This unit had an assignment for writing a memo to my team members about the best LinkedIn practices. In the process of researching, I have realized that LinkedIn offered a lot more than just a web version of my resume. It can be used as a blog platform to post about professional experiences and thoughts. Active engagement in other people’s content might even attract recruiter’s attention to your own profile. Moreover, LinkedIn also offer skill assessments that certifies the skills you mentioned in your profile, as well as recommendations from your past employers and coworkers. All these tools will be especially useful for someone seeking a job. I am currently in a coop program and will be starting my internship searching journey this summer. I feel the need to create a professional social media network very soon as it can greatly expand my network and increase my chances of landing a job. I am glad to have learned these features now, so I can put them into good use when I need them the most.

The other major assignments of this unit was the formal report proposal, project outline and progress report. At first, I was very lost in what topic to conduct my research on. After a lot of brain storming, I chose to write about the addition of small-wheeled vehicle lanes on major roads of UBC. I feel that this topic is something I am passionate about as a member of the skating community here at UBC. If such a lane can be implemented, it will benefit both skaters and non-skaters. After I put my ideas down on paper, the goals and steps flows nicely in a sequence, and all I had to do for the project outline is to organize them like a table of contents. However, I had great troubles with creating the survey for my research. I had many questions to ask, but to keep the survey short, I had to only keep the most important questions. I also learned how to use the UBC survey system, which had a really nice user interface, but the process the figuring out which questions should show up for a skater vs. a non-skater took quite some time to implement. In the end, the progress report memo was just a matter of reporting my work and setting a schedule for myself. Since the organization of goals, questions and steps of my research was already clear to me while doing the outline and the survey, I feel confident and optimistic in the outcome of this research. I can see how these steps will lead me to successfully write a formal report.

The peer review process of this unit was smooth. It’s honestly been a pleasure for me to review Jackson’s work. His writing is very formal and concise. He is able to express his ideas clearly with succinct and accurate language, which is also something that I need to improve on. I gave him some advice on avoiding negativity in his writing. In terms of the feedback he gave me, he pointed out a few minor grammatical errors such as “In UBC…” is unclear, and instead I changed it to “The UBC campus is over 400 hectares in size, therefore making it difficult for students to travel across campus quickly, especially with only 10 minutes in between classes”. He also suggested to improve the brevity of some sentences. Content wise, he suggested to address potential benefits for all parties in the proposed solution section and to include a clear statement for secondary sources of data. I think those are all great suggestions and I have revised my proposal according to them. After another round of reviewing process, I have again seen the benefits of doing peer review. It gives you another perspective of your work before it gets marked or published as a formal report.

Lastly, I am glad that my research is ready to get started and I look forward to getting survey feedback from participants and reading the response from the UBC community. I have attached a link to my revised research proposal and Jackson’s review of my proposal below.

My research proposal: Small-wheeled Vehicle Lanes on Main Road of UBC

Jackson’s peer review: Peer Review – Formal Report Proposal – Small-wheeled Vehicle Lanes on Main Road of UBC