Self-assessment Functions for Process of Career Planning

So if through self-assessing there is a possibility that a person's self-concept, or self-esteem is going to be damaged why would this be a motive of self-evaluation, surely it would be better to only self-verify and self-enhance and not to risk damaging self-esteem? Trope suggests in his chapter "Self-Enhancement and Self Assessment in Achievement Behaviour" that self-assessment is a way in which self-esteem can be enhanced in the future. For example self-assessment may mean that in the short-term self-assessment may cause harm to a person's self-concept through realising that they may not have achieved as highly as they may like; however in the long term this may mean that they work harder in order to achieve greater things in the future, and as a result their self-esteem would be enhanced further than where it had been before self-assessment.

Within the self-evaluation motives however there are some interesting interactions. Self-assessment is found a lot of the time to be associated with self-enhancement as the two motives seem to contradict each other with opposing aims; whereas the motive to self-assess sees it as important to ensure that the self-concept is accurate the motive to self-enhance sees it as important to boost the self-concept in order to protect it from any negative feedback.