Setting Personal Goals
Senior 4 · Entrepreneurship
Setting Personal Goals
Lesson 2 of 4
25 min
Asked by a career adviser what she is good at, Ineza, in S4, shrugs: "Nothing special." The adviser asks different questions. Who in your family manages the money for the small shop? Ineza does, every weekend. Who designed the poster for the school's science fair? Ineza. Who do friends call when they quarrel? Ineza. In ten minutes she has evidence of book-keeping, design and peace-making, three skills she did not know she had. (Illustrative case.)
Think about it: why do people so often fail to see their own skills and qualities, and who can help them see?
Definition
Skill: an ability to do something well that is learned through training and practice. Technical (hard) skills belong to a particular task, such as sewing, programming or book-keeping. Transferable (soft) skills are useful in almost any work, such as communication, teamwork and problem solving.
Definition
Personal quality: a lasting feature of a person's character or behaviour, such as patience, honesty, confidence or persistence. Self-awareness: knowing your own values, skills, qualities, strengths and weaknesses accurately. Self-assessment: the methods a person uses to build that knowledge.
| Values | Skills | Personal qualities | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Question it answers | What matters to me? | What can I do? | What am I like? |
| How it is gained | Family, faith, culture, experience | Training and practice | Temperament and long habit |
| How fast it changes | Slowly | Quickly, with practice | Slowly, with effort |
| Examples | Integrity, independence, service | Book-keeping, design, selling | Patience, confidence, persistence |
| Tool | How to use it | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Values ranking | Write 15 values on cards; keep the 10 most important, then 5, then 3 | Your core values, in order |
| Skills audit | List skills; rate each from 1 to 5; give evidence; ask others to rate you too | Strengths, gaps, and where your view differs from others' |
| Personal SWOT | List your strengths and weaknesses (inside you) and the opportunities and threats around you | A plan: use strengths, fix weaknesses |
| Johari window | Compare what you know about yourself with what others know | Blind spots and hidden qualities |
| Interest inventory | Answer questions about activities you enjoy (such as Holland's RIASEC, Unit 3) | Fields of work that suit you |
Two American psychologists, Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham, devised the Johari window in 1955; its name joins their first names. It divides what can be known about a person into four panes, according to whether the person knows it and whether others know it.
Tip
Ask three people. Self-assessment alone is biased: most people underrate some skills and overrate others. Ask a teacher, a friend and a family member to rate the same skills, and look for the gaps between their view and yours.
Worked example 1: a skills audit with others' ratings
Ineza rates herself from 1 (weak) to 5 (excellent) on three skills, and three people rate her too. (Illustrative ratings.)
| Skill | Self | Teacher | Friend | Aunt |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Book-keeping | 2 | 4 | 3 | 5 |
| Public speaking | 4 | 2 | 3 | 2 |
| Design | 4 | 4 | 5 | 3 |
Mean of the others' ratings, , and the gap = others' mean − self-rating:
Interpretation: a large positive gap (book-keeping) is a strength in her blind pane: she underrates it. A large negative gap (public speaking) is a weakness she has not noticed: she overrates it, so it needs practice. A gap near zero (design) is in the open pane.
Worked example 2: a personal SWOT
Ineza wants to start a small design and printing service for schools and shops.
Actions: use her design strength and her uncle's printer to serve local schools; practise presenting at school club meetings to fix her main weakness; save for a second-hand computer; plan most work for the holidays.
Warning
Weaknesses are not permanent labels. A skills audit shows where you are now, not what you are. Skills grow with practice, so a weakness is a plan, not a verdict. And don't list only technical skills: employers and customers value communication, reliability and teamwork as much.
Toolshero, "Johari Window Model". Watch how feedback and self-disclosure move information between the four panes, then think of one thing that may be in your own blind pane.
Practice
Key points
Sources and credits
Written by Ganzaa: Ineza's case, the Johari window diagram (after Luft and Ingham's 1955 model), the tables, the worked examples and the practice items. The people and ratings are illustrative (2026).
Quick check
Match each item to what it is.
Tap one on the left, then its partner on the right.
