Self assessment aims at collecting and analyzing relevant information about a very complex subject i.e. YOU. You can perform a SWOT analysis on yourself to know your strengths and weaknesses and also to find out the opportunities and threats involved in pursuing the objective. Self assessment is the first step in the career planning process. On self assessment, you collect information about yourself in order to make a career decision. Thus learning about yourself helps you to figure out what career you should pursue. Self assessment will also help you to identify where changes must be made, why it must be made and how to go about it. Thus it should be the first step you take when choosing an occupation.
Various self assessment tools, also known as career assessment tools help in the career planning process. Self assessments include values, interests, personality, and skills which plays an important role in your career choice.
- Values: the things that are important to you, like achievement, status, and autonomy
- Interests: what you enjoy doing
- Personality: a person’s individual traits, motivational drives, needs, and attitudes
- Skills: the activities you are good at
Sometimes you may have to show self-confidence by conducting a self-assessment to determine your strengths and weaknesses. This is required to determine the areas where you are strong in and as well as identify your shortcomings. It will give you an insight on where you should concentrate your time and energy. Thus through self assessment, you can identify your strengths and weaknesses and moreover work on it. So never put yourself down only because you are not good at a certain task. Place your thoughts and energy in those areas you do well. Never allow negative thoughts to come across. Always think positive and build yourself up.
When choosing an occupation, you have to consider your values otherwise, there’s a chance that you’ll dislike your work and therefore not succeed in it. There are two types of values: intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic values are related to the work itself and what it contributes to society. Extrinsic values include external features, such as physical setting and earning potential.
Job seekers, before they start to look for work, must go through some self assessment questions like:
- What kind of work do I really want to do?
- What are my skills, talents, values and qualities?
- What are the trends I see in the marketplace today?
You can express yourself during an initial introductory interview and meetings, where you can discuss your interests, needs, and values by looking at previous work, volunteer experiences, extracurricular activities, education, and hobbies. You can write an interest and personality test to be aware of your core interest areas and your preferences for such things and how you make decisions. Also creative self-exploration exercises and computer-based self-assessment programs can help you to identify your core interests, values, and skill areas, as well as to link these assessment results to specific career fields.
In short, self assessment begins and ends with oneself. It involves asking oneself a series of questions and providing the answers, all by oneself.