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If you struggle with self-confidence, allow me to let you in on a not-so-secret secret: so does everyone else. It’s a misconception that confident people always feel certain. They may do a better job of masking their self-doubt, but it’s still there.
Over the course of our careers, we all face many types of circumstances that involve uncertainty or put us outside our comfort zones, such as new roles, unfamiliar problems, first-time tasks, or difficult conversations.
It’s tempting to shy away from these moments, but if we waited until we were completely confident before facing such situations, we'd never actually move forward and gain the experience that provides the confidence we want.
Importantly, confidence isn’t certainty. It’s the trust in your ability to figure things out – to learn, adapt, and response – even when you’re uncertain or scared. It starts with the belief that your perspective has value. And it grows through experience and evidence, not just positive thinking.
So the real question becomes: How do we deliberately build that evidence? Here are three practical ways, all things you can start doing right away.
1. Build Competence
The first, most reliable, and most obvious source of confidence is competence. Confidence grows when we know our stuff. Think about the difference between walking into a meeting when you haven’t prepared versus when you deeply understand the issue being discussed. When you know your subject, your brain has evidence that says: “I belong here.”
So how do you build competence? Here are some simple suggestions:
- Ask someone who is strong in an area to share their tips, or even ask them to help you
- Prepare thoroughly, whether for a meeting, task, project, or whatever
- Keep learning, whether in an educational sense, from experience, or from exposure to others. This is the 3 E’s framework of development. Some people add a 4th E – environment – which is about putting yourself in the right setting to learn and grow
- Seek feedback and keep improving your skills
2. Take Small Risks
You can also build confidence is by taking small risks. Action builds confidence. Yes, you may find yourself outside your comfort zone. You won’t feel competent in the moment, but you will build competence over time. Every time you take a small risk and survive it, your confidence grows.
Examples of small professional risks might include:
- Sharing an idea in a meeting, or even just speaking up
- Making an adjustment to how you approach a task where you want to improve
- Volunteering for a stretch assignment
- Sharing difficult feedback with a work colleague who is unlikely to overreact
At first, these things can feel uncomfortable. But over time, they become normal. As author Susan Jeffers once said: “Feel the fear and do it anyway.” And remember that confidence doesn’t mean the absence of fear. It means acting despite it.
3. Reframe Failure
A third key to building confidence is to reconsider how we think about failure. One of the biggest obstacles to confidence is the fear of getting something wrong. But every successful individual has a long list of things that didn't work the first time.
- Presentations that fell flat
- Ideas that got rejected
- Projects that struggled
- And many more
Confident people don’t avoid these experiences. They choose to interpret them differently.
Instead of thinking, “I’m a failure”, they ask, “What can I learn from this?” You may be familiar with the example of Thomas Edison that captures this mindset. When he was asked about his failed attempts to invent the light bulb, he said: “I haven’t failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” When we treat mistakes as learning experiences, we remove one of the biggest barriers to confidence.
So, boost your confidence by (1) building competence, (2) taking small risks, and (3) reframing failure. You've got this! (Those are words of encouragement to help build your confidence.)
JR and the PathWise team
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