Developing Yourself at Work

Developing yourself professionally is essential to success in the workplace. Learning new skills makes you a more valuable employee and can lead to future promotions. It also helps you to stay calm during stressful situations. Whether you are looking to develop your communication, flexibility or leadership skills, there are many ways to do so at work.

Development is a multidimensional process that involves economic growth, social progress and environmental protection. It is a major international concern and encompasses different areas of activity, such as the elimination of poverty, hunger and disease in the world; eradication of illiteracy and ignorance; achieving sustainable economic growth; providing people with better living standards through higher incomes; and enabling them to make more choices and take more actions.

One of the central issues in developmental psychology is whether development is largely a result of nature (genes, biology) or nurture (environment, learning). Some researchers who endorse lifespan or ecological systems meta-theories believe that the causes of development are both natural and cultural. Others, such as Arnold Gesell, argue that children develop along a fixed sequence of stages.

Another key issue in development is continuity versus discontinuity. Some theorists, such as Freud, Erikson and Piaget, argue that development takes place in a series of qualitatively distinct stages, like caterpillar, chrysalis and butterfly, which unfold in a predetermined order. Others, such as the behaviorists and some sociologists, believe that development is continuous and occurs throughout an individual’s life.