WE’VE all been asked this, or, at least, we’ve all watched with morbid fascination as someone else struggled to answer this question: “On a scale of one to 10, how do you rate yourself?”
For most people, the instinctive response is to try to come up with an accurate self-rating. While this is all well and good, you have to be aware that whoever is asking you that question is actually setting you up for a fall, unwittingly or otherwise, so be careful.
1, 2, 3, 4, kick yourself out the door
THE most basic thing you have to remember is that, unless you’re deliberately trying to lose your job, do not give yourself a ranking of one to four. If you do, it will be interpreted in only one of three ways: you are either very honest about your incompetence, in which case you should be handed your hat and told to find something else to do; you’re trying very hard to look “honest” and “uncompromising” in your self-evaluation, in which case, you are trying too hard and should be kicked out for being an inveterate preening fool; or you are exaggerating your difficulties, which you will then immediately blame on someone else. Even allowing for this to be actually true, i.e., you suck at your job because some people make it impossible for you to succeed, you would do well to remember that you were placed in that position because some people, at some point, believed that you could do it, despite the obstacles. By whining about it, you basically prove them wrong.
5, 6, you’re not supposed to be doing this for kicks
ON the other hand, give yourself a ranking of five or six, and you create the impression that you’re merely coasting along: Doing just enough to get by, but not enough to make any real difference—a true-blue placeholder. Think Shaggy, maybe? The comparison may actually be more apt than you think.
If this is how you see yourself— or if you’re stupid enough to admit that you’re a slacker—then it would be ridiculous to assume that anyone, let alone your employer, will appreciate you for it—unless you’re in the business of hunting down ghosts with your friends and a talking Great Dane called Scooby Doo.
7, 7.5, now back it up with a little jive
NOW, not everyone will appreciate that you’ve given yourself what amounts to be the passing grade in elementary school, so you have to be quick to defend your self-rating of seven to 7.5.
First, make it very clear that your rating reflects both satisfactory performance and the openness to the possibility of improvement. Second, if pushed to declare that you actually believe “you’re just passing” (and you can bet your retirement lump-sum that they will use that grade-school analogy), respond that this is as hard as you can toot your own horn, but that there are those whose opinions you value, who believe that a higher rating could be justified.
Now this answer might not satisfy whoever is asking you the question, but very few people will actually complain about you not wanting to beat your own chest.
8, 9, 10, the ego strikes again!
TO be fair, and if you’re truly good at what you do, you might be able to get away with an eight. But nine or 10 is definitely Kanye West country. Even if it is true and, by all objective measures, you are darn near-perfect at what you do, it is poor form to say so about yourself. I mean, West is good, after all. What grates is his eagerness to claim the title for himself.
If the question was an honest one—or, at least, a softball toss to give you the chance to make yourself look good—then a self-effacing answer would double the benefit to you. You’ll come off as humble— which is an excellent virtue—and confident enough in your own worth that you’re comfortable leaving it to other people to judge you.
If, on the other hand, the question was meant to trip you up, a humble answer defuses the trap. If you were to frankly rate yourself a nine or 10, despite the presence of ill will toward you, you will have only exposed your soft-white underbelly to all sorts of ridicule, whether to your face or behind your back.
And there you have it: A practical guide to making your way out of that question alive.
James Jimenez is the spokesman of the Commission on Elections