Guide to Self-Assessment

Understanding yourself for the purposes of career development is no simple task, however self-assessment is one method that can help. A key goal of self-assessment is to identify some things that might be meaningful to you, what your interests are, what you value, what you are good at and what your personality type is. Examining all of these factors can then help you make decisions about your career direction.

Completing some self-assessment exercises can help career planning and decision making.These questionnaires can help to provide you with some career learning and open your mind to new possibilities that you may not have considered. They can help to identify areas that you appear unsuited to and this process of elimination can help you to refine your choices. Alternatively, self-assessments can simply confirm what you already know and validate that you are on the right career path. This affirmation can be very useful and can serve to increase your confidence in that area.

Self-assessments do just that – they assess ‘your opinion’ on your personal attributes such as your interests, values, attitudes, skills, and beliefs. Your answers are then used to create a personal career profile of you, highlight your individuality and how you can use your uniqueness to inform your career decisions.

Just as there are many different attributes, so too are there many self-assessment tools available online. Some are free, others require payment before you can receive the results. All are starting points only and taking several different assessments will help to build a more complete picture that represents you well.

It is important to stress that no amount of self-assessment is going to give you a 100% understanding of yourself, no one in life ever fully knows themselves, we just get to know ourselves more as we age. There will always be elements of the assessments that will be spot-on, just as there will be elements that are not. However, undertaking self-assessment will certainly help deepen your understanding of yourself, help you to find a goof fit with the world of work and education and focus your career direction more.

The following short story (and animated adaptation) written over a century ago, illustrates this nicely.

The Blind Men and the Elephant John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887)

It was six men of Indostan, to learning much inclined,

Who went to see the Elephant (though all of them were blind),

That each by observation might satisfy his mind.

The First approached the Elephant, and happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side, at once began to bawl:

"God bless me! but the Elephant is very like a WALL!"

The Second, feeling of the tusk, Cried: "Ho, what have we here,

So very round and smooth and sharp? To me 'tis mighty clear

This wonder of an Elephant, is very like a SPEAR!"

The Third approached the animal and happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands, thus boldly up and spake:

"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant is very like a SNAKE!"

The Fourth reached out an eager hand and felt about the knee

"What most this wondrous beast is like is mighty plain," quoth he:

"Tis clear enough the Elephant is very like a TREE!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said: "E'en the blindest man

Can tell what this resembles most; deny the fact who can,

This marvel of an Elephant is very like a FAN!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun about the beast to grope,

Than seizing on the swinging tail that fell within his scope,

"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant is very like a ROPE!"

And so these men of Indostan, disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion, exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right, and all were in the wrong!

Useful Links

Finding Potential - Free Psycometric Tests

Free access to industry standard assessments that include: two personality questionnaires, two 360's, two sifting questionnaires for sales & administrative roles and an individual engagement questionnaire.

123 Test

Free IQ tests, career tests, and personality tests. All tests are designed to help you find serious answers to your questions about IQ, personality, or career assessment.

Holland Interest Profiler

Official O*Net test used widely in the USA to determine your career interests. Matches to careers from the O*Net database. Note: The Interest Profiler on this site is more advanced and links to an Irish database.

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