Task 2 Reflection

Reflection on interview with Anna Furlong

My narrative interview with Anna really got me thinking about what it means to be a leader. Anna’s ideas of professional values, managing change in the workplace and the future of work come from years of experience. Professionalism comes with experience. Whether it be through years of education or years of working, an individual’s experience for a long period of time defines their professionalism.

Professional Values

Anna’s professional values are flexibility, empathy, punctuality, teamwork and working well with others. This mainly stems from her experience. The more experience and time someone spends in a profession gives a person more credibility. Anna’s professional values have been shaped through years of on field experience. The way in which Anna has reshaped my views on professional values is: . I’ve realised that in order to be successful in what I plan to do it’s about who you know rather then what you know . Emotional intelligence (EQ) is at the core of any profession . Working well with others is achieved by being flexible to different personalities and understanding how all parties can benefit from every interaction

Managing change

Corona virus has been a major test for everybody to learn how to manage change. Managing change well is what gives an individual competitive advantage. Anybody can complete a given task but managing change means can you quickly adapt, quickly think outside of the box and use street smarts. My narrative interview with Anna has taught me that in the real world once again, it’s not only about what you know but how efficiently you can apply that knowledge. The way in which Anna has reshaped my views on managing change is: . As a leader, having a set, well communicated plan to the team is so important . Providing tools to a team to better adapt with change is also a main responsibility of a leader when managing change . Maintaining good and respectful communication with everybody and having the courage to speak up and communicate ideas

The Future of work?

“The future of work is now. Digitalisation and globalisation have sparked radical shifts in how we live and work. The coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis has accelerated these beyond anything we could have imagined (OECD, 2020).”

In the last 50 years technology has evolved more quickly than it ever has before in human history. With the invention of computers we have seen a massive increase in the digitalisation of workspaces. The future of work is moving towards a more collaborative online workspace. However, within the beauty industry, what is going to happen to the experience of going into store and trying on products? Can you really replace feeling the products and seeing the colors in real life?

L’oreal group and David Jones have collaborated to create a new service called virtual consultations. At the moment it is just a pilot experiment. This is a significant step into the future of work as it shows how the beauty industry can be digitalised. My job as the beauty advisor running the service means my job is to make a virtual beauty consultation worthwhile for the customer just as much as it would be coming into store.

When asking Anna what she thought about the future of work in our industry she said:

. We will move towards having the option of online however counters and make up stores will still exist because people really like to utilise their senses when it comes to makeup and fragrance. It’s not like clothes, make up is different

Overall, my interview with Anna really taught me that no matter how digital we are it doesn’t take away from the importance of individual emotional intelligence. Although a lot of the world is shifting towards being more digital, the human beings running it still need to have high emotional intelligence to achieve high outcomes. People may think that digitalisation is taking over the world, however it isn’t. Digitalisation aids us to make our lives easier however it is still only a tool that we use. We still need people in jobs behind this and we still need good emotional intelligence to interact with each other.