MGT201 Managing Self and Others Module Assessment Guide 2026 | University of Sunderland

MGT201 Managing Self and Others Module Assessment Guide

MGT201 Managing Self and Others Assessment Brief

As potential managers, leaders, practitioners, or professionals, the ability to be self- reflective is an essential behaviour and routine in being and becoming reflexive and self- aware. In your professional lives you will ‘manage’ and ‘lead’ others in their behaviour and action while they complete tasks within the workplace.

This assessment has been designed to provide you with reflexive space (Armstrong, 2015; 2018) as a reflexive digital bricolage (Armstrong, 2018) to reflect, consider and develop your own understanding in terms of how your individual differences potentially influence managing others.

The assessment comprises three sections, namely:

A)A short essay question
B)An authentic reflective storyboard
C)A Mahara portfolio containing a reflection on lectures

A)Essay (1000 words)

This segment is to demonstrate your understanding of reflective approaches as taught in class over the last 10 weeks, using academic references and adequate examples from your work life or university experience. Your referencing should be done using the Harvard style and sources should be from peer-reviewed journals.

You should plan your entire essay in a manner that shows a logical flow. A consideration could be to use the PEEL1 paragraph.

Question: What is reflective learning, and how does this enhance the self-awareness of managers in organisations?

B)Authentic Reflective Storyboard (2000 words)

Your authentic reflective storyboard should capture a reflection on a SINGLE experience2 from one of the following:

1.Motivating others for developing performance.
2.Dealing with conflict.
3.Dealing with a sensitive issue
4.Influencing others through negotiation.

Your storyboard should begin with a short introduction to which of the contexts above (e.g. conflict, managing for performance etc) you want to draw the experience from, and why you have chosen it for reflection. Once this foundation is laid, you should select, and introduce the individual difference(s) that is/are most relevant to the experience. For example, you may use ‘emotional intelligence’ to code your experience of dealing with sensitive issues or personality to code managing conflict or ‘Values and beliefs’ to code an experience of managing negotiation. You do not need to use these exact pairings, but you must ensure that the Individual Difference used is relevant.

Next, create an unstructured free-write of the experience (about 500 words) before demonstrating knowledge of reflective writing by re-writing this free-write using traditional or non-traditional reflective approach. You should enrich your storyboard with extracts from diagnostics (for example personality profile; emotional intelligence and social intelligence); and consider including artful forms (lyrics, proverbs, poetry, photographs, drawings, please do not include videos).

Lastly, you should create a Johari window, which codes the experience using a professional bodies’ behavioral framework (e.g. CIPD HR Profession Map) or the Alvesson identity framework in addition to the Individual Difference framework which you have specified above. Your Johari window should show through the use of descriptors taught in class, colour coding or other suitable means what is encapsulated in your open, blind, hidden and unknown windows. These four panes must be present in your Johari Window. Please note, it is not expected that each of the panes carry the same weighting or emphasis, it will depend upon your evaluation and reflection of the experiences. For example, you might reflect more on the Blind self than the other three panes (open; hidden; unknown). This is your coding and you have autonomy on how it is done, so be creative. Remember that this section carries 25% of the total marks, so it is important that you do it well. Ask your seminar tutors for help during the workshop to ensure you do it properly

The storyboard requires proper citations to the sources used, and when known frameworks (e.g. Big 5 or Myers Briggs) are mentioned, these should also be cited properly, using Havard referencing style. I have included below an additional section with suggestions, reiterating the steps for creating your authentic storyboard.

C)Your Mahara e-Portfolio (1000 words)

The final requirement for your assessment is the inclusion of a Mahara ePortfolio link. Mahara ePortfolio allows you as a manager, or future manager to present your work to audiences in a manner that does not clog email servers. The use of pictures enhances readability and the likelihood of the communicated message being passed across.

For this assessment, your Mahara ePortfolio should consist of a minimum of 5 journal entries. These journal entries should summarise your understanding of 5 separate lectures, in a reflective manner. Each journal entry should be enhanced with an image and/or metaphor that captures the essence of the reflection e.g. reflecting on ‘Managing

for performance’ may be illustrated by meandering mountains/streams instead of a straight linear path.

You should include the link to your completed portfolio on the title page of your submission. Please ensure that your portfolio link works as changes cannot be accepted after the submission deadline. Also refrain from editing the portfolio after submission deadline – portfolios showing a timestamp beyond the submission date will not be marked.

Suggested Assessment Structure

Title Page - Please include a title page with the following information

• Name and student number
• Module title
• Workshop tutor
• Topic of reflection with subheading on what you are reflecting on e.g. Managing
  performance: my experience of being promoted to Team leader’
• Mahara ePortfolio secret URL
• Essay question (about 1000 words)
• Your Authentic storyboard (about 2000 words of free write and extracts. You MUST
  specify the source of the extracts and reference the framework being used)
• Present your JOHARI Window, where you code the experience – no word limit, but key.
• Bibliography – about 1-2 pages with everything you read

MGT201 Managing Self and Others Assessment – Part B Guidance

Part B: Managing Others (35 Marks)

Based on your JOHARI Window for Part A, you now reflect on how you would manage others by reviewing, reflecting on and evaluating a single experience or event. 

With reference to your experience or event, write a 1000-word reflection with extracts from your JOHARI Window (Part A) where you advise a manager on one of the following: 

• Managing Performance and engagement 
• Managing Conflict
• Managing Difficult and Sensitive Issues
• Managing Negotiation through influence and communication

To support your reflective essay, include relevant academic citations from theoretical frameworks and models. 

Advice 

In workshop 2 of the following weeks:

• Week 6 - Managing Performance and Engagement 
• Week 7 - Managing Conflict
• Week 8 - Managing Difficult and Sensitive Issues
• Week 9 - Managing Negotiation through influence and communication

You will complete a free write reflection using the Writing through the Mirror reflective learning approach proposed by Gille Bolton. This will form the basis of your Part B Reflective Essay as follows:

Step 1: Complete your free writes in the workshops as indicated above

Step 2: From the evaluation part of your JOHARI Window (Part A of the assessment), extract key words/sentences which support your reflection and use this as ‘data’ (this does not count in the word count). Code this so they indicate if they are Open, Hidden, Blind, or Unknown panes of the JOAHRI Window (indicate the coding in your Part A so it is clear).

Step 3: The reflection from Step 1 should be around 500 words, and you do this first. This can be presented as traditional reflection (as one or two paragraphs) or using artful and metaphorical reflective learning, this can be presented as a song, poem, using drawing, or painting. 

Step 4: Once you have completed Step 3, write up to 100 words of an opening paragraph that outlines the reflective learning approaches you have identified from completing your reflection (using academic citations from MGT201 Reading List Weeks 1 and 5 and adding by drawing from articles and other relevant books) – these will then be part of your bibliography.

Step 5: Once you have completed Step 4 then write a closing paragraph which makes connections with the concepts presented in weeks 2, and or 3, and or 4 and the relevant week for your chosen reflection (Week 6 - Managing Performance and engagement; Week 7 - Managing Conflict; Week 8 - Managing Difficult and Sensitive Issues; Week 9 - Managing Negotiation through influence and communication). This should be around 400 words and include academic citations – which are added to your bibliography. 

Please note: This is an essay, not a report, so no sub-headings, no introduction or conclusion, and it should be presented as outlined above. Make sure you have citations (references). Do not quote or copy and paste; apply the citations as indicated in Steps 4 and 5.

Part C – Literature Reflection Assessment Guide    

Critically reflect on your future professional identity (as a manager, leader, or employee) using Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) or Super’s Lifespan, Life-Space Theory. Discuss and evaluate how you will develop the attributes of:

• Professional ethics and etiquette
• Readiness for graduate employment
  Support your reflection with theoretical concepts and practical strategies.

Present this as a 1500-word reflective essay, including academic citations, and you should also draw from your answers from Parts A and B of this assessment.

The purpose of Part C is to draw together your understanding in terms of Managing Self and Others as you have diagnosed Professional Behaviours in Part A as a JOAHRI Window (in terms of demonstrated as Open and Hidden) and to be developed (as blind and unknown) so you should have 4 different behaviours (CIPD) or Standards (CMI and CIM) or Code of Ethics (ACCA). From this diagnosis, you have demonstrated how Managing Self can influence Managing Others as an Experience in Part B.

Part C is concerned with making sense of your Professional Identity (articulated in Part A) by structuring this using either Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) or Super’s Lifespan, Life-Space Theory (Video Guides on these two theories are located in the MGT201 Canvas site in the Assessment Unit) – you use 1 of these theories to structure your literature reflection.

Note: A literature reflection is the application of theory – it is not the copying and quoting of knowledge. A literature reflection considers the theory and its placement in context to demonstrate understanding. The literature reflection should be written in 1st person as this is an autobiographical and auto-ethnographic approach, as it considers your identity in terms of your career development. You should not be using quotes or extracts from textbooks, journal articles or monographs; it should be an application. I encourage you to use monographs more than textbooks and journal articles.  

Within the 1500 words, you should use the chosen Career theory (Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) or Super’s Lifespan, Life-Space Theory) as the structuring and reflect on how you have developed Professional ethics (behaviour) and etiquette as you prepare yourself for graduate employment.

Professional ethics and etiquette are concerned with VALUES, so you need to consider your values and how these are demonstrated and could be developed within your Career development. 

'Professional etiquette is the acceptance of a standard of behaviour which is accepting of others, with a conscious observation of working to and within organisational boundaries. It is an acceptance and permission to behave in a manner which reflects decency, respect, manners, being polite, behaving in accordance with the culture, ethics, values, and expected norms of your profession, which is outlined by Professional bodies as either a behavioural framework (e.g. CIPD HR Profession Map), standards (e.g. CIM and CIM); code of ethics (e.g. ACCA).

The literature reflection should draw from the theoretical concepts discussed in the module, and you need academic citations which can be drawn from the MGT201 Library Reading Lists, plus additional readings from monographs, journal articles and relevant textbooks. 

This is a critical reflection, so it should consider:

• How do you make sense of your values
• How your values are influenced by mood, personality, motives, emotions
• How have you made sense of your professional identity
• How being reflective has given you permission to be authentic, the struggles for identity and vulnerability (look at the readings in MGT201 Library Reading List Week 5).

The above in relation to the chosen Career theory (Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) or Super’s Lifespan, Life-Space Theory.

You are expected to have academic citations throughout the literature reflection… 

Assessment Support and Guidance

As part of the module delivery there will be the following support for the assessment.

-The first half of each weekly workshop will be a reflective session (to illustrate a reflective approach).
-The 2nd half of each week’s workshop will be a reflective activity to guide, support and signpost you in developing your storyboard.
-A JOHARI Window video guide is available within the MGT201 Canvas site (which will act as an assessment guide).
-From week 6-9, 1hour of each workshop will be dedicated to assessment support

Submission Information

Two submissions are expected from you

1.A word document of your entire assessment (around 3000 words) uploaded to the submission dropbox by 2pm on  . This word document should include a Title page with details of a secret URL for your Mahara ePortfolio
2.A Mahara portfolio created to present your journal reflections of 5 separate lectures in a visually appealing way. To avoid being disqualified, this portfolio must not be edited after the submission deadline.

MGT201 Managing Self and Others Marking Framework

The descriptors for the grade bands for this module are as follows:

• Mastery (70%+): Exemplary depth and originality, deeply reflective, and critical application of theory.
• Proficient (60-69%): Strong understanding with emerging depth and critical engagement.
• Capable (50-59%): Adequate understanding, mostly descriptive, limited critical reflection.
• Satisfactory (40-49%): Basic understanding with minimal insight or engagement.
• Limited (16-39%): Weak or absent understanding, poor reflection, and no critical engagement.

In addition to this University of Sunderland Undergraduate Criteria, the marking rubric/framework shown on the next page will be applied. As you can see, it will be extremely difficult to pass without the inclusion of a Mahara ePortfolio link, so make every effort to create and learn how to use your ePortfolio.

MGT201 Assessment Rubric

A Step-by-Step Guide to Designing a Reflective Storyboard

The following step-by-step guide is to support you in the design of a reflective storyboard. It is important to note there are numerous ways of approaching a storyboard and therefore it is not expected you ‘copy’ and ‘imitate’ the example within this guide. The example in the guide is for illustration only…

Remember, this step-by step guide is intended to signpost you to consider:

1.The focus of the reflection
2.Understanding reflective learning approaches
3.Discovering your identity as future managers, professionals, and practitioners
4.Exploring your self-awareness
5.Considering the authenticity and vulnerability of your reflection
6.Considering how your individual differences could influence how you act and behave.

The following pages will be presented as a step-by-step guide and will include an example from Dr Paul-Alan’s (HRM Lecturer) professional life. It is shared with you as a sign of vulnerability and authenticity.

Step 1: - Choose the Focus of the Reflection

Example: Motivating others for developing performance

Step 2: - Free Write about an experience of experiences.

Please note: by free writing you will be authentic as you will not self-edit and or distort the experience.

Example:

As a teacher in higher education, I have over the many years of teaching considered how I can provide learning spaces, support and practices which encourage students to be successful in their studies. This includes how I design assessments, design virtual learning environments (CANVAS), how I structure content including learning materials and learning activities. Over the years I have listen to my ‘artful and creative voice’ and embraced different ways of designing learning for students on Management Programmes (including those on HRM, Finance and Marketing programmes). I have a perspective and a vision of learning and I adapted my artful and creative practice for a range of learners (undergraduate, postgraduate and doctorate); as a liberal humanist I am guided by equity and my expectations and boundaries are considered around ‘effort’, ‘dedication of the learner’, to never judge, to be fair, to be inclusive, to be respectful and to consider the range of abilities of the learners.

I provide opportunities for learning through in person activities, through digital practices, through guides, by considering the scope of the learners. I consider the assessment when designing the structure of a module and this is translated into the design of the Canvas site. In workshops I adapt my responses based on the discussions and interactions with the students, I do not have a script, I am adaptable and responsive. I notice when students are not sure and adapt my response accordingly.

I am aware I am not ‘liked’ by all students; I see myself as marmite. I am misunderstood as I am seen as strict by some, as intense by many, as having high standards and expectations. What is not seen or understood is I am passionate about learning and see higher education as the gateway to a better life. I have worked at a Civic University for most of my professional career because I believe I can make the most impact with students from a similar class background as me. I only wish for effort; I only wish for those who try and if a student sees me (by understanding me) I build connections. I set out to build confidence in learning and I believe learning is transformational and therefore requires effort. Learning is a gift, at higher education it is optional not compulsory, you are investing in your future.

Step 3: - Code the experience

Choose the individual difference(s) that is/are most aligned to the experience and use this to code the experience(s). As this is a management module, you are expected to use a professional identity framework (eg CIPD or Alvesson). Coding will give you a structure, and the panes of the Johari window should be represented by colours. Revisiting the example above I would use the colours of personality and match these to the JOHARI Window as follows:

So, I would go through the experience(s) I have written and code key words in the colour from the table (based on feedback gathered from others).

Example:

As a teacher in higher education, I have over the many years of teaching considered how I can provide learning spaces, support and practices which encourage students to be successful in their studies. This includes how I design assessments, design virtual learning environments (CANVAS), how I structure content including learning materials and learning activities. Over the years I have listen to my ‘artful and creative voice’ and embraced different ways of designing learning for students on Management Programmes (including those on HRM, Finance and Marketing programmes). I have a perspective and a vision of learning and I adapted my artful and creative practice for a range of learners (undergraduate, postgraduate and doctorate); as a liberal humanist I am guided by equity and my expectations and boundaries are considered around ‘effort’, ‘dedication of the learner’, to never judge, to be fair, to be inclusive, to be respectful and to consider the range of abilities of the learners.

I provide opportunities for learning through in person activities, through digital practices, through guides, by considering the scope of the learners. I consider the assessment when designing the structure of a module and this is translated into the design of the Canvas site. In workshops I adapt my responses based on the discussions and interactions with the students, I do not have a script, I am adaptable and responsive. I notice when students are not sure and adapt my response accordingly.

I am aware I am not ‘liked’ by all students; I see myself as marmite. I am misunderstood as I am seen as strict by some, as intense by many, as having high standards and expectations. What is not seen or understood is I am passionate about learning and see higher education as the gateway to a better life. I have worked at a Civic University for most of my professional career because I believe I can make the most impact with students from a similar class background as me. I only wish for effort; I only wish for those who try and if a student sees me (by understanding me) I build connections. I set out to build confidence in learning and I believe learning is transformational and therefore requires effort. Learning is a gift, at higher education it is optional not compulsory, you are investing in your future.

Step 4: Add Extracts from Tests or Poetics

As a creative person I would use poetics (as metaphorical reflective learning) to illuminate the reflection rather than extracts from tests.

Example:

As a teacher in higher education, I have over the many years of teaching considered how I can provide learning spaces, support and practices which encourage students to be successful in their studies.

With my lightnin' bolts a-glowin I can see where I am goin' to be

(Source: Wake by Arcade Fire, 2004)

This includes how I design assessments, design virtual learning environments (CANVAS), how I structure content including learning materials and learning activities.

Over the years I have listen to my ‘artful and creative voice’

Birds end their song Only you compare
Only you know where they're gone.
Clutch the final straw Break it in your hand
No one understands it's yours (Celebrate by Embrace, 2006)
and embraced different ways of designing learning for students on Management Programmes (including those on HRM, Finance and Marketing programmes). I have a perspective and a vision of learning and I adapted my artful and creative practice for a range of learners (undergraduate, postgraduate and doctorate).

Step 5: Consider the Reflective Learning Approaches

From the example it demonstrates the following:

-Reflection in, on and through action
-It is metaphorical reflective learning using lyrics and colour
-It considers altering critical perception.
-It considers swampy lowlands.
-It is liminal.
-It is transformational learning.
-It considers portals and maps as a form of transitioning.
-It is vulnerable.
-It is authentic.
-It demonstrates the multiple identities of self-doubter, surfer, and storyteller.

Within the example Paul has demonstrated:

-Personality
-Social and emotional intelligence
-Mood
-Values
-Beliefs
-Motives
-Identity

The example captures experiences of how as a teacher in higher education Paul’s individual differences influence how he motivates and manages the performance of students (whether they are undergraduate, postgraduate or PhD).

Step 6: Find your Way to Design a Reflective Storyboard

Follow the previous steps and find your ‘voice’ and your identity as potential managers, professionals, and practitioners. Combine all the above in the suggested layout to produce your reflective storyboard (Question B)

Good Luck…