoft PowerPoint presentation you will create in Week 5, summarizing what you have learned about developing your management capabilities.

For Week 1:

In the 1940s, two political theorists, Carl J. Friedrich1 and Herman Finer2, debated a critical question of accountability in US public administration-how much should one rely on formal prescriptions and control mechanisms, and how much must one depend on what we have called the inner compasses of persons entrusted with public responsibilities?

In other words, how much can we rely on the laws to keep administrators in check, and how much can we rely on the moral consciences of our administrators?

Tasks

Analyze and explain which is a better accountability of measure, external or internal controls or the character of the administrator.

Define in detail how you support your choice.

Explain why or why not you believe that most citizens today view public service as the highest and noblest calling.

If not, describe what would need to change for this to be true.

Deliverable

Submit your answers in a double-spaced, 4- to 6-page Microsoft Word document, not counting the cover and reference pages.

Cite sources using the APA format on a separate page.