Competency development in higher education: Crafting the future self as a driver for change

Comparison between ideal and real self provides the chance to implement a process of social and emotional competencies development. At theoretical and empirical levels, there is still room to measure the effects of the ideal self crafting on the activation of a competency development process and how the real self signals actual strengths and areas of improvement. Nonetheless, literature could devote more attention to the role of higher education institutions in the process of developing the competencies, from helping students in assessing their real self and discovering the needed competencies to achieve the desired future. The present study describes the implementation of this process in the domain of higher education, showing the results from an elective course delivered in a public Italian University to Master’s degree students.