In the past few years, someone must have brought up the topic of self-awareness in almost every conference I was speaking at. Usually, it is how “other people” lack self-awareness, especially the leaders they report to. Self-awareness is a crucial leadership trait, yet most people cannot evaluate themselves. It may well be the hardest thing in the world.
For example, 95% of all parents think their children are above average. More than 98% of us believe our leadership skills are above average. Most people believe they would be in the ‘low-risk’ category when it comes to their likelihood of getting heart attacks or serious illnesses, regardless of their current exercise regime. Most people are unrealistically optimistic about their health risks compared with their peers. Research shows that most university students do a far better job predicting the longevity of their roommates’ romantic relationships than their own.
Clearly, these examples illustrate that people are not objective in their self-evaluation. Research indicates that the “majority of people say that they are more likely than their peers to provide accurate self-awareness.”
A few years ago, I read a great book by brothers Chip & Dan Heath called “Switch” where the two brothers describe how individuals are afflicted by “positive illusion“.
They also concluded that most people are lousy self-evaluators. They believe
this results in our inability to change as we are often delusional about our strengths and weaknesses, thinking change is unnecessary for us.
In this book, the Heath brothers espouse the story of an experiment by psychologists Peter Borkenau and Anette Liebler. The experiment was tagged the ‘Fake Weatherman’ study. The scholars brought a fake weatherman into a room full of people, and that person gave a 90-second weather report. The folks in the room then had to guess the weather reporter’s IQ. They also asked the fake weatherman to guess his own IQ. What did they find? Amazingly, the observers offered far more
accurate predictions than the weatherman, even though they knew nothing about
this complete stranger!
This experiment was later repeated in different forms. Each time, people with limited to no knowledge or background of the individual observed made a far better assessment of the person than the individual concerned. How could this be possible? We should make better assessments of ourselves than total strangers, right? But time and time again, we seem less accurate in our assessment of ourselves than a total stranger is.
Why is this so? The reality is that no one welcomes bad news about themselves. It
is also hard admitting that you may not be as good as others, or worst, having
to own up to mistakes. But the leaders that do seek out true self-evaluation do
so because they want to keep learning and growing. Without awareness, there is
no growth.
Ask almost any leader, and they will readily agree that self-awareness is critical to success. Yet, many are unaware of their actual ability or areas of development. The deeper the self-awareness obtained, the greater the leader. Yet, most leaders have no time for personal reflection.
The LOSA CEO
Years ago, a CEO of an organisation asked me to coach his leadership team. As I sat with him, he was clearly annoyed and furious with the quality of the leaders
reporting to him. In fact, he used strong words such as ‘stupid’ and ‘useless’
to emphasise how poor his team was. I listened and told him I would get back to
him after meeting his team and assessing them.
Surprisingly, as I met the team, his version of events didn’t match what his team said. This got me rather curious, so I told him I would like to spend some time determining the real issue. He continued to be adamant that he had a poor-performing leadership team.
Interestingly, in all his stories, he was the solitary voice of reason, pushing changes and driving the board’s agenda. Yet, all his direct reports seemed to work hard for
the success of the organisation too. In fact, they believed that he was the reason the organisation couldn’t move forward.
As I tried to ‘coach’ this CEO, he became defensive and continued to assert that
he was right, and they were all clueless. This situation continued for a few weeks until I told him that he may have the ‘LOSA’ disease. He immediately looked me in the eye and asked me what that was and if there was a cure. I replied, “The LOSA disease happens to folks who are lousy self-evaluators. LOSA means Lack of Self-Awareness. And the only way to fix it is to reflect and take personal responsibility.”
I lost that assignment and never met him after. Needless to say, he did not remain CEO for very long, either.
Self-Assessments in the Workplace
In the workplace, flawed self-assessments are not just confined to CEOs or senior leaders. HR leaders tend to be extremely bad self-evaluators too. Employees also tend to overestimate their skills, making it challenging to give meaningful feedback. The most complex discussions are with HR leaders or employees who feel that they ‘know it all’ and are always right. In fact, I make it a point to never hire such people if I can detect these types during interviews.
HR leaders, too, sometimes display overconfidence in their judgments, particularly in areas they feel they know a lot about. They fail to understand that the world keeps changing and situations
and contexts continually evolve. And often, we make these leaders “god-like” and bestow so much respect and prestige that they soon believe they are immune to mistakes. This further reinforces their belief and distorts their self-evaluation efforts, which causes HR leaders to make bad hires and judgments of people.
Just like in business, in universities, students rate their performance better than their teachers.
Studies show that students generally cannot assess how well or poorly they grasp books read. According to the same study, students “tend to be overconfident in newly learned skills.”
Even business schools are looking for self-aware applicants. Pete Johnson, Berkeley’s MBA admissions, says “it’s better for applicants to be self-aware than claim no weaknesses”. Yet, most business schools hardly teach MBAs how to take time out to conduct honest assessments of their true self.
Steps to Self-Evaluate
Essentially, our self-views generally differ from our actual behaviour and performance. We overrate ourselves, thinking we are “above average” in skill or even overly optimistic about our estimates of when we will complete future projects or assignments. So, how do we become better self-evaluators?
I want to suggest four steps for us to do so:
1.
Gather Evidence –
Before making judgments about ourselves, gather as much evidence as possible from as many sources as possible. Obtain 360-degree feedback from colleagues, managers, and friends. Attain any form of assessments done, even those done for development. Ask as many people as possible for frank feedback on strengths and weaknesses.
2.
Analyse Evidence –
Once you have gathered as many data points as possible, analyse the data. Review the feedback and be as honest as possible with yourself. Do not try to find fault with the data or justify or defend yourself. Keep an open mind as you analyse the data and imagine you are analysing the evidence of someone else.
3.
Draw Conclusions
– Outline clearly a detailed report on yourself. Identify your strengths, areas to improve, and where you stand with others. Be clear to spell out in your report how good (or bad) you are in each area of your work, relationships, and goals. This may be tough to do alone, so you may want to get a spouse or close friend to help you through the process.
4.
Develop an Action Plan
– Finally, develop a clear plan to improve. The goal of the exercise cannot just be knowledge but has to be action-oriented. Build a plan and set precise timing to overcome gaps or issues.
Remember, the process is not about finding faults with yourself. It is to identify areas you may not be aware of—such as situations where you lose your temper, argue too much, lie, or think
too highly of yourself. Then develop a plan and start improving.
Final Thoughts
Research indicates that people who really know themselves are happier and more content with life. It is the hardest thing to honestly ‘examine’ ourselves and our character, including its flaws and limitations. Yet, to know ourselves enables us to go to a “higher ground” and a higher level of consciousness.
Only when we realise that we are not ‘perfect’ and have “repairs” to be made can we truly grow and develop into the leader or HR professionals we are meant to be. Remember, self-management can only happen when we are first self-aware. Nothing can be ‘fixed’ without really knowing what to fix.
Roshan Thiran is CEO of Leaderonomics Group, a group of social enterprises passionate about transforming the nation through leadership development, employee intelligence and learning. Amongst the most innovative businesses that are part of the group include eVulx, an award winning digital simulations organisation, Necole, the leader in blended learning globally and Budaya, who have developed game-changing employee intelligence apps and the MAD Movement.
