Self-Evaluation: A Step-by-Step Guide
First, request the following from your company’s personnel department:
- Written job descriptions for your current position and the positions above and below yours
- Your company’s official evaluation form
By reading the job descriptions, determine if you’re performing at job level, above, or below it. What responsibilities should you have but don’t? What’s preventing you from taking on more responsibility? Lack of skills, opportunities, time? What responsibilities lay beyond your current position?
Now peruse the official evaluation form. On what criteria will you be evaluated? What’s the ranking scale? Where do you rank in each area? Where would you like to be? Scrutinize the past months and recall concrete examples of good and poor performance. Write them down.
Using your self-rankings, determine what resources you need to get to where you want to be. More training? More time? Or just the opportunity to show you can do it?
Finally, determine how you’re going to fill the gap. Skills can be gained by going back to school, through on-the-job experience, by reading, or from official or unofficial training. If you’re having trouble with time management or interpersonal relationships, devise a plan to address these areas. Maybe you need to beef up your professional image by attention to detail, getting to work on time, and dressing more appropriately. Whatever your areas of concern, the first step to addressing them is identifying them.
Where To Go For Help
Don’t know where to start? Here are some possibilities.