What is Self-evaluation?
Self-evaluation is a process that helps you become more aware of your own strengths and weaknesses. It entails looking back at your past and asking key questions to gain insight and understanding about yourself. Self-evaluation is also the first step in assessing how well you are achieving goals and meeting expectations. In this article, we will explore what self-evaluation is, as well as steps to conduct a self-evaluation so that you can better understand yourself and others.
Key takeaways
- Self evaluation is the process of becoming more self-aware. It is done so through the form of self-reflection.
- Managers are turning to self-evaluations in place of one-way performance reviews to encourage employees to take accountability over their careers.
- Scheduling time regularly to conduct self-evaluation is a key habit to achieving your goals.
Why is it important?
Self Evaluation is an opportunity to look back at what you have already achieved and compare yourself against your own expectations. It allows us to see where we are in line with our goals, identify areas for improvement, recognize success when it happens, and set ourselves up for further growth. Looking over what happened previously will allow us to identify successes as well as areas for improvement so that we might meet our expectations better next time around. Identifying these key points allows us to see where things went wrong but also where they went right – this type of review helps us plan ways to improve those aspects going forward!
Self-evaluations shouldn’t happen only at the end of a project or just once in a while. Instead, they should be ongoing processes that help you stay on track toward achieving your long-term vision. By constantly looking back over past performance to inform future action, you will not only become more successful but also gain greater insight into how others perceive you.
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Self Evaluation in the workplace
More and more, organizations are moving towards a version of self evaluation in place of performance reviews for their employees. This provides employees with the opportunity to evaluate their contributions to the organization rather than having a manager dictate to them. Managers may still conduct a performance review on the employee. However, the discussions may focus more on converging on a shared understanding of how the employee performs and what is expected.
Self evaluations also encourage employees to take accountability for their performance and any career goals they may have. For companies with clear performance metrics for reaching a promotion, employees can identify what skills and behaviours they need to demonstrate in order to receive that promotion. Additionally, it will help employees identify what areas they need improvement.
Finally, managers can greatly benefit from employees performing self-evaluations as they give managers insight into how the employee views themselves on the team. This can help build empathy and perspective, enabling the managers to better motivate the employees. They can also help play to the employee’s self-perception by helping them showcase their strengths.
Steps to conducting a self-evaluation
Having a clear and structured approach to your self evaluation will help you reap more rewards from the process. Below are four steps you can take to ensure your self-evaluation is valuable time spent.
1. Schedule time for your self-evaluation
Like anything that is worth doing in your life, you should schedule dedicated time to conduct a self-evaluation. Start with half an hour first thing in the morning on a day where you do not work. This will allow you to be as present as possible for the exercise.
2. Get out a pen and some paper
Taking the time to write down your answers is a highly valuable part of the exercise. For one, it forces you to structure and formulate your thoughts. Second, it gives you a record that you can go back to at a later date. Minimize distractions by writing down on pen and paper rather than your computer.
3. Work through a series of questions
If journaling comes naturally to you, then go ahead and take your regular thought process. For the rest of us, running through a series of questions or prompts can help kick-start the reflection. Below are some questions to help kick start the process.
- What is an achievement that you are most proud of and why?
- What did you do to reach this achievement?
- Who are the individuals who helped you on this journey?
- Who are individuals who you were able to help on this journey?
- Where do you feel you need to improve?
- What are some things you can do to reach those improvements?
- What do you want to accomplish next?
You do not have to work through all of these questions each time for your self-reflection. However, at minimum, reflect on what you achieved, how you got there, and what you could have done better. This will provide you with a baseline evaluation for you to track progress and trends for when you look back at your past evaluations.
4. Review your past self-reflections and your goals
The culmination of all your self-reflections should demonstrate patterns and trends that are moving towards your goals. Every so often, be sure to review your goals to ensure they still align with what you want to achieve in your life. Your reflections may bring you to the realization that the things you thought you wanted are no longer the same as before. Recalibrate your goals based on the things you are learning about yourself from your self-evaluations.
