Self Assessment: a Tool for Growth

Inquire Within for Workplace Success

The Harvard Business Review found in a recent workplace study, that leaders are better at self-assessment than

non-leaders. They also found that the ability to self-assess makes employees stronger in other areas of performance.

In order to tap into self-assessment, it may be useful to write one for your next performance review.  This will enable you to share the information and measure your accuracy, based on your manager’s input.

Self-assessment is the first step to improvement.  To get you started on your quest for self-improvement, Sharon Daniels, chief executive of AchieveGlobal, has come up with some useful guidelines for writing a self-assessment.  They include:

• Reflect: Good leaders think about their motives and beliefs, and listen for opinions that contradict them. Keep the big picture in mind and assess how your actions have affected goals and successes.

• Be honest about your warts: When writing a self assessment, do not skimp on your shortcomings. If the list is short… dig deeper.

• Include your contributions to the bottom line: Be specific and include all the backup data that is available.

• Describe ways that you have improved: Include training you have participated in and how you have applied it. Position yourself as you would a product.

• Do not be self-serving: In other words, do not take more than your share of the credit. The goal is honesty here.

Daniels also suggests that you use self-assessment as a year round learning tool and that you ask yourself the following questions on a regular basis:

• Is what I am doing working?
• How can I improve?
• Do I have any unproductive habits that are getting in the way?
• Do I have any behavior issues getting in the way of success?
• Am I focusing on priorities?
• Am I looking inward as often as needed?

Daniels offers more advice on self-assessment in the full post (link below). Looking inward is a great way to move forward and in this post-recessionary period, we all need to perform at our best!