Well, the C-word gets bandied around a lot; women we work with mention it a lot, we’ve felt it, lost it, admired it in others, even felt slightly queasy about it.
Last week I encountered it in a few different ways. I met a very confident young women who talked passionately and articulately about her career and what she wanted from it, then later told me she was terrified of public speaking, that it made her feel physically sick. At the Facebook IWD17 event on Friday, a panel of successful entrepreneurs spoke about feeling like they didn’t know what they were doing when they started out, but did it anyway. (The evidence shows that women don’t launch their own businesses due to a lack of confidence). The irrepressible Dame Joan Collins said that her advice to her younger self would be, “be more confident”. The theme for IWD17 is #beboldforchange. It’s a Monday so we’ll start gently; this week think about confidence – yours, your colleagues, family and friends.
- What makes you feel more confident, and how can you get more of that?
- How can you make someone else feel more confident? Don’t just think about it, do it.
- Share an example of when you didn’t feel confident, perhaps when you faked it (putting the ‘con’ into confident)
- Pick one thing that’s out of your comfort zone this week, something you would do if you felt more confident and do it anyway.
- Talk to the most confident person you know, ask them for their secret sauce.
- Identify your gremlin, that voice of doubt, give it a name, make friends with it, but don’t let it be the boss of you.
Advice:-
From the entrepreneurs: “done is better than perfect”. From the management experts: “confidence beats competence, if you have the latter, be the former.” From an unknown source: “self-confidence is the best outfit, rock it, own it” #bemorebird
