Fahad Alamer

April 17
th
2014



Final Reflection Paper





















Commitment to Success

After reading my early reflections and responses, I observed that I did not
know many things about business including my major-, and did not understand other
aspects of them. I would not claim that I am aware of every important detail of the field
of business, but I believe that now, I DO have the fundamentals and the basics that I need
to go through this path.
To explain this, I would like to give two examples from my professional
biography project, and the goals setting project. In the professional bio, I imagined and
wrote, that I became a brand manager in the marketing department in BOA, after earning
the CPA and the Masters degree in accounting. I misunderstood the functions of
professional or graduate accountants, and related them to the marketing, which I believe
now that it was a big mistake and inaccurate. In the Goal Setting reflection I had a similar
mistake, when I decided that I would be there, in any section of the Accounting
Department, at a well-known company, without realizing the initial positions and tasks of
the fresh graduate accountants (I have had the same misunderstanding while doing the
Inquiry project as well).
I would like to explain how my thinking about myself, my major, and business in
general, have changed, by realizing how wrong I was when I made mistakes such as the
two examples above. The amount of knowledge that I have gained during the CDT and
business classes was enough to me to realize that many of the basic ideas I have had,
were not tangible facts, and sometimes, they were not accurate.
When I decided to study accounting, the only aspect I adopted, was the
compensation, and the market demand. It seems now that the method I chose to set such a
goal was wrong. I dont regret the path I chose to myself, but I believe that I had not done
a good research about what I was going to confront, and ignored many facts about this
business. To avoid this from happening again during my academic progress and future
goals, I have to know and measure my skills and what I am capable of. I have also to
cover my next step by studying the target itself, whether I match it or not.
Overall, I think that I gained many ideas, replaced some, and supported many old
ideas that I am still holding, but the only thing that is still standing the same in my mind,
is the fact that in Accounting major, there is a good space to develop and grow.















Inquiry

There are two reasons of choosing the profile of my Inquiry Project. First, the
major of myself, and second, between all the careers and majors, this is the one that
I have good knowledge of.
I was confused about how to gather the information from certified or reliable
resources, especially in the Demographics and annual compensation parts. After
spending a good amount of time in Bureau of Labor Statistic website, and
understanding the order of it. I was also confused how to transform the data and
numbers into my own words, and I overcame this by trying to include one detail in
each sentence, and if I had to put more than one, I figured out another methods such as
making comparison between two amounts or two years.
After finishing the Inquiry project, I knew that I learned new methods of
researching, explored new resources that I can rely on for future plans, and discovered
lots of facts and outcomes of the field that I probably will work in.
Personally, I understood one important aspect about myself that misunderstood
earlier, before the Inquiry Project. I changed my mind about the idea that I hate the paper
work and researches, and realized that it could be interesting and more fun if I discover
something I like or I am interested in.

From my Inquiry Project experience, I claim that the importance of learning the
inquiry matters because this specific side determines if we are literate in a specific field
or not, thus if we are qualified to succeed in the same field or not. For me, it is very
expected that I will have to apply the methods of inquiry sooner of later for many
purposes, such as searching about a job, or internship. I would also apply these methods
in smaller purposes in the academic life, may be before attending an elective course.

















Cultural Awareness

As a person who has been living and studying in the U.S for only one year, I
was and still am learning many things from people from an open culture such as the
American culture. I would not claim that my condition is rare, because I have met
many people from many parts of the world studying with me at the UNCC. I have
held a large responsibility to learn whatever I could from this diversity. A good
opportunity to do this was performing the CDT in-class activities with new people in
each session.
Honestly, I was neutral and did not have serious assumptions, what I really have
had is some confusion of the reasons they chose their majors, and what their values and
beliefs of business. Day by day, by doing these activities and speaking with others, I
started to understand their points of view, their motivations, and why they chose who
they are. Now, it seems to me that I have understood great aspects about other cultures
from simple activities such the personal descriptors, and from the comments I have
received about what I missed and what was good in my resume.
I would like to give an example about how my understanding of business
success has changed after the discussions in the class. For me, the word success in
business necessarily meant the ability to make money. I discussed this topic in the class
with my classmates, and realized that many of them seek to provide a good impact on
their own environments and societies. Another part of people in class believed that
affording good amount of money, and investing this money in their childrens education
is a big success. We agreed that a big part of success is the self-satisfaction because it a
big reason and motive of productivity.
In the end, I can say that the people whom I have met in the CDT classes gave me
the impression that business is above everything for them. Almost every student has at
least one job while they are studying their bachelors degree. They are also aware of the
financial affairs, since most of them have already dealt with banks and financial
institutions to afford the necessary amounts to attend the university.