One of the most important steps in the cycle of excellence is the employee self-appraisal. Your manager may ask you to conduct a self-appraisal approximately one or two weeks before your performance review. It is worth taking the time to complete this exercise thoughtfully, because it will enable you to compare your impression of how well you did with your company's impression. The form may be identical to the one your manager uses, so it will give you a good indication of what will be talked about in your performance review and later filed with the human resources department. You will also need a copy of your job description to conduct the self-appraisal most effectively.

Even if your organization does not require a formal self-appraisal, it is to your advantage to complete a self-test, since the performance review process is so closely related to your career advancement.

The Salary.com Performance Self-Test is an employee self-appraisal that can be personalized according to your specific responsibilities. Use it at any time in the year to check your progress, including performance review season. The Salary.com Performance Self-Test encourages you to think about questions such as these.

• Taking each part of my job description in turn, how well have I carried out that aspect of my work?
• To what extent have I achieved the objectives I to which agreed at my last review?
• In what aspects of my work have I been most successful (give examples) and why?
• Are there any aspects of my work where I have not done as well as I hoped (give examples) and why?
• In what aspects of my work is there room for improvement?
• How do I intend to improve?
• Are there any changes needed to my job description to reflect changing responsibilities?
• What objectives should be set for each of the main aspects of my job (my key result areas) for next year?
• What steps do I think will be necessary to ensure that these objectives are achieved?

- Bill Coleman, Vice President of Compensation