Human Resource Self-Assessment

Every individual is defined or characterized by interpersonal values, attributes, skills, abilities and interests towards something.  Depending on this factors, one choses or opts for a predefined career , that he or she thinks, correlates the most with their interests and abilities. For some, it may be specific skill or a trait of intelligence that set them apart from rest of the crowd since they are little kids, like dancers, musicians, singers, sportsmen etc. and their god gift naturally develops a very prominent career path for them in their adult hood. On the other hand,  others who also possess great skills and god gifted abilities, but are not sure of what exactly to do, or are in a state of dilemma regarding the most suitable career path for them, they can relax, take a deep breath and conduct  a self-assessment .  Self-assessment can be a great way of analyzing oneself, in terms of which direction you want to go. It is helpful for not only recent graduates and students, but also helpful for individuals, who have reached onto a dead end in their current career or job profile. Someone who is saturated with their current career, or who is bored with monotony of their job, is not able to climb the management ladder, who feels they are in totally wrong profession and more. Whenever, any individual lands oneself into this kind of situation, he/she can think of conducting a self-assessment, to carve new career paths and goals for them.

There are multiple ways of doing a self-assessment, the most direct being, having one on one talk with your own self.  Understanding, what you like, what you can do the best, what were your goals five years ago, where are you now, what are your likes and dislikes, where you want to be five years from now, can you do better, what are your skills and abilities, are you channelizing it effectively, are you happy with your current state, how you can enhance your current abilities and more. You can write about all these, make a diary, use a software, analyze through your skills and by various such methods, you yourself can come to a conclusion, of analyzing self and achieving positive results. Also some times, people use help of professionals, who conduct various written, verbal and psychoanalytical tests on you as an individual, to generate some results. These results, also drives you towards the same direction, and helps you in choosing the best career for you, but with help of qualified individuals and sophisticated analytical systems.

Career for me, is identity. Personal values and beliefs, plays a very pivotal role in deciding ones career.  For any individual, personal values, defines his characteristic, and his infatuation towards certain job or field. Our values motivate us to choose a certain career path, and put in all our efforts to achieve excellence.  For me, my personal value that is important for me, when choosing a career is prestige, self-identity, independence, alpha male quality, and excellence.  I would like to carve a name for me, with my immense knowledge and excellent work I do, in any job I choose.  For me, I should be known for my work and knowledge of my subject. I always admire Professor Dumbledore as he was epitome excellence of his field, in terms of creating unmatched identity, alpha male quality, beyond achievable knowledge and excellence in everything he undertook during his career. Hence, for me my career would be something that would define me, carve my name in society for my great work in that field and unmatched excellence I have achieved throughout my career.  Apart from this four main values, I also admire security and stability, as career needs to be stable and secure. Volatile career is short lived and you have to deal with exclusive uncertainty and insecurity related to career throughout your life, which is fascinating for young adults say between 21-35, but after that you need to be secure and stable in terms of your career.

Looking at my current situation, after finishing my degree in biomedicine, I worked for two to three odd years in research labs for biotech companies. But I was very much stagnant in terms of my career progression. Working in same labs, same positions, with same chemicals, in that white coat, started pinching me a bit. Also without a management degree, I was not allowed to join any other department than, the R&D department, and to be in charge of R&D department, you have to have a PhD level of academics in your kitty. Also, Ph.D. was too much of an investment and I did not see myself as someone who could work in labs all my life. Hence, I decided to pursue a management degree, which will help me in progressing my career ahead. My current situation is quite optimistic in terms of what I wanted, as getting a professional business degree, will help me in opening new opportunities for me in the Bio-pharmaceutical industry, as I would be able to choose from many management departments in this industry to work for.  Having said so, I have been always interested in the bio-pharmaceutical field. The biological world of human body and microbes have always interested me and hence, I would always like to be associated with this field. May be not working into core research, development or academic departments, but in departments which needs mix of both technical acumen and management expertise. It can be in health and service departments of governments or private bio-pharmaceutical companies. In this industry, my core interests lies in working specifically for two departments, product development and management or brand management.  My strongest attributes would be one my never ending thirst for biomedical sciences, hence I never stop myself from acquiring technical proclivity on multiple topics of biomedical sciences and two, my extrovert nature & zeel for sectors like advertising, communications, marketing, development of new products, product awareness and establishing. As for any biopharmaceutical organization, government or private, development of new products and their establishment in the market is very necessary. For doing this they need someone like me, some who can development their product into a brand, through communication with government professionals , academicians, pharmaceutical managers, doctors etc  who already are very technically skilled. Hence, someone who has management experience, communication, advertising & media skills and technical knowledge to easily communicate on technical level with professionals. Hence, my attributes of having management studies, extrovert nature and technical acumen will help me moving ahead in brand and product management department of biopharmaceutical industry. My previous accomplishments which made me think of thinking seriously about getting ahead in this direction was when, working for Biopharma company in UK, I was the only biochemist working in that branch. So, any queries or seminars company conducted for marketing of new products, brand development, had stalls in conferences and in events like this, I was the one who use to handle the heat, talk with great minds of biotech world, market our speciality biotech products to them, have brief technical discussion about our products and help in brand management and advertising activities along with my lab work. This accomplishment of mine, motivated me sersly to pursue a business degree and move ahead in field of biopharmaceutical brand and product development department.