Build Confidence to Deliver Faster – DBR 048

Do Busy Right

Today, let’s talk about confidence. In my season of life right now, my daughter is entering the career world. She’s finished college and now has to find a job/career. She needs to enter conversations and situations that she’s never experienced before. Naturally, her confidence is not very high. This plays out in two ways: she tries to avoid certain situations, and she fears “being nervous”. So I’m thinking about (and trying to help her with) confidence. This is not the “do confidence right” podcast. This is the Do Busy Right podcast. And the question then becomes, “what does Do Busy Right have to do with confidence?” Glad you asked. Confidence attaches at a very significant point in productivity. You've heard me talk about delivering in previous episodes. Perhaps you've heard me talk about the fact that the work's not done until the result is shipped to the customer who needs it. You could argue that that no value has been created in the world until the result is in the customer's hands. Anything that interferes with delivery is, therefore, a productivity issue. Lack of confidence can delay delivery. So in order to Do Busy Right, we need to have solid confidence. Lack of confidence hurts us in two ways: one short term and one long term. The short term effect is: If we’re not confident then we hesitate in shipping our results, in delivering. Whether that be in a product sense, in a “do I have the meeting” sense, or in a “selling” scenario. The long-term effect is: If we’re not confident, we don’t deal with feedback well. This means we avoid the primary tool for growth. We’ll talk about the specific confidence we need and the specific feedback we need and how they work together. So Lack of confidence interferes with delivery

• The final arbiter of ‘done’
• Inventory (undelivered results) have no value, but represent cost
• Same for knowledge work
• If we hesitate on the ‘done’ decision, we delay delivery and don’t turn inventory into sold product.

Fragile in the face of feedback

• Feedback should help us build our processes
• 1 – motivation to build process
• 2 – specific targets for improvement
• If we avoid feedback, we can’t improve our process

Real confidence

• Nate Zinsser – The Confident Mind
• Confidence is a mindset – a well-developed mental approach when facing certain kinds of situations.
• Confidence is built, constructed as a mindset. I doubt that we’re “just born with it”. Zinsser talks about how to build the mindset.
• Based on:
• Evidence
• Previous performance
• Tested process
• Solid preparation

Counterfeit confidence(s)

• “shallow” confidence
• Confidence vs. Bravado – confidence is based in evidence and bravado is based in potential
• Bravado is a fragile sort of confidence
• Potential is a tricky thing – too easy to claim without evidence
• We know we need some sort of confidence and bravado is easy
• Confidence based on “how good you are” is tricky

Imposter syndrome lack of confidence

• We have to pretend – what’s our other choice?
• “try-hard”
• confidence is not, “oh, I got this”. That's not confidence, that's bravado.
• Don’t prepare an easy excuse for failure – go ahead and care

Building confidence

• Our brains may discount our own evidence
• But we know how to measure experience, training, and preparation
• Taking training
• Praising the work/effort, not the trait (“you’re so smart/artistic/talented”) – previous work
• Getting feedback
• Keep a They Love Me file
• Confidence grows and feedback is the fertilizer

How to handle feedback

• We're not very well trained at receiving feedback
• Seek feedback on quality (did I do it right) from people that are good at doing what you do.
• Seek feedback from users/customers (did it work? – was it useful?)
• Negative feedback – don’t take it personally, it’s not about YOU -
• Decide how you’re going to change your process

Once you’re there – free throws

• Process ‘nervous’ properly, as an adrenaline reaction
• Instead, we try to downplay the importance of the situation – which is hard
• Confidence is about presenting who we are in a situation.
• Think about success and don’t think about failure.
• "On this particular occasion, In this particular situation, they fouled the wrong guy"
• Think (as best you can): "I’ve performed under this circumstance before"

Hit me up so we can have a dialog rather than a monologue: [e-mail] or on LinkedIn (please mention the podcast in the connection invitation).