Do you really know what self-awareness is?

In leadership and coach development, in assessment centres and in competency frameworks the term self-awareness is frequently used, and personally I know it is a competency that I have strived to develop.  It has become a popular ‘buzz’ word in management and leadership publications, with claims that is linked to increased performance, emotional intelligence and effective leadership; and it is often perceived to be a critical component in leadership and career success.  However, rarely is it defined, and do we really know what it is?  I have to admit that it wasn’t until I started researching the concept did I realise that it is a term and construct that is often confused with self-knowledge and self-consciousness; so, what exactly is it?

Through a systematic literature review and research, I sought to get to grips with what exactly the construct is and how it differs from self-knowledge and self-consciousness.  It is a complex construct complicated by the fact that the individual elements of ‘self’ and ‘awareness’ have a multiplicity of definitions.  The literature review revealed that the construct is multi-layered made up of several components, which can be divided into intra- and inter-personal elements.  The inter-personal elements comprise of those which can be observed by another person and include perception of others and behaviours.  This of course means we need to attain feedback from others when we are developing self-awareness.  This is fraught with difficulty as we tend to ‘filter out’ what we may not want to see or hear, so this means that developing self-awareness and knowing that one has developed it accurately is a real challenge.  The intra-personal elements include beliefs and values, internal mental state, physiological responses, strengths and weaknesses, motivations and needs.  In sum, self-awareness can be defined as:

“Self-awareness consists of a range of interpersonal (the perception of others and individual behaviours) and intrapersonal components (beliefs, values, strengths, weaknesses, motivations, internal mental state and physiological responses) in order to develop self and human connection with others.”

 In terms of differentiating self-awareness from self-consciousness and self-knowledge, it was identified that self-consciousness is the intra-personal components of self-awareness, whereas self-knowledge is the output of self-awareness i.e., self -awareness gives us self-knowledge of our biases, prejudices, responses, needs and wants.  It is this self-knowledge that can then help us develop deeper connection with self, which is an essential pre-requisite for developing connection with those around us.   This is perhaps why it is linked to increasing leadership effectiveness.  However, developing self-awareness is an ongoing journey which requires motivation, commitment, and effort.

If you want to read more please have a look at the published systematic literature review (Carden, J., Jones, R.J. and Passmore, J., 2022. Defining self-awareness in the context of adult development: a systematic literature