Pause and Retrospect
Pause and Retrospect
“Without reflection, we go blindly on our way, creating more unintended consequences and failing to achieve anything useful”
- Margaret J. Wheatley
Reflecting or conducting a Retrospection is the ability to take time out and look back at what you have worked on. Reflections can be done on a daily, monthly or yearly basis. It is an opportunity for you to look back and ask specific questions that might help you notice the success you have accomplished, the challenges you have experienced, the mistakes you would not like to make again and most importantly how to draw learnings from all the actions you took.
Therefore, the only time you should continue moving on without looking back is... never. However, don’t worry if you have never done a reflection or retrospection of your career or life. Many people catch up later in life which is okay, but sometimes we may lose track and go about our lives and never get the chance to experience the power of reflection.
In today’s fast-moving world it is increasingly becoming impossible to pause for just a little bit and take a moment to reflect on what we have worked on for the day, week, month or year. Let alone reflect on what we actually would like to do. As workers, we are busy, overworked and underpaid that taking time out feels like wasting time.
A research conducted by Professor Francesca Gino (Tandon Family Professor of Business Administration ) and Gary Pisano (Harry E. Figgie, Jr. Professor of Business Administration) of Harvard University on Learning by Thinking: How Reflection Aids Performance found out that, we actually become and perform better when we take the time to reflect. That could be reflecting on our work or life. They also discovered that reflecting allows one to develop confidence in their ability to achieve a specific goal, which ultimately leads to a higher degree of performance.
Reflection will allow you to see your success which comes mostly from your strengths. Seeing this success will enable you to build confidence in yourself and your capabilities. You will see a pattern in the way you solve challenges or repeated mistakes, which might help you plan better next time. Above all, you will be able to set specific and achievable goals based on your objectives for the day, month or year.
To get started with your own reflection, we have developed a few questions that we think could be a great start for you to answer as you begin to develop your personal brand.