One of the things that mark the end of the year is reflections. This cuts across both our personal and professional lives. The good thing about reflections and reviews is that it allows us to evaluate our achievements, strengths, enables you to refocus your efforts and provides areas for improvement. Year end reviews shouldn’t be done just because, nor should it be something we do just to tick off our year end to-do, but should be taken seriously and conducted with the intention of growth and improvement.
What are some of the things you should cover in your review?
Your accomplishment:
I know how tricky it can be to write or state your accomplishments especially if you had a ‘hard’ year or spent a chunk of time transitioning or looking for a job. However, if you take a long, hard look at the year you will realize you did some phenomenal things. There is no standard for accomplishment; it differs from person to person. For one, it could be landing their first paying gig, for another it could be learning to write a stellar CV themselves, for someone else it could be daring to transition into another career field and for someone who probably spent half of the year job hunting and is yet to get an offer, your accomplishment could be the courage displayed in applying to different places despite the rejections and how hard it was. So yeah you should be proud of yourself.
Strengths & weaknesses:
It is important to evaluate what you did excellently well and certain gaps you need. Did you improve your communication skills? Learn to set boundaries at work? Write it down. Did you also realize that you need to learn to speak up and advocate for yourself? That although you’re good at what you do, interviewing is a hassle for you? Note this. Then seek out areas of improvement so that you can get better.
Set Goals:
Goal setting should not be approached from a 0–100 perspective. Rather, it should be from a 0–2–5…etc perspective. For example, if you plan to build your personal brand next year and take up speaking gigs, your goal shouldn’t be — speak at 30 big tech events next week. While it is good to dream big, our dreams should also be broken down into realistic steps. Your goal will somewhat look like learning public speaking skills — begin to speak at meetings — speak at a design workshop- speak at XYZ virtual community learning sessions etc. The more you do these, the more you get better at it and eventually, get to your ultimate goal of being a paid, big tech event speaker.
So, how should you go about your annual review? There is no set template for this. But, you can look through your journals, your job application sheet, your personal and work calendar to see how far you have come and what you have done. There are other examples to imitate/ For example, technologist Justin Duke divides his review into personal, professional and content sections, and ends his review with 5 core goals for the new year. You can also look up examples online or use templates to conduct yours.
Year end reviews are about reflection and sometimes our memories may not supply the data we need to carry this out. This is why you need data at your disposal to look back at the year. Think calendars, your email, tc. Here are some information you should access before starting your reflection
What if you do not have some or all of the information above? Don’t fret. You should go on to do your review with information you can remember and then set up a system to ensure that you have all the data points needed for the coming year. When reflecting, ensure to examine and question and not dwell or beat yourself up on lapses. The essence of a reflection is to know and improve and not to go down the rabbit hole of regret and should-haves.
For instance, if you spent the year looking for a job, do not spend time looking at the ‘rejection’ emails and getting sad all over again. Rather, consider the reasons why you didn’t make it through. Could it be that your CV does not reflect what you’ve done in your career? Do you need to get better at interviewing or at technical tests? Do you perhaps, need to reduce the number of applications you put out per day so you can optimize for less but better and optimal applications? These are some of the factors you should consider. This review will also show if your skills are suited for another industry rather than the ones you’ve been applying to and can be key in helping you make a career pivot.
For those who aren’t job hunting but looking to grow even more in the coming year, conducting a personal year end career review in addition to that carried out by your employer or manager is important. Examine all you did at work throughout the year, the areas you grew in and feedback from your manager to determine 2–5 things to either double down on or get better at.
Remember, the trick is to reflect objectively - identify strengths and gaps and - concise goals for the coming year.
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