Certificate in Personal Development for Leadership and Strategic Management
(Level 7 – 15 Credits)
 

The Certificate in Personal Development for Leadership and Strategic Management is a 15-credit Ofqual regulated qualification and is the equivalent level to a 15- credit level 7 course. This course has been designed to help learners develop their own personal leadership and management skills in the context of the creation and achievement of organisational vision and strategic direction. Learners must achieve the learning outcomes and meet the standards specified by the assessment criteria for the certificate. To achieve the standards for this certificate, learners will be required to understand the knowledge and skills needed by leaders and managers, create a plan to achieve these qualities and be able to know how progress with the plan can be reviewed.

Total Qualification Time: 120 Hours

Total Guided Learning Hours: 60

Total Credit Value: 15

Personal Development for Leadership and Strategic Management

This course aims to help learners develop their own personal leadership and management skills in the context of the creation and achievement of organisational vision and strategic direction. The learners will:

• Understand how knowledge and skills in leadership and strategic management support the creation and achievement of organisational vision and strategy
• Understand how to develop and communicate organisational vision
• Be able to manage development of own personal knowledge and skills in leadership and strategic management to support achievement of personal and organisational vision and strategy
• Be able to reflect on the benefits of personal development in the achievement of personal growth and organisational vision and strategy

Indicative Content

1. Understand how knowledge and skills in leadership and strategic management support the creation and achievement of organisational vision and strategy

• Meaning of vision and strategy and their interrelationship
• Knowledge and skills required – visioning, describing possible futures with clarity, creating, giving direction, specificity, providing motivation, planning, communicating and listening at different levels, synthesizing, analysing, empathy, decision taker, link between vision and strategy, bringing about effective change, emotional intelligence, developing and leading high performance teams, consistency and reliability, delegation, dealing with conflict, gaining alignment.
• Contribution to organisational vision and strategy. Leadership and management knowledge and skills can be insufficient. Other factors which come into play include – financial situation, political uncertainty, availability of human and physical resources, and instability in the market.
• Ranking order produced from criteria leading to determination of high, medium and lesser importance.
• Similarities, difference and importance of knowledge and skills needed by strategic managers compared to operational managers.

2. Understand how to develop and communicate organisational vision

• Factors impacting on organisational vision - history of the organisation, external and internal business environment, capacity of the organisation, anticipating potential barriers, skills and ambition of leadership team.
• Approaches to developing vision - Two way, top down bottom up, timing, clarity, specificity, quality of information, presentation, dialogue, culture understanding and, feedback loops, involvement.
• Factors which impact on the communication of vision to internal and external stakeholders - size of organisation, organisational development, culture and diversity, size, complexity and boldness of vision, communication systems, dissemination and cascading processes.

3. Be able to manage development of own personal knowledge and skills in leadership and strategic management to support achievement of personal and organisational vision and strategy

• Theories of leadership and management and their application - Transformational Leadership, Transactional Leadership, tri-dimensional leadership theory, charismatic leadership, situational leadership.
• Audit of personal skills and knowledge linked to creation and achievement of organisational vision and strategy.
• Objectives and personal development plan- specific, clear, challenging, achievable objectives linked to audit, directly related to plan with stated outcomes, tasks, time frames, deadlines, monitoring points. Plan could include formal learning leading to qualifications, training courses, work shadowing, and job rotation or mentoring. Plan could include informal learning e.g. reading texts, learning from successes and mistakes, using diagnostic tools e.g. Myers Briggs; development of emotional intelligence, ability to learn, systems thinking.

4. Be able to reflect on the benefits of personal development in the achievement of personal growth and organisational vision and strategy

• Benefits of review - reviewing performance, learning from experience, repeating what is good, dealing with weaknesses, acknowledging success. Review can be used frequently in order to improve e.g. at key milestones, at the outset and conclusion of tasks, at the end of a meeting, after a difficult problem.
• Sources of information - appraisal outcomes, 360-degree feedback systems, client feedback, staff/colleague/superiors’ feedback, personal observations, data, KPIs, business results.