How’s your confidence these days? If you’re feeling strong and confident, great! If, however, the events of the past two years have impacted your perspective on your career or working environment, your confidence may have taken a toll.
Maybe you’re in a place where your confidence has been whittled away. You once had it, but now you are doubting yourself, wondering if you’ll ever get that promotion, if you really can do that next challenging job, or even if you want to do this job anymore.
When we lose our confidence, it causes others to doubt us…because lack of confidence is often mistaken for lack of competence.
Do you recognize any of these confidence killers?
- Not feeling valued. When you work really hard and you realize your efforts are not recognized, it wears you down.
- Overlooked for roles or promotions. When you have your sights set on that promotion or that next assignment, and it goes to someone who you know is not as competent as you, you can start to doubt yourself.
- Making mistakes without learning and recovering. We all make mistakes in our career. What kills our confidence is when we fail to recover from them. Instead, we start wearing them like a label, believing that somehow our little mistake has now become a part of who we are.
- Difficult people in your career path. It may be a critical boss. Or perhaps you work in a department where all you deal with are problems and negative people. Soon you start absorbing their attitudes.
- Frustrated at trying to be visible in a virtual world. Working from home has been a blessing for many and has had it’s benefits. But networking and remaining visible have been challenging…sometimes to the point of wanting to give it up.
When we take the initiative to reclaim our view of ourselves, we regain control of our confidence and our career.
Taking action for yourself increases your confidence. When we allow circumstances or other people to manage our careers we can begin to feel disillusioned when things don’t proceed as we hope. Taking action for ourselves regains our sense of control and therefore our confidence in our future.
Setting and meeting goals increases confidence. I’ve never seen someone set goals too high and lose their confidence because they failed to meet them. But I have seen people without goals doubt their abilities.
Knowing your value increases your confidence. When you are clear on how you add value you can direct your efforts to those activities. Recognition is most likely to come from where you add the greatest value.
Know your options. Keeping a broad perspective on career options and getting that confirmed by others gives you the confidence of knowing you have choices.
Articulate your accomplishments. Knowing what you’ve accomplished and letting it be known to others who influence your career helps you feel good about what you’ve done and be recognized for it. We all need to have that confidence that comes from within, but it is also important for our careers to have external recognition for what we do.
It’s time to build your confidence and take charge of your career. What action will you take for yourself today?
Photo: Jacob Lund/Shutterstock
