Case study: Sandra's professional development

Sandra has been employed with Harmony Community Centre as leader of the community garden project for six months. Sandra reports directly to you, the manager of the centre.

You have just caught up with Sandra about how her team is performing. In this discussion you have both identified some skills that could be improved in the community garden project's small team of four volunteers to enhance the services provided.

Sandra tells you that the project's retail business has recently started to pick up - more and more customers are coming to the garden project to buy seedlings and plants. She has noticed that the volunteers are not trained in retail and customer service. You both agree that the team could benefit from skill development to improve their cash handling, administration and customer service skills.

2.Create a learning and development plan for the community garden project volunteers to address the performance issues identified in the case study. Your plan should cover the following:

• a) Areas for improvement: List each performance area to be improved.
• b) Strategies to improve performance: Describe the strategies and activities that can be implemented to address the areas for improvement.
• c) Providers: Provide details of external training providers or consultants that can be engaged to deliver the required performance development activities. Note the process you would follow to engage the providers.
• d) Timeframes: Note the timeframes involved in providing and delivering the performance development activities.
• e) Quality and compliance strategies: Describe the methods that will be used to monitor the performance development activities to ensure they meet compliance and quality standards.