Applicable to: All staff, especially new staff, as well as trainees, and interns.

To support your personal and professional growth, we encourage you to utilise the following activities.

Use the roles and responsibilities described under each team to guide the selection of the competencies you wish to gain.

Planning what competencies to gain

At the start of the internship, identify the competencies that you would like to gain during the internship. During the internship, if you identify more competencies that you would like to gain, feel free to highlight additional cells.

1️⃣ Identify 1-2 competencies that you would like to start with first. 

2️⃣ Optionally, choose another 1-2 projects or tasks from rebrand.ly/ActSEAVolOpp that align with your goals.

Planning how to gain competencies


ActSEA uses the "see-do-teach" approach to help you become more proficient in the competency you wish to gain.For example, if the competency is to facilitate workshops.
1See: This involves gaining knowledge of how the competency is practiced, and can be done through a variety of methods depending on the nature of the skills involved.
  • Study established guidelines e.g. reading the facilitator's guide
  • Watch video tutorials e.g. video on facilitation skills
  • Complete a training module e.g. do an online course on facilitation
  • Participate in a relevant activity e.g. attend a workshop and observe how facilitators work
  • Attend a briefing/training • Study past examples e.g. recording of workshop
2Do: This involves applying the knowledge/skill with ActSEA, and demonstrates that you are able to perform the skills required.
  • Facilitate at least one workshop, first as a co-facilitator, then as lead facilitator
3Teach: This involves training others in the competency, and helps you gain an in-depth understanding of the skills required. It does not have to involve direct training.
  • Review, update and/or develop guidelines e.g. suggesting how the facilitator's guide can be improved
  • Create video tutorials e.g. create a video 10 tips for managing disruptive participants
  • Create a training module
  • Run a briefing/training session
  • Mentor a new facilitator

Working on your competencies

You are expected to regularly meet with your ActSEA mentor(s) and peers to:

  • Decide which competencies to work on in the coming days/weeks
  • Plan what activities to carry out in order to see-do-teach skills that are relevant to the identified competencies.
  • Review progress on planned activities and competencies.

You are encouraged to document your plans and achievements in your personal Confluence space (or another platform you are comfortable with). That will help you keep track of the progress you are making.


To help you reflect on what you learned during the internship, we encourage you to write a blog post in your personal space at the end of each week, responding to at least 3 questions below:

  1. What have been your key successes, achievements, or learnings?
  2. If you have a personal/learning/training development plan, what progress have you made towards those plans? Provide examples of progress made.
  3. What challenges have you faced? How did you deal with these challenges?
  4. What feedback have you received? How did you deal with the feedback? What did you learn from the feedback?
  5. What have been the connections between what you learned in ActSEA and what you learned in the classroom?
  6. How has the internship helped you better understand your abilities, strengths, weaknesses, values and/or interests? (Please identify these abilities, strengths, weaknesses, values and/or interests)
  7. Reflect on your working style and personality as a team member of ActSEA. Do you think there is anything you should try to change?
  8. What changes have you experienced in yourself?
  9. What insights have you gained into the type of work you have been involved in? Has your perception towards the type of work you are doing changed? If so, in what way?
  10. What have you valued most from your experience so far? How will you apply this to other aspects of your life?
  11. How does your experience relate to what you want to do as a career? What did you discover about your fit in this type of career?
  12. Any thoughts on ActSEA's vision, mission, culture, strengths, and weaknesses. Has your perception of ActSEA changed? If so, in what way?
  13. What were your expectations of the internship? To what extent has the internship met your expectations so far? What else would you like achieve in the remainder of the internship?

For interns/trainees who are with ActSEA for more than 3 months, the frequency of the reflection can be reduced as we progress through the internship/traineeship.

Inspired by The College of Wooster.

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