Advancement in your career requires honest self-assessment. Beyond being truthful with yourself about your weaknesses, you need to know what competencies are most important in your job. For example, management employees need to be proficient at persuasion and giving guiding principles more than non-management workers. Plan ways to improve your essential competencies to progress in your professional career.

Communication Skills

Communication abilities will most likely be among the most important assets of your career. Assess yourself according to how well you get your messages across, decipher the conversations around you, present ideas and resolve conflict through verbal and written skills. Aspects to pay particular attention to how much of an active listener you are, your ability to make complex materials comprehensible and your skills in inspiring others with written and oral communication.

Problem Solving

How you solve problems helps determine your overall effectiveness at work. Think back to how you handled difficult situations in the past. There likely are areas where you can pinpoint mistakes you can learn from. For example, if you had an employee neglect work duties and instead of confronting him about his performance, you did some of the tasks, you got the work done but did not resolve the issue to the best of your ability.

Technical Proficiency

Technology is a core component in almost all business fields, and it changes quickly. It is, therefore, critical to your success to assess accurately how well-equipped you are in technical areas. Compare yourself with others you consider proficient in technological abilities. Keep abreast of new innovations, test your skills regularly and strive to learn new systems and software applications that will get you and your company an advantageous edge.

Work Discipline

The degree of discipline you possess reflects greatly in your productivity and performance on the job. Evaluate your typical work day by looking at the percentage of time you spend on each aspect. Consider aspects of work discipline, to include time management, attendance and tardiness. Weaknesses in these areas indicate a problem with your work discipline. Awareness of these types of issues is the first step in resolving them and making a general improvement in your professionalism.

Employee Relations

Dealing with conflicts and issues that arise between workers is an interpersonal skill that often is difficult to master. Assess your abilities in the realm of employee relations by considering you skills in empathetic thinking, negotiation, general guidance, honesty and transparency. Determine the strengths and weaknesses you have in handling employee relationships. Your goal should be to behave in an ethical, impartial and honest manner at all times.