Running head: SELF REFLECTION 1

Self-Reflections

Godfrey Mbonu

Capella University

Unit 10 Assignment 2

BMGT8002: Rsch Proc, Thry and Prac in Glob Bus

Tracy Elazier

June 15, 2018

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What I Appreciate

Personal transformation is a dynamic, uniquely individualized process of expanding

consciousness whereby individuals become critically aware of old and new self-views and

choose to integrate these views into a new self-definition. Self-reflection presents some of the

most powerful instructional opportunities in our classrooms and workplaces. Its potency is in

how it exercises multiple skills.

The major implication was support to maintain motivation in an online learning

environment must include communications and socialization on an ongoing basis during the

dissertation writing process. Doctor of management organizational doctoral program leaders may

use this study to examine doctoral student support issues, chairs’ encouragement strategies, and

the need for dissertation coaching. The conceptual framework for this qualitative narrative

inquiry was Bandura’s (1997) self-efficacy theory, Atkinson’s (1957) expectancy value theory,

and Vygotsky’s (1978) social constructivist theory.

Questions Unanswered

Very few empirical studies have investigated programmes in which doctoral students act

as peer facilitators in faculty writing groups. The authors reported on the development of a

centrally delivered doctoral student writing programme in which twenty student participants

were mentored and provided with the resources to initiate their own faculty-based doctoral

writing groups. ‘Legitimate peripheral participation’ was used as a conceptual lens to interpret

the data collected during the establishment and evaluation of the programme. All student

participants in the preparatory training course, which was developed in consultation with

postgraduate students and research supervisors, went on to become doctoral writing peer
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facilitators of peer writing groups. Insights from seven of these showed how a well-structured

and supportive programme harnessed the benefits of peer learning by bringing personal rewards

to participants and building institutional capacity around doctoral research writing literacies.

One or Two Things to Change

Despite the growing number of studies exploring PhD students’ experiences and their

social relationships with other researchers, there is a lack of research on the interaction between

the type of experiences and the social agents involved, especially in relation to not only problems

and challenges, but also to positive emotions and experiences. In this study, the authors

addressed this gap exploring the relationship between four ecology doctoral students’ most

significant experiences and their perceived position in the research community. Additionally,

they aimed at exploring the utility of a methodological device with two instruments, Journey

Plot and Community Plot. Results showed, in one hand, that both positive and negative

experiences were significant in students’ trajectories, but the proportion varied greatly across

participants. Supervisors were related to negative experiences, whereas the broader community

was mostly source of positive experiences. Research writing and communication experiences

were significant in relation to all the social agents, while other contents of experience were

restricted to the smallest social layers (e.g. research motives were confined to the individual

layer, and research organization to the individual and supervisor layers). Relationships between

the type of experiences and participants’ position in the community were found and implications

for doctoral education discussed.

Growth and Change

The present research examined the influence of self‐regulated decision making on

satisfaction in career path (college major for Study 1, job for Study 2) and major‐related career
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choice. Results indicate a full mediating effect of fit in the relationship between self‐regulated

decision making and satisfaction in career path. Self‐regulated decision making also influenced

major, job congruence via satisfaction with a participant's college major. Findings suggest that

individuals who possess self‐regulatory ability in decision‐making contexts were more likely to

choose majors and jobs of good fit, experience satisfaction from their career decisions, and

choose careers relevant to their college majors.

The Past Ten Weeks

The paper analyses issues related to supervision and support of early career researchers in

Estonian academia. The authors used nine focus groups interviews conducted in 2015 with

representatives of social sciences in order to identify early career researchers’ needs with respect

to support, frustrations they might have experienced, and resources they might have for

addressing them. Our crucial contribution was the identification of wider support networks of

peers and colleagues that might compensate, partially or even fully, for failures of official

supervision. On the basis of our analysis the authors argued that support for early career

researchers should take into account the resources they already possessed but also recognized the

importance of wider academic culture, including funding and employment patterns, and the roles

of supervisors and senior researchers in ensuring successful functioning of support networks.

Through analyzing the conditions for the development of early career researchers, producers of

knowledge, the paper contributed to social epistemology understood as analysis of specific forms

of social organization of knowledge production.

My Personal Transformation

The scholarship about transformative learning theory has continued to grow

exponentially, although much of the research was redundant with a deterministic emphasis while
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overlooking the need for more in-depth theoretical analysis. Explanations for this oversight are

numerous, including a failure to ground research in primary sources, an over-reliance on

literature reviews of transformative learning, lack of critique of original research; marginal

engagement in positivist and critical research paradigms, and a lack of involvement in

transformative learning by European adult education scholars. In order to stimulate theoretical

development, this paper discussed five specific issues that would hopefully provoke further

discussion and research. They included the role of experience, empathy, the desire to change, the

theory’s inherently positive orientation, and the need for research involving positivist and critical

approaches.

My Big Surprises

Earning a PhD is a complex process that complements the existing skills developed

working in hospital or academic libraries. Two medical librarians who are now doctoral

candidates, provide definitions of the PhD and reasons for pursuing this degree. Further, they

present information on the three phases of earning a doctorate degree in the fields of Library and

Information Studies (LIS) or Education, the coursework, comprehensive exams, and, the most

difficult part, the dissertation process. They provide methods for survival, including selecting

and cultivating advisors, creating a dissertation support group, and developing personal habits

that helped to assure success in this major initiative. The authors have shared their perceptions

and personal motivations in the hope that these personal stories, complemented by the

information and strategies about the PhD process, would be helpful both to those who are

considering this major change in lifestyle and to those who support others undertaking this

endeavor.

New Confidence
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Doctoral students face numerous challenges along the path toward achieving a doctorate.

With the experience likened to a rite of passage, many faced periods of confusion and

disorientation, liminal periods of being betwixt and between. Threshold concept theory,

reconceived as conceptual thresholds when experienced on the doctoral level, could inform how

they were understood. The aim of this research was to explore liminal experiences during the

doctoral journey and offer suggestions for how supervisors could better support their learners.

This qualitative narrative inquiry explored doctoral liminality amongst 23 participants coming

from five countries and 19 different disciplines. Findings cut across the diversity of the

participants, with their liminal experiences comprising a sense of isolation, lack of confidence

and impostor syndrome, and research misalignment. Periods of liminality were rarely discussed,

even after long periods of time. Findings were offered to provide guidance for supervisors to

help support and scaffold their learners.

Areas to Bolster in the Coming Classes

The most important criteria to consider when deciding on a dissertation advisor are the

research interests of the faculty members in your department. Ideally, a graduate student should

select a dissertation advisor who has a successful, active scholarly agenda in the area the student

is researching. A professor who shares the same, or similar, research interests as you will have a

better understanding of the questions you are trying to answer and the contribution you are

attempting to make to the field. You can benefit from the professor’s expertise on the subject

matter and trust that he/she knows what will be the most effective way for you to approach your

research. If you are not able to secure an advisor who shares your interests it will be imperative

to have someone on your dissertation committee who does.

Experience with my Cohort Support

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In their study, Miller & Brimicombe (2010, pp.408-409) suggest that the PhD process can

be viewed as a journey. They note that ‘…in the original sense, a journey is the act of moving

from one place to another. The journey of life also includes both the passage of time and changes

of phase in our being as we age, learn, and develop’. They argued that it is helpful to

conceptualize the PhD process as a journey and to use travel metaphors to examine students’

experiences. The authors agreed with Miller & Brimicombe’s suggestion, and further argued that

the milestones in a PhD journey could also be examined as stages in a rite of passage. In this

regard, the PhD process could be considered as both the initial stage towards the making of a

scholar, as well as the liminal stage where the PhD candidate is not yet a scholar, but is more

than just a student (as they have a certain amount of authority with regard to the direction and

completion of their PhD research). This relates to the characteristic of the liminal state as

‘betwixt and between’ or ‘neither here nor there’ (Turner, 1967). As PhD candidates are students

in training, or in the process of becoming a scholar, we suggest that viewing the PhD journey

through the language of rites of passage will enhance the transitional or transformational

processes inherent in it. This echoes the underlying assumptions of two previous studies of

training teachers that regard the process of transforming the student teacher into a professional

teacher as a rite of passage (White, 1989; Head, 1992).

Conclusion

The essay draws on a synthesis of the research on doctoral education, early career

researcher trajectories, research structures and academic work environment. The analysis

suggests the following: doctoral education reform is being driven largely by policy concerns,

rather than by evidence or disciplinary intention; and academic work environment is becoming

less and less attractive due to increasing demands for productivity and accountability. The author
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concludes with a call to action: unless we, as academics, take action on several fronts, we may

find that the PhD becomes purely a policy instrument, and that in the long-term, life of an

academic will no longer be attractive to PhD graduates.

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References

Amran, N. N., & Ibrahim, R. (2012). Academic rites of passage: Reflection on a PhD

journey. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 59, 528-534.

Diggs, B. J. (2017). African American Online Doctor of Management Students' Perceptions of

Dissertation Writing and Support: Narrative Inquiry (Doctoral dissertation, University of

Phoenix).

Eigi, J., Velbaum, K., Lõhkivi, E., Simm, K., & Kokkov, K. (2018). Supervision, mentorship and

peer networks: how Estonian early career researchers get (or fail to get) support. RT. A

Journal on Research Policy and Evaluation, 6(1).

Elliot, D. L., Baumfield, V., Reid, K., & Makara, K. A. (2016). Hidden treasure: successful

international doctoral students who found and harnessed the hidden curriculum. Oxford

Review of Education, 42(6), 733-748.

Eun, H., Sohn, Y. W., & Lee, S. (2013). The effect of self‐regulated decision making on career

path and major‐related career choice satisfaction. Journal of Employment

Counseling, 50(3), 98-109.

Kumar, V., & Aitchison, C. (2018). Peer facilitated writing groups: a programmatic approach to

doctoral student writing. Teaching in Higher Education, 23(3), 360-373.

McAlpine, L. (2017). Building on success? Future challenges for doctoral education

globally. Studies in Graduate and Postdoctoral Education, 8(2), 66-77.

Sala-Bubaré, A., & Castelló, M. (2017). Exploring the relationship between doctoral students’

experiences and research community positioning. Studies in Continuing Education, 39(1),

16-34.
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Stevens-Long, J., Schapiro, S. A., & McClintock, C. (2012). Passionate scholars: Transformative

learning in doctoral education. Adult Education Quarterly, 62(2), 180-198.

Tammy L. Mays & Bernie Todd Smith (2009) Navigating the Doctoral Journey, Journal of

Hospital Librarianship, 9:4, 345-361, DOI: 10.1080/15323260903250411

Taylor, E. W., & Cranton, P. (2013). A theory in progress?: issues in transformative learning

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