Managers evaluate employee performance and provide feedback for professional development during performance reviews. Traditional performance reviews follow a top-down structure, but modern companies are adopting a more 360-degree approach.

One aspect of the 360-degree performance review is the employee self-evaluation, in which team members are encouraged to reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, career aspirations and growth opportunities. Here, employees provide an honest self-assessment, focusing on their achievements and improvements over time.

Employers should promote self-evaluation to aid employee growth and organisational success. This guide shares 45 self-evaluation questions to ask employees and best practices for incorporating employee self-evaluation into performance review workflows.

These 45 essential employee self-evaluation questions will help your organisation develop an effective review process. Select questions from this curated list or write your own when creating your self-evaluation form:

Ask employees to reflect on their performance at work over the past quarter, six months or one year. These performance questions will gather insights to give you a better understanding of your employees’ output and their contributions to business goals:

Use these questions to gauge how to help your employees achieve their career goals.

These questions help employees identify areas for improvement. Encourage employees to reflect transparently on any skills gaps that could have an impact on their careers:

The conduct of employees should align with and reflect the core beliefs of their company. Measure how well an employee represents your organisation’s mission and values by asking them:

Asking questions about an employee’s role gives managers a fresh perspective on their performance and productivity. Add these questions to get employees thinking about how their role affects them on a daily basis.

You should set goals during each review to encourage growth and motivate employees. Ask goal-setting questions like the ones below:

Self-evaluation questions like these encourage employees to consider the strengths and skills that they can improve:

Job satisfaction affects everything from employee productivity to engagement and retention. HR teams can track employee satisfaction by asking the following questions:

Managers should ask employees whether they see themselves working at an organisation for the long term. These questions help employees evaluate their future career plans and outlook on company growth.

Related: Top questions for employee self-evaluation: Examples and tips

Performance reviews have become standard among organisations; most conduct performance reviews at least annually. Employee evaluation is a performance review between employees and their managers to assess their progress and goals.

Self-evaluation turns that on its head: instead, employees reflect on their work progress, sometimes with or without the guidance of their manager. These performance reviews encourage employees to take responsibility for their work and help managers understand the employee experience.

Self-evaluation questions can also provide valuable performance feedback, giving employees a clearer insight into their strengths and weaknesses.

Other benefits of employee evaluation include the following:

Effective self-evaluations should allow for advocacy rather than require employees to criticise their performance. Even top performers may not be able to reflect on their abilities without encouragement, making it harder to understand where they need support.

Self-evaluation also allows employees to deepen their self-awareness regarding their strengths and weaknesses, which is essential for improving interpersonal skills.

Employers can promote performance accountability by asking employees to conduct regular self-evaluations. When tasked with judging their performance, employees feel a sense of ownership. They can critique their work output, explain their contributions to projects and assess what needs improvement.

Responding to self-evaluation questions can strengthen an employee’s relationship with their manager by improving their communication skills and adapting their communication style to suit different situations. Sometimes, employees hesitate to ask their manager for guidance or share their accomplishments. Providing follow-up conversations after self-evaluations enhances understanding and clarity of feedback, fostering better communication between employees and managers.

Use an employee self-evaluation form to encourage employees to discuss their achievements and challenges openly. Managers can use their employees’ insights to highlight their exceptional contributions and offer resources to help with challenges.

Use your self-evaluation form to guide employees through a skills gap analysis and identify available upskilling opportunities.

For example, an employee may notice that they can improve their performance reports if they adopt a new reporting tool. Their manager can help them secure training to use the tool or offer resources.

Self-evaluation encourages employees to reflect on their ongoing career goals and how they align with company values.

Each employee’s personal career goals are unique. Reflecting on their current accomplishments and prospects helps them understand how their current role can help them achieve their career goals.

Employees who set personalised goals become more motivated to achieve success and contribute to team and organisational objectives, boosting employee engagement over time.

Additionally, adding self-evaluation questions to your performance review surveys creates an employee feedback loop that strengthens the trust between employees and their managers. Recognising accomplishments during this process boosts confidence and reinforces individual contributions to the company’s mission.

Related: Motivation vs. engagement: what’s the difference?

Considering both the manager’s evaluations and self-assessments produces a comprehensive view of an employee’s performance. Self-evaluations can mitigate subjective bias in performance evaluations conducted by managers, providing valuable insights that might be missed in standard evaluations.

This dual perspective guarantees a fair review process that accurately reflects contributions and challenges. By valuing both sides, organisations can build a more transparent workforce.

Use neutral language in your self-evaluation questions to ensure that employees can provide honest feedback without feeling pressured to show that they have consistently exceeded expectations.

Structured self-evaluations not only aid in understanding an individual’s strengths and weaknesses but also significantly contribute to their overall professional development and personal growth.

These questions encourage individuals to reflect on their past experiences, strengths and areas for development. When employees take the time to articulate and document their accomplishments, it provides them with a clearer understanding of their contributions and instils a desire to continue improving and enhancing their overall work performance.

This reflective practice can motivate them to set new goals, embrace challenges and pursue opportunities for professional growth and career development within the organisation.

Try these best practices to promote more insightful employee responses and accurately measure performance:

Setting clear objectives for your self-evaluation surveys enables you to ask the right questions. Which specific areas are you looking to gain insights into?

Having a clear goal helps to ensure that each question will enable you to achieve your target. By setting clear objectives, teams can create standardised self-evaluation surveys for their organisations.

The best surveys feature clear and concise questions and instructions. Focus on only asking questions that support the survey’s objectives. Additionally, use straightforward language so that every respondent understands how to answer the questions. Consider including instructions about how to fill out the survey and a note about its purpose.

Customise self-evaluation surveys to align with different job roles and goals. Ask questions that are tailored to an employee’s experience. Aligning questions to the type of employee helps HR teams glean more valuable and actionable insights.

Use neutral language, provide balanced response options and avoid jargon and survey bias. Biased surveys don’t give HR accurate employee insights. Write self-evaluation questions with diversity and inclusivity in mind.

Remind employees that these surveys can help them improve their self-awareness. Before the survey, discuss with employees how you will use the survey data to encourage honest answers.

Provide straightforward instructions for employees to answer the self-evaluation questions honestly. Explain the importance of their input and how it will contribute to the performance review process. Being well informed makes employees feel more comfortable completing the survey.

Evaluate the survey’s effectiveness after each performance review period to identify modifications. Continuously improve the survey using employee and manager feedback. Make changes if the survey does not add the value to performance reviews that you wanted it to.

Employees will share extensive feedback about their organisational experience in self-evaluation surveys. Listen to their opinions, concerns and suggestions to improve the employee experience and boost productivity. Teams should, in particular, act on employee feedback about the tools that they need to succeed.

Structured self-evaluations help employees understand their strengths and advocate for their contributions during performance reviews. HR teams can collect valuable employee feedback by incorporating employee self-evaluation questions into their performance review survey.

Start encouraging employee self-reflection and effective employee performance management. Get started today with our Employee Self-Evaluation Form Template.