“Take-12” Self-Evaluation Questionnaire for Professionals

This self-evaluation will help you discover words, phrases, and sentences to help you establish your credibility with people who do not know you yet. It is vital that "you" be able to tell people about yourself without sounding like an arrogant ass who is bragging for the sake of trying to impress. The answers you come up with to the questions below can easily be used to develop your own specific compelling and memorable answers to “Who are you?” and “Why you?”

NOTE: After seeing how clients use this questionnaire, I find that you only need to really answer 3-4 questions to have enough information to come up with a statement or two about yourself. I recommend questions 1, 3, 4, 5, 8, 10, but feel free to choose the ones that elicit the kind of information your audience can use to either establish you as the subject matter expert or someone who can be trusted and believed.

  1. What would you and others say are five of your personality pluses?

  2. What are the ten most interesting things you have done or that have happened to you?

  3. What do you do for a living and how did you end up doing it?

  4. What do you like/love about your current job/career?

  5. How does your job/career use your skills and talents, and what projects are you working on right now that best showcase them?

  6. What career successes are you most proud of having accomplished (from the current position and past jobs)?

  7. What new skills have you learned in the last year?

  8. What obstacles have you overcome to get where you are today, both professionally and personally?

  9. What essential lessons have you learned from some of your mistakes or failures?

  10. What training/education have you completed and what did you gain from those experiences?

  11. What professional organizations are you associated with and in what ways member, board, treasurer, or the like?

  12. How do you spend your time outside of work, including hobbies, interests, sports, family, and volunteer activities?

  13. In what ways are you making a difference in people's lives?

As you can see, the Take-12 is actually made up of 13 questions. Since I have been using this with real people like you, I find that Questions 8 and 9 are better answered separately rather than as one. Question 9 is one of the most important questions to answer here, which will lead to incredible stories you can share with investors that demonstrate how you think and react to change, mistakes, and failure.

“Take 12” is from Peggy Klaus, author of Brag! The Art of Tooting Your Horn Without Blowing It

Self-Introduction Template

Introducing yourself or having someone introduce you:

  • Tell people your first name and job title, perhaps tenure

  • Add relevant information about yourself related to your audience and topic

  • Add one or two things you like to do to get a little personal

  • Perhaps mention one or more of your superpowers if you feel comfortable

  • Add one item that your audience would not find searching Google

Homework:

Suggestion: Write your sentences as if someone is introducing you to an audience using the exact words you hand them.

  1. Create a self-introduction with 100 words or less and validate.

  2. Using concision, cut your self-intro to 50 words or less and validate.

  3. Finally, create a one-line self-introduction after your name and validate.

Validating Your Self-Introductions

If you would like to have me validate your Self-Introductions, feel free to send them to me, and I will offer you feedback to validate your ideas and perhaps help you amplify them too!

Want to connect right now? Volley me a video message.

MY Self-Introductions examples

NRG 100 Words

Meet Nathan Gold. For the past 15 years, he’s been preparing people for high-stakes speaking opportunities such as TED-talks, SharkTank, investor pitching, crucial sales meetings, and even job interviews. Nathan hails from the San Francisco Bay Area and travels the world delivering keynotes, interactive workshops, live streaming, and 1:1 coaching sessions to people like you and me. The Wall Street Journal called Nathan “An elevator pitch expert.” and he is an Industry Fellow at UC Berkeley and Hong Kong Baptist University, a guest lecturer at Wharton Entrepreneurship, featured on The Kauffman Founders School, and is a two-time published author.

NRG 50 Words

Meet Nathan Gold hailing from San Francisco. For the past 15 years, he’s been preparing people for high-stakes speaking opportunities such as TED-talks, SharkTank, investor pitching, crucial sales meetings, and even job interviews. The Wall Street Journal called Nathan “An elevator pitch expert.” and he is a two-time published author.

NRG 1+:

Meet Nathan Gold. For the past 15 years, he’s been preparing people for high-stakes speaking opportunities such as TED-talks, SharkTank TV, investor pitches, crucial sales meetings, and even job interviews.