Tips for Financial Planning And Safety during Pandemic

The last 1.5 years since beginning of 2020 had been an extremely difficult time for people all over the world.   Pandemic did not spare anyone.   Rich, poor, religion, creed,  haves, have-nots, white, black, brown...nothing -  the Corona virus impacted everyone equally.   Unfortunately,  it did effect the economically struggling class more rapidly than others who fortunately could avail medical facilities with insurance, investments or personal savings.   

This pandemic had been a great eye opener for all of us and it is very important wake up call to address emergencies not just this one, but anything going forward.  However, handling the crisis and managing emergencies for many during the last many months, have made me repeatedly emphasis on adequate financial planning and staying safe during these unprecedented times.

Here are few of the learnings that I would like to share:

Using Digital banking for all financial needs

It may sound silly, but cash had been the biggest carrier of the contagious virus and carrier during the times of Corona crisis as it changes hands quite rapidly.   The risk of contamination is very high when it comes to handling cash for transactions.    Using internet banking, online tools like PayTM, GPay, Pockets is effecting for goods and transactions from the comfort of our homes and staying safe during pandemic

Adequate Health Insurance

It is very important that we have enough insurance coverage to handle crisis during this pandemic.  It is very important to have sufficient medical insurance cover for you and your family to safeguard your financial state in case of a medical emergency and also to avail required medical facilities.  Having the details of the insurance card,  government provided medical insurance using Aadhar Card and company id card and manager / insurance desk contact numbers handy and informed to all members in the family is a must.   Take Top-up cover in case you have any morbid conditions that may require additional medical support

Life insurance Details

Indians especially have this mind-block when it comes to talking about death and planning in case we are gone.  It is very important that the family should not suffer financially when the emotional and physical trauma of a bereavement is there in the family.   So insurance policy details and insurance helpline numbers,  agent details, and original policy documents available place details should be shared with all the family members.   Life insurance is the biggest protection to the family even after we are gone

Nomination Details

Many times, we are so selfish that we fail to update and keep track of the nomination details to our holdings, be it bank accounts, lockers, insurance policies,  investments, shares, trade documents or planning of WILL for our immovable assets like buildings, farms and houses.   The struggle of the legal heirs is unimaginable when the nomination details are not updated for these investments.  So it is important to update nomination, keep a copy of the investments and keep your family or the nominee informed with the legal documents so claims become easy for them when the situation happens

Emergency Funds

Many of us in the rat race for survival forget to keep aside funds to manage unpredicted emergencies.  There should be funds kept aside to manage anywhere from 3 to 6 months during the crisis,  In case of any incapacitation due to Covid or any disease or loss of job due to the economic splurge that is happening, these funds will help you meet the basic needs of survival of your family and opportunity to bounce back both physically and financially without losing confidence

Being ALERT is Important

It is very important that we stay alert of the fraudsters on Internet during this pandemic.   Having very unpredictable passwords only known to family is important for all online login ids and also it is very important to have an add-on debit card in the name of a spouse or a child for handling emergency.  It is also important that you keep your ATM Pins and cards safe and ensure you key in 000 after you finish you withdrawals in ATM to ensure the keypad don't record your PIN.

Do not share your passwords or PINs to anyone on phone/ email or calls / google docs/ links/  or to even to those who claim are from Bank, Insurance company, Govt or IT agency / RBI/ Covid care centers or even if some personifies like a relative or friend. Or tries to create a panic situation where you share everything in emotional vulnerability times.  Do not transfer money in those panic situations especially to any individual accounts.   Being ALERT is important not to end up bankrupt

Stay Home!  Stay Safe!  Stay Secure!!! 

Suicide Story Calling for Hope and Help

Expression of life with smiles and cheers

The loud laughter’s for such silly jokes

Confidently standing beyond arrogance

False countenance nonchalantly reticence

As I pulled over the mask to show different me

So fake and so conflicting to nonexistent inner glee

Not with intentions to cheat everyone around

But disguising with pretense to one thyself

Murky gorge of reality without an escape

As my skull becomes evil’s warehouse

It is nothing but a curse being titled strong

For the actual struggle hidden all along

Swinging precarious between hope and surrender

Hiding tears and fears battling scary bearers

Consummating the artists within in disguise

Desponding alive in growing stronger 

Unable to eat, sleep, travel or wander

Trying to slip into the little dodging slumber

Absolute frames of absurd thoughts derider

Hugging the lifeless pillow to cry aloud

Of falling into the valley deep into the grounds

Running behind the leaving train

Waking up with a jerk and disdain

Succumbing to the loneliness of the chest

Sweating unusual than on a wilder trek

Where is my inner strength disappear

And the ardent faith ruled over by devils

Cries in cowers laid to rest in corner

The provocation to die chanting over life

Darkness and death looking alluring

Life be uphill struggle and non-fetching

Scared of another day and survival

Everything looked repulse and pointless

Hearing my fore-fathers calling me to the shore

Another life, another time, welcoming to meet

Where is the hope that made life everything?

Heartache, emptiness of the inner soul

Lost merry, life easy, trading my nothing

The curtains are ready to be brought down

The drama of life is ready to sure end

Free from the masks of public appearance

No more delving in pity of others around

Time to put an end to the corrosion of mind

Beyond the layers of wisdom thick to grind

Depression is never seen till it’s too late

Death can seem to be the only solace

Finding the Story of Suicide around,

Look again, think and stop by for a second

Give them a hug, hope and helping hand!

That moment, may bring them back to life again!

Rent My Womb!

She came and she saw my child

Beautiful bundle of joy and kind

Her eyes were green and thoughts gone wild

She snatched her from my arms being unkind

I felt sad that she could not be a mother,

Offered her to help the way I can do better

Promising her tears to go away titter

And let her thoughts not go to wither

What can I do to help her from not being a mother?

Can I give away my precious bundle of joy to share together?

Or can I rent my womb in turn for her joy

And make her also feel the warmth of being a mother

I could see her love for children

And the way she can take care of them in random

Why was God so unkind not to give her, her own?

To spread the happiness and belonging grown

She was just another ordinary woman with all the feelings

Reacting to the sensitivities of the society towards barren ladies

Cried alone and showed fake smiles when she was in a group

Yet, she cursed her destiny and her life that was in a soup

I could feel her sadness and relate to her as a woman

She cried when I said that I would bear her child

Caught my hands and whispered silently in my ears

That she can never feel the child her own when I am around!

Where can I go, from this world afar?

Just because I thought to be kind making her as a mother

To share my space of physical pain for her joy

At the end, I realized I need to say to this thought, a Good Bye!

Giving a child in adoption is not just another solution, having the mind and thought, heart and soul to share whom you have is the boldest thing you could do.  If infertility is an issue, open your hearts to receive the god’s child left alone in this world.  Surrogacy is just a social taboo. If that could solve the problem, go ahead and do it. But just do it on time and with the biological mother’s full will and warmth. Not for money and renting the womb…and let the foster mother shower love and care just like her own. After all, we are a country where we saw Lord Krishna enjoying both Devaki and Yasodha…foster care is not new to this world…where hearts can open to welcome anyone with same happiness and peace!

Is it not time to bridge the gap between to-be-parents and orphans in this world, so that we fill a great joy in the lives of both?   Instead of making infertility an issue,  childless couples lives a misery,  orphans children abandoned in this world,  we need to look beyond our limitations and take the bold steps that are necessary to become a better society, as strong individuals and above all happy self's by doing what our hearts say is right and what our sensible thoughts make us believe we can and move on!


Inspired by Suliaman's Poem: http://sulaimansait.blogspot.in/2013/10/surrogacy-controversy-poem.html

SAY NO TO CHILD LABOUR- World Day against Child Labour- June 12, 2013

As the world today is celebrating ‘No Child Labour Day’ , the sound of the shrill call from a elite friend of the past resonanced in my ears loudly again-   “Rama-   Ekkada chachavey”….meaning Rama, where the hell have you died….

The just 10+ year old child ran to her ‘Madam’ side in a less than a minute and this fabulous rich civilized woman creature gave her a kick in her pit saying that she should stay in her sight all the time.  The little girl was embarrassed for I was there watching this happen …and as I tried stopping this so called friend.   The Madam gave the instructions to Rama to start pressing her legs as she stretched them on the coffee table from the sofa.  I felt like pushing her sofa upside down.. The poor little girl started to obey her silently for everything she was instructed to!.  

This is just one of the millions Rama’s who silently endure the pain of a heavy childhood, not see a penny of their earning which get sent to their parents in the villages,  fed on the leftovers and let to sleep on the floor even in chill winter nights.  These children help in domestic chores of cleaning, cooking and washing.  Few help the elders run errands for them.  Few are destined to be baby sitting all the times as mothers keep busy with kitty party’s and clubs and sometime genuine work schedules.   

Children working as child sex workers silently, not knowing of pregnancy and child birth, and subsequent consequences are another side of this sad story.  Children trafficked to other countries as domestic help and baby sitters, forbid of their rightful education and growing up years of childhood to enjoy, the poverty of the parents push them to the chores beyond their age. 

Millions of children work in remote villages in farms, silently inside the rooms of the factories,  do demeaning chores hidden inside the industries and sadly in the red light areas of the country doing jobs beyond their age and understanding.  

Construction laborers’, hotel waiters and cleaners, domestic helpers, courier boys, news paper boys, car cleaners,  workers in quarries and as wood cutters, cobblers, painters and potters.  These children do not know what is it like having a four square meal, a good night  comfortable sleep,  education and alphabets,  money and savings and no dreams of a sustainable future.  They get for the day, they eat and sleep what ever is possible and carry on with their lives.   By the time, they realize what they lost, they can never get back -  the precious childhood and hopes of education

 Thanks to the night schools and no child left behind campaigns, the children today are getting the required awareness and attention.  However, there is yet a larger segment of the society that is not careful of this menace between us.   Thoughtlessly employing children at any form of work is made illegal in most part of the world, but the law remained in the books far away from action. 

Time to say NO to Child Labour and put a strong end to this in our country.   Every child need to be set free to dream and dare to move in their lives with confidence and choice than be pushed to labour and burdened childhood.

Dark is Beautiful- Skin Color is still an issue. Why? (Inspired by the Dark is Beautiful Campaign)

In the darkness of sky, I find the brightest stars!

In the midst of the world, lies the darkest cores!

In the mountains, we find the darkest peaks!

In the depths of oceans, we find the rarest gems!

True....No one got a right in this world, to make you feel that your color of the skin is an issue.  You are beautiful in your own right.   The beauty of heart is more important than the color of the skin.  Everyone  knew this, however the society is still obsessed with fair people.   Fairness of skin is considered wanted, confident and attractive.   Even the darkest people have the beautiful outlook, however this is ignored.  

The shade of our skin takes over the strength of brains and will of our hearts.   Unfortunately, not only in India, but in many parts of the world, the cosmetic market is making, that the fairness is the thing that the world wants...  The advertising business and marketing world, creates a inferiority complex in the minds of not only adults but also children that being fair is important for existence.  What they don't care to understand is that it is hitting hard on the psychology of young minds and making them feel inferior, left behind and introverts in nature.   

Schools and colleges do not encourage dark skinned students to come front on the stage.... Dark skinned talents are pushed to back seat when it comes even for job interviews,  marriage proposals,  or today even adding to your friends list in Facebook.... Every person, is trying to put the best of display picture, Photoshoped and hiding their real self....Why is this crisis?  Why is the stigma still continuing even after having the Presidents of Nations who have darker shades of skin?   

O

Our beloved church in Glendale, where we enjoyed being
accepted and loved without any bias

Looks and appearance matters,  to some extent in the industry like Cinema and Media, however, the same industry saw success stories like Rajnikanth and Nandita Das and we still think talents are only in white skinned people.    Were we not called Brown people from times immemorial.   Why are we so obsessed with the Nations where they have people who are fairer.  In fact in those Nations, the people are trying to have tanned skin,  respecting our people equally and consider us one among them and respecting us for what we are and not for how we look...

Happy my favorites god are all dark!

My story is a classical example of this discrimination.  I was my dad's dearest daughter, as he always wanted me not to feel inferior when the whole world kept commenting that I am the darkest kid in the family....It was in fact, it was him and my class teacher Satyavathi teacher in 7th grade, who made me overcome this complex, and patted on my back and said that I should explore oratory, essay writing and be on stage playing my favorite dramas...However,  my younger sister got to act as angel and I always got the Three men from East, or the cattle, where my face is covered in the dramas.  But those days, I didn't even realize that my skin color was a problem.  I kept winning and it became a habit..and noting bothered me....

Solid Rock Relationship-  nothing comes in between

 As a teen, my mom always had the fear that I may not have a proper marriage proposals as I am short and dark among st our three sisters.   The first pinch of discrimination came in when my mother in law, sighed heavily that she got a dark girl for his handsome son....that was when the reality dawned on my face of adulthood.   I cried.  But it was my husband who stood behind me and said that the goodness of heart is million times better than the fairness of the face.   His statements that I am beautiful,  I have a very artistic features, and so on encouraged me to divert my attention towards positive things and ignore the nonsense comments around...

Happy Family....

When my child was born, I cried.  She was pink bundle of joy.  I could not believe that I can have the fairest baby in the world in my arms.  I thanked God that she will not have to endure the skin color complexes that I had to withstand and kept fighting all my life....

My mentors who encouraged me to be
good professional, no bias faced on my overseas
trips and happy I was just accepted as I am

Today, my thoughts, my achievements and self-contentment of being a blogger, writer, poet and a good professional and above all, being a happy wife, proud mom, sister, and daughter makes me overlook all the issues, I had to face due to my skin color.  

Trust me, I also tried every damn fairness cream in the market expecting overnight results and slowly realized that nothing is going to change by the fake promises made by the cosmetic companies.  

The change has to be within me, on how I look at myself in the mirror everyday. ..I can look and say, I am dark...and feel inferior...or I can take a look, give myself a strong  smile and say, that I am beautiful, both internally and externally.  The beauty is surely lies in the happiness of your mind and the sparkle in your eyes.    It is important how you feel about yourself than how the world feels about you...ultimately the world around you will change to the way you feel....... Beautiful in your own way!

Dealing with Uncertainty

In today's world of chaotic chase between options and varied goals, the factors of uncertainty have become quite certain in every one's life.  Be it professional or personal aspects, today we live in a kind of confusion, anxiety, caution, nervousness and expectations.  In fact,  this uncertainty is the New Normal, it is not a negative aspect of life any more.  Uncertainty means multiple Options.   Certainty limits our scope and actions whereas uncertainty gives us a larger room for choosing anything that would make our lives better, challenging and progressive. 

The first principle of dealing with Uncertainty is understanding the fact that uncertainty gives us multiple directions and enriches our thought process.   Instead of avoiding this fairly certain aspect, it is good to deal with it and excel in managing the varied directions that lay in our front.  This is called as turning adversities into opportunities

Unknown unknowns are not easy and often scary as there is no choice of safety and security in the way we want to deal with things in the most peaceful and consistent way.    This uneasiness will actually limit our potential and finding new opportunities and possibilities.   Instead of worrying where our relationships would take us,  where our careers would lead us and what our friends and neighbours think about us, we need to focus on the things in hand.  This would let us make informed decisions considering all the factors within and outside our line of control.

Windy afternoon at Venice Beach watching the tides and boats

We always end up paying a huge cost for the uncertainty when we don't take calculated risks.  Understanding that taking risks is very much a success factor and also noting that the chances of failure only makes our options of success more stronger and worth the effort will make things easy for us.   Taking risks and failing is always better than not taking any.  This would eventually end all possible successes as well if we don't dare to take new steps in life.

This overwhelming situation has become the norm of life, with the vulnerable global economy, job losses,  corruption,  political unrest, emotional entanglements, and the urge to succeed in everything and anything we do.   A parent worries about a 2 year old getting admission in a school today in India, and a grown up child worries about getting a good college, educated graduate worries about a high paid job,   a professional worries about marriage,  a relationship that would sustain in these days of high tech no time life styles,  a married couple worries about having children, bringing them up in right way being both working professionals,  old people are uncertain which child would support them when they need,  employees are worried about promotions, managers are worried about pie-sharing, companies are worried about competitions, countries are worried about economy and war, and world is worried about global warming, depleting natural resources and oil, unexplored mineral wealth, and fight for the borders.   More the quest for being organized, civilized, and perfect, the world is actually heading towards a bigger chaos and Uncertainty.   So calm down, this is just the phenomenon of the present day life.

Personally, every one of us have various goals and ambitions in life.  These ambitions can be towards being something or achieving everything in life.   We always want to be the one which we are not.  An actor tells that he wanted to be a doctor...a teacher tell that's she wanted to be a lawyer.... a house wife dreams about a career,  a working woman dreams about spending more time with children.... Too many goals and the too many lives that we wish to lead.  Ultimately we have to make choices.  Make one decision at a time that will take us in the direction in which we want to go no matter what is the  end result.   A person who don't expect the end result and travels the road less travelled with courage, wisdom and wishful thinking is the person who succeeds more times than the one who keeps a life time goals and struggles to run all sides.   A step by step move actually eliminates the amount of uncertainty in life to a great extent.

The future is always uncertain and unclear and difficult to see through.   That doesn't mean that we don't need to dream, dare to think, decide to aim and struggle to cross the bridges of fate with poise and will.   It means that we need to take every step with courage and eliminate the fear of uncertainty by taking every move with viewing options on all sides, and keeping the ground felt at every level of decision making to avoid a highly nervous uncertainty.   Taking informed decisions with  level of intelligence will make us walk through the foggy unknowns in life and still be content with the end result with the fact that we have done deliberate decision making taking all factors into consideration.

To fail and to raise every time,  taking new routes towards human development and progress,  and not slowing down when we are pulled back hundred times, but to leap ahead with courage and realign our decisions based on the outcomes as we cross each step in the only way to deal with the uncertainty.  History has taught us that the greatest achievers of mankind are the one's that dealt with the uncertainty and nothing else.    Man would not have landed in space any day had he not taken the risk of going far above the skies where he was not sure if he can ever land somewhere!   So uncertainty is actually not a negative aspect of life any longer, it is a pristine way of telling us to  take right decisions and move in the right direction and go by what our intuition, circumstances and hearts tell us!

Happy Dealing with Uncertainty folks!  I am dealing with one now with the same spirit!



Top Ten Reasons/Factors for Stress in Working Parents

 I started this post with the aim of writing the 10 different stress factors for working mothers, and then realized that the stress factors are common to all working parents irrespective of if it is a man or a woman, more so for all professionals and working people of today’s world. How you plan to manage and avoid these stress factors depend on several personal factors and each individual can look into it in their own way and manage it. If you think any one of the above factors is familiar to your daily lives, it is time to give this post a serious thought!

1. Balancing Act between work and personal lives:


Today, the world is running faster than your thoughts. Traffic signals make you find seconds as longer in the life than anything else. Projects, work deadlines, everything makes you automatically pace with the world around. The way to organize one self to match with the expectation of the work place and family/children become important. Priortize not just the work for the day, but also the attention you need to pay to family and children become important. As long as one can organize, prioritize and pay attention and divide the available time with due diligence gives the best of both worlds

2. Feeling of Anxiety:

The feeling of anxiety to outperform others at work and the feeling of anxiety to prove as the best spouse / best parent all the time, ends up in a deep feelings of anxiety. This anxiety eats away attention to details, makes one feel nervous about everything happening in the day to day life and feel overwhelmed at both ends. At one point, in a urge to please everybody ends up pleasing no body. These feelings of anxious approach everything we do makes us aim at perfection all the time and there by damaging the very essence of the tasks. Understanding that every person cannot give 100% all the time to all things is very important to manage this stress factors.

3. Self pity and guilt consciousness

Every time I update my timesheets in office after a hectic work routine for a week, I feel so bad for myself. I think why I am working so hard, am I doing a thankless job, is this worth giving away my personal time for family and kid etc etc, and this happens to many people around me these days. The feeling of self-pity makes you feel depressed and tired more than the actual work. The guity consciousness that you are not spending enough time with your children makes you feel all the more miserable. Kids these days do understand the parental work pressure and they balance it right from the beginning. It is important for parents to sit and talk to children, help them understand that they are very important in life and they plan quality time with the family.

4. Becoming workaholics and lack of proper management of work

The competition to perform the best and the challenges of outsourcing project, client expectations, organizations widening their horizons in the times of recession and all these economies take toll on the committed people at work. People who take these factors both internal and external to the lines of control become workaholics in the long run. Over a period of time, these workaholics lose focus and attention and then start to bargain for best organized days of work. Proper management of work and organized every day routine makes work life easy and possible for good personal time. Communication, attentive work culture and positive management of work is the key.

5. Unplanned family time and distractions to work

Making a quick and timely calls to take family updates during breaks is always a welcome, but running errands for the family during work hours is something that may not please any bosses. Long personal calls, causal chit chats for long hours, browsing for personal needs, catching up with old friends on facebook and other social networking sites during production work hours is a sure no-no. Making families understand that they will not be able to pay attention to work with the distractions of family during work is very important to avoid the stress that such situations cause at work. Being truthful to personal emergencies is always understood by organizations and cooperated.

6. Continuous work with no vacations and personal time

Few people don’t take breaks or planned vacations for years. Families expected, fight, express it and finally give up with much frustration causing stress to the individuals also. Taking few days vacation and coming back refreshed is the best way to manage stress. That will not only give you energized mind to act fast but also giving you the physical break from the office ergonomics. Playing a cherished game, spending time with spouse for quite dinners, taking kids to beach and visiting old family members can sometimes be a great stress reliever.

7. Travel

In spite the culture of remote work in place in many corporate, travelling has become inevitable in everyone’s life these days. No big corporate are any longer located in the prime areas of the city and the travel to the work locations vary any time between 15 mins to 2 hours. And the traffic woes of today with the increased vehicles on the road add to the stress. If you job needs you to travel, that adds more to this stress on move. Taking public transportation or private transportation , it has its own levels of stress. Public commutation has too much crowd, inconvenient timings and above all women face all kinds of stress especially in trains and buses in India. Private transportation takes the tension to calm driving, cultural changes, increased cost of fuel, unorganized traffic etc. Planning ahead, avoiding drunken driving, maintaining traffic rules, following safety norms are few ways to avoid this stress.

8. Productivity

What you learn, what you work, what you earn and what you give are all correlated with one another. Right opportunities at the right time do not happen always to all people, but how you maintain your best at all times, consistency in your performance, practice and thinking is what makes your productivity. The stress and struggle to maintain this consisitency, reliability and integraty is a continuous factor for stress in lot of working professional today. To perform this and also inject the need of these values into children add to our stress. The essence of this factor is not to cause to the stress in reality but should be a way to get out of it. Productivity should not become a stress factor instead in should contribute to growth.

9. Multi Tasking and losing focus

Moving targets, in both personal and professional lives, changing priorities, reorganizing day to day activities cause lot of stress in individuals today. This add to the working parents daily woes. Multitasking is no more an additional ability, but the very walk of life today. If you cannot do it, you are just out of the game. Staying focused while doing 10 things at a time is the key stress factor. But not paying attention or giving focus is worse. So doing one task after the other, managing multi tasks with care and staying focused is very very important to stop making this a stress factor.

10. Not giving time for self

One desperate friend called me at 10 pm in the night to share the life’s burden and to lean on a shoulder and ears that can care. After 4 hours of talking into the night, this friend thanked me and said that I blessed him with the most precious gift in his whole life, I was confused. He said that the best of the gifts one can give to other in these hectic days is ‘Time’ and time to listen, share and react in a way to comfort the other person. Similarly if one is not able give time to oneself’s personal interests either in music, sports, hobbies of any kind, or simply time to relax for few hours and do nothng can contribute to greater levels of stress. Able to relax and not having a train of thoughts running all the time is also a best way to avoid stress. Meditation, exercise, eating right food, spending time with friends, visiting places of worship, listening to favorite music, watching favorite tv shows or visiting places on vacation, this personal time can be anything and even if it means giving oneself few hours a week will make a lot of sense to one’s life these days

Why Self-Appraisals are conducted in Organizations?

Every December is a time when every employee expects to be recognized, appreciated, duly rewarded both monetarily and emotionally as part of the team, corporate, organization, workplace and lot more.  The swing between job hopping and loyalty is there in any organization and industry.  Some matured Performance Appraisal Processes include the first step as Self-Appraisal.

Now the question arises on, Is Self-Appraisals necessary?  Because no individual will ever portray themselves as Not Competent, or Not Professional enough for recognition.

The second major questions is, Do the Self-Appraised Information really taken into consideration during the final evaluation of the performance by the Manager/ HR and the Organization?   90% of the answers would an implicit NO, though 90% would not dare to acknowledge it explicitly.  Then why this process?

I as a professional see top 4 reasons why Self-Appraisal becomes important and vital in one's evaluation cycle/ process/ progress or what ever you may call

1.  It is a process to have "Supporting DATA".   Statistics on how many hours I worked, how many project hours I executed, how many successes or failures on Variances in terms of Cost, Scope and Time have I achieved, how many blue flags/ appreciations I have received from clients?   , How many Red flags or Escalations I was reason for., How many people I mentored, how many trainings I attended, How much did I do my tasks successfully on a day to day basis and what impact did I have on the teams I worked. What value additions did I bring in to the Company.   This is one way of tracking the whole year of work.  Keeping data accurately, if subjected to Audit, will have references either in personal repository or a share point.
Valid information in terms of accurate data makes not just employees life easy, but those of Managers too.

2. Accountability:   You are accountable for the tasks entrusted to you...How much ever trivial they may be to the Organization, they would still be a large portion of your individual performance. 

3. Yardstick ..This may show as similar to Supporting Data...But one big difference is in the first one you have a the required statistics to support your judgement of your performance.   In this factor, your manager will have required information to support your growth in comparison to your colleagues in the most competitive and logistically controlled environment.   Here the yardstick, is how was your were important and unique when compared to others... The proof of a point that you deserve the best have to stand out.

4. Self Understanding, Satisfaction and Sustainability....I am very much fond of this point no 4.  To me where I stand in my own terms of assessment is more important than what my managers assess me.  Basically, this gives me required motivations, a inner satisfaction of job well done, fruitfully balanced my time between professional aspirations and personal commitments,  and this motivates me to train myself more on the areas I identify as growth possible, and share expertise in the areas where I proved extraordinary.   To me this is within the line of control.....irrespective of the ratings/bonus/appraisals made within the 'Out of Control' parameters which are influenced by lot of other factors than my own performance.   My manager's limitations, Organizations overall profits and budget allocations,  peer pressure, competition, customer feedback and so many 360 degree views are surely not in my control...but my performance is well within my boundaries and I can make it 100%.  

So to me Self-Appraisal is the most important aspect of career, to revisit where I stand in my Corporate Ladder and how fast can I reach my next steps and what I need to do to achieve them.  These describe my goals as a Professional irrespective of any influential factors that I have limited control. 

If every employee realises this fact in his or her best interest, I am sure Organizations will never fail in its collective objectives.

So, please do not blame your managers if something goes wrong, try to be balanced, and look at the flip side of the process to identify where you need to improve.  If all goes well, then, Go ahead and Celebrate!!!  I wish the second one to one and all!