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From my previous definition Of critical thinking to a fully understanding of critical thinking now, I attained the knowledge of critical thinking from some scholars’ view. Specifically, Helpers defined the critical thinking with character of purposeful, reasonable and goal directed. Also, I realized the significance of applying critical thinking skills in daily life. To illustrate the important role of critical thinking, I gave the example of my previous critical thinking application experience. Applying critical thinking skills, I analyzed data efficiently that source from the internet and make fairly judgment on what is real and believable.
Then correct and trustworthy data was effectively collected and soon put in use. The reason why I choose week 1 journal is that the first class impressed me a lot. It let me grasp a fully understanding of the critical thinking theory, making me know what knowledge I will get in the following class. What is most important, I began to understand the teaching intention of this unit. Just as mentioned in the journal entry, I found that critical thinking is being used in our normal life, everywhere and anytime. I will consciously exercise the critical thinking skills through applying that in business and daily life.
No doubt, I strongly believe I will develop my autonomous and constructive critical capabilities to a high level after this unit. As mentioned above, my previous biases on critical thinking has been changed. Can define the critical thinking in a new lenses, and find the prevalence of critical thinking usage. Through the scholar’s idea on the concept, I realized the characters of critical thinking and these characters are what had never considered before. As a student of business school, I find it necessary to put the skills into practice consciously and exercise it as much as possible.
This reflective journal 1 includes the summary of my week 1 reflective journal entry. Thought it was the most interesting entry and gave the reason why select it. Now, after identifying the biases I used to hold in terms of the definition of critical thinking and the prevail usage of critical thinking skills, I become aware of the imperative role played by critical thinking in daily life and business sphere. Reflective Journal weekly entries Week 1-3 Reflective Journal weekly entry 1 [reflecting on Week 1] Reflective question 1 (from Blackboard): How would you define critical hinging?
Please provide an example of where you have applied critical thinking before and discuss if this was useful. Reflective response: Before the week one’s lecture, which gave an introduction of Critical Thinking in Business, simply defined critical thinking as a mode of thinking. For instance, one that always wonder the reality and truth of what others said, then he or she is a critical thinker. At one time, thought critical thinking mostly depends on one’s character. If have a sensitive, suspicious and timid personality, I am more likely to use critical thinking skills.
But after the lecture, I have realized that critical thinking is more than a way of thinking, but a combination of skills. As the definitions given in the lecture, it is characterized with purposeful, reasoned and goal directed (Helpers 2003). And critical thinking is a core skills like many other essential business professional skills that business man should master. As a student who is studying in business school, I can acknowledge the aim of this unit. This program will help develop my autonomous and constructive critical capabilities and apply the critical thinking skills in business practice and normal life.
Critical thinking skills can be used in everyday life. For example, I used critical thinking when goggled to kick for information. Firstly, I had to find the useful data in different source, picked the most reasonable information. As the data or information may be incorrect in the internet, so had to recognize whether it is real and put it into use for purposely. To achieve that, I used critical thinking ability to collect and analyzed the data. It was really useful. Because without the critical thinking skills, I would be confused about what kind of information should I look for and hard to recognize the real data.
Without the purposeful and goal directed capabilities, this kind of task will be really hard to achieve. Reflective Journal weekly entry 2 [reflecting on Week 2] Reflective question 2: From a stakeholder point of view, briefly describe a negative experience with business in which you have been (or are currently) involved in? How might other stakeholders of this business view your experience? It was a really terrible experience that I was involved in online business. The story started from an advertisement in the shopping program. The advertisement is to promote a new smart phone which is said to be more national than phone.
And employed a film star for celebrity endorsement. Then, appealed by the advertisement, I found the product in the internet and bought it online. Unfortunately, I got the phone and found that it looks differently from what I saw in the TV. What is worse, it is a simple phone that can only make call and send message. Could not find any feature that was advertised to be more functional than phone. So I realized that I was cheated by the TV advertisement. Was really angry and contacted the seller via the internet, but got no response.
After several times’ appeal, finally got the espouse that won’t get the refund and all that they can do is to give me a discount if I buy a new one. From the perspective of customer, my confidence on e-shopping is really blooded. I thought I must not be the only one that was cheated by the TV advertisement. There must have been others that also bought the phone and realized the fraud. As a consumer, I was taught a lesson that seeing is believing. I will be more careful on the TV advertisement and never buy product if only see that in the TV. Now I can use the critical thinking skills to analyze whether it’s real or not.
From the view of other stakeholders, such as seller. They pay more efforts on the sales and they may not care much more on product’s quality. It is probable that they never use the phone before put it for sale. They will get in trouble after customer’s appeal but they would not do anything for they are profit oriented. And they only treat my complaint as normal one of the complaint cases. From the perspective of TV station that broadcast the advertisement, they may also never do trial test on the phone. It is also possible that the TV station hold the point that the quality has nothing to with them.
And nonuser’s complaints will also not be sent to them. We can make a conclusion that corporate social responsibility is needed in the business filed. Economic is not the only factor that should be taken into account. Reflective Journal weekly entry 3 [reflecting on Week 3] Reflective question 3: What is your opinion about acknowledging others when you refer to their work? When and how do you think this happens in the business community? Discuss the possible advantages and disadvantages of acknowledging the work of others in business. In my opinion, it is really necessary to acknowledge others when refer to their ark.
It is a behavior to respect and reward their efforts. Before my postgraduate course, I did not realize the importance of Intelligence property (IP). So, I got a big trouble in the assessment last semester since I did not reference well. So, am very careful about the reference in my assignment now. According to the tutorial’s tree diagram, if the ideas that I want use are from others, and are not common knowledge, then I have to reference. With regard to when and how this happen in the business community, I think it is likely to happen in business cooperation, such as Joint Venture and equines alliance.
Because in this kind of business operation, knowledge interfile will be enhanced and therefore, the risk of knowledge loss will also increase. So, generally speaking the management will pay more attention to the property protection and any kind of knowledge exchange will acknowledge the partner firstly. In this way, the intelligence property can be effectively protected and thus help avoid risk and build tight relationship with partner. As mentioned above, the advantage of acknowledging the work of others is to protect the IP and help build good relationship with partners.
It is a win-win behavior as it help build a good external environment where IP is respected and protected. Then the collaboration will keep going on the right way. With respect to the disadvantage of acknowledging the work of others, in the short term, think it may raise your implementing cost as you may have to pay for the price of referring to others’ work. But in the long run, this will avoid potential risks and build a good reputation for the company. As mentioned in the week 2 reflective journal, corporate social responsibility is an essential quality that merchants should own.