The whole concept of self-awareness lends itself to the idea that it is something we should and can know about ourselves from within. I have recently began to understand that the other critical piece to this concept is the awareness and alignment with how others see us as well. This HBR post was excellent:
‘There are lots of compelling reasons to build a better team. Great teams deliver stronger results, faster. They’re more innovative. They challenge you to learn more quickly and to be at your best. And, let’s face it — they’re simply more fun to work with.
Recently, I found a new reason to build a better team — to address the fact that most of us are surprisingly lacking in self-awareness. Researcher and author Tasha Eurich uncovered this disturbing statistic through her multi-year study on the topic of self-awareness: 95% of us think we are quite self-aware, but only about 10-15% of us actually are.’