Basic Life Skills
Your Personal Assessment - Part 1

When you think about skills it's essential that you think wider than career skills or the skills you currently use. Push yourself a little bit here so that you don't just rely on what you do now to inform your future.

Matching your skills to a career is important to ensure a 'good fit'. But be careful of choosing a career just because you have the skills it requires.

This page on basic life skills is the first part of a 4-part assessment designed to help you learn more about yourself (and apply this knowledge to aspects of your life, such as finding a career).

The four parts of your Personal Assessment are:

1. Your Basic Life Skills (this page)
2. The Abilities and Aptitude test
3. Discover your Values
4. Your Personality profiles

When you've finished this basic life skills assessment complete the other assessments. When you're done you'll know a lot more about yourself. You can apply this knowledge to choosing a career or finding the right career if that's your aim.

Ready? Let's start.

Use a spreadsheet or a few blank pages to make a list of your skills. Divide the page into three columns down the length of the page.

If that's too much work you're welcome to download this free .pdf basic life skills worksheet - yeah, I did it for you!

Roles

A useful way to start is to align roles and skills. Head the left hand column Roles and make a list of the roles you've had in your life. What are all the different roles you've had in life? You should leave a few lines of space between each of the roles you write down.

Roles are official and unofficial functions and positions you've had in your personal and professional life. Or just think about all the things you do. Your personal life could include roles such as mother, father, son or daughter.

Perhaps you are a partner to someone. Think about all areas of your life and include roles from sport, hobbies, interest groups, or being a student.

Push yourself to think of different roles and write them all down. Don't hold back! Think about all the things you do. If you are a friend to someone, write that down. If it's your job to mow the lawn write it down. Write everything down.

Professional Roles

Now think about professional roles. Write down the job titles you have held. If you've been a committee member write it down. Other than your official job title what other roles were you expected to perform at work? Think hard. Be creative.

Remember to keep some space between each of the roles you write down. The idea is to generate a list of as many different roles you've had. Hopefully you've got plenty to work with.

If not, go and ask someone to help you. Ask them to help you creatively think of as many different things that you do as possible.

Lastly, think about the things you really enjoy doing. Are these already on your list? If not, add them now.

Skills

The next step happens in the middle column on your page. Head this column Skills. Next to each role you've written in the left hand column write the basic life skills you need to complete the task. Again, think hard! Be creative. Write everything down. There are no wrong answers!

There's usually more than one skill for each role. For example, mowing the lawn requires me to operate a machine, but also requires excellent time management skills and organisational skills. I might need good communication skills and an awareness of safety procedures. Can you think of more?

Some ideas of skills you can draw on include:

• Written communication skills: expressing yourself clearly in writing
• Verbal communication skills: expressing your thoughts and ideas clearly by speaking
• Being Flexible: adapting easily to different situations
• Persuading: convincing others
• Teamwork: working easily as part of a group
• Leadership: motivating and leading others
• Planning and organising
• Implementing ideas
• Problem solving: investigation and analysis skills
• Mathematical skills: analysis and understanding of numbers
• Computing skills: understanding of computers and software
• Emotional Intelligence skills: self awareness, self management, social awareness, and relationship management.

Fill that middle column with abilities relevant to each of the roles you have written. Ask yourself What do I need to know in order to fulfill this role? What do I know, or do, that helps me in this role?

You may find yourself writing the same or similar skills for different roles. That's ok, but push yourself to think 'outside the box'. What career skills are you overlooking? Think of as many different but relevant skills as you can.

Rate It!

Use the last column to rate your skills using two assessments:

• I do this well, or
• I need to develop this skill further

Make up a symbol for each rating. You might use a smiley face or a big check (tick) to indicate I do this well and a question mark (?) or a star (*) for I need to develop this skill further. Place a symbol next to each of the basic life skills you have written in the middle column.

It's hard work isn't it? But this level of planning and knowing your basic life skills will help you make decisions in your life.

The last thing you need to do is create two new lists of skills. Using the pages you've created make one list of basic life skills that you do well, and another list of basic life skills that are areas for development.

When you've finished the basic life skills assessment choose the next assessment (abilities and aptitudes) from the list below.

1. Basic Life Skills (this page)
2. The Abilities and Aptitude test
3. Discover your Values
4. Personality profiles

I'm already preparing your next assessment. See you there!

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